Affective polarization has become a central concept to explain how citizens think and behave in Western democracies. However, while research has made great progress studying the causes, consequences, and remedies of this concept, we know surprisingly little about how affective polarization actually feels. This research note contributes to recent efforts to characterize affective polarization with specific emotions. Drawing on cross-sectional data from five European countries (Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom; total N = 4,794), we analyze which emotions respondents report to experience toward in-party and out-party voters and which of these emotions correlate with affective polarization scores. While we find that only a few respondents report negative emotions toward in-party voters, they feel moderate amounts of hope, enthusiasm, and pride without being exuberant. Fear-related emotions toward out-party voters are rare, and while one in five respondents experiences extreme anger, disappointment, or disgust toward opponents, up to 50% experience these emotions just slightly or not at all. The emotions most consistently related to affective polarization are positive emotions toward in-party voters and – to a lesser extent – aversion, hate, and disgust toward opponents. We describe patterns across countries and demographic backgrounds and highlight a practical implication: affective polarization feels more positive than what prevailing notions of ‘fear and loathing’ let believe.

Coastal, riverine, and lacustrine environments have played a central role in the development of human societies, yet locating and documenting this record of activity in littoral environments have proven difficult. Terrestrial survey methods reach their limit at the water’s edge, whereas marine geophysical equipment often struggles in depths of less than 1 m. This “white ribbon” of missing data represents a persistent methodological gap but one that is rich in information. Recent work on Scottish crannogs, or artificial islands, has highlighted this predicament while also providing a test bed for practical solutions. This article presents the results of that work: a robust and repeatable workflow for high-resolution shallow-water photogrammetry, tested in challenging conditions and benchmarked against the GNSS-enabled accuracy of drone surveys. The approach combines stereophotogrammetry, using artificial scale bars for internal calibration, with ground control points to enable the integration of terrestrial and underwater data. This method is both accessible and efficient, offering a replicable framework for recording archaeological sites at the water’s edge.

The symbiotic relationships between Black politics and religious institutions have often been understood through the lens of the Civil Rights Era and the political significance of the Black Church. Today, religious organizations remain an important pillar of Black political organizing, with particular focus on Black Protestant Churches. Given the increasing Black Muslim population, we examine the relationship between Black religious socialization and political attitudes. We view these identities intersectionally and investigate how religion may produce within-group differences with respect to both religious and racial identity development, which in turn produces some variation in political attitudes. Using the 2020 Collaborative Multiracial Post-election Survey (CMPS) and the 2020 PEW Survey of Black Faith, we demonstrate that perceptions of Black collective identity and religious identity differ for Black Christians and Black Muslims. Importantly, linked fate and identity importance differently predict political attitudes even if the political attitudes fundamentally remain similar.

An account of the earliest known works on outer billiards is accompanied by a reproduction of the summary of B. H. Neumann’s 1959 colloquium and some highlights from the theory.

Videoconferencing cognitive behavioural therapy (VCBT) has gained increased attention in recent years. While in-person CBT is well-studied, there is limited research on therapists’ attitudes towards delivering CBT through videoconferencing. A cross-sectional online survey on preferences and attitudes towards videoconferencing was distributed to CBT clinicians, mainly psychotherapists, psychologists, and counsellors, during the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 140 complete responses were analysed using descriptive statistics. Most respondents expressed positive or very positive attitudes towards VCBT, considering it a time efficient option, suitable for building a therapeutic alliance. Agenda setting, goal formulation, assigning and reviewing homework, providing booster sessions, and guided self-help support were the CBT components most respondents perceived as best fitted for the videoconferencing format. In contrast, role-play, exposure with response prevention, and interpersonal skills training were rated as the least suitable techniques. VCBT was considered most appropriate for treating insomnia, stress-related conditions, and anxiety disorders, and least appropriate for bipolar disorder, trauma-related conditions, and specific phobias. The findings indicate that Swedish CBT clinicians largely viewed videoconferencing as a viable format during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly for diagnostic groups commonly treated with face-to-face CBT and with the use of structured and highly verbal CBT techniques. However, the use of VCBT for more complicated conditions, as well as using interpersonal, experiential and skills training techniques, was perceived as less suitable. Further research is needed to examine clinician preferences and training needs, and the development and delivery of specific CBT components through video, including for more complex cases and younger age groups.

Key learning aims

1. (1) CBT clinicians had generally positive attitudes towards working with VCBT during the COVID-19 pandemic.

2. (2) CBT clinicians preferred structured and verbally provided techniques, over interpersonal and more experiential techniques, when using the videoconferencing format.

3. (3) CBT clinicians perceived VCBT to be suitable for diagnoses commonly treated with face-to-face CBT, such as insomnia, anxiety disorders, and stress.

4. (4) Most CBT clinicians also perceived VCBT as time saving and suitable for maintaining a therapeutic alliance.

5. (5) A session length of at least 30 minutes was preferred among CBT clinicians.

Legislators may consider the preferences of both business actors and citizens when making trade policy decisions. But when business and citizen preferences diverge, what makes legislators more responsive to one side or the other? We argue that when levels of political engagement are kept constant, legislators are more responsive to citizens than business. This effect should be particularly large for left-leaning legislators and legislators who conceive of themselves as delegates. We use three survey experiments with over 1000 legislators from 47 countries across the globe and qualitative evidence from an open survey question and 30 interviews with legislators to test our expectations. Based on this unique evidence, we find strong support for our expectations. These findings contribute to research on trade policy-making, the interaction between elites and the public in international relations, and responsiveness.

We develop and validate a survey instrument to elicit six key economic preferences in children: undefined time preferences, risk preferences, altruism, positive reciprocity, negative reciprocity, and trust. The survey was administered to a sample of 339 nine-year-old children, for whom we also collected behavioral data through incentivized choice experiments targeting the same preferences. Our econometric analysis allows us to identify a set of 14 survey items that best predict children’s experimental behavior. For each preference, we also compare the predictive power of this 14-item validated survey to a shorter 9-item self-evaluation version. Our results demonstrate that these surveys provide a simple and reliable tool for measuring individual preferences in children – enabling researchers to account for heterogeneity when designing and evaluating policies targeting younger populations.

Public opinion surveys are an indispensable tool for studying politics in Southeast Asia. But publicly available data are often in short supply in the region. To this end, we introduce SIKAP, a harmonized and open-access dataset of 58 weekly surveys (N = 95, 923) conducted in advance of, during, and in the aftermath of the 2024 Indonesian general election. We describe the data collection procedures and assess the quality of the sample. We demonstrate its utility by analyzing the effects of two political events on Indonesian voters’ attitudes in almost real time. First, we show that a constitutional crisis in August 2024 where the coalition of then President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) defied the Constitutional Court’s rulings led to a sharp but ultimately temporary decline in the public’s approval of Jokowi. Second, we show that voters who supported candidates other than Prabowo Subianto in the general election report large and persistent declines in support for democracy in the aftermath.

Backers of nuclear deterrence are thought to use strategic logic, while nuclear disarmament advocates are believed to embrace moral reasoning. Yet policy makers and diverse publics may hold both—ostensibly contradictory—preferences. Recent studies find that publics in Western democratic countries support the nuclear strikes underpinning long-standing conceptions of deterrence policy. But other scholarship indicates that these very same publics want to abolish nuclear arsenals. A lack of comparative analyses across the Global North and the Global South limits the generalizability of these claims. Does a categorical dichotomy between nuclear deterrence and disarmament really reflect global public views on the bomb? What explains a multitude of seemingly inconsistent scholarly results? In this reflection essay, we argue that deterrence and disarmament are not necessarily incompatible tools for reducing nuclear dangers. We point to several ways that individuals might simultaneously accommodate both pro- and antinuclear weapons policy positions. To investigate this proposition, we offer a new observational dataset on global nuclear attitudes from a survey we conducted in 24 countries on six continents (N = 27,250). Unlike isolated studies of these phenomena, our data strongly confirm that publics do not subscribe to categorical views of nuclear weapons. This headline finding and novel dataset open new possibilities for studying nuclear politics.

The measurement of sodium excretion in 24-h urine samples is the recommended method to assess dietary salt intake to monitor salt-related public health policies. Ensuring complete collection of 24-h urine samples is important for the accurate assessment of salt intake. We compare the use of the objective biomarker, recovery of para-aminobenzoic acid (PABA), to self-reported 24-h urine completeness. Data collected from 868 men and women aged 19–64 years from the England Sodium Survey 2018/2019 (part of the UK National Diet and Nutrition Survey (NDNS)) were used to compare self-reported 24-h urine completeness based on a collection duration of 23–25 h, no missed urine collections/voids and a minimum urine volume of > 0·4 L against completeness based on the urinary recovery of oral doses of PABA. Two-thirds (69 %; 561/812) of participants who adhered to the PABA protocol provided a complete 24-h urine collection. Assessed by self-report, 71 % (619/868) of participants provided a complete 24-h urine collection. Sodium excretion was (geometric mean (interquartile range)) 127 (97–170) mmol/24 h with PABA and 126 (97–169) mmol/24 h by self-report; salt intake was 7·40 (5·65–9·94) g/d and 7·38 (4·53–8·83) g/d, respectively. The proportion of participants above the UK-recommended salt intake of 6 g/d was 70 % by both PABA and self-report. This study shows that the use of self-report of 24-h urine collection completeness provides an assessment of sodium excretion and dietary salt intake with the same accuracy as when PABA recovery is used to assess completeness.

Research into the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) has established links between environmental exposures in early life and later-life health outcomes. Emerging interventions typically focus on improving maternal nutrition and neonatal healthcare practices yet often neglect to assess or enhance subject understanding of potential long-term impacts or to communicate the benefits of maximising parental health prior to conception. This study critically evaluates a survey tool developed to measure knowledge of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and early-life contributors to lifelong health. The rationale behind the wording and format of the questions is examined alongside options for coding and statistical interpretation of the data. Considerations for implementation are discussed, illustrated by key findings arising from tracking of the tool’s application in Aotearoa New Zealand over ten years. We demonstrate that the survey tool can be adapted for use in a variety of contexts, producing both quantitative and qualitative baseline data suitable for informing health promotion interventions and monitoring changes in population knowledge. This research also highlights a key difference between awareness of and understanding of scientific concepts and the importance of distinguishing between these when considering public engagement with science.