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Power Can Chill the Mind’s Capacity for Empathy, Researchers Find
The shocking behavior of high-profile men now embroiled in sexual harassment scandals may be explained in part from psychological studies showing a link between power and a dampened capacity for empathy.
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Hyesung Grace Hwang
“Pupillary Reactivity to Social Exclusion: A Window into the Mechanism behind Social Exclusion Detection” Social exclusion causes distress. However, physiological mechanisms behind such distress responses are unclear. We investigated whether pupil dilation, an automatic physiological response, occurs when excluded by humans versus computers. Pupil dilation increased after exclusion by both humans and computers, suggesting fast-acting sensitivity to exclusion may be an evolutionarily ingrained tendency.
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Raffles Cowan
“Core Beliefs in Late Adolescence: Factor Structure and Implications for Psychosis, Depression, and Anxiety” Core beliefs contribute to development of psychosis, depression, and anxiety. We found that core beliefs were more factorially complex and linked to attenuated psychotic symptoms in adolescents at ultra-high risk for psychosis, and that they were less factorially complex and linked to depression and anxiety symptoms in non-clinical community adolescents.
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Adrienne Romer
“Structural Alterations within Cerebellar Circuitry Are Associated with General Liability for Common Mental Disorders” We examined structural neural correlates of a general psychopathology factor in a large sample of young adults. We identified reduced cortico-cerebellar white matter integrity and gray matter volume as transdiagnostic correlates, suggesting that this circuitry supporting basic information integration, coordination, and monitoring may contribute to general liability for psychopathology.
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Stephanie Elaine Wemm
“Different Sides of the Same Addiction Coin: Common Patterns of Hormone Responses in Problem Gamblers and Heavy Smokers” We compared hormone levels (the DHEA and its sulfate, DHEA-S, to cortisol ratio) at baseline and in response to a stressor in problem gamblers, heavy smokers, and healthy controls. Similar patterns of a blunted stress response emerged in gamblers and heavy smokers, suggesting a common physiological vulnerability to stress.
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25th Annual RAND Summer Institute, July 9–12, 2018
The RAND Corporation will hold two conferences addressing critical issues facing our aging population: The Mini-Medical School for Social Scientists on July 9-10, 2018, and the Demography, Economics, Psychology, and Epidemiology of Aging conference on July 11-12, 2018. Interested researchers can apply for financial support covering travel and accommodations. More information and the application form are available here.
