Author: dispatchtimes news

A field experiment conducted in Germany has found that transgender women face notable penalties in the labour market when applying for jobs, particularly when they do not look like a typical cisgender woman. The study shows that disclosing a transgender identity and possessing facial features traditionally associated with men independently reduce employers’ positive responses, and the combination compounds the effect. Transgender women are individuals who were assigned male at birth but identify as women. They often face elevated barriers in the workforce, including lower employment rates and higher poverty relative to cisgender people. The research occupies a broader field concerned…

Researchers in the United States have unveiled a new framework for understanding how people decide on political choices, revealing that the majority rely on simple mental shortcuts rather than weighing every available feature. The Berkeley-based study shows that the decision rule people use can shift depending on the topic and the complexity of the choice environment, challenging assumptions that survey analyses capture all deliberation. In political science, choice-based conjoint experiments are widely used to gauge public opinion on complex issues. Participants are shown side-by-side profiles of options—such as candidates or policy proposals—with varying features, and asked to pick a preference.…

The study raises questions about the long-held belief that oxytocin universally promotes warmth in social relations, suggesting instead that the so‑called love hormone can intensify negative memories for people who struggle with relationship anxiety. Researchers from McGill University report that oxytocin amplified the emotional negativity of maternal memories in individuals with high attachment anxiety, with implications for how the hormone might be used in therapeutic contexts. The work appears in the journal Emotion. Attachment theory holds that early interactions with caregivers shape lasting patterns in how people relate to others. Securely attached individuals tend to expect reliability and support, while…

A multicohort study examining healthy adults aged 18 to 65 has found that a brain aging index—an imaging-based estimate of how old the brain appears relative to a person’s chronological age—maps onto thinking skills, mood and gut biology. Conducted by Kanhao Zhao and colleagues with support from National Institutes of Health funding, the research spans data drawn from groups in the United States and Japan and hinges on cross-cohort analysis. The brain aging index is produced by training a computer model to predict age from brain scans; a positive score suggests an older-appearing brain, while a negative score indicates a…

A large Norwegian birth cohort study has concluded that a child’s overall ADHD traits by mid-childhood are primarily driven by the child’s own genetics, with little evidence that parental genes shape development through the household environment. Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder is a neurodevelopmental condition characterised by patterns of inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity. Decades of twin studies have shown ADHD to be highly heritable, indicating a major role for a child’s own DNA in the emergence of these traits. Yet genetics and environment do not operate in isolation. Scientists have increasingly explored whether a person’s traits are shaped by the genes of…

The kind of industry a person works in appears to say very little about what they look for in a romantic partner, according to new research published in Personality and Individual Differences. Across seven countries, a person’s sex and whether they were imagining a short-term or long-term relationship were far more strongly linked to partner preferences than whether they worked in a people-focused, things-focused, or ideas-focused sector. Vocational interests refer to the broad preferences that guide people toward certain types of work. Psychologists often map these interests along a spectrum that contrasts working with people, like nursing or teaching, with…

A new neurocomputational model, supported by brain imaging, suggests that overreliance on prior expectations when interpreting facial expressions can signal a heightened risk of developing depression. By analysing how the brain processes angry faces, researchers uncovered a pattern of visual distortion that may foretell symptoms up to four years before they emerge. The study was published in Science Advances and led by Han Lu of Shenzhen University and Qiang Luo of Fudan University, using data from the IMAGEN cohort in Europe. The team combined functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with a deep learning framework to explore how sensory input and…

A new international study suggests the social environment in which people live shapes whose version of reality they adopt. Researchers found that in cultures where relationships can be formed and dissolved with relative ease, individuals align their worldviews more selectively with those who help them achieve their goals, partly by feeling less in sync with less helpful others. The findings were published in Social Psychological and Personality Science. The team behind the research includes Abdo Elnakouri, assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Houston and director of the Worldviews in Motion Lab, alongside Eli J. Finkel…

Adolescence appears to be a turning point for sex differences in the microstructure of deep grey matter, according to a new brain-imaging study led by Christopher G. Filippi of The Hospital for Sick Children and Richard Watts of the University of Canterbury. Using Restriction Spectrum Imaging, the researchers analysed data from 1,643 individuals aged 9 to 35 drawn from two large public databases, and found that sex differences in the tissue structure of emotion, memory and reward centres emerge during puberty, rather than in early childhood. Deep grey matter comprises several brain structures beneath the outer layer of tissue, including…

Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine have shown that the unconscious brain retains striking capabilities even under general anaesthesia. In a study involving patients undergoing epilepsy surgery, scientists used Neuropixels probes to monitor hippocampal activity and observed language processing, pattern recognition, and even anticipation of forthcoming words while consciousness was suppressed. The findings, published in Nature, challenge long-held assumptions about the link between awareness and thinking. Dr Sameer Sheth, professor and Cullen Foundation Endowed chair of neurosurgery and a McNair Scholar at Baylor, said: “Our findings show that the brain is far more active and capable during unconsciousness than previously…