The commission effect
According to research in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, salespeople receiving a commission perceive that they earn more when their commission rate is high on a low-priced item versus low on a high-priced item—even when they net the same amount. The effect was observed across 10 experiments with 3,484 participants in different populations in the United States, including Amazon Mechanical Turk workers, undergraduate students, and employees working in sales roles, as well as different compensation structures, such as employees being paid directly by consumers. The research also shows that the effect has downstream consequences on behavioral intentions, such as the likelihood of recommending an employer to friends seeking a sales job. Finally, the research shows that this commission effect emerges because commission rates are easier to evaluate than total sales amounts.
DOI: 10.1037/xap0000441opens in new window
Cannabis can’t conjure creativity
Smoking cannabis makes people think their and others’ ideas are more creative than they actually are, according to research in the Journal of Applied Psychology. Across two studies, researchers asked a total of 331 participants in the United States, about half of whom used cannabis 15 minutes prior to study onset, to indicate their level of happiness. They then asked participants to report how creative they were at one of two tasks: coming up with novel uses for a common item or proposing ideas for helping a band increase their revenue. The researchers found that cannabis use increased happiness, which translated to higher self-given creativity ratings by cannabis-using participants than by those who did not use cannabis. However, the researchers, blinded to the experimental conditions, did not rate the cannabis users’ ideas as more creative than the abstainers. Individual participants in the cannabis-use group rated the creativity of their fellow participants higher than participants in the abstinence group rated their fellow participants.
DOI: 10.1037/apl0000599opens in new window
10% of older adults have dementia
About 1 in 10 Americans older than 65 have dementia, according to a study in JAMA Neurology. Researchers in the United States asked 3,496 participants ages 51 and older (mean age was 76.4 years) involved in a nationally representative study to complete a battery of comprehensive neuropsychological tests and interviews. Based on the tests and interviews, they classified 11% as having dementia and 23% as having mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Rates of dementia and MCI rose sharply with age: 3% of people between 65 and 69 had dementia, rising to 35% for people ages 90 and older. The data also showed a disproportionate burden of dementia among older adults who identified as Black or African American, MCI among older adults who identify as Hispanic, and both categories of cognitive impairment among people with less education. No differences were found between men and women.
DOI: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2022.3543opens in new window
Hormone therapy and depression risk
Women who started systemic hormone therapy prior to age 50 saw a two-fold higher risk for depression the year immediately after starting compared with women who did not use hormone therapy, indicates a study in JAMA Network Open. Researchers examined the medical records of all 825,238 women age 45 in Denmark between 1995 and 2017, without prior oophorectomy, breast cancer, or cancer in reproductive organs. Across the duration of the study, 189,821 (23%) of the women initiated systemically or locally administered hormone therapy. Systemically administered hormone therapy was mainly started before age 50 and was associated with a two-fold higher risk of a subsequent depression diagnosis compared with nonusers. This link was seen among women taking estrogen alone or estrogen combined with progestin. Locally administered hormone therapy was initiated equally across ages and was not associated with increased depression risk. Furthermore, women who began this type of therapy after age 54 experienced a lower risk of depression than nonusers.
DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.39491opens in new window
Dangers of TV violence for kids
Watching violent TV during the preschool years can lead to risks of psychological and academic impairment by the summer before middle school starts, according to a study in the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics. Researchers asked parents of 978 girls and 998 boys in Canada between the ages of 3.5 and 4.5 to report their children’s exposure to television violence. They then noted child-reported and teacher-reported measures of adjustment at age 12. They found that for girls, early exposure to televised violence was associated with increases in emotional distress and decreases in classroom engagement, academic achievement, and academic motivation at age 12. For boys, viewing violent content was linked to increases in emotionally distressed, inattentive, conduct-disordered, and socially withdrawn behavior, as well as decreases in classroom engagement, academic achievement, and academic motivation at age 12.
DOI: 10.1097/DBP.0000000000001135opens in new window
Beauty premium fades in remote classes
A study in Economics Letters suggests that the beauty premium that normally boosts the grades of attractive female students disappears when classes are taught remotely. A researcher asked 74 individuals to rate the attractiveness of the faces of 307 engineering students across five cohorts at a Swedish university. The researcher first found evidence of a beauty premium in in-person instruction settings for both males and females. For nonquantitative courses such as business and economics that encouraged student-teacher interactions, student attractiveness was positively correlated with student grades. No effect was found for quantitative courses such as math and physics that were often graded entirely through exams. When instruction moved online during the Covid-19 pandemic, the grades of attractive female students dropped in the nonquantitative subjects. However, the beauty premium remained for males, an effect the researcher suggested was due to males’ (but not females’) attractiveness translating into increased persistence and social skills. These traits are both linked to creativity, which is helpful in nonquantitative courses.
DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2022.110782opens in new window
Birding your way to a brighter mood
A study in Scientific Reports suggests that listening to chirping birds, especially while outside, significantly improved people’s mental well-being for up to eight hours, even among those with major depressive disorder (MDD). Researchers asked 1,292 participants around the world, but mostly in Europe, to report on their smartphones their mood and the presence (or absence) of birds, trees, and water three times per day for two weeks. The participants logged 26,856 of these assessments between April 2018 and October 2021. An analysis of the data revealed that the participants were more likely to feel confident, relaxed, happy, connected to other people, and energetic and less likely to feel anxious, stressed, down, lonely, and tired when hearing or seeing birds. The effect, which lasted up to eight hours, was stronger when the participants were outdoors and was observed in people with MDD as well as those without a mental health condition. Benefits were still evident after accounting for exposure to trees and water.
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-20207-6opens in new window
Covid-19 aged teen brains
A study in Biological Psychiatry: Global Open Science indicates that Covid-19 pandemic stress aged teen brains faster than normal. Researchers compared MRI scans of 128 adolescents in the United States, half taken before (November 2016 to November 2019) and half during (October 2020 to March 2022) the pandemic. The postpandemic scans revealed unusually high growth in the hippocampus and amygdala, brain areas that respectively control access to some memories and help regulate fear, stress, and other emotions. The researchers also found that youth assessed after the pandemic shutdowns had higher-than-expected thinning of the tissues in the cortex, which is involved in executive functioning. The postpandemic teens also had more advanced brain age and more severe symptoms of anxiety, depression, and internalizing problems than is typical of this age group.
DOI: 10.1016/j.bpsgos.2022.11.002opens in new window
Dynamic diagnoses
According to The Lancet Psychiatry, nearly half of people with a mental health disorder are diagnosed with a different disorder within 10 years after initial diagnosis. Researchers followed 184,949 adults in Denmark who had received one of the 20 most common first-time psychiatric diagnoses in a psychiatric hospital between 1995 and 2018. In a 10-year follow-up, 47% had at least one subsequent diagnosis that differed from their first. The diagnoses most likely to change over time were acute psychosis, addiction, and depression. The ones least likely to change included functional disabilities, eating disorders, and sexual disorders.
DOI:10.1016/S2215-0366(22)00367-4opens in new window
Can’t stop the beat
Low-frequency, inaudible bass beats make people on the dance floor move more, according to research in Current Biology. Researchers strapped motion-capture headbands onto 60 participants in Canada attending an electronica concert. When they switched on very low frequency (VLF) speakers about every two minutes during the 45-minute concert, the participants danced 12% more vigorously. In an additional study performed later, 17 new participants could not consciously identify when the VLF beats were playing in the audio version of the concert from the first study. The researchers hypothesize that the unconscious effects on the original participants’ behavior resulted from vestibular and/or tactile processing of the VLF beats.
DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2022.09.035opens in new window
Neuroticism in the blood (pressure)
Diastolic blood pressure—the lower of the two numbers in a blood pressure reading—is very likely to cause neuroticism, indicates research in General Psychiatry. Researchers examined data from eight large-scale genome-wide association studies of hundreds of thousands of individuals with predominantly European ancestry. They then looked for associations among clusters of genes linked to four traits of blood pressure—systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, pulse pressure, and high blood pressure—and four psychological states—anxiety, depressive symptoms, neuroticism, and subjective well-being—in between 170,911 and 463,010 of the individuals. The analysis revealed a causal association only between diastolic blood pressure and neuroticism.
DOI: 10.1136/gpsych-2022-100877opens in new window
Attractive and selfish
A study in Evolution and Human Behavior indicates that people who see themselves as attractive believe they deserve special treatment and are more likely to act selfishly. Across five studies, researchers asked a total of 1,303 participants in China to rate their own attractiveness. In two studies, the researchers manipulated participants’ self-perceived attractiveness. And in another study, they manipulated entitlement by asking some participants to write justifications for why they deserve the best in life. The researchers then assessed participants’ level of entitlement and intention to behave in their own self-interest. Overall, they found that self-perceived attractiveness affected selfish behavior both directly and by increasing the sense of entitlement. Higher entitlement, in turn, was associated with higher self-interest behavior.
DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2022.09.005opens in new window
Black women report depression differently
A study in Nursing Research indicates that Black women with symptoms of depression more often report sleep disturbances, self-criticism, and irritability than stereotypical symptoms such as depressed mood. Researchers analyzed data from 227 Black women in the United States who were screened for depression as part of a study examining the genetics of blood pressure. Participants with greater depressive symptoms were more likely to report somatic symptoms—such as fatigue, insomnia, and decreased libido—and self-critical symptoms—such as self-hate and self-blame—than traditional depression symptoms such as feelings of hopelessness or depressed mood. The participants with depressive symptoms also reported irritability and an inability to experience pleasure.
DOI: 10.1097/NNR.0000000000000635opens in new window
Downside to fixing fussiness with screens
Placating toddlers in the midst of a tantrum with a smartphone or tablet can lead to further emotional dysregulation in the children, suggests research in JAMA Pediatrics. Over a period of six months, researchers in the United States tracked the frequency with which 422 parents and caregivers used electronic devices to calm their fussy 3- to 5-year-old children. They also tracked symptoms of emotional reactivity or dysregulation in the children, including rapid shifts between sadness and excitement, a sudden change in mood, and heightened impulsivity. Among the boys, the use of electronic devices to calm children at the 3-month point of the study was associated with higher emotional reactivity at the 6-month mark. Among both boys and girls already experiencing hyperactivity, impulsiveness, and strong temperaments, soothing with a device at three months was associated with higher emotional reactivity, while higher emotional reactivity at three months was linked to increased device-calming at six months.
DOI: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2022.4793opens in new window
