Social Psychology News

June 7, 2024

Top Headlines

Diverse Friend Groups Promote Better Social Cohesion and Wellbeing

June 5, 2024 — New research featuring more than 24,000 people has found that having diverse groups of friends improves wellbeing and social cohesion, despite people's tendency to gravitate towards people more similar to ...

Great News, Parents: You Do Have Power Over Your Tweens' Screen Use

June 5, 2024 — For many parents, it can feel like curbing kids' screen use is a losing battle. But new research has found the parenting practices that work best to curb screen time and addictive screen behavior: restricting screens in bedrooms and at mealtimes and ...

Lost in Lockdown: Study Reveals Feeling Isolated from Others Can Warp Our Perception of Time

June 4, 2024 — Research has looked at the psychological impact of the pandemic through the lens of ...

Social Media Use and Sleep Duration Connected to Brain Activity in Teens

May 30, 2024 — A new study found a distinct relationship between sleep duration, social media usage, and brain activation across brain regions that are key for executive control and reward ...

Latest Headlines

updated 12:24pm EDT

AI Saving Humans from the Emotional Toll of Monitoring Hate Speech

May 30, 2024 — A team of researchers have developed a new machine-learning method that detects hate speech on social media platforms with 88 per cent accuracy, saving employees from hundreds of hours of emotionally ...

Intervention Reduces Stress and Feelings of Burden of Family Caregivers of Older Adults With Dementia

May 29, 2024 — Interprofessional research study found that family caregivers of older adults living with dementia experienced a 15% drop in stress after a 9-week ...

YouTubers Cheer People Up More Than Casual Friends, Study Suggests

May 23, 2024 — One-sided relationships with YouTubers are more emotionally fulfilling than talking to casual friends, a new study ...

Brain Connectivity Patterns Differ in Infants at Familial Risk for Autism

May 22, 2024 — A study has found distinct brain connectivity patterns in six-week-old infants at risk for developing autism spectrum disorder ...

Climbing the Social Ladder May Slow Dementia

May 21, 2024 — Researchers analyzed data from the Japan Gerontological Evaluation Study and found that socioeconomic status (SES) transitions affect dementia risk. Specifically, upward SES mobility is greater ...

Mental Disorders May Spread in Young People's Social Networks

May 23, 2024 — A recently completed study demonstrates that mental disorders may be transmitted between individuals within social networks. The finding was the most evident in the case of mood, anxiety and eating ...

Singing Researchers Find Cross-Cultural Patterns in Music and Language

May 15, 2024 — Are acoustic features of music and spoken language shared across cultures? Researchers recorded themselves performing traditional music and speaking in their native language. In all 50+ languages, ...

Giving Lessons to Your Teenage-Self Could Boost Your Wellbeing

May 14, 2024 — Asking young adults to advise their younger selves could have a positive impact on their self-esteem, resilience and mental ...

Large Language Models Can't Effectively Recognize Users' Motivation, but Can Support Behavior Change for Those Ready to Act

May 16, 2024 — Large language model-based chatbots can't effectively recognize users' motivation when they are hesitant about making healthy behavior changes, but ...

When Saying 'Please' Is More Strategic Than Magic

May 15, 2024 — By kindergarten age, most children have been taught that 'please' is a magic word. 'Please' is an expression of politeness that shows courtesy and respect, turning a potential demand into a request ...

More Than Just Social Media Use May Be Causing Depression in Young Adults, Study Shows

May 29, 2024 — Over the past few decades, there has been a significant increase in the prevalence of depression in adolescents and young adults -- and a simultaneous uptick in the inclusion of technology and social ...

Quality Over Quantity for Screen Time -- Study

May 29, 2024 — It is what we are looking at, rather than how much time we are spending our time online that influences our health and wellbeing, according to a new report. The study is a comprehensive examination ...

How Family Economic Insecurity Can Hurt Child Mental Health

May 23, 2024 — Economic difficulty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic led to a cascade of connected problems for some parents -- resulting in mental health problems for their children, a new study suggests. ...

Team Studies Factors Related to a Sense of Economic Insecurity in Older Adults

May 13, 2024 — Researchers undertook a study of older adults to examine the connection between a sense of economic insecurity and a person's participation in social ...

Study Traces an Infectious Language Epidemic

May 13, 2024 — A computer scientist has shown the power of language to predict harm -- this time to the nation's ...

AI Intervention Mitigates Tension Among Conflicting Ethnic Groups

May 10, 2024 — While intergroup interaction is a prerequisite for initiating peace and stability, there is the risk of further escalation from direct interactions. A shortage of an impartial electronic contact ...

Physics Confirms That the Enemy of Your Enemy Is, Indeed, Your Friend

May 3, 2024 — The famous axiom 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' is part of Austrian psychologist Fritz Heider's social balance theory, introduced in the 1940s. Previous studies have tried to ...

New Study Reveals How Teens Thrive Online: Factors That Shape Digital Success Revealed

May 3, 2024 — A new study sheds light on the role that new and traditional media play in promoting and affecting character development, emotions, prosocial behavior and well-being (aka happiness) in ...

Social-Media Break Has Huge Impact on Young Women's Body Image, Study Finds

May 1, 2024 — There's a large and growing body of evidence pointing to potentially negative impacts of social media on mental health, from its addictive nature to disruptions in sleep patterns to effects on ...

Loneliness Grows as We Age

Apr. 30, 2024 — Loneliness in adulthood follows a U-shaped pattern: it's higher in younger and older adulthood, and lowest during middle adulthood, reports a new study that examined nine longitudinal studies ...

Don't Be a Stranger -- Study Finds Rekindling Old Friendships as Scary as Making New Ones

Apr. 23, 2024 — Psychologists have found that people are as hesitant to reach out to an old friend as they are to strike up a conversation with a stranger, even when they had the capacity and desire to do ...

Infected: Understanding the Spread of Behavior

Apr. 23, 2024 — A team of researchers found that long-tie connections accelerate the speed of social ...

Marginalized Communities Developed 'Disaster Subculture' When Living Through Extreme Climate Events

Apr. 23, 2024 — An assistant professor conducted a study in which he lived among one of the poorest, most marginalized communities in Seoul, South Korea. In the ethnographic study, he asked residents how they dealt ...

Social Media Affects People's Views on Mental Illness

Apr. 23, 2024 — Even subtle differences in the wording of social media messages may be enough to sway young people's beliefs about depression and anxiety and their ...

Exploring Brain Synchronization Patterns During Social Interactions

Apr. 23, 2024 — Social interactions synchronize brain activity within individuals and between individuals. In a new study, researchers compared brain synchronization between pairs of people with relatively strong ...

Life Goals and Their Changes Drive Success

Apr. 22, 2024 — Though life goals change over time, a study of teen goals indicates that goals of education and high prestige can drive ...

Study Reveals How Humanity Could Unite to Address Global Challenges

Apr. 16, 2024 — New research has found that perceptions of globally shared life experiences and globally shared biology can strengthen psychological bonding with humanity at large, which can motivate prosocial ...

Economic Wealth May Be Linked With Happiness in China -- If Inequality Is Low

Apr. 10, 2024 — A country's economic prosperity is linked with improved well-being in its residents, according to a new ...

Everyday Social Interactions Predict Language Development in Infants

Apr. 8, 2024 — Researchers found that when the adult talked and played socially with a 5-month-old baby, the baby's brain activity particularly increased in regions responsible for attention -- and the level ...

Prairie Voles Display Signs of Human-Like Depression

Apr. 4, 2024 — Researchers make the case that prairie voles, small rodents that are found throughout the central United States and Canada, can be effectively used as animal models to further the study of clinical ...