decision-theory

Nature, Published online: 22 June 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01957-z Researchers have long discussed the replication crisis. Now it’s time to tackle another problem in the behavioural sciences: generalizability.

As a kid, I did my best to avoid exercise. As an adult, I endured it for the sake of my health. Then I set myself a clear goal – and motivation was no longer an issue It’s fair to say I don’t come from a long line of athletes. When I was growing up in the 1990s, sport was something other people did; we were not a family who cycled, much less jogged. In PE I was the wheezing child hiding behind th…

BackgroundSuicide risk remains difficult to predict, particularly among populations exposed to interpersonal violence. Although psychopathic traits have been linked to suicidal behavior, emerging evidence suggests these associations vary across psychopathy domains. The present study examined whether overall psychopathy and specific psychopathy facets were associated with suicide risk among violen…

BackgroundFear of childbirth is an important perinatal mental health concern, particularly among women of advanced maternal age. However, the specific interrelations between spousal support and fear of childbirth remain unclear.MethodsThis cross-sectional study recruited 279 pregnant women of advanced maternal age from a tertiary hospital in Henan, China, using convenience sampling. Spousal suppo…

Dogs and cats both give you a brief mood lift, but only one of them seems to raise your stress levels too.

Acceptable risk is often defined in technical, regulatory, or ethical terms. Yet people do not decide that a risk is acceptable simply by estimating probabilities or expected harms. Judgments of acceptability are also shaped by how a hazard is perceived, whether those responsible for managing it are trusted, and whether exposure is regarded as fair. This mini review brings together research on ri…

The global shift toward a service–oriented economy has made emotional labor an inevitable occupational demand, yet its impact on frontline bank employees' occupational health remains underexplored. Drawing on Conservation of Resources theory, this study investigates the relationships among emotional labor, job burnout, turnover intention, and perceived organizational support(POS), distinguishing …

ObjectivesThe objective of this study is to understand whether individuals show different search patterns for health-related terms on Google Trends depending on their cultural background.MethodThis study analyzed Google Trends data for health-related terms in both the United States and South Korea.ResultsThe result suggests that Americans show stronger temporal landmark effects than Korean with h…

Veterans who worked in high-blast occupations, such as artillery or weapons training, show higher rates of anger and aggression. Using artificial intelligence to scan medical records, researchers found this occupational exposure carries a distinct behavioral risk.

Voters often warp their memories of an election to align with the actual results. A new psychological study reveals how partisan biases shape our memories, leading people to subconsciously rewrite their past predictions to protect their political identities.

Apps can support healthier lives. But when every walk, meal, and night’s sleep is judged, wellness can become another source of pressure.

A new psychology study reveals that when a highly accurate AI system confidently accuses someone of lying, human supervisors tend to override the decision—a "truth bias" that actively destroys the AI's detection accuracy.

Alcohol misuse and suicide are significant public health issues among college students and often co-occur. Individuals with minority identities have a greater risk for both alcohol misuse and suicidality due to increased stress associated with racism and heterosexism. A new study examines risk for alcohol misuse and suicide separately and concurrently among college students with minoritized and i…

While extensive research has documented strong associations among alcohol use, sexual assault victimization, and sexual aggression, much less is known about how these risk factors transfer to online situations. A new study has found that college students who drank more were more likely to perpetrate cyber sexual aggression, and among those who did perpetrate, they did so more frequently. These re…

Economic deprivation is broadly associated with poor health outcomes, including substance use disorders (SUDs). A new study has examined the impact of lower household income and parental education on the risk for children and young adults from those households to develop SUDs. Findings will be shared at the 49th annual scientific meeting of the Research Society on Alcohol (RSA) in San Antonio, Te…

Nature Communications, Published online: 21 June 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-74747-w People’s reward learning is shaped by context, but the cognitive origins of this bias remain poorly understood. Here, the authors provide evidence that attention may underlie these distortions by shaping how rewards are encoded during reinforcement learning.

Whether its our careers, health or relationships, we often set the bar too high and end up feeling disappointed when it doesn’t work out. Try this new way of thinking … and you may just see some real results Every January, millions of us sit down and write our goals for the year. By March, most of them have been abandoned. So we set new ones in spring, and when September rolls around, we do it ag…

A psychological study of men convicted of intimate partner violence found that a lack of social support increases the risk of reoffending, while childhood abuse fuels physical aggression by severely impairing a person's impulse control.

Video games are often criticized for keeping people glued to screens and isolated from the real world. Many parents and health experts have worried that spending too much time playing games may increase loneliness and reduce social connections. However, a new study suggests that this view may not tell the whole story. Some video games […] The post Some Video Games May Reduce Loneliness and Increa…

Scientific Reports, Published online: 20 June 2026; doi:10.1038/s41598-026-57241-7 Relationship between sleep, stress and psychological distress in internally displaced persons depends on the length of displacement