A Worldwide Test of the Predictive Validity of Ideal Partner Preference-Matching

©American Psychological Association, [2024]. This paper is not the copy of record and may not exactly replicate the authoritative document published in the APA journal. The final article is available, upon publication, at: [ARTICLE DOI]”Ideal partner preferences (i.e., ratings of the desirability of attributes like attractiveness or intelligence) are the source of numerous foundational findings in the interdisciplinary literature on human mating. Recently, research on the predictive validity of ideal partner preference-matching (i.e., do people positively evaluate partners who match versus mismatch their ideals?) has become mired in several problems. First, articles exhibit discrepant analytic and reporting practices. Second, different findings emerge across laboratories worldwide, perhaps because they sample different relationship contexts and/or populations. This registered report—partnered with the Psychological Science Accelerator—uses a highly powered design (N=10,358) across 43 countries and 22 languages to estimate preference-matching effect sizes. The most rigorous tests revealed significant preference-matching effects in the whole sample and for partnered and single participants separately. The “corrected pattern metric” that collapses across 35 traits revealed a zero-order effect of β=.19 and an effect of β=.11 when included alongside a normative preference-matching metric. Specific traits in the “level metric” (interaction) tests revealed very small (average β=.04) effects. Effect sizes were similar for partnered participants who reported ideals before entering a relationship, and there was no consistent evidence that individual differences moderated any effects. Comparisons between stated and revealed preferences shed light on gender differences and similarities: For attractiveness, men’s and (especially) women’s stated preferences underestimated revealed preferences (i.e., they thought attractiveness was less important than it actually was). For earning potential, men’s stated preferences underestimated—and women’s stated preferences overestimated—revealed preferences. Implications for the literature on human mating are discussed.Unfunde

Self-Persuasion Increases Motivation for Social Isolation During the COVID-19 Pandemic Through Moral Obligation

During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments use direct persuasion to encourage social isolation. Since self-persuasion is a more effective method of encouraging behavioural changes, using an experimental approach, we compared direct persuasion to self-persuasion on underlying motivations for voluntary social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. We asked the participants (N = 375) to write three arguments in support of social isolation (self-persuasion condition) or to evaluate three government graphics containing arguments for social isolation (direct persuasion condition). Then we asked the participants to evaluate perceived own vulnerability to COVID-19, the perceived severity of COVID-19, moral obligation to socially isolate and the attitude toward social isolation. Self-persuasion had a significant impact on the moral obligation to socially isolate, and through it on self-isolation intention. We also found evidence that individuals who perceived greater benefits from social isolation and who perceived a higher severity of COVID-19 have a higher intention to socially isolate. Significant sex and age differences also emerged. Our findings provide new insights into mechanisms of self-persuasion and underlying motivations that influence social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic

Dataset and R code for "Much ado about nothing - a meta-analysis of time spent playing video games and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic"

This dataset and R code underpins a comprehensive meta-analysis investigating the relationship between video gaming time and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. It encompasses data extracted from 17 studies, with 26 effects and 18,026 participants, evaluating the increase in gaming time, and 22 studies, with 100 effects and 19,752 participants, assessing the association between gaming time and mental health. This dataset is crucial for stakeholders in public health, education, and policy to develop informed strategies concerning video gaming in future pandemics