Secular authority reduces atheist distrust 1 RUNNING HEADER: SECULAR AUTHORITY REDUCES ATHEIST DISTRUST Reminders of Secular Authority Reduce Believers' Distrust of Atheists

Abstract Atheists have long been distrusted, in part because they do not believe that a watchful, judgin

The Origins of Religious Disbelief: A Dual Inheritance Approach

Widespread religious disbelief represents a key testing ground for theories of religion. We evaluated the predictions of three prominent theoretical approaches—secularization, cognitive byproduct, and dual inheritance—in a nationally representative (United States, N = 1,417) data set with preregistered analyses and found considerable support for the dual inheritance perspective. Of key predictors of religious disbelief, witnessing fewer credible cultural cues of religious commitment was the most potent, β = .28, followed distantly by reflective cognitive style, β = .13, and less advanced mentalizing, β = .05. Low cultural exposure predicted about 90% higher odds of atheism than did peak cognitive reflection, and cognitive reflection only predicted disbelief among those relatively low in cultural exposure to religion. This highlights the utility of considering both evolved intuitions and transmitted culture and emphasizes the dual roles of content- and context-biased social learning in the cultural transmission of disbelief (preprint https://psyarxiv.com/e29rt/)

Mentalizing Deficits Constrain Belief in a Personal God

Religious believers intuitively conceptualize deities as intentional agents with mental states who anticipate and respond to human beliefs, desires and concerns. It follows that mentalizing deficits, associated with the autistic spectrum and also commonly found in men more than in women, may undermine this intuitive support and reduce belief in a personal God. Autistic adolescents expressed less belief in God than did matched neuro-typical controls (Study 1). In a Canadian student sample (Study 2), and two American national samples that controlled for demographic characteristics and other correlates of autism and religiosity (Study 3 and 4), the autism spectrum predicted reduced belief in God, and mentalizing mediated this relationship. Systemizing (Studies 2 and 3) and two personality dimensions related to religious belief, Conscientiousness and Agreeableness (Study 3), failed as mediators. Mentalizing also explained the robust and well-known, but theoretically debated, gender gap in religious belief wherein men show reduced religious belief (Studies 2–4)

Analytic atheism : A cross-culturally weak and fickle phenomenon?

Religious belief is a topic of longstanding interest to psychological science, but the psychology of religious disbelief is a relative newcomer. One prominently discussed model is analytic atheism, wherein cognitive reflection, as measured with the Cognitive Reflection Test, overrides religious intuitions and instruction. Consistent with this model, performance-based measures of cognitive reflection predict religious disbelief in WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, & Democratic) samples. However, the generality of analytic atheism remains unknown. Drawing on a large global sample (N = 3461) from 13 religiously, demographically, and culturally diverse societies, we find that analytic atheism as usually assessed is in fact quite fickle cross-culturally, appearing robustly only in aggregate analyses and in three individual countries. The results provide additional evidence for culture's effects on core beliefs.Peer reviewe

Search for squarks and gluinos with the ATLAS detector in final states with jets and missing transverse momentum using √s=8 TeV proton-proton collision data

A search for squarks and gluinos in final states containing high-p T jets, missing transverse momentum and no electrons or muons is presented. The data were recorded in 2012 by the ATLAS experiment in s√=8 TeV proton-proton collisions at the Large Hadron Collider, with a total integrated luminosity of 20.3 fb−1. Results are interpreted in a variety of simplified and specific supersymmetry-breaking models assuming that R-parity is conserved and that the lightest neutralino is the lightest supersymmetric particle. An exclusion limit at the 95% confidence level on the mass of the gluino is set at 1330 GeV for a simplified model incorporating only a gluino and the lightest neutralino. For a simplified model involving the strong production of first- and second-generation squarks, squark masses below 850 GeV (440 GeV) are excluded for a massless lightest neutralino, assuming mass degenerate (single light-flavour) squarks. In mSUGRA/CMSSM models with tan β = 30, A 0 = −2m 0 and μ > 0, squarks and gluinos of equal mass are excluded for masses below 1700 GeV. Additional limits are set for non-universal Higgs mass models with gaugino mediation and for simplified models involving the pair production of gluinos, each decaying to a top squark and a top quark, with the top squark decaying to a charm quark and a neutralino. These limits extend the region of supersymmetric parameter space excluded by previous searches with the ATLAS detector

Search for direct production of charginos and neutralinos in events with three leptons and missing transverse momentum in √s = 7 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for the direct production of charginos and neutralinos in final states with three electrons or muons and missing transverse momentum is presented. The analysis is based on 4.7 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data delivered by the Large Hadron Collider and recorded with the ATLAS detector. Observations are consistent with Standard Model expectations in three signal regions that are either depleted or enriched in Z-boson decays. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set in R-parity conserving phenomenological minimal supersymmetric models and in simplified models, significantly extending previous results

A Multisite Preregistered Paradigmatic Test of the Ego-Depletion Effect

We conducted a preregistered multilaboratory project (k = 36; N = 3,531) to assess the size and robustness of ego-depletion effects using a novel replication method, termed the paradigmatic replication approach. Each laboratory implemented one of two procedures that was intended to manipulate self-control and tested performance on a subsequent measure of self-control. Confirmatory tests found a nonsignificant result (d = 0.06). Confirmatory Bayesian meta-analyses using an informed-prior hypothesis (δ = 0.30, SD = 0.15) found that the data were 4 times more likely under the null than the alternative hypothesis. Hence, preregistered analyses did not find evidence for a depletion effect. Exploratory analyses on the full sample (i.e., ignoring exclusion criteria) found a statistically significant effect (d = 0.08); Bayesian analyses showed that the data were about equally likely under the null and informed-prior hypotheses. Exploratory moderator tests suggested that the depletion effect was larger for participants who reported more fatigue but was not moderated by trait self-control, willpower beliefs, or action orientation.</p

Search for top squark pair production in final states with one isolated lepton, jets, and missing transverse momentum in √s = 8 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

The results of a search for top squark (stop) pair production in final states with one isolated lepton, jets, and missing transverse momentum are reported. The analysis is performed with proton-proton collision data at s√ = 8 TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in 2012 corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 20 fb−1. The lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) is taken to be the lightest neutralino which only interacts weakly and is assumed to be stable. The stop decay modes considered are those to a top quark and the LSP as well as to a bottom quark and the lightest chargino, where the chargino decays to the LSP by emitting a W boson. A wide range of scenarios with different mass splittings between the stop, the lightest neutralino and the lightest chargino are considered, including cases where the W bosons or the top quarks are off-shell. Decay modes involving the heavier charginos and neutralinos are addressed using a set of phenomenological models of supersymmetry. No significant excess over the Standard Model prediction is observed. A stop with a mass between 210 and 640 GeV decaying directly to a top quark and a massless LSP is excluded at 95% confidence level, and in models where the mass of the lightest chargino is twice that of the LSP, stops are excluded at 95% confidence level up to a mass of 500 GeV for an LSP mass in the range of 100 to 150 GeV. Stringent exclusion limits are also derived for all other stop decay modes considered, and model-independent upper limits are set on the visible cross-section for processes beyond the Standard Model

Search for direct top-squark pair production in final states with two leptons in pp collisions at √s = 8TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search is presented for direct top-squark pair production in final states with two leptons (electrons or muons) of opposite charge using 20.3 fb−1 of pp collision data at √s = 8 TeV, collected by the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider in 2012. No excess over the Standard Model expectation is found. The results are interpreted under the separate assumptions (i) that the top squark decays to a b-quark in addition to an on-shell chargino whose decay occurs via a real or virtual W boson, or (ii) that the top squark decays to a t-quark and the lightest neutralino. A top squark with a mass between 150 GeV and 445 GeV decaying to a b-quark and an on-shell chargino is excluded at 95% confidence level for a top squark mass equal to the chargino mass plus 10 GeV, in the case of a 1 GeV lightest neutralino. Top squarks with masses between 215 (90) GeV and 530 (170) GeV decaying to an on-shell (off-shell) t-quark and a neutralino are excluded at 95% confidence level for a 1 GeV neutralino