Are you curious about curiosity?

Kids (and adults) are often curious. Maybe you are curious about dinosaurs, giant squids, or rollercoaster rides. But have you ever been curious about why you are curious about some things but not about other things? In the last 10 years, scientists have asked similar questions about curiosity. In this article, we will share some of the answers. We explain how scientists across the world study curiosity. We also explain that people become curious to seek out specific information or to explore new things. Based on research on curiosity and the brain, scientists think that curiosity is a signal that it is valuable (or rewarding) to learn something or figure something out. Curiosity can even make you remember information better. After reading this article, we hope that your curiosity is satisfied

The Temporal Dynamics of Surprise

Guided by a temporal dynamics perspective, we review and integrate theories and empirical evidence on surprise. We conceptualize surprise as the initial response to unexpected events, which should be differentiated from subsequent states that occur after people had time to make sense of the unexpected outcome. To understand the nature of surprise, it is therefore important to take time into account. Following this, a review of immediate cognitive correlates of surprise shows that irrespective of the valence of the outcome, the initial responses are the same. Moreover, the temporal dynamics perspective reconciles seemingly contradictory findings regarding the valence of surprise, such that studies that focus on surprise while it happens (initial interruption) support the notion that it feels relatively negative, whereas studies that focus on states after cognitive mastering show that subsequent experiential states depend on the valence of the outcome

Freezing in response to social threat: A replication

Freezing is an adaptive defensive response to a stressful event. Recent research suggests that freezing not only occurs in response to physical threats but also in response to social threats (e.g., angry faces; Roelofs, Hagenaars, & Stins, 2010).Given the practical and theoretical importance of this finding, the current study aimed to replicate and extend it. Following the original study, we measured heart rate while participants viewed emotional faces (angry, happy, neutral). Extending the original study, we included a baseline measure and performed additional, more fine-grained analyses. Our results support the hypothesis that participants show physiological signs of freezing when looking at angry faces. Importantly, we also find this effect when comparing heart rate in the angry block to baseline levels. Interestingly, the heart rate effects are explained by deceleration in the first 30 seconds of the 1-minute angry block, but not in the second 30 seconds. Like Roelofs et al., we find evidence that the effects are modulated by state anxiety, but our effects are only marginal and we do not replicate the negative correlation between heart rate and state anxiety in the angry block. In general, we thus find evidence for physiological signs of freezing in response to social threat. We discuss implications and venues for future research

Financial scarcity increases discounting of gains and losses: Experimental evidence from a household task

Data and materials supporting the paper "Financial scarcity increases discounting of gains and losses: Experimental evidence from a household task

On the physiology of interruption after unexpectedness

We tested whether surprise elicits similar physiological changes as those associated with orienting and freezing after threat, as surprise also involves a state of interruption and attention for effective action. Moreover, because surprise is primarily driven by the unexpectedness of an event, initial physiological responses were predicted to be similar for positive, neutral, and negative surprises. Results of repetition-change studies (4 + 1 in Supplemental Materials) showed that surprise lowers heart rate (Experiments 1-4) and increases blood pressure (Experiment 4). No effects on body movement (Experiment 2) or finger temperature (Experiment 4) were found. When unexpected stimuli were presented more often (making them less surprising) heart rate returned to baseline, while blood pressure remained high (Experiment 4). These effects were not influenced by stimulus valence. However, second-to-second analyses within the first (surprising) block showed a tendency for a stronger increase in systolic blood pressure after negative vs. positive surprise

Paradoxical side effects of green advertising:how purchasing green products may instigate licensing effects for consumers with a weak environmental identity

Research into green advertising has mainly investigated how green appeals can enhance product attitudes, sales, and brand image. But what happens after people have purchased a ‘green’ product advertised in a green ad? In two experiments, we show that purchasing a green product may have paradoxical post-purchase effects, such that it may lower intentions to engage in subsequent environmentally friendly behaviour (a so-called licensing effect). Importantly, our results show that these post-purchase effects are moderated by environmental identity: only people with a weak environmental identity show these paradoxical postpurchase licensing effects, people with a strong environmental identity are more likely to continue behaving in an environmentally friendly way.Social decision makin

Freezing in response to social threat: A replication

Freezing is an adaptive defensive response to a stressful event. Recent research suggests that freezing not only occurs in response to physical threats but also in response to social threats (e.g., angry faces; Roelofs, Hagenaars, & Stins, 2010).Given the practical and theoretical importance of this finding, the current study aimed to replicate and extend it. Following the original study, we measured heart rate while participants viewed emotional faces (angry, happy, neutral). Extending the original study, we included a baseline measure and performed additional, more fine-grained analyses. Our results support the hypothesis that participants show physiological signs of freezing when looking at angry faces. Importantly, we also find this effect when comparing heart rate in the angry block to baseline levels. Interestingly, the heart rate effects are explained by deceleration in the first 30 seconds of the 1-minute angry block, but not in the second 30 seconds. Like Roelofs et al., we find evidence that the effects are modulated by state anxiety, but our effects are only marginal and we do not replicate the negative correlation between heart rate and state anxiety in the angry block. In general, we thus find evidence for physiological signs of freezing in response to social threat. We discuss implications and venues for future research

How information on sexism may increase women’s perceptions of being excluded, threaten fundamental needs, and lower career motivation

The current research investigates the effects of exposure to information about the prevalence of sexism in society on women’s perceptions, needs, expectations, and career motivation. We examined this in four studies. The publication package contains four datasets in SPSS with syntaxes

How information on sexism may increase women’s perceptions of being excluded, threaten fundamental needs, and lower career motivation

The current research investigates the effects of exposure to information about the prevalence of sexism in society on women’s perceptions, needs, expectations, and career motivation. We examined this in four studies. The publication package contains four datasets in SPSS with syntaxes