Men's sexual desire fluctuated as much as women's in the short term, while women's desire was more variable in the long term

Does Sexual Desire Fluctuate More Among Women than Men? Emily A. Harris, Matthew J. Hornsey, Wilhelm Hofmann, Patrick Jern, Sean C. Murphy, Fanny Hedenborg & Fiona K. Barlow. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Jan 25 2023. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-022-02525-y

Abstract: There is a lay assumption that women’s sexual desire varies substantially over time, whereas men’s is stable. This assumption is mirrored in prominent theories of desire, which posit that women are more variable than men in the extent to which they desire sex, and that women’s sexual desire is more contextually sensitive than men’s. We tested this assumption across three longitudinal studies. Study 1 assessed desire at 3 time points spanning 13 years (Nobservations = 5562), and Studies 2 and 3 (Nobservations = 11,282) assessed desire moment-to-moment over 7 days. When desire was measured over years, women were more variable in their sexual desire than men (Study 1). However, we found a different pattern of results when desire was measured over the short term. In Studies 2 and 3, we found no significant differences in women’s and men’s desire variability. The extent to which desire varied as a function of affective states (e.g., happiness) and relationship-oriented states (e.g., partner closeness) was similar for women and men, with some exceptions; women’s desire was more negatively associated with tiredness and anger in Study 2. These data qualify existing assumptions about sex differences in sexual desire variability.

General Discussion

Social psychological and lay theories of desire suggest that men’s desire is stable (and high), whereas women’s desire ebbs and flows depending on their social context (Baumeister, 2000; Regan & Berscheid, 1995). The present study sought to test this assumption, specifically addressing the following three questions: (1) Do women show more variability in sexual desire compared to men? (2) Compared to men, is women’s sexual desire more strongly related to their general affective states? And (3) Is women’s sexual desire more strongly tied to their relationship-oriented states compared to men’s desire?

In order to assess intra-individual changes in desire, we conducted three longitudinal studies assessing desire over 13 years (Study 1), and from moment to moment over 7 days (Studies 2 and 3). These studies collectively sampled women and men at 16,885 time points using diverse sampling methods, including community samples in Australia and the US and a population-based sample in Finland. We assessed general desire in Studies 1 and 3 and partner-specific desire in Study 2.

With regard to our first research question, when desire was measured over the longer term, women’s desire varied to a greater extent than men’s desire. In Study 1, desire was assessed three times over 13 years, with women showing significantly greater variability than men, consistent with previous research assessing changes in desire among newlyweds over four years (McNulty et al., 2019), and studies of desire during the transition to parenthood (Rosen et al., 2021). Thus, the theory that women’s desire is more variable than men’s desire is supported by longitudinal studies examining desire over many years. However, the effect was small, as can be seen in Fig. 2, and Study 1 was the most well-powered study to detect a small effect. As is often the case, the overlap in women’s and men’s distributions far exceeds the differences.

Study 1 raises the question of why desire may be more variable among women compared to men over the long term. One possibility, supported by Rosen et al. (2020), is that the transition to parenthood has a larger impact on women’s desire relative to men. We did not, however, find a significant interaction between sex and having children on desire in Study 1 (cf. McNulty et al., 2019; Rosen et al., 2021). A second possibility is that women’s desire may be more likely to decline with age as a function of feeling less attractive, due to the intersecting experiences of gendered beauty standards and ageism (Buote, 2010; van Anders et al., 2021). Relatedly, it may be that women’s desire is more likely to change over time as a function of relationship inequities if they are partnered with a man (Harris et al., 2022; van Anders et al., 2021). Additional waves of data and/or additional longitudinal studies are needed to further test the extent to which women’s desire varies more than men’s over the lifespan, and why.

When desire was measured over the short term, our results diverged from previous theorizing and quantitative results—we found no evidence that women’s desire was more variable than men’s desire in the short term. On average, both men and women show relatively large fluctuations in desire over seven days. Academic and lay assumptions about women’s desire being variable appear to be accurate. However, the assumption that men have stable desire was not supported by the data, at least in the short term. Men’s desire was as variable as women’s desire, and it was more variable than other states, such as stress and tiredness. Our findings suggest that female erotic plasticity theory, therefore, may not extend to desire in the short term.

To assess the second and third research questions, we tested whether sex moderates the associations between desire and affective and relationship-oriented states “in the moment.” In terms of affective states and desire, women and men showed similar patterns. The associations between desire and stress, attractiveness, happiness, and loneliness were significant and not moderated by sex. These findings counter assumptions that women’s desire is more sensitive to contextual factors compared to men. In particular, feeling attractive or satisfied with one’s body is often tied to women’s sexuality. Our findings suggest that researchers and the lay public may underestimate the importance of feeling attractive for men’s desire, consistent with qualitative research from Murray and Brotto (2021) showing that men in heterosexual relationships “desire to feel desired.” The effect of tiredness on desire was stronger for women in Study 2, but not in Study 3. Thus, while women’s desire was sensitive to their immediate affective states, men’s desire was equally so, perhaps with the exception of feeling tired.

In terms of the associations between relationship states and desire, there were some differences between men and women. Across Studies 2 and 3, we found no moderating effect of sex on the associations between desire and feelings about their relationship, with one exception. In Study 2, women’s anger towards their partner were more strongly (negatively) associated with desire than men’s. Thus, there may be some nuanced differences in the extent to which affective and relationship states are associated with desire. Overall, however, the patterns of association were strikingly similar for women and men, with only two of nineteen relationships moderated by sex.

Implications

Our findings provide an opportunity to build upon our current models of sex and desire over time. While the theorizing around women’s variability in desire is supported in the longer-term, it does not apply to moment-to-moment changes in desire. These findings support a distinction between short-term changes, or “state” desire, and medium- to long-term changes, or “trait” desire. Factors affecting desire “in the moment” may diverge from those affecting desire in the long term, consistent with work on gender and sex differences in absolute levels of desire (Dawson & Chivers, 2014).

Factors affecting momentary desire may also diverge from those affecting other fluid dimensions of sexuality. Women appear to show greater variability in their sexual attitudes, behavior, and attraction (e.g., Diamond et al., 2017) compared with men, but not desire, at least in the short term. One possible explanation is that desire is experienced similarly to other mood states, such as hunger or tiredness. As such, desire may be more likely to vary along with other momentary states, rather than individual differences in sex or gender. Other dimensions of sexuality, such as attitudes, behavior, and attraction, may be more sensitive to gendered pressures and expectations. Additional theorizing and research are needed to assess the relative influence of gendered expectations across different dimensions of sexuality.

Our findings regarding short-term desire variability have notable practical implications for women’s and men’s sexual self-concepts and sexual relationships. An assumption that men have stable desire and women have fluctuating desire may lead to inaccurate impressions of the world—that is, we may perceive women to be “hot and cold” and simultaneously underperceive men’s variability in desire. We may also discourage men from acknowledging fluctuations in desire if they are felt to be “not manly,” and men may subsequently engage in sexual activity despite experiencing a period of low sexual interest. Finally, for women partnered with men, sexual rejection may be more painful if women assume men have consistently high desire. That is, if a woman is under the assumption that her man partner has a consistently high sex drive, his disinterest in sex is likely to be attributed to external factors (such as her desirability) rather than internal factors (such as his naturally fluctuating sex drive). This may partially explain why women tend to have more negative responses to sexual rejection compared to men (de Graafe & Sandfort, 2004) and speaks to the importance of communication when engaging in sexual rejection (Impett et al., 2020). As such, acknowledging that desire changes in both men and women may diminish negative feelings in response to a partner’s sexual disinterest.

Limitations and Future Directions

The study of within-person changes in sexuality is still in its infancy. Research on desire discrepancy has shed light on the variable nature of desire—desire fluctuates, and these fluctuations are likely going to be different between partners, such that one partner may peak while another partner may drop (Mark, 2012, 2014; Ridley et al., 2006). Daily diary studies have uncovered practices and strategies that can “keep the spark alive,” buffering against drops in desire over time (Muise et al., 2013b). These previous studies, and findings from Studies 2 and 3, support a “state” conceptualization of desire, whereby desire can fluctuate throughout the day and in response to external events. Further, women’s and men’s desire appear to be equally “state-like,” such that variability in desire is similar for women and men in the short term.

We note, however, that our findings are specific to our conceptualization of desire as a state. We assessed desire using one to three items that were designed to assess a brief snapshot of a person’s current level of desire. The items tended to be highly correlated (Studies 1 and 3), and single-item measures demonstrate appropriate predictive validity in experience sampling studies (Song et al., 2022). Further, our findings are largely consistent with previous work conceptualizing desire in response to sexual stimuli, whereby patterns of desire change are similar for women and men (Dawson et al., 2013). As such, this study directly addresses sex differences in state desire variability.

We did not explicitly assess trait desire, so our findings cannot speak to the extent to which women’s and men’s trait levels of desire change over time. Previous work has found that gender and sex differences in average desire may be more likely to emerge when desire is conceptualized as a trait rather than a state (Dawson & Chivers, 2014). Thus, it may be that when operationalized as a trait, desire may be more stable and trait-like for men than women. However, there is an open question as to whether it is appropriate to conceptualize desire as a trait (Dawson & Chivers, 2014; Mark & Lasslo, 2018).

The measurement of state desire may be appropriate given the extent to which it fluctuates, however, our measures may be constrained in other ways. It is possible that participants in our studies were responding according to the demand characteristics of the studies. In Study 3, we controlled for social desirability and found that the results remained unchanged. An additional possibility is that desire levels were inflated by virtue of completing the daily surveys—that is, being asked to introspect on one’s desire may cause an increase in desire. While we think this is a possibility, we do not believe this would affect our conclusions, as we did not find ceiling effects of desire, and we were interested in sex differences in variability in desire rather than baseline levels of desire.

Finally, our findings speak more directly to theories relating to sex differences in desire variability. Additional data are needed to assess whether our results would hold when assessing participants’ gender. Further, studies of gender and sex differences tend to focus on women/females and men/males and tend to only sample, heterosexual participants. Future research is needed to explore gender and sex differences beyond the gender binary, and why differences may exist. For non-binary and/or allo-binary participants, it may be that desire is sensitive to contexts in which gender identity is affirmed or denied, which might in turn influence relevant affective states, such as happiness, attractiveness, and partner closeness. And, of course, this may be similar for men and women who do identify within the binary. It may be that heterosexual women’s desire varies over the life span, as a function of heteronormative pressures, whereas women not partnered with men may experience desire differently. Future research on experiences of desire with gender and sexually diverse samples is needed to help answer these questions and contribute to a growing field of feminist and queer research on desire (e.g., Chadwick et al., 2017; Holmberg & Blair, 2009; Mark et al., 2018).

Liberal political views may be seen as a subtle signal of wealth in today's society; the shift of wealthier people to the political left may coincide with a working-class shift to the right

Are Political Views the New Luxury Goods? Bence Nanay. Psychology Today, January 25, 2023. https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/psychology-tomorrow/202209/are-political-views-the-new-luxury-goods

- Conspicuous consumption is defined as overtly displaying signs of material wealth, while inconspicuous consumption signals wealth more subtly.

- Liberal political views may be seen as a subtle signal of wealth in today's society.

- The shift of wealthier people to the political left may coincide with a working-class shift to the right.

Remember that time when Rolex watches and Louis Vuitton handbags signaled wealth? Some (not all) rich people really want the rest of the world to know that they are rich. This is often called conspicuous consumption1: You spend money on things that make people see you as well-off.

The problem is that these often not-very-subtle indicators of wealth are becoming very easy to fake. You can get a pretty convincing Rolex replica for about a hundred bucks and a fake Louis Vuitton handbag sometimes for much less. What is the fan of conspicuous consumption supposed to do? If you continue wearing your Rolex, you may be mistaken for a replica-wearing wannabe. That's the last thing you would want.

One answer is to go subtle. This is sometimes dubbed inconspicuous consumption2: Wear a watch from an obscure but very high-end watchmaker, eat organic and single-origin quinoa, and so on. You will still be recognized as rich, but only by those who count. So you can show that you are rich without appearing to show that you are rich. No crassness, no fakes. No danger of being mistaken for a nouveau riche.

Political views: The next step in inconspicuous consumption

But inconspicuous consumption is still about material goods. The next step in showing one's wealth without appearing to show it is signaling wealth with the help of values, not material goods. And these values are often political views. It is obviously in the material interest of rich people to be against taxing the rich. However, if you say—often and loudly—that the rich should be taxed, this must mean that you are super wealthy. It signals your wealth much more efficiently than Rolex watches or organic, single-origin quinoa.

Some new research shows that this shift is real. In fact, it can also help us to understand some of the perplexing aspects of recent political realignments, especially people voting against their material interests, and how, as more well-off people vote left, more poorer people also vote right, which is a surprising reversal of the classic political landscape.

This new turn in consumerism may seem entirely harmless, maybe even amusing, but it is not without potentially dangerous consequences. If people perceive the elites as having left-wing values, then as a reaction, strong populist sentiments could be evoked with extreme right-wing propaganda. And we all know what that can lead to.

References

1 Veblen, Thorstein. The Theory of the Leisure Class. Retrieved from: https://moglen.law.columbia.edu/LCS/theoryleisureclass.pdf.

2 Elizabeth Currid-Halkett. (2019). The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univesity Press.

3 Enke, B., Polborn, M. & Wu, A. (2022). Values as Luxury Goods and Political Polarization. Retrieved from: https://www.nber.org/papers/w30001

Male flies that had got the brush-off from a female behaved more aggressively towards their fellow males

Sexual rejection modulates social interaction and reproductive physiology. Liora Omesi, Mali Levi, Elia Dayan, Yong-Kyu Kim, Lital Barak-Buchris, Reza Azanchi, Ulrike Heberlein, Galit Shohat-Ophir. bioRxiv Jan 22 2023. https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.04.27.441612

Abstract: In highly polyandrous species, in which females mate with multiple males within a single fertility period, there is typically a high level of sperm competition. To cope with this challenge, males apply various behavioral and physiological strategies to maximize their reproductive success. Previous studies in Drosophila melanogaster established a link between the composition of the social environment and the reproductive success of individual male flies. While most studies until now focused on the adaptive responses of male flies to the presence of rival males, little is known about whether the outcomes of sexual interactions with female partners alter male-male social interactions. Here we show that repeated failures to mate promote coordinated physiological and behavioral responses that can serve to increase reproductive success over mating rivals in the future competition. We exposed male flies to sexual rejection, successful mating or no sexual experience, and analyzed the behavioral repertoires of individuals within groups and the structure of their emerging social networks. We discovered that failures to mate promote the formation of distinct emergent group interactions and structures, where rejected male flies form low density social networks and actively minimize their encounters with other group members, while increasing their aggressive behavior. In addition, sexually rejected male flies elevate the production of seminal fluid proteins and extend mating duration with receptive females, altogether leading to reduced re-mating rates. Our results demonstrate the existence of a flexible mating response as possible coping strategy for living in a highly dynamic and competitive environment as the social domain.

Reading for pleasure in adolescence did not yield any benefits for mental health in a large longitudinal study

Murray, Aja L., Patrick Errington, Yi Yang, Daniel Mirman, Ingrid Obsuth, Tom Booth, Denis Ribeaud, et al. 2023. “Is Reading for Pleasure in Adolescence Good for Mental Health? A Counterfactual and Within-person Analysis in a Large Longitudinal Study.” PsyArXiv. January 25. psyarxiv.com/dsbec

Abstract: Reading has been proposed to be a protective factor in mental health; however, testing this is made challenging by the vulnerability of the reading-mental health association to confounding. In this study, we used two complementary approaches to address this: propensity score matching and random intercepts cross-lagged panel models (RI-CLPM) in a large longitudinal study: the Zurich Project on Social Development from Childhood to Adulthood (z-proso). For the counterfactual analyses, mental health outcomes of anxiety, depression, and psychosis-like symptoms were measured at ages 17 and 20 and reading engagement was measured at ages 15 and 17. Matching variables included a wide range of factors potentially related to reading and mental health outcomes and when matched with respect to these covariates, there was no consistent effect of reading for pleasure on anxiety, depression, and psychosis. Similarly, using an RI-CLPM to account for between-person stable confounding factors suggested no evidence for a positive effect of reading on later mental health across ages 13,15,17 and 20. The only significant effects were detrimental effects of reading on anxiety and psychosis at age 20 when using non-bi-partite matching. Future research over shorter time lags is recommended to explore whether reading has shorter term benefits for mental health.

The domains in which people most strongly chose mates who were similar to themselves were politics, religion, intelligence and substance use

A comprehensive meta-analysis of human assortative mating in 22 complex traits. Tanya B Horwitz, Matthew C Keller. bioRxiv, Mar 20 2022. https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.03.19.484997

Abstract: Assortative mating (AM) occurs when the correlation for a trait between mates is larger than would be expected by chance. AM can increase the genetic and environmental variation of traits, can increase the prevalence of disorders in a population, and can bias estimates in genetically informed designs. In this study, we conducted the largest set of meta-analyses on human AM published to date. Across 22 traits, meta-analyzed correlations ranged from r = .08 to r = .58, with social attitude, substance use, and cognitive traits showing the highest correlations and personality, disorder, and biometrical traits generally yielding smaller but still positive and nominally significant (p < .05) correlations. We observed high between-study heterogeneity for most traits, which could have been the result of phenotypic measurement differences between samples and/or differences in the degree of AM across time or cultures.

Humans show higher levels of fearfulness than other great apes, which has been adaptive for care-giving

The human fear paradox: Affective origins of cooperative care. Tobias Grossmann. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, April 18 2022. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/behavioral-and-brain-sciences/article/abs/human-fear-paradox-affective-origins-of-cooperative-care/B6DC0651D8B6EC81C43AF41BC22EDD15

Abstract: Already as infants humans are more fearful than our closest living primate relatives, the chimpanzees. Yet heightened fearfulness is mostly considered maladaptive, as it is thought to increase the risk of developing anxiety and depression. How can this human fear paradox be explained? The fearful ape hypothesis presented herein stipulates that, in the context of cooperative caregiving and provisioning unique to human great ape group life, heightened fearfulness was adaptive. This is because from early in ontogeny fearfulness expressed and perceived enhanced care-based responding and provisioning from, while concurrently increasing cooperation with, mothers and others. This explanation is based on a synthesis of existing research with human infants and children, demonstrating a link between fearfulness, greater sensitivity to and accuracy in detecting fear in others, and enhanced levels of cooperative behaviors. These insights critically advance current evolutionary theories of human cooperation by adding an early-developing affective component to the human cooperative makeup. Moreover, the current proposal has important cultural, societal and health implications, as it challenges the predominant view in WEIRD societies that commonly construe fearfulness as a maladaptive trait, potentially ignoring its evolutionary adaptive functions.

Despite years of training in clinical psychology students, no significant differences were found in self-reported mentalization capacity between first and last year students

Does clinical training improve mentalization skills in future therapists? A comparison of first and last year students of clinical psychology and of engineering. Steffen André Fagerbakk, Silje Helen Sørhøy, Torbjørn Nilsen and Nina Jakhelln Laugen. Front. Psychol., January 23 2023. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1066154

Objective: Mentalization has been suggested as a therapist skill that might be important for therapeutic success. The aim of this study was to explore whether the mentalization capacity of students of clinical psychology differs from other students, and whether last-year students differ from first-year students.

Method: A total of 297 students participated in this study, recruited from first and last years of psychology and engineering study programs. All participants filled out the MentS, a self-report measure of mentalization capacity.

Results: No significant differences were found in self-reported mentalization capacity between first and last year students of clinical psychology. The results did however show that first year students of psychology had significantly higher self-reported mentalization skills compared to students of engineering, and higher MentS-scores were associated with gender (female) and higher age.

Conclusion: The finding that students of clinical psychology rate themselves as having a higher capacity to mentalize compared to students of engineering might suggest that individuals with a higher capacity to mentalize are more likely to engage in clinical psychology and become therapists. However, the lack of significant difference in self-reported mentalization capacity in last year students of clinical psychology compared to first year students might indicate that the Norwegian education in clinical psychology does not succeed in enhancing mentalization in future therapists. Clinical psychology study programs might benefit from targeted mentalization training.

Discussion

This study aimed to contribute to the line of research that has identified mentalization as a potentially important therapist skill, by exploring the mentalization abilities among students of clinical psychology at the beginning and the end of their education, compared to students of engineering. The first hypothesis was that last year students of clinical psychology would have a higher self-reported capacity to mentalize compared to first year students. However, this hypothesis was not supported as the results showed no significant difference between these groups. The second hypothesis was that first year psychology students would have a higher self-reported capacity to mentalize compared to first year engineering students. The results showed that psychology students scored significantly higher on the total MentS and its three subscales compared to engineering students, thus confirming the second hypothesis.

The Norwegian version of the MentS indicated satisfactory internal consistency. Moreover, females scored significantly higher than males and higher age predicted higher MentS scores. These results are in line with expectations based on previous research (Anderson et al., 2009; Abu-Akel and Bo, 2013; Dimitrijević et al., 2018).

Differences between first year students and last year students

Our study found no significant differences in self-reported mentalization capacity between first and last year students, neither among students of clinical psychology nor students of engineering. The assumption was that years of clinical training contributes to enhancement of mentalization capacity, and an improvement among students of clinical psychology was therefore expected.

It is reasonable to expect that students of clinical psychology would have a good basis for improving their mentalization capacity considering that they have high self-reported mentalization capacity at the beginning of their education. Previous studies have found that mentalization capacity can be improved through therapy (Fonagy and Bateman, 2019, pp. 103, 323; Luyten et al., 2020) and Ensink et al. (2013) found that psychology students significantly improved their mentalization capacity after attending a mentalization course. Their findings show that specific training in mentalization skills can make positive change in a relative short time span. They also observed a decrease in mentalization skills for a control group who only had didactic training and no training in mentalization. This indicates that the capacity for mentalization does not develop spontaneously through clinical training but must be targeted specifically. These results may also render the possibility that a narrow focus on diagnostic criteria and formulations of treatment plans might cause a decline in mentalization capacity. Although knowledge about diagnostic criteria and treatment plans are essential in clinical practice, one should be aware of the potential downfalls with excluding targeted mentalization training in the curriculum.

Another possible explanation for our results is that self-report measures might not successfully measure actual mentalization due to response bias. Self-report measures are based on participants self-evaluation, and not objective observations of actual behavior in interpersonal interactions (e.g., Murphy and Lilienfeld, 2019). Thus, participants might not have an accurate experience of their own mentalization capacity, it can be distorted by characteristics in the person such as self-confidence. Also, clinical education and training might provide students of clinical psychology with more insight about what it is possible to know about themselves and others. The clinical program does include both self-reflection and training in critical thinking about science. Therefore, students of psychology might become more critical about their own knowledge and about what they can know about themselves and others. Thus, the effect of growing critical thinking might confound the effect of growing mentalization skills in psychology students. Furthermore, social desirability might be a confounder of the student’s responses as mentalization is viewed as a desirable quality for a psychologist. This might lead to systematic bias in the students’ responses to the MentS. Also, it might be possible that students who are admitted to the clinical program gain a new perspective on themselves and view themselves as future psychologist. This new perspective might make them overconfident about their mentalization skills, leading them to report mentalization capacity in an overconfident way. Moreover, it is reasonable to assume that low mentalization skills involves less precise evaluation of these skills in the self, considering that these individuals often have a lack of interest in the mental world of themselves and others (Fonagy and Target, 2008; Luyten et al., 2019, pp. 39–43). This might lead to systematic bias in self-reporting by individuals with low mentalization skills.

The regression analysis showed a positive relationship between MentS-scores and age, but not with years of study. This differs from the findings of Dimitrijević et al. (2018), who found that higher education, and not age, was related to higher score on the MentS. Considering the hypothesis that capacity for mentalization improves simply by mentalizing (Allen et al., 2008, p. 320), especially in interpersonal contexts with individuals that possesses high mentalization skills, the capacity for mentalization should improve with age (Luyten et al., 2020). If this is true, then older people would have better mentalization skills simply because they have had more time practicing the skill. There are however few known studies that investigates the nature of age-related changes in mentalization skills. Conclusions regarding this are therefore yet to be made.

Differences between first year students of psychology and engineering

First year students of clinical psychology scored significantly higher than engineering students on both the total MentS and each of the three subscales. Interestingly, students of clinical psychology also scored significantly higher than students of fundamental psychology for both the total MentS and the Self-and Motivation-subscales, but not for the Other-subscale. These results suggest that students of clinical psychology have a high self-reported capacity to mentalize already at the beginning of their education.

The preliminary hypothesis was that first year students of psychology would have a higher capacity to mentalize compared to engineering students. The assumption was that individuals with an motivation and skill to mentalize, would be more likely to select psychology as their major. Thus, differences in mentalization abilities should be evident even at the beginning of the course, and before students receive any therapist training. The field of psychology involves attempts to understand the interactions between the human mind and behavior, and the contextual environment in which it takes place, whereas mentalization broadly refers to the ability to understand mental states that underlies behavior in oneself and others (Fonagy, 2008, p. 3). It can be assumed that individuals who have a lower innate motivation and skill to engage in such activities should thus be less likely to engage in the field of psychology if choices are influenced by their levels of interests in the human mind and behavior.

The findings that first year students of psychology rate themselves as having higher capacity to mentalize compared to first year students of engineering support the assumption that mentalization capacity may predict student’s selection of study major to some extent. These results correspond with Focquaert et al. (2007) who found that students of humanities (e.g., social science, medicine, and biology) had a more empathizing cognitive style than students of science (e.g., mathematics, engineering, physics, and chemistry).

The significant differences between students of clinical psychology and fundamental psychology were not expected. The preliminary assumption was that students selecting any psychology program would possess similar levels of mentalization by the beginning of their studies. The admission process is based on high-school grades and does not involve any screening of their therapeutic abilities, such as the capacity to mentalize. Whereas fundamental psychology is concerned with the theoretical and empirical study of the human mind and behavior, clinical psychology also involves implementing this knowledge into direct interpersonal interactions with patients in therapy. This difference in course curriculum thus renders the possibility that students with a higher motivation and skill to mentalize, might be more likely to select the clinical perspective.

Among the psychology students in our study, there was an overrepresentation of female students. This rendered the possibility that the group differences in mentalization capacity were due to gender rather than study program. However, the regression analysis confirmed that study program significantly predicted total MentS scores even when accounting for the significant effects of gender. These findings strengthen the conclusion that students of psychology had a significantly higher self-reported capacity to mentalize than students of engineering, regardless of their gender. Why women seem to have better mentalization skills than males are not fully understood. A common stereotype is that women generally talk more about thoughts and feelings (i.e., mental states) than males do. This stereotype is supported by studies indicating that women are more emotional and emotionally expressive than are men (Brody and Hall, 2008). It also might be supported by research showing gender differences in constructs closely related to mentalization and attentiveness toward mental states. Evidence in current literature suggests that females have higher emotional intelligence compared to males, and that females generally have a more empathizing cognitive style (Brackett et al., 2004; Focquaert et al., 2007). Also, some studies have found that parents have more emotional content in their talk with daughters than with sons (Fivush et al., 2000; Aznar and Tenenbaum, 2015), and it is suggested that children are shaped into this gender difference in emotion expression by their parents and by their particular social environment (Chaplin, 2015). Luyten et al. (2020) argues that the capacity to mentalize is relationship-and context dependent, as mentalization develops in the context of interpersonal interactions and is continuously influenced by the mentalizing capacity of those who partake in these interactions. If females in fact do engage in more talk about mental states, and thus practice their mentalizing skills more than males, then this might be a possible reason why females have a higher capacity to mentalize. However, considering the common view that women are more emotional and emotionally expressive than men (Brody and Hall, 2008), it might be the case that women have an advantage in interview-based measures of mentalization because of their superior ability to express emotions. This view is supported by studies showing that women are more elaborate when depicting internal states (e.g., Fivush and Haden, 2003; Fivush et al., 2012; Grysman, 2018).

Limitations and future research

This study presents new and interesting findings about the mentalization capacity among students of clinical psychology. However, some limitations of this study need to be addressed. The study uses a cross-sectional design, which may not be suitable to evaluate actual changes in mentalization capacity. Longitudinal designs represent a better basis for evaluating the development of individual mentalization skills, and may allow for within-subject comparisons of mentalization skills development in addition to between-subject comparisons. However, longitudinal designs are both time and resource demanding and were therefore beyond the scope of this study. Also, this study used voluntary response sampling and there is no information on those that were invited to participate but did not respond. This might be an issue in terms of representativeness, as the respondents might for example be those who were most interested in the field of study, leading to sampling bias. Moreover, there is need for more understanding of how mentalization develops in training programs as we currently do not know exactly what promotes mentalization and what does not.

As described throughout this discussion, there are some obvious limitations with the use of self-report measures. However, self-report measures are less time and resource demanding, and thus more suitable for use in larger samples. Future research should include additional measures for evaluation and assessment of the psychometric properties of the MentS. Assessments of the MentS reliability should include comparisons with established measures of mentalization, such as questionnaires (e.g., RFQ: Fonagy et al., 2016) and interviews (e.g., AAI: George et al., 1996). Because self-evaluations of one’s own mentalization capacity might be inaccurate and biased by individual characteristics, it could be advantageous to collect information from family, significant others, peers, and co-workers. Thus, it might be of interest to develop a version of the MentS for other-evaluation of mentalization capacity. Comparisons of self-evaluations vs. other-evaluations might contribute to more accurate assessment of mentalization. Other-evaluations of participants mentalization capacity might provide researchers with information about how individuals mentalization is experienced by others in interpersonal interactions. This would make sense considering that mentalization is a relational concept, and measurement should capture relational contexts.

The validity of self-report measures of mentalization is challenging to assess due to the complexity of the construct. Mentalization overlaps with other constructs that are different, but closely related to mentalization (e.g., empathy, theory of mind, and emotional intelligence). It can be challenging to determine if a self-report really measures mentalization and not related constructs. Because mentalization is a complex construct that involves several aspects of human behavior and mental states, self-report measures might not be sufficient for measuring all of these aspects.

The distribution of MentS-scores showed a lower spread among psychology students compared to students of engineering. This could suggest a ceiling effect, meaning that the MentS might not be sensitive enough for groups who have high mentalization skills. The assessment of mentalization in homogenous groups such as therapists might require different methods of measures than groups that are more heterogenous in terms of mentalization capacity. Furthermore, the MentS does not measure mentalization in terms of context or interpersonal relationships which rises some uncertainty about whether or not it can capture the “state” aspects of mentalization, considering it is assumed to be invariant across different relationships and contexts (Fonagy and Luyten, 2009). Other measures, such as the Reflective Functioning Scale as scored on the Adult Attachment Interview, involve the aggregation of mentalization across a number of attachment relationships.

Chess tournaments: We find that women make more mistakes when playing against men; men, however, play equally well against male and female opponents; we also find that men persist longer before losing to women

Gender, competition, and performance: Evidence from chess players. Peter Backus, Maria Cubel, Matej Guid, Santiago Sánchez‐Pagés, Enrique López Mañas. Quantitative Economics, Vol 14, Issue 1, Jan 2023, p. 349-380. https://doi.org/10.3982/QE1404

Abstract—This paper studies gender differences in performance in a male‐dominated competitive environment chess tournaments. We find that the gender composition of chess games affects the behaviors of both men and women in ways that worsen the outcomes for women. Using a unique measure of within‐game quality of play, we show that women make more mistakes when playing against men. Men, however, play equally well against male and female opponents. We also find that men persist longer before losing to women. Our results shed some light on the behavioral changes that lead to differential outcomes when the gender composition of competitions varies.

This study contributes preliminary evidence that associations between moderate alcohol consumption and reduced risk for depression may reflect genuine causal effects

Moderate Alcohol Consumption and Depression: A Marginal Structural Model Approach Promoting Causal Inference. Rachel Visontay et al. The American Journal of Psychiatry, Jan 18 2023. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.22010043

Abstract

Objective: Moderate alcohol consumption is associated with decreased risk for depression, but it remains unclear whether this is a causal relationship or a methodological artifact. To compare the effects of consistent abstinence and occasional, moderate, and above-guideline alcohol consumption throughout early to middle adulthood on depression at age 50, the authors conducted a secondary analysis of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 cohort and employed a marginal structural model (MSM) approach.

Methods: Baseline was set at 1994, when individuals were ages 29–37. The MSM incorporated measurements of alcohol consumption in 1994, 2002, and 2006, baseline and time-varying covariates, and repeated measurements with the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale–Short Form (CES-D-SF). A total of 5,667 eligible participants provided valid data at baseline, 3,593 of whom provided valid outcome data. The authors used all observed data to predict CES-D-SF means and rates of probable depression for hypothetical trajectories of consistent alcohol consumption.

Results: The results approximated J-curve relationships. Specifically, both consistent occasional and consistent moderate drinkers were predicted to have reduced CES-D-SF scores and rates of probable depression at age 50 compared with consistent abstainers (CES-D-SF scores: b=−0.84, 95% CI=−1.47, −0.11; probable depression: odds ratio=0.58, 95% CI=0.36, 0.88 for consistent occasional drinkers vs. abstainers; CES-D-SF scores: b=−1.08, 95% CI=−1.88, −0.20; probable depression: odds ratio=0.59, 95% CI=0.26, 1.13 for consistent moderate drinkers vs. consistent abstainers). Consistent above-guideline drinkers were predicted to have slightly increased risk compared with consistent abstainers, but this was not significant. In sex-stratified analyses, results were similar for females and males.

Conclusions: This study contributes preliminary evidence that associations between moderate alcohol consumption and reduced risk for depression may reflect genuine causal effects. Further research using diverse methodologies that promote causal inference is required.

The richer the country and the higher its average neuroticism score, the higher its rate of vaccination (at least one dose)

Neuroticism predicts national vaccination rates across 56 countries. Nicolas Vermeulen. Current Psychology, Jan 21 2023. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12144-023-04234-8

Abstract—Quite strikingly, there is significant variation in Covid-19 vaccine coverage around the world. Some countries do not progress from around 2-3% while others are close to 100% coverage. In addition to some already known economic, health and sociodemographic predictors, the present research is interested in emotional factors that may predict a significant part of this cross-country variation. We examined the personality factor Neuroticism, which corresponds to the relatively stable tendency to experience negative emotions, anxiety and low tolerance for stress. Results confirm that gross domestic product represents around 50 percent of cross-country variation. Neuroticism added 6 to 9 percent of inter-country variation in vaccination coverage. The results are discussed in relation to the associations between Neuroticism, increased worry, greater attention to Covid-19 related information and confidence, as well as lower vaccine hesitancy.

Discussion

These findings highlight that neuroticism significantly predicts variations in country vaccination rates in different continents. These findings remained significant even after controlling for gross domestic product or physical health/risk factors such as age or obesity known to impact vaccine distribution (Basak et al., 2022; Oshakbayev et al., 2022). These results can be related at a more local level to data showing that neuroticism predicted negative affect level and variability during the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany as well as with neuroticism’s associations with mean levels of attention to COVID-19 related information and worry (crisis preoccupation) (Kroencke et al., 2020). If people scoring high on neuroticism paid more attention to COVID-19 related information and worried more about one’s own health during the pandemic, it may explain neuroticism’s role in adhering to a vaccines’ national strategy. Our results also relate to UK findings showing that lower levels of neuroticism are associated with increased COVID-19 vaccination hesitancy (Halstead et al., 2022).

However, our data, in combination with the above-mentioned results, may seem to contradict other data from Russia showing that neuroticism is positively associated with vaccine hesitancy or resistance (Roshchina et al., 2022). It should be noted that most of the above-mentioned literature is related to vaccine intention (or attitude) when vaccination campaigns had not yet begun. This differs notably from the present data, which relates to actual vaccination rates rather than to anticipated behavior (intentions). The contradiction could, for example, be related to trust in vaccines or in the government, given that a recent study showed that a significant portion (around 30%) of those who had been vaccinated had nevertheless a low level of confidence in the Covid-19 vaccines (Gbenonsi et al., 2022).

From this perspective, it is interesting to note that in Roshchina et al. (2022), a high level of trust in institutions was associated with a stronger intention to be vaccined. Confidence in the solution (i.e., vaccines) together with fear of Covid-19 may appear as key factors to account for the apparent contradiction. The “appeal to fear” model (Witte, 1992) emphasizes that for a promoted behavior to be considered, one must feel at risk (susceptibility), and one must be confident that the solution (or response) is effective, easy to implement, and cost-effective. The appeal to fear model predicts that if risk susceptibility is high but confidence in the solution is low, there might be denial of the threat and rejection of the solution. In this sense, it is not surprising to observe in Roshchina et al. (2022) that vaccine resistance and hesitancy were greater in the regions with worse epidemiologic situations, where fear is potentially stronger because of threat proximity. This proposed explanation fits quite well with data showing that anxiety during covid Covid-19 is negatively related to confidence, controllability and physical distance to the nearest Covid-19 covid patients (Wu et al., 2021). In this way, it might be suggested that when there is a threat and confidence in the solution is high, neuroticism could increase acceptance, whereas if confidence is low, neuroticism could increase hesitancy.

Future research could aim to better understand how neuroticism not only influences vaccine intention but also the transformation of these intentions into actual behaviors. One way might be to use the photovoice method, which allows researchers to understand facilitators and barriers from the unique perspective of each participant, to understand the contextual conditions of participants, and to increase social justice by adequately informing mental health service providers and policy makers (Tanhan & Strack, 2020).

Digital natives' early and continuous exposure to pornography: Porn literacy seems an ability that they developed over time, which allowed them to critically engage with pornography and observe how it had affected them

Digital natives' experience of early and continuous exposure to pornography. Fredrika Hedberg. Master's Thesis, Sociology, Lund Univ. Department of Sociology, Spring 2022. https://lup.lub.lu.se/luur/download?func=downloadFile&recordOId=9092102&fileOId=9092106

Abstract—With the technological advancements of the 21st century, online pornography has become increasingly available to children and adolescents, and this research aims to investigate how individuals who started watching pornography at an early age experience pornography. The study implements a phenomenological approach and is based on 13 qualitative interviews with participants who started watching pornography before the age of 15. In doing so, this research utilised Simon and Gagnon’s (1973) sexual script theory and Porn Literacy theory as the theoretical framework through which to analyse the data. The results indicate that the participants´ sexual scripts evolved over time through their consumption of pornography and sexual interactions and incorporated various aspects of pornography that had an influence on such things as their expectations of sexual encounters, gendered perspectives, body image, and amount and type of pornography sought out. Porn literacy seemed to be an ability that the participants developed over time, which allowed them to critically engage with pornography  and observe how it had affected them.

6.0 Conclusion

While not all participants felt as though pornography had a significant impact on their lives, it seems to have informed and shaped their sexual script in some manner, be it the assumptions they developed about how sex was going to be, how they should act, how their future partner would act, what acts would be pleasurable to their partners, and how to draw boundaries with partners. Pornography was some of the first visual representation of sex they received, and some were too young at the time to recognise it as sex, although most reported that it was something exciting and something they knew they should not be watching. Being exposed to pornography at an early age had sex seem less special to some prior to experiencing it in contradiction to other forms of media as outlined by Garceau and Ronis’s (2019) that portray the loss of virginity as something special and meaningful. It shaped their assumptions about how sex was going to be before they experienced it, making it seem like something intense and a little intimidating for some depending on what type of pornography they were watching. With this assumption came the sexual roles that the participants thought they should play that they derived from pornography, which seems to have been a distinctly gendered dichotomy where they would emulate the gender roles they viewed in pornography to some extent. For the male participants this meant taking on a more dominant or leading role and for the female participants, it meant that they were more submissive and tolerated their partners behaviour despite their discomfort. While the participants claimed that these roles were largely inspired by their porn consumption, it is possible that it could, in addition, have been derived from other forms of media that promote the gender stereotype of man as dominant and women as submissive and the aforementioned sociocultural standards pertaining to women’s sexual agency. Although the participants performed these roles, there was a discrepancy between how they thought they should behave and how they wanted to but felt pressured to conform to the gendered roles. This pressure to fill these roles, however, seemed to dissipate over time as the participants had more sexual experience and gained confidence in their sexuality and actual preferences. Some participants did not see it as an issue or something negative to perform these sexual gender roles but rather perceived it as the natural order of things. The participants used pornography as educational to varying degrees, as many lacked the representation of sexual acts in their education and assumed that some of what happened in pornography would overlap with regular sex, and some used it for inspiration in specific sexual situations. Most of the participants stated that this was not beneficial for them, and that they eventually had to be re-educated as they had developed what Garceau and Ronis (2019) referred to as an “atypical” script (Garceau and Ronis, 2019, p.39). Based on this I would argue that the studies that tout pornography as ‘educational’ ought to use word ‘inspiring’ or the like as when pornography is used by children and adolescents as sexual education it is not always beneficial. In terms of porn literacy, the participants´ narratives suggest that they all could critically engage with the content they viewed, and that this ability had evolved over time. The participants who had little notion of what sex was when they started watching pornography seemed to have developed a sense of porn literacy later on in life as porn was their primary source of information about sex. As their porn literacy developed over time, there were times in the participants´ lives when porn had a more significant effect on aspects of their sexuality and sexual script such as their body image, sexual behaviour, and assumption about gendered sexual expectations; it appears as though some participants still experience these despite their porn literacy. It is important to note here that these sexual standards and power dynamics not only exist in mainstream pornography but correspond to the general western standards of beauty and sexuality portrayed in mass media which porn mirrors and exaggerates. The most common aspect of the participants´ body image that was raised as an insecurity caused by pornography was genital appearance and function, although some participants noted a negative influence on their physique as a whole. Although not all of the participants reported any desensitization to pornography and mainly watched the same type of porn over time, some participants had experienced a desensitization that encouraged them to seek out more niche genres. Some of them experienced a cognitive dissonance between what they watched in pornography and what they thought was acceptable to do or wanted to do in real life. Some felt shame because of this type of pornography that they felt did not represent them as people, but they kept returning to, and they in many cases chose not to think about it after watching it, compartmentalising it to a very private sexual experience. Two of the participants, Nick and Toby, practiced what they watched in real life and belonged to different sexual subcultures categorized by BDSM practices and feminisation. The participants who had a problematic relationship to pornography were the ones with the most negative outlook on pornography, although most participants noted that they regretted started watching it at such an early age.