New Content From Perspectives on Psychological Science

To Be FAIR: Theory Specification Needs an Update
Caspar J. Van Lissa, Aaron Peikert, Maximilian S. Ernst, Noah N. N. van Dongen, Felix D. Schönbrodt, Andreas M. Brandmaier

Open science innovations have focused on rigorous theory testing, yet methods for specifying, sharing, and iteratively improving theories remain underdeveloped. To address this limitation, we introduce FAIR theory, a standard for specifying theories as findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable digital objects. FAIR theories are findable in well-established archives; accessible in terms of their availability and ability to be understood; interoperable for specific purposes, such as selecting control variables; and reusable in that they can be iteratively and collaboratively improved on. This article adapts the FAIR principles for theory; reflects on current FAIR practices in relation to psychological theory; and discusses FAIR theories’ potential impact in terms of reducing research waste, enabling metaresearch on theories’ structure and development, and incorporating theory into reproducible research workflows—from hypothesis generation to simulation studies. We present a conceptual workflow for FAIRifying theory that builds on existing open science principles and infrastructures. More detailed tutorials, worked examples, and convenience functions to automate this workflow are available in the theorytools R package. FAIR theory constitutes a structured protocol for archiving, communicating about, and iteratively improving theory, addressing a critical gap in open scholarly practices and potentially increasing the efficiency of cumulative knowledge acquisition in psychology and beyond.

Artificial Intelligence and the Psychology of Human Connection
Ryan L. Boyd, David M. Markowitz

As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly embedded in social life, understanding its interpersonal and psychological implications is urgent yet undertheorized. This article introduces the machine-integrated relational adaptation (MIRA) model, a transdisciplinary, middle-range theoretical framework that provides a foundational account of when, how, and why AI functions as a relational entity in human ecosystems. MIRA distinguishes two crucial roles of AI: relational partner (direct-interaction companion) and relational mediator (shaping human-to-human communication). Synthesizing psychosocial theories of human relationships, interpersonal communication theory, psycholinguistics, and human–computer interaction, MIRA structures AI’s relational impact within antecedents, processes, moderators, and outcomes. Central to MIRA are four principles describing how AI fosters social adaptation: linguistic reciprocity, psychological proximity, interpersonal trust, and relational substitution versus enhancement. These principles illuminate how adaptive AI language and behavior can elicit emotional investment, simulate mutual understanding, or even supplant human interaction. MIRA integrates established theories—attachment theory, social exchange theory, and epistemic trust frameworks—and proposes a research agenda that bridges foundational psychology with emerging sociotechnical contexts. Rather than offering a deterministic view, MIRA provides a generative, testable structure for investigating the evolving role of AI in relational life and guiding future human–AI-connection research.

How U.S. Funding Restrictions Endanger the Future of Psychology: Consequences for Research, Training, and Clinical Care
Kaitlyn A. Kaiser

In 2025, U.S. policy changes imposed sweeping limits on the scope of research eligible for federal support alongside sharp reductions to science-agency budgets, threatening the foundations of psychological science. This article examines the consequences of these shifts across three interrelated domains. First, topic-based restrictions curtail inquiry into key areas such as gender and sexual identity, social determinants of mental health, and systemic disparities, jeopardizing the continuation and expansion of research essential to evidence-based policy and interventions. Second, shrinking budgets and reduced funding opportunities destabilize graduate and postdoctoral training systems, constraining opportunities for emerging scholars and weakening the pipeline of future researchers. Third, cutbacks to health-agency budgets and programs diminish the delivery of mental-health services, with immediate and long-term consequences for public well-being. Although the analysis centers on the United States, the implications extend globally given the reach of U.S. investments, collaborations, and training infrastructure. The article concludes that although systemic challenges are formidable, psychologists at all career stages retain tools to resist their most harmful effects and to safeguard the field’s scientific integrity and societal impact.

Revisiting Hebb: The Mechanisms of Repetition Learning
Philipp Musfeld, Klaus Oberauer

In 1961, Donald Hebb established a classic paradigm for studying repetition learning: He asked participants to remember several memory sets for an immediate serial recall task and repeated one set multiple times throughout the experiment. Participants’ ability to recall the repeated set improved gradually with repetitions, thereby demonstrating repetition learning. Explaining this effect has concerned researchers for decades because it provides key insights into how we form durable memory representations through repeated exposure. In this article, we revisit the dominant views on the mechanisms underlying repetition learning, thereby challenging the central assumption that repetition learning is gradual and implicit. We show how these views have emerged from flawed analytical approaches, summarize recent evidence strongly contradicting these claims, and reanalyze previously published data to illustrate how correcting implausible analytical assumptions leads to different theoretical conclusions. We propose an updated theoretical framework of the cognitive mechanisms underlying repetition learning that integrates elements from previous models of the Hebb repetition effect with established models of episodic memory, thereby joining two branches of the memory literature.

Power, Privilege, and Positionality in Psychology Departments: Toward a Framework for Inclusive Excellence
Leher Singh

Although academic departments and institutions frequently champion ideals of egalitarianism and inclusion, many are defined by status hierarchies that can undermine their stated commitment to these ideals. This article examines the distinct and interconnected influences of power, privilege, and positionality in the defense of progressive norms, with a particular focus on psychology departments as a context for epistemic and cultural analysis. The article proposes three orienting principles to guide departments toward greater equity and inclusion: (a) triangulating policies, ideals, and norms through participatory equity; (b) fostering an inclusive climate that values diverse forms of knowledge; and (c) establishing the preconditions for sustainable culture change, including alignment of rewards, acknowledgment of resistance, the need for restorative sacrifice, and measurement of progress. Collectively, these principles offer a practical framework for reconfiguring the academic department toward cultural inclusivity and socially situated scholarship that is meaningfully aligned with the civic responsibilities of higher education.

Presence Is Reality: Rethinking Virtual and Real-World Consciousness
Oliver Singleton, Aikaterini Fotopoulou

The sense of presence is typically defined as the feeling of “being there” in a virtual environment, whereas the sense of reality is defined as the ability to discriminate between real and unreal phenomena. We challenge this rigid dichotomy, arguing that presence and reality can be considered conceptually, mechanistically, and phenomenologically continuous. We first demonstrate that both cognitive sciences and virtual reality (VR) studies use the terms inconsistently and interchangeably. We then go on to identify and combine perceptual and cognitivist accounts of presence, arguing that presence, like reality, is likely to be formed from integrative mechanisms. We then go further to identify converging psychophysical findings from the two fields in multisensory integration, self-embodiment, and agency. This is further supported by results from preliminary neuroimaging studies, indicating a shared frontolimbic substrate for generating the feeling of “realness.” This reconceptualization has significant implications, including validating the use of VR as a tool for studying the sense of reality and its clinical disorders. We conclude by advocating for directly comparing these phenomena in future research to systematically test for their functional and neural equivalence.

People’s Responses to Nuclear Weapons: Mapping Post-Cold War Research
Astrid Kause, Helen Fischer, Zia Mian, Susan T. Fiske

Nuclear weapon threats are increasing and may be comparable to levels not seen since the worst periods of the Cold War. There could be value in psychologists documenting and explaining people’s responses to nuclear weapons. More than 3 decades have passed since the last major reviews of people’s responses to nuclear weapons. We thus aimed to understand how psychologists and researchers from related fields have empirically studied responses to nuclear weapons since the end of the Cold War. We systematically mapped articles reporting on people’s responses. A search in Web of Science and Scopus identified 18,505 hits. Screening resulted in 256 suitable articles. We assessed (a) publication patterns, including how many articles focused on responses to nuclear weapons, when those articles were published, and in which field; (b) the research community, namely author collaborations and focal journals; (c) research themes, as indicated by cocitation networks and theoretical backgrounds; and (d) the validity, generalizability, and replicability of empirical findings, as indicated by adequate samples and validated measures. We found renewed interest in the field but not yet a coherent research community and only some evidence for its evolution from occasional, scattered, one-off studies toward a coherent and coordinated scholarly field.

A Social Identity Theory of Digital Identity
William J. Bingley, Peter Worthy, Janet Wiles, S. Alexander Haslam

People increasingly live their lives online, which means that their identities are increasingly constituted by and displayed through their activities on digital platforms. Existing theorizing about the psychology of digital identity has emphasized the social roles that people perceive and aim to verify online. These accounts can explain how digital identities are shaped by the social environment but not how they come together to create social life online. Moreover, there are unique features of digital identities, imposed by the digital platforms on which they are enacted, that cannot be accounted for by existing theories of offline social identity. To address these limitations, in the current article we propose a social digital identity theory that outlines how a person’s digital identity is shaped by their online and offline group memberships, as well as the implications of this psychological process for the well-being and performance of both individuals and groups. In outlining this theory, we aim to extend theorizing around social identity and digital identity by integrating these fields within a framework that recognizes and helps us better understand the merging of online and offline life.

Reframing the Performance and Ethics of Empathic AI: Wisdom of the Crowd and Placebos
Mark A. Thornton

Recently, claims have emerged that artificial intelligence (AI) is better at providing empathy than humans. These claims are based on experiments in which large language models were prompted to generate empathic responses to short emotional passages. These responses, as well as analogous responses generated by human participants, were judged by third-party human raters. In several cases, the AI-generated responses were preferred to human responses. Such findings have led to suggestions that people should use empathic AI to supplement human empathy. This article critically examines these positions by drawing analogies to two well-established psychological effects. First, I argue that the apparent preferability of AI-generated empathy reflects an analogue of the “wisdom-of-the-crowd” effect. This reframes the performance of empathic AI in a more mundane and less dehumanizing way. Second, I consider whether people should use AI for empathy. Here I draw an analogy to placebo effects, suggesting that even clear utilitarian benefits may not justify the adoption of empathic AI. Through these analogies between AI and well-known psychological effects, this article equips readers with new conceptual tools for grappling with empathic AI, its performance, and the morality of its use.

Hiking the Hypothetical Trail in Two Directions: How Reversing the Direction of Comparisons Can Advance Psychology
Vera Hoorens, Clément Belletier, Sara D. Hodges

Comparisons in psychological research are often directional, with one entity (a group, situation, condition, or measurement) that is the “target” of the comparison being compared to a baseline or reference point (the “referent”). A particular unidirectional framing often gets entrenched in a research tradition. This can be problematic because people (including researchers) focus disproportionately on the target rather than on the referent of directional comparisons. They thus mainly seek explanations for differences or similarities in processes associated with the target. As a consequence, a unidirectional perspective obscures ideas and impedes theoretical progress, particularly if the designation of the referent was arbitrary (i.e., not representing a default) to begin with. We first examine mechanisms that entail unidirectionality in research traditions. Drawing primarily on social psychology (but with an eye toward the broader field of psychology), we review examples in which a dominant unidirectional perspective has been fruitfully challenged. We then present four case studies from domains characterized by unidirectionality in which reversing the direction of comparison could stimulate new insights. We provide guidelines for avoiding or reversing one-way theoretical paths and consider metaquestions that our analysis provokes. We end with limitations of our work and recommendations for future research.

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