Concerns have been growing about the veracity of psychological research. Many findings in psychological science are based on studies with insufficient statistical power and nonrepresentative samples, or may otherwise be limited to specific, ungeneralizable settings or populations. Crowdsourced research, a type of large-scale collaboration in which one or more research projects are conducted across multiple lab sites, offers a pragmatic solution to these and other current methodological challenges. The Psychological Science Accelerator (PSA) is a distributed network of laboratories designed to enable and support crowdsourced research projects. These projects can focus on novel research questions, or attempt to replicate prior research, in large, diverse samples. The PSA’s mission is to accelerate the accumulation of reliable and generalizable evidence in psychological science. Here, we describe the background, structure, principles, procedures, benefits, and challenges of the PSA. In contrast to other crowdsourced research networks, the PSA is ongoing (as opposed to time-limited), efficient (in terms of re-using structures and principles for different projects), decentralized, diverse (in terms of participants and researchers), and inclusive (of proposals, contributions, and other relevant input from anyone inside or outside of the network). The PSA and other approaches to crowdsourced psychological science will advance our understanding of mental processes and behaviors by enabling rigorous research and systematically examining its generalizability.

Over the last ten years, Oosterhof and Todorov's valence-dominance model has emerged as the most prominent account of how people evaluate faces on social dimensions. In this model, two dimensions (valence and dominance) underpin social judgments of faces. Because this model has primarily been developed and tested in Western regions, it is unclear whether these findings apply to other regions. We addressed this question by replicating Oosterhof and Todorov's methodology across 11 world regions, 41 countries, and 11,570 participants. When we used Oosterhof and Todorov's original analysis strategy, the valence-dominance model generalized across regions. When we used an alternative methodology to allow for correlated dimensions we observed much less generalization. Collectively, these results suggest that, while the valence-dominance model generalizes very well across regions when dimensions are forced to be orthogonal, regional differences are revealed when we use different extraction methods, correlate and rotate the dimension reduction solution.

Background: Lockdowns to prevent the community transmission of COVID-19 pandemic has confined the people at home and imposed social restrictions, which is expected to cause alterations in circadian driven sleep-wake schedule and its associated lifestyle behaviors. Design and Methods: An online questionnaire-based survey was conducted to assess the impact of lockdown on the sleep-wake pattern, meal timings and digital media exposure time on the Indian population during lockdown. Responses of 1511 participants (age ≥18 years) were analyzed to assess the effect of gender and age on these parameters before and during lockdown.Results: The sleep onset-wakeup times and meals’ time was significantly delayed during lockdown, which was more pronounced in younger subjects. However, young individuals reported increased sleep duration at this time. Increased digital media duration was evident in all age groups, mainly in males. However, females reported more delay in sleep onset-waking time and first meal timing with longer sleep duration during lockdown.Conclusions: Discord with social and natural cues due to complete lockdown during COVID-19 pandemic leads to a state of social jetlag with delayed sleep-wake, meal timings and excessive digital media exposure among Indians, which has differential impact on males and females as well as across different age groups. These findings have applied implications in sleep health and related behavior during longer social isolation conditions such as current COVID-19 or similar situations and may help to prepare better for any such future events.

Physical activity (PA) and nutrition are the essential components of a healthy lifestyle, as they can influence energy balance, promote functional ability of various systems and improve immunity. Infections and their associated symptoms are the common and frequent challenges to human health that are causing severe economic and social consequences around the world. During aging, human immune system undergoes dramatic aging-related changes/dysfunctions known as immunosenescence. Clinically, immunosenescence refers to the gradual deterioration of immune system that increases exposure to infections, and reduces vaccine efficacy. Such phenomenon is linked to impaired immune responses that lead to dysfunction of multiple organs, while lack of physical activity, progressive loss of muscle mass, and concomitant decline in muscle strength facilitate immunosenescence and inflammation. In the present review, we have discussed the role of nutrition and PA, which can boost the immune system alone and synergistically. Evidence suggests that long-term PA is beneficial in improving immune system and preventing various infections. We have further discussed several nutritional strategies for improving the immune system. Unfortunately, the available evidence shows conflicting results. In terms of interaction with food intake, PA does not tend to increase energy intake during a short time course. However, overcoming nutritional deficiencies appears to be the most practical recommendation. Through the balanced nutritious diet intake one can fulfill the bodily requirement of optimal nutrition that significantly impacts the immune system. Supplementation of a single nutrient as food is generally not advisable. Rather incorporating various fruits and vegetables, whole grains, proteins and probiotics may ensure adequate nutrient intake. Therefore, multi-nutrient supplements may benefit people having deficiency in spite of sufficient diet. Along with PA, supplementation of probiotics, bovine colostrum, plant-derived products and functional foods may provide additional benefits in improving the immune system.

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Background: Chronotype is the circadian time preference for sleep–wake timings. However, its impact on cognitive performance is least explored. Objective: The present study investigated the effect of chronotype (morning “M” vs. evening “E”) on cognitive measures as a function of time of the day. In addition, the correlation between electroencephalogram (EEG) waves and subjective/objective cognitive measures were investigated. Method: Cognitive status of 28 adult male subjects (15 “M” and 13 “E”) was assessed objectively through event-related potential (ERP) by administering visual odd ball paradigm test and subjectively through Montreal Cognitive Assessment questionnaire. In addition, 20 to 30 min of resting EEG was recorded. Recordings were done from 8 to 10 am and from 4 to 6 pm on a single day. Power spectral analysis of EEG for alpha and beta waves at PZ and FZ cortical sites was done after subjecting selected epochs to fast Fourier transformation. Also, latency and amplitude of P300 potential from event-related potential record were measured. Appropriate statistical tests were applied for analysis. Results: Higher alpha and beta power was observed in “E” at PZ in the evening. “M” showed increased P300 latency and amplitude during evening session for frequent and rare stimuli and vice versa in “E.”’ Significant negative correlation was seen between latency of rare stimuli and alpha and beta power at FZ site during evening in “E” chronotype only. Conclusion: Result indicates better attention and alertness during evening hours in evening chronotypes and vice versa in morning chronotypes. The findings could be implemented to schedule the mental performance/cognitive load according to individual chronotype.

Eyewitness identifications play a key role in the justice system, but eyewitnesses can make errors, often with profound consequences. We used findings from basic science and innovative technologies to develop and test whether a novel interactive lineup procedure, wherein witnesses can rotate and dynamically view the lineup faces from different angles, improves witness discrimination accuracy compared with a widely used procedure in laboratories and police forces around the world-the static frontal-pose photo lineup. No novel procedure has previously been shown to improve witness discrimination accuracy. In Experiment 1, participants (N = 220) identified culprits from sequentially presented interactive lineups or static frontal-pose photo lineups. In Experiment 2, participants (N = 8,507) identified culprits from interactive lineups that were either presented sequentially, simultaneously wherein the faces could be moved independently, or simultaneously wherein the faces moved jointly into the same angle. Sequential interactive lineups enhanced witness discrimination accuracy compared with static photo lineups, and simultaneous interactive lineups enhanced witness discrimination accuracy compared with sequential interactive lineups. These finding were true both when participants viewed suspects who were of the same or different ethnicity/ race as themselves. Our findings exemplify how basic science can be used to address the important applied policy issue on how best to conduct a police lineup and reduce eyewitness errors.