To date, most studies linking youth well-being to character attributes focus on average effects based on between-person differences. In this study, we examined the within- and between-person relations among character attributes and well-being using an intensive longitudinal data set from the Compassion International (CI) Study of Positive Youth Development in Uganda. 

An orientation to promote good (i.e., a disposition to take actions that contribute to the good of oneself and others) has been associated with better health and wellbeing outcomes. However, less is known about how orientation to promote good differs across countries and across sociodemographic groups within different countries...

The neural mechanisms of consciousness remain elusive. Previous studies on both human and non-human animals, through manipulation of level of conscious arousal, have reported that specific time-series features correlate with level of consciousness, such as spectral power in certain frequency bands. However, such features often lack principled, theoretical justifications as to why they should be related with level of consciousness...

Past experiences influence how we perceive and respond to the present. A striking example is awareness priming, in which prior conscious perception enhances visibility and discrimination of subsequent stimuli...

Using an evolutionary model, this study explores the conditions under which metacognition (awareness of one’s own knowledge) would be expected to evolve in the opt-out paradigm, a common experimental method used to study metacognition. In such experiments, individuals must choose between opting-in and attempting a task with a large reward or opting-out and receiving a smaller guaranteed payoff. Two evolving traits – bias and metacognition – jointly determine whether individuals opt-in. Overall, the results support predictions implicating uncertainty in the evolution of metacognition but suggest metacognition may also evolve in conditions where metacognition can be used to identify cases where an otherwise inaccessible high payoff is easy to acquire.

Little is known about early-life experiences that may lead to higher optimism levels in adulthood. Using data from 202,898 adults in 22 countries, childhood candidate antecedents of optimism were examined...

The richness of a child’s early-life environment robustly predicts later cognitive abilities. White matter is likely also a key mediator of this link, given that communication along myelinated fiber tracts...