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Effort is costly. People devalue personal rewards that require some measure of physical or even mental effort. Laboratory studies now suggest that physical effort is especially costly when engaged to benefit others. Even when people are willing, however, their efforts are often superficial, with people doing what is necessary but no more.
Sleep consolidates newly acquired motor skills, leading to improvements in performance after sleep. A study now finds that similar performance improvements following sleep can rely on different neural mechanisms depending on the properties of the learning task.
A key question in human evolution is the role of language in Early Stone Age toolmaking. A neuroimaging study now shows that Acheulian and Oldowan toolmaking recruit brain areas associated with different functions. The brain's language network is most strongly engaged when toolmaking is learned through verbal training.
Social learning is a crucial building block of human culture, but how and why do people vary in their propensity to learn from others? Experiments in Ethiopia suggest that pastoralists rely more on others' knowledge than do horticulturalists.
Extraordinary altruists risk their own health and life to help anonymous strangers. A study now shows that extraordinary altruists are motivated to do good to distant others not because they feel socially closer to them, but because they genuinely care more for the welfare of strangers.
Research now shows that human social networks surrounding a person who unexpectedly dies recover from the loss through strengthening of the relationships between friends and acquaintances of the deceased individual. The study demonstrates how individuals change their interaction patterns to support one another during a time of grief.
Functional magnetic resonance imaging and social network analysis show that on viewing familiar individuals in a small social network, the brain activates regions critical for inferring mental states and intentions, as well as regions associated with spatial navigation and psychological distance.
People who purchase liberal books have distinct tastes for science compared with those who purchase conservative books. This raises questions about the existence of ‘echo chambers’ on matters where science can inform political debates.
The assumption of rationality is at the heart of action explanations. A Bayesian model of theory of mind, which explicitly relies on this assumption, can predict with high accuracy the inferences that people make about the mental states underlying others’ actions.
Whether ritual behaviour reliably predicts cooperation is hotly debated. A study evaluating religion and social links among all adult residents of two South Indian villages finds that religious practice clearly predicts reciprocal cooperative ties. Rigorous quantitative field studies like this are a powerful way to resolve long-standing debates.
Immunization against vaccine-preventable diseases not only protects the individual but also has a social benefit. A study now shows that communicating this effect, known as herd immunity, can have a substantial impact on a person's inclination to vaccinate, an insight that could be leveraged in vaccine advocacy.
A study now finds that visual perceptual learning of complex features occurs due to enhancement of later, decision-related stages of visual processing, rather than earlier, visual encoding stages. It is suggested that strengthening of the readout of sensory information between stages may be reinforced by an implicit reward learning mechanism.
A study now shows that 20% of the population accounts for 60–80% of several adult social ills. Outcomes for this group can be accurately predicted from as early as age 3 years, using a small set of indicators of disadvantage. This finding supports policies that target children from disadvantaged families.
A new theory of city size, embodying ideas from economic complexity and cultural evolution, provides a rich basis for speculating on their economic structure and suggests hints as to how old cities might regenerate their past prosperity and how new ones might generate more success.
