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Volume 8 Issue 2, February 2024

3D shape perception

Recent research has shown that people can perceive the shape of objects, even when the objects are not directly perceptible (for instance, when draped in cloth). These findings present a challenge to existing theories of shape perception, which are based on the use of surface cues alone. Yildirim et al. present a computational model of three-dimensional shape perception that integrates intuitive physics and analysis-by-synthesis to explain how shape can be inferred both when surface object cues are available and when they are not (as in cloth draping).

See Yildirim et al.

Cover image: Lan Zhang/E+/Getty. Cover design: Bethany Vukomanovic.

Editorial

  • Our understanding of the human past is changing rapidly, and this does not come from new evidence alone. We are seeing an increasing diversity of perspectives among archaeologists, and they are asking new and important questions. But the field still has a long way to go.

    Editorial

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Comment & Opinion

  • Political polarization leads to distrust. In universities, this can lead to conflict or silence in classes and hinder learning and engagement. Faculty members and leaders can promote depolarization by encouraging constructive dialogue in and out of class, cultivating viewpoint diversity within boundaries and expanding civic spaces.

    • Sigal Ben-Porath
    Comment
  • Most scientific prizes and medals are named after men, and most of these are also awarded to men. The very few awards named after women or not named after a person at all are more frequently awarded to women, although parity between the gender of recipients is still not achieved. We call on the scientific community to rethink the naming of academic awards, medals and prizes, their nomination and selection criteria, and to diversify awarding committees and procedures to ensure greater inclusivity.

    • Katja Gehmlich
    • Stefan Krause
    Comment
  • The use of typological conceptions of race in science is not based in evidence. A recent report from the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, USA clarifies how human populations should be described in genetics and genomics research. It makes twelve recommendations that are highly relevant to behavioural genetics.

    • Joseph Graves Jr
    Comment
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Research Briefings

  • Using a large dataset of individuals from Early Neolithic Europe, we analysed DNA, diet and pathology to determine which factors most affected skeletal height. We found that the male–female height differences in north-central Europe were exceptionally large, and that the short stature of female individuals in this region possibly reflects a cultural preference to support male individuals. By contrast, in the Mediterranean, it is male individuals who were short, probably as a consequence of environmental stress.

    Research Briefing
  • Whether conservatives or liberals have higher sensitivity towards underrepresentation depends on the target of the judgement: conservatives are shown to have higher thresholds than liberals for indicating bias against traditionally nondominant groups, whereas liberals have higher bias thresholds regarding dominant groups. However, such relationships weaken when the targets of bias are unknown or ideologically irrelevant to the observer, which emphasizes the context-dependency of such bias judgements.

    Research Briefing
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Reviews

  • The authors address the central criticism of latent variable models in behavioural science, which is that a wide range of causal models may account for the observed data (the factor indeterminacy problem). They review how researchers have recently started using genome-wide data to provide a source of additional information to help to overcome the factor indeterminacy problem by decomposing the genome into a set of uncorrelated units.

    • Margaret L. Clapp Sullivan
    • Ted Schwaba
    • Elliot M. Tucker-Drob
    Review Article
  • Aguinis et al. review the literature on corporate social responsibility (CSR) at the individual level of analysis and propose a framework for organizing research around three categories: CSR perceptions, CSR attitudes and CSR actions.

    • Herman Aguinis
    • Deborah E. Rupp
    • Ante Glavas
    Review Article
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Research

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Amendments & Corrections

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