Karen Smith

In other summer news, I saw Glass Animals last night and spent much of the concert trying to imagine what Patrick's experience would have been when he took his daughter 😅 @quantitude.bsky.social

Exciting summer news in the SPAN Lab! Gaby Rivera Martinez, a rising senior in the lab, received a RUN Dean's List Summer Undergraduate Fellowship to support her thesis work on how loneliness and socioeconomic status influence emotion perception in young children. Congrats Gaby!! 🥳

I didn't see this until now because I've been at the beach (which also meant I lost the race last week) but can confirm this is quite accurate 😂

The SPAN lab is looking for children ages 4 - 7 years old to participate in our new study on emotional development! The study is all online and you can earn up to $60 in gift cards. You can find more information and sign up here: childrenhelpingscience.com/studies/795a...

Please share!

Learning in context: Socioemotional stimuli enhance cognitive learning processes but not psychophysiological engagement in early adolescence
osf.io/preprints/ps...

Learning about psychophysiology in the SPAN lab!

Childhood adversity influences future decision-making. This systematic review suggests adversity shifts individuals to prioritize information about risks and de-value information about reward- which is likely adaptive in adverse contexts.

authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...

@kesmith.bsky.social

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The final commentary on this paper (Thayer & Friedman) is now also out!
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

“Arousal might refer to some set of processes underlying emotion but evidence for its role in emotional experiences and behavior is at best mixed and imprecise” from @kesmith.bsky.social & @sethpollak.bsky.social

(Reading as I prep an arousal coding template 💃)

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Our response:
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Also check out the thoughtful commentaries on the paper by David Sander, Otniel Dror, and Julian Thayer & Bruce Friedman on the article. Two of the three are out online!

Sander: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Dror: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

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Posting here as well as on the other app.

Finally getting around to sharing our (@sethpollak.bsky.social) new theoretical paper! We challenge assumptions around the role of arousal in emotion, highlighting ambiguity in how the construct is defined and measured.

journals.sagepub.com/eprint/XWGB4...

And a quick plug for New Jersey - it is a fantastic place to live! New York is minutes away, and, on top of that, there’s beautiful beaches and hiking all less than an hour away. Also delis and bagels 🥯 - need I say more.

You can find more info on the lab here (sites.rutgers.edu/span-lab/) and the Rutgers Newark PhD program here (sasn.rutgers.edu/graduate-pro...). Email if you have questions!

In case there is anyone here who is not on Twitter:

I will be recruiting a PhD student this cycle! Apply if interested in questions related to how stress shapes development. Particularly a good fit if interested in loneliness, emotion, learning, decision making, and psychophysiology.

Interested in researching emotion regulation, loneliness, well-being, and rural health using EEG and peripheral psychophysiology methods? You are in luck! I am recruiting a graduate student to start Fall 2025! See my faculty webpage for more details www.ndsu.edu/faculty/ajfi...