Rob Booth

A social media announcement about my new grant, made by my university.

My university announced my new grant on social media.

They did not announce it here on BlueSky, where all the academics hang out ... 🤦

Daniel Gumb's cave and the Cheesewring, Bodmin Moor

A windswept tree, Bodmin Moor

A ruined mill building, Bodmin Moor

Bodmin Moor was looking gorgeous this morning ... misty and mysterious ...

Today, TÜBİTAK have funded my project on optimism bias and positive mood. Thanks, folks! 🤓

This means I will soon need a postdoc. If you are interested in affective science, and have some experience with longitudinal SEM analyses, please get in touch with me!

Back-scratching bovine leads scientists to reassess intelligence of cows Brown Swiss in Austria has been discovered using tools in different ways – something only ever seen in humans and chimpanzees

Veronika the cow shows evidence of tool use? Wow!

"There is no suggestion that Veronika’s skills are evidence of the evolution of an ominous new species of super-cow." 🤓

www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

My 6 year old, pressing his sandwich together like he's a fancy chef

Halfway through dinner, my Turkish/English boy spontaneously made himself a meatball-and-yogurt sandwich 🥰 🧿

Happy New Year!
İyi seneler!

New preprint!

Not a headline-grabber, but an important step for my lab group: Demonstrating the good psychometric properties of my probability bias (expectancy bias) measure.

The preprint, and the measure in both English and Turkish, are freely available here:

doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/GXJK8

They're handsy people, these clinical associates.

Proofread needed ..! :)

Turns out @mikeflanaganfilm.com , @stephenking.bsky.social and @markhamillofficial.bsky.social were right: I just saw The Life of Chuck, and it really is excellent.

Well done, lads.

Please post here too :)

Increasing Depressive Symptoms of Students in Turkey (Türkiye), 1990-2023: Effects of Gender, Socioeconomic Status, Anxiety, and the COVID-19 Pandemic Manuscript under review. This project includes the dataset, and the preprint. Hosted on the Open Science Framework

New preprint!

"Increasing Depressive Symptoms of Students in Turkey (Türkiye), 1990-2023: Effects of Gender, Socioeconomic Status, Anxiety, and the COVID-19 Pandemic"

This is under review: the final published version may end up looking very different to this ;)

doi.org/10.17605/OSF...

Trying to submit my paper from the cafe at Dolmabahçe Palace today ... Keep getting distracted by dolphins 😍

Of course, just because those two authors are successful journalists, it doesn't necessarily follow that their opinions on psychology are any good 😂

But in both these cases, I found myself nodding along in agreement most of the time!

Really enjoyed @helenlewis.bsky.social 's new book, The Genius Myth. Interesting historical perspective, and I love the idea of 'scenius'

Pairs nicely with The Intelligence Trap ( @davidarobson.bsky.social )

YouTube video by GUE TR Diving at Cynthiana Beach, Paphos, July 2025

Had a nice little rec dive in Cyprus last week. Thanks to Ray at Dive Point Cyprus!

youtu.be/7RxSp_naDiU?...

Me speaking at the conference, looking sweaty while pointing at my slides

I'm very late mentioning this, but I had a good time at the European Congress of Psychology in Cyprus last week!

Spoke about my recent paper on the Best Possible Self intervention, and met some nice people :)

Just bagged tickets to see @danielsloss.bsky.social in Istanbul... Again!

Said to my wife: "Daniel Sloss is coming back"

She said: "Why..?"

Tinsel the calico glares at you with a furrowed brow

“I asked chatGPT-“ ok, and I asked Tinsel, and she said you’re an uninspired, vapid dork who needs a computer to think for them.

The wildest thing about being a professor is that it's somehow acceptable to email the smartest experts in the world to help you with your homework, and they just...write you back with help.

Sometimes they compliment your question, or even thank you for asking.

It's bonkers.

The barista drew a cock and balls on my flat white :(

I'm gonna give my barista the benefit of the doubt, and assume this was meant to be a heart

Scholarships: MS students receive 32,500 TL per month, and a two-person dorm. PhD students start on 50,000 TL per month and a private dorm. The monthly stipends increase a little if you do not want to live on campus.

Sabanci University, Istanbul, is accepting applications for master's and PhD programs in Psychology!

There will be events on 8th May (Tuzla campus; 14:30, FASS 1089) and 13th May (Minerva Han, Karaköy; 16:00-19:00) where you can meet some of us, and learn about the programs and scholarships.

‘Dangerous nonsense’: AI-authored books about ADHD for sale on Amazon Experts say online retailer has ethical responsibility to guard against chatbot-generated work on sensitive topics Amazon is selling books marketed at people seeking techniques to manage their ADHD that claim to offer expert advice yet appear to be authored by a chatbot such as ChatGPT. Amazon’s marketplace has been deluged with AI-produced works that are easy and cheap to publish, but which include unhelpful or dangerous misinformation, such as shoddy travel guidebooks and mushroom foraging books that encourage risky tasting. Continue reading...

‘Dangerous nonsense’: AI-authored books about ADHD for sale on Amazon

Fork of Probability bias, optimism/pessimism, intolerance of uncertainty Manuscript submitted for publication. Hosted on the Open Science Framework

New preprint!

Probability Bias Predicts Depressive Symptom Severity, Independently of Optimism/Pessimism and Intolerance of Uncertainty

By Robert W. Booth (me!) and Dinkar Sharma. Freely available from the link below.

NOT YET PEER REVIEWED, will probably change!

doi.org/10.17605/OSF...

It's a PowerPoint error message, that says my document hasn't been updated since the 1st of January, 1601.

PC did a weird update today, and threw me a spectacular error message.

I guess it HAS been a while since I worked on that document!

Group photo of speakers at the session.

My presentation. 'Optimistically-Biased Probability Estimates Longitudinally Predict Positive Mood'

Results of Study 4: When positive mood at Time 1 is controlled, optimism bias at Time 1 significantly predicts positive mood at Time 2, 4 weeks later. Standardised beta equals .24

Interesting time at the International Conference on Positive Psychology at Üsküdar U. last weekend. Thanks to Ebru Morgül for chairing the session!

Presented my recent work, showing that optimism bias (optimistic expectancies) predict positive mood up to 4 weeks later. Preprint coming soon ...

We are so excited to announce our Free Summer Prize Draw!​

Spotted any ghost gear whilst diving?

You can win a GFUK prize bundle worth up to £100!
It includes a hoody, tee and a bracelet.

Competition information and full T&Cs here

www.ghostfishing.co.uk/competition/

Efficacy of the Best Possible Self intervention for generalised anxiety: exploration of mediators and moderators Generalised anxiety is increasingly prevalent, yet access to therapeutic interventions remains limited. We present two randomised control trials aimed to investigate the efficacy of the Best Possib...

Just sharing this interesting new paper from Duffy et al. In two studies, the Best Possible Self intervention reduced anxiety scores, by about half a standard deviation.

This is consistent with my recent RCT. Can the BPS be useful for anxious people? Worth following up!

doi.org/10.1080/1743...

How people with major depression adjust their expectations of future life events in response to other patients’ reports of the positive effects of psychotherapy Research proposed the devaluation of positive information, referred to as cognitive immunisation, as a mechanism underlying the persistence of negativ…

Happy to share this new article published open access in BRAT🎉📢:
In a relatively large experimental study funded by @dfg.de, we examined cognitive immunisation as a mechanism of biased belief updating in depression. Results suggest a nuanced picture. See more 👇
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I really liked his discussion of the possibility that some emotion expressions might become universal in the future, simply because of the dominance of basic emotion theory outside the field of emotion science.

The cover of the book.

I've recently finished A Human History of Emotion by Richard Firth-Godbehere, and it was excellent!

@profrichfg.bsky.social has written an authoritative, accessible book about the history of emotions and emotion concepts, which goes right up to the present day. Highly recommended!

Me by a big sign that says 'Trinity'

Me just before my first lecture

Back home from my Erasmus visit to the Trinity Centre for Global Health, at @tcddublin.bsky.social. Had a great time talking about social emotions!

Thanks to Frédérique Vallieres for hosting and good conversation 🤓