Anxious to detect deceit: an empirical investigation of social defense theory.

Social Defense Theory (SDT) states that anxious attachment reflects an adaptive sentinel strategy, whereby anxious people should be better able to detect lies than secure people. Existing research on this issue, however, has not been able to evaluate whether heightened lie detection among anxious individuals is due to an actual ability or a bias to assume that others are lying (one that pays off when others are, in fact, lying). We addressed this issue in a study in which 254 adults had to determine whether people in videos were lying or telling the truth about their experiences. Contrary to the predictions of SDT, highly anxious people did not have a heightened ability to separate lies from truths, but were biased to assume that others were lying regardless of the authenticity of their statements.

Put your mask on first to help others: Attachment and sentinel behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The objective of this research was to learn whether attachment style is related to the ways people try to warn, protect, and care for others during the pandemic and what kinds, if any, personal protective measures they are taking. Data were collected in early May 2020 from 200 Amazon MTurk (AMT) workers who participated in exchange for payment. People who were high in attachment-related anxiety were more likely to behave as "sentinels" (i.e., warning loved ones to engage in safe practices such as hand washing, wearing a face mask), whereas those high in attachment avoidance were less likely to do so. These findings suggest that insecure attachment may contribute to peoples' willingness to protect themselves and others during the pandemic.

Estimates of donated sperm use in the United States: National Survey of Family Growth 1995-2017.

OBJECTIVE: To provide national estimates of donor insemination (DI) use in the United States and a description of the population of users. DESIGN: Population estimates were generated from nationally representative data through weighted proportions and count estimates. SETTING: Not applicable. PATIENT(S): Participants were U.S. women of childbearing age (15-44 years) sampled for interview in the National Survey of Family Growth. INTERVENTION(S): None. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Respondents who reported having received artificial insemination were asked the origin of the sperm. Responses could include husband/partner, donor only, or mixed donor and husband/partner. RESULT(S): In 1995, an estimated 170,701 (95% confidence interval 106,577-234,825) women had undergone DI using donor or mixed sperm. In 2015-2017, 440,986 (95% confidence interval 108,458-773,513) women were estimated to have used it. The DI users were mostly white, urban, older, college-educated, and had high family incomes. CONCLUSION(S): The DI use changed over time, from a decrease between 1995 and 2013 to a precipitous growth in 2015 to 2017. In recent years, nearly half a million women may be dealing with personal, relationship, and familial issues born of DI use. The United States does not maintain records on the usage of donor sperm, but better tracking of the use and outcomes of treatment would provide better estimates of the size of the affected population.

The effect of admitting fault versus shifting blame on expectations for others to do the same.

A wealth of research has investigated how and why people cast blame. However, less is known about blame-shifting (i.e., blaming someone else for one's own failures) and how exposure to a blame-shifting agent might lead to expectations that other agents will also shift blame. The present research tested whether exposure to a blame-shifting (versus responsibility-taking) agent would lead perceivers to expect a second, unrelated target to also shift blame. Contrary to our expectations, people expected greater blame-shifting after exposure to a responsible agent, particularly when perceivers were surprised by this reaction to failure. Discussion focuses on how people habitually expect some people to shift blame for their mishaps, and how expectancy violations when people act in unexpected ways predict the extent to which perceivers expect unrelated agents to also shift blame.