The Annual Review of Psychology, Volume 68

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Suzanne K. Moses is Annual Reviews’ Senior Electronic Content Coordinator. For 15+ years, Suzanne has played a central role in the publication of Annual Reviews’ online articles. Not a single page is posted online without first being proofed and quality checked by Suzanne.

For years now, Suzanne has sent a company-wide email to announce the publication of each new volume. These emails provide insight into the variety, depth, and quality of the articles. Her messages are thoughtful, discerning, playful, and deeply personal. They remind us all of the beauty and wonders of science; all the reasons we do what we do.

We’ve now asked Suzanne to share her volume announcements with our readers. We hope you enjoy this new series of posts!

Anna Rascouët-Paz
Online Media Editor

View the full table of contents for Annual Review of Psychology, Volume 68.

Like many, I grew up thinking that memories were a perfect record of what happened in my life. Discovering that we rewrite our own memories all the time was a very strange moment for me. I’ve come to believe that memory is a slippery and somewhat dangerous thing; we have to trust our own minds, but we also need to recognize that those same minds have a vested interest in protecting themselves. The autobiography of Elizabeth Loftus, “Eavesdropping on Memory,” is a fantastic inside look at studying memory. It is a honest and open look at her thoughts, and it feels intensely personal. It isn’t often that an autobiography moves directly onto my personal top ten list upon first reading—but this one did. It’s impossible to skim, and I found it difficult to pull a single quote that captures the writing style for you.

I soon discovered I wasn’t particularly interested in mathematical psychology, but I never missed the required Friday seminar sessions where faculty and fellow graduate students discussed their research findings, even though my mind was elsewhere. I would often sit in the back and write letters to my relatives. Sometimes I actually got some sewing done (e.g., hemming skirts that needed to be shortened) to the sound of voices discussing the latest developments in mathematical learning theory.

I also enjoyed Metcalfe’s “Learning from Errors” because I find the idea that being willing to experiment and make mistakes leads to better learning and understanding overall is rather uplifting. One aspect of this I particularly found interesting was regarding immediate versus delayed feedback about errors:

The study found that college students performed equally well in the immediate and delayed feedback conditions, whereas children in grades 3 to 5 did better when the feedback was delayed. Interestingly, Kulik & Kulik (1988) noted that whether delayed or immediate feedback produced better results differed between studies conducted in the classroom and those in the laboratory. Lab studies tended to show that delayed feedback was better, whereas classroom studies favored immediate feedback. They concluded, however, that the real difference between these studies was whether the learners paid attention to the feedback. Students in the classroom are highly engaged in knowing the answers to questions right after taking a test.

ps680627-f1Finally, I want to point out that this volume of the Annual Review of Psychology has something for everyone and an article for nearly every situation. Have you ever had the impulse to really analyze your close relationships? Let me suggest Finkel’s article “The Psychology of Close Relationships: Fourteen Core Principles.” You might learn new and exciting things about how relationships are constructed.

Or have you ever felt uncomfortable interacting with a robot? Been caught treating your furby as a living pet? Then you may want to look at Broadbent’s “Interactions With Robots: The Truths We Reveal About Ourselves.” It’s interesting to flip the usual lens and ask what these interactions say about us.

Reengineering our website: why, what, and how?

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Every website needs a periodic refresh as the digital landscape is constantly evolving. Here at nonprofit publisher Annual Reviews, six years have elapsed since our last major redesign, and we wanted to upgrade our user experience. We are pleased to announce a number of site enhancements that will benefit our online community.

For readers:

  • Automatic optimization of on-screen experience for all devices and screen sizes, and seamless pairing to an institutional subscription
  • New article layout and functionality facilitates rapid scanning for easier online reading
  • Search functionality provides more flexible filtering with improved image, author, and multimedia results

For authors:

  • A new section highlights information for preparing the review that you were invited to write, including journal-specific requirements

For librarians:

  • Dedicated section provides improved, centralized navigation to Librarian and Agent resources
  • Specialized functions for account administration remain unchanged but we have enhanced account security

“We are delighted to offer our end-users and stakeholders a more modern, adaptable and intuitive experience,” said Director of Technology Paul Calvi. “This reengineering has been made possible thanks to the partnership between the talented crew here at Annual Reviews, our design agency Interactive Strategies and advances in our online publishing platform, Literatum by Atypon Systems Inc”.

new_logoSome of you may have noticed that our logo has also evolved. Our goal here was to make it just a little easier to read online. As for the different stripes, they represent the colored bindings of our print editions which have been such an important part of our history.

We welcome your feedback via Twitter or Facebook.

Vision Science: How Do We See in 3D?

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How do we see in 3D when we start with a 2D projection on our retinas? How can a flat painting give the illusion of depth and perspective?

In the video describing his latest article in Annual Reviews, Andrew Welchman, a researcher at the University of Cambridge, explains how our neurons put all this information together to produce 3D views.

Read the full article from the Annual Review of Vision Science.

Vera Rubin, Who Proved Dark Matter’s Existence, Dies

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screen-shot-2017-01-03-at-13-54-41Dr. Rubin stood as a constant reminder of the sexism that is still such a problem in many scientific fields. There were petitions and protests and demands that she be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for her discoveries, and now she never will be.

This is how the autobiographical article she wrote for the 2011 Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics begins:

My life has been an interesting voyage. I became an astronomer because I could not imagine living on Earth and not trying to understand how the Universe works. My scientific career has revolved around observing the motions of stars within galaxies and the motions of galaxies within the Universe. In 1965, if you were very lucky and interested in using telescopes, you could walk into a research laboratory that was building instruments that reduced exposure times by a factor of 10 and end up making remarkable discoveries. Women generally required more luck and perseverance than men did.

The full text is available for free:

Runners-Up for Person of the Year: CRISPR Scientists

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Time Magazine named U.S. President-Elect Donald Trump its 2016 Person of the Year, but amongst the runners-up are the scientists who identified the mechanisms and developed the technique of gene editing using clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR), as well as those who are attempting to find direct applications in human health.

The implications are significant for the treatment of diseases with genetic components. If gene sequences can be altered, they can also be corrected to eliminate the risk of illnesses such as cystic fibrosis or Huntington’s Disease. They can also be used in the treatment of certain cancers. The technique is all the more revolutionary because it is cheap, very accurate, and easy to use.

While many of the scientists involved in these discoveries co-signed a letter urging caution in the use of CRISPR, wary as they are of genome modifications that could be passed on to offspring, this new technology also offers a lot of hope for many diseases that have not yet found a cure.

Jennifer Doudna, of the University of California at Berkeley, along with Emmanuelle Charpentier of the Max Planck Institute, developed a way to simplify this technology and apply it to all kinds of DNA. Feng Zhang, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, showed it was possible to use it on human DNA. Carl June, of the University of Pennsylvania, is now attempting to harness CRISPR to treat cancer.

Congratulations to all of them.

Browse Dr. Doudna’s articles for Annual Reviews:

Read Dr. June’s articles for Annual Reviews:

U.S. Public Opinion and the Environment

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Two authors scheduled to write for the 2017 Annual Review of Political Science signed a piece in the Washington Post exploring how much resistance U.S. President-Elect Donald J. Trump’s appointee to the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) may face.

Citing work they have done for the next volume of our journal, Political Scientists Patrick J. Egan, of New York University, and Megan Mullin, of Duke University, show that of all the issues, the environment is where the political divide between Republicans and Democrats is starkest. While polarization has been growing between left and right, they most disagree on spending to protect the environment, above the reduction of poverty, childcare, schools, and science.

They conclude that President-Elect Trump’s nominee for the EPA, Scott Pruitt, while being the most conservative appointment for the agency since 1981, will probably not see much political resistance for his agenda to reduce regulation to curb climate change.

MIT Astrophysicist Sara Seager Profiled in NYTimes

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Sara Seager, astrophysicist and planetary scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and contributing author of the Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics, was interviewed in The New York Times Magazine of Dec. 7, 2016.aa480631-f16

Dr. Seager’s work has taken her to seek exoplanets—planets that orbit stars outside our own solar system—and, more specifically, exoplanets that would share characteristics with Earth. A rocky planet that would be far enough from its star that its water would be liquid and life on it possible.

Her research allowed for the discovery of the first exoplanet atmosphere. Using light, she is able to identify the elements and gases that exist in these atmospheres. The ultimate goal, she says, is to determine whether we are alone in the universe.

Read Dr. Seager’s article for the 2010 Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics:

Seven Annual Reviews Authors Win Breakthrough Prizes

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The 2016 Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics was awarded to Kip S. Thorne, of the California Institute of Technology (CalTech), and Rainer Weiss, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They lead the LIGO Project with CalTech’s Ronald W.P. Drever, also a recipient of the prize, and they share this honor with the other 1012 who were part of this research. Together they were the first to detect the gravitational waves predicted by Albert Einstein.

Find Dr. Thorne’s article in the 1972 Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics:

Find Dr. Weiss’ article in the 1980 Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics:

Five Breakthrough Prizes in Life Sciences were awarded in 2017, to the following laureates:

• Stephen Elledge, of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Harvard Medical School, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, “for elucidating how eukaryotic cells sense and respond to damage in their DNA and providing insights into the development and treatment of cancer.”

Dr. Elledge is scheduled to write an article for the 2017 Annual Review of Cancer Biology.

• Harry F. Noller, of the University of California, Santa Cruz, “for discovering the centrality of RNA in forming the active centers of the ribosome, the fundamental machinery of protein synthesis in all cells, thereby connecting modern biology to the origin of life and also explaining how many natural antibiotics disrupt protein synthesis.”

Find Dr. Noller’s articles in the Annual Review of Biochemistry:

• Roeland Nusse, of Stanford University and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, “for pioneering research on the Wnt pathway, one of the crucial intercellular signaling systems in development, cancer and stem cell biology.”

Find Dr. Nusse’s articles in the Annual Review of Cell and Developmental Biology:

• Yoshinori Ohsumi, of the Tokyo Institute of Technology, “for elucidating autophagy, the recycling system that cells use to generate nutrients from their own inessential or damaged components.” This comes two months after Dr. Ohsumi won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Find Dr. Ohsumi’s articles in the Annual Review of Cell and Developmental Biology:

• Huda Y. Zoghbi, of the Baylor College of Medicine, Texas Children’s Hospital, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute, “for discoveries of the genetic causes and biochemical mechanisms of spinocerebellar ataxia and Rett syndrome, findings that have provided insight into the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative and neurological diseases.”

Find Dr. Zoghby’s articles in the Annual Review of Neuroscience, the Annual Review of Physiology, and the Annual Review of Genomics and Human Genetics:

How Social Science Can Help Shape Election Law

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In this video, Richard Holden, Professor of Economics at UNSW Australia Business School, and author of this comprehensive review, sheds light on the democratic process and the surprising factors that influence how people vote.

The review presents existing social-science research that helps us think through the voting process, including how electoral boundaries are drawn, the redistricting process, what might explain the high incumbent reelection rate in the United States, and how geography influences voting. All this has particular relevance in today’s context of highly polarized and partisan politics that encourages nefarious practices like gerrymandering to win votes. Professor Holden’s review suggests that social science can be a powerful tool to inform election law and support a healthy and transparent democratic process in an increasingly complex political climate.

Learn more with this article, which we’ve made freely available:

Free Trade and the U.S. Election

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2908273630_bd93cee6f3_zAs we approach the end of the 2016 presidential campaign in the United States, we explore one of the most heatedly discussed issues: international trade and the various trade deals the country has entered.

Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party’s nominee, has been criticized by Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s nominee, for her support of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), signed in 1994 between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico by her husband, then-U.S. President Bill Clinton. During her tenure as Secretary of State under President Barack Obama, she spoke in favor of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a proposed deal between 12 countries of the Pacific Rim that has become a priority for the current administration.

Secretary Clinton now says NAFTA didn’t live up to its potential and will need to be renegotiated—a promise made by the Obama campaign in 2008, which his administration didn’t keep. She also says that the latest version of the TPP, which would cover 40% of the global economy with approximately 800 million consumers, doesn’t meet her “high bar” for “creat[ing] American jobs, rais[ing] wages and advanc[ing] our national security.”

Another proposed deal in the early stages of the negotiating process is the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), between the European Union and the United States, covering a third of global trade.

Mr. Trump, on the other hand, has built his platform on a blanket rejection of free trade.

As the political tide seems to have turned toward protectionism, World Trade Organization Director General Roberto Azevedo has expressed concern about the anti-trade rhetoric on both sides of this campaign. With election day looming, what can we learn about trade deals, regional and global, and their long-term effects on participating economies, specifically on poverty, the environment, and public health? Do they result in net gains or net losses?

Learn more with these five articles, which we’ve made freely available:

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