Intellectual similarity of virtual twin pairs: Developmental trends

Virtual twins (VTs) are same-age unrelated siblings reared together from infancy who replicate twinship, but without the genetic relatedness. A 2005 report from the ongoing Fullerton Virtual Twin Study found an IQ intraclass correlation of .26 (p < .01, n = 113 pairs) and a within-pair difference of 13.22 IQ points. The average age of VTs in that study was 8.10 years (SD = 8.56, range: 4.01-54.84 years). An opportunity to retest members of 43 VT pairs, 1.70-8.96 years after their time 1 assessment, allowed additional analyses of genetic and environmental influences underlying general intellectual development. A decrease in the VT IQ correlation and an increase in the within-pair difference were indicated, consistent with increasing genetic and/or non-shared environmental influences and decreasing shared environmental influence on general intellectual development throughout childhood.     

Swagger, sway, and sexuality: Judging sexual orientation from body motion and morphology

People can accurately judge the sexual orientation of others, but the cues they use have remained elusive. In 3 studies, the authors examined how body shape and motion affect perceived sexual orientation. In 2 studies, participants judged the sexual orientation of computer-generated animations in which body shape and motion were manipulated. Gender-typical combinations (e.g., tubular body moving with shoulder swagger or hourglass body moving with hip sway) were perceived generally to be heterosexual; gender-atypical combinations were perceived generally to be homosexual. These effects were stronger for male targets. Body shape affected perceived sexual orientation of women, but motion affected perceived sexual orientation of both men and women. Study 3 replicated and extended these findings. Participants judged dynamic outlines of real people (men and women, both gay and straight) in which body shape and motion were measured. Again, gender-atypical body motion affected perceived sexual orientation and, importantly, affected accuracy as well.     

Getting Emotional About Explanations: Social Explanations and Social Explanatory Styles as Bases of Prosocial Emotions and Intergroup Attitudes

We are interested in the bases of social emotions such as compassion and hostility. Our analysis centers on social explanations, or people’s answers to the question: Why does the target behave that way or experience those outcomes? Below, we review classic approaches to social explanation and then review work linking explanations to emotions. Finally, we focus on work from our lab that connects explanations to prosocial emotions and intergroup attitudes, including compassion for the disadvantaged and reduced vengefulness toward the violent. A crucial contribution of our work is to illuminate complex connections between explanations and emotions: A given explanation has different socio‐emotional implications depending on the explainer’s motives. Finally, we review our work suggesting that individuals have social explanatory styles, and that particular styles are predictive of dispositional compassion. A key implication of our work is that social explanations are another basis of prosociality, in addition to factors such as empathy and moral principles.