Willem E. Frankenhuis’s research while affiliated with Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law and other places

In situations of poverty, do people take more or less risk? One hypothesis states that poverty makes people avoid risk, because they cannot buffer against losses, while another states that poverty makes people take risks, because they have little to lose. Each hypothesis has some previous empirical support. Here, we test the ‘desperation threshold’ model, which integrates both hypotheses. We assume that people attempt to stay above a critical level of resources, representing their ‘basic needs’. Just above this threshold, people have much to lose and should avoid risk. Below, they have little to lose and should take risks. We conducted preregistered tests of the model using survey data from 472 adults in France and the UK. The predictor variables were subjective and objective measures of current resources. The outcome measure, risk taking, was measured using a series of hypothetical gambles. Risk taking followed a V-shape against subjective resources, first decreasing and then increasing again as resources reduced. This pattern was not observed for the objective resource measure. We also found that risk taking was more variable among people with fewer resources. Our findings synthesize the split literature on poverty and risk taking, with implications for policy and interventions.

In understanding the psychology of social inequalities, research has often portrayed groups of individuals in disadvantaged positions as lacking in agency, skills, or motivation–portrayals that can stigmatize these groups. Countering this stigma, recent developments have been made in so‐called “strength‐based” research to better understand and acknowledge the agency, skills, and motivation people in disadvantaged positions often show. Yet, this research is not focused on understanding how inequalities emerge. The present research explores ways to study inequalities without risking to stigmatize people. For example, how can we address disparities in certain motivational factors (e.g., belonging, or confidence) without stigmatizing groups as lacking motivation? And how can we study the way people experience disadvantage without reducing them to the role of weak, passive victims? To answer such questions, we integrate traditional social‐inequality research with recent advances in strength‐based research in what we call a “holistic approach” to studying inequality. At the core of this approach is a simultaneous recognition of context‐level disadvantage (a focus of traditional inequality research) and individual‐level agency (a focus of strength‐based research). This approach allows for a broader–a holistic–perspective on existing inequality‐research, and points to underexplored research questions within social psychology (e.g., how do people actively respond to disadvantage?). After outlining this approach, we distill it into 10 practical guidelines and illustrate how to implement guidelines in an existing research agenda. In doing so, we hope to support authors, reviewers, editors, and other stakeholders aiming for an accurate and non‐stigmatizing study of inequalities.

Decades of research have shown that adversity tends to be associated with lower working memory (WM) performance. This literature has mainly focused on impairments in the capacity to hold information available in WM for further processing. However, some recent adaptation-based studies suggest that certain types of adversity can leave intact, or even enhance, the ability to rapidly update information in WM. One key challenge is that WM capacity and updating tasks tend to covary, as both types of tasks require the creation and maintenance of bindings in WM; links between mental representations of information in WM. To estimate the associations between adversity and different processes in WM, we need to isolate variance in performance related to WM capacity from variance in performance related to updating ability. In this Registered Report, participants from the Dutch Longitudinal Internet studies for the Social Sciences (LISS) panel completed three WM tasks: two complex span tasks and a task measuring both binding and updating of information. In addition, we estimated participants’ exposure to neighbourhood threat, material deprivation and unpredictability. We estimated associations between the three types of adversity and latent estimates of WM capacity and updating using structural equation modelling. We did not find consistent associations between adversity and WM capacity or updating, nor did we find evidence that the associations were practically equivalent to zero. Our results show that adversity researchers should account for overlap in WM tasks when estimating specific WM abilities.

Exposure to adversity may impair executive functioning (i.e., deficit frameworks), but could also enhance, or leave intact, specific EF abilities (i.e., adaptation frameworks). Both frameworks often use raw performance (e.g., speed) to estimate EF ability. However, this approach (1) conflates different cognitive processes, and (2) generally does not distinguish specific EF abilities from processes that are shared across EF tasks, such as general processing speed. Here, we integrate deficit and adaptation frameworks by building bridges with mathematical and cognitive psychology. Specifically, we use cognitive modeling (Drift Diffusion Modeling) to isolate different cognitive processes: speed of information accumulation, response caution, and speed of stimulus encoding and response execution. We then use structural equation modeling to investigate whether associations between adversity and cognitive processes are task-general or ability-specific. We recruited 1061 participants from the Dutch LISS panel. Participants completed a basic processing speed task, two inhibition tasks, and three attention-shifting tasks. We measured exposure to threat and material deprivation in childhood and adulthood. Exposure to threat (but not material deprivation) in adulthood was negatively associated with task-general processing speed. After accounting for task-general processes, remaining variance was not related to either inhibition or attention-shifting ability. Non-preregistered analyses showed that childhood exposure to material deprivation and threat were negatively associated with (1) general processing speed, and (2) task-specific information accumulation. The latter reflected unique features of individual tasks, rather than specific EF abilities. Taken together, these results suggest that adversity researchers overestimate associations between adversity and specific EF abilities when analyzing raw performance.

Frameworks are widespread in developmental psychology. They offer general ideas about what to study in human development: which concepts to focus on (e.g., systems, trade-offs), which processes to test (e.g., micro-macro, bidirectional), and which methods to use (e.g., interview, equations). However, despite their prominence, there exists very little consensus or guidance on how to use them in research. As such, frameworks have an obscure role: they influence our research questions, methods, and theory, but often in ways we cannot articulate for ourselves, let alone for others. This paper presents a practical guide for leveraging frameworks to improve developmental research. We suggest that frameworks can guide us through a research project’s “map of conceptual terrain”: which questions to ask and how to study them. We first classify these considerations into topic areas (i.e., “regions”), including assumptions and ideas about timescales and processes of developmental change. We then offer a strategy for charting a “path” through these regions, creating chains of logic to make increasingly specific claims and choices, from framework to research practice. As an illustrative example, we use Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological framework to study parent-child relationships, highlighting its affordances and limitations. We also draw contrast with other prominent frameworks, showcasing how different frameworks can alter a researcher’s path. Our proposed explicit and systematic use of frameworks can serve as a powerful navigation system for building and refining research programs. Thus, our paper provides a guide for developmental scientists to more explicitly use and capitalize on frameworks in their empirical research.

Decades of research have shown that adversity tends to be associated with lower working memory (WM) performance. This literature has mainly focused on impairments in the capacity to hold information available in WM for further processing. However, some recent adaptation-based studies suggest that certain types of adversity can leave intact, or even enhance, the ability to rapidly update information in WM. One key challenge is that WM capacity and updating tasks tend to covary, as both types of tasks require the creation and maintenance of bindings in WM; links between mental representations of information in WM. To estimate the associations between adversity and different processes in WM, we need to isolate variance in performance related to WM capacity from variance in performance related to updating ability. In this Registered Report, participants from the Dutch Longitudinal Internet studies for the Social Sciences (LISS) panel completed three WM tasks: two complex span tasks and a task measuring both binding and updating of information. In addition, we estimated participants’ exposure to neighbourhood threat, material deprivation, and unpredictability. We estimated associations between the three types of adversity and latent estimates of WM capacity and updating using structural equation modeling. We did not find consistent associations between adversity and WM capacity or updating, nor did we find evidence that the associations were practically equivalent to zero. Our results show that adversity researchers should account for overlap in WM tasks when estimating specific WM abilities.

We propose the concept of short-term mindsets as an alternative to self-control as envisioned in Gottfredson & Hirschi's self-control theory (SCT). We lay out a competing perspective, short-term mindsets theory (STMT), based on this novel concept. STMT assumes that short-term mindsets are partly rooted in enduring individual differences and in part develop in response to criminogenic environments, events, and experiences. STMT connects individual-level perspectives to sociogenic views by explaining how several risk factors of crime (e.g., negative parenting, delinquent peers, substance use) all impact on short-term mindsets. Exposure to one risk factor encourages short-term mindsets that, in turn, make exposure to other risk factors more likely, thereby increasing the likelihood of crime. We show that STMT enjoys stronger empirical support than SCT, better aligns with other theory, and can account for phenomena typically considered at odds with, or outside the purview of, SCT.

The idea that some abilities might be enhanced by adversity is gaining traction. Adaptation-based approaches have uncovered a few specific abilities enhanced by particular adversity exposures. Yet, for a field to grow, we must not dig too deep, too soon. In this paper, we complement confirmatory research with principled exploration. We draw on two insights from adaptation-based research: 1) enhanced performance manifests within individuals, and 2) reduced and enhanced performance can co-occur. Although commonly assumed, relative performance differences are rarely tested. To quantify them, we need a wide variety of ability measures. However, rather than using adaptive logic to predict which abilities are enhanced or reduced, we develop statistical criteria to identify three data patterns: reduced, enhanced, and intact performance. With these criteria, we analyzed data from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development to investigate how adversity shapes within-person performance across 10 abilities in a cognitive and achievement battery. Our goals are to document adversity-shaped cognitive performance patterns, identify drivers of reduced performance, identify sets of “intact” abilities, and discover new enhanced abilities. We believe principled exploration with clear criteria can help break new theoretical and empirical ground, remap old territory, and advance theory development.