Perhaps surprisingly, the field study showed no significant difference in portion sizes given to men vs. women. Hard to know exactly why this occurred, but one possibility is that standardization in serving practices at such restaurants may have limited the impact of gender on portion decisions.

But my favorite (and most expensive) part is the field study, where we sent 91 pairs of men and women – matched on BMI -- to fast-casual restaurants where they ordered the exact same meal from the same server separated by a few minutes. We then weighed their portions outside the restaurant.

Another study showed that these stereotypes impact memory. Using a “Who ordered what?” paradigm found that people remembered counter-stereotypical pairings (women with large portions, men with small portions) better than stereotype-consistent ones!

New lab paper in JESP! What is the association between gender and food portion sizes? And how might such associations impact actual real-world treatment? We used lab and field studies to explore this question 🍽️

Read much more about this (open access) work, led by lab members Elisabeth Irvine and William Li, here: authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...

This field study finding was far from obvious, though – a majority of both a laypeople and social psychologist sample predicted that men would receive larger portions than women in our field study.

Perhaps surprisingly, the field study showed no significant difference in portion sizes given to men vs. women. Hard to know exactly why this occurred, but one possibility is that standardization in serving practices at such restaurants may have limited the impact of gender on portion decisions.

First, studies using both direct and indirect measures found that gender-portion stereotypes exist -- people consistently associate men with larger food portions and women with smaller portions, even when using the exact same foods but just showing different amounts.

2024 was the first year I kept track of every book I read, so for no reason here is what I read - in order - over the year. Top 5 in bold.

In a study with over 35k participants and 75 topics, explicit attitudes were more reliable than implicit attitudes (IAT). At the same time, we found substantial variability in test-retest reliability for implicit and explicit attitudes across topics, even when tested within a single study session.

New paper in JPSP with @elianeroy.bsky.social ! Here, we ask: Is measuring attitudes more like playing darts or more like searching for a prize in a ”claw” machine? More details in the thread below....

One takeaway? Many attitudes may not be as fixed as we think. Even self-reported, explicit attitudes showed notable levels of inconsistency even when measured just minutes apart.

A follow-up study was able to replicate this general pattern in a longitudinal sample whose attitudes were measured three weeks apart.

Predictors of reliability for both implicit and explicit attitudes were characterized more by their similarities than their differences. Attitudes experienced as high in distinctiveness, certainty, familiarity, and self-relevance had higher reliability for both implicit and explicit attitudes.

In a study with over 35k participants and 75 topics, explicit attitudes were more reliable than implicit attitudes (IAT). At the same time, we found substantial variability in test-retest reliability for implicit and explicit attitudes across topics, even when tested within a single study session.

Attitudes could be like a dartboard – fixed and stable – and any differences in reliability could then be attributed to measurement error. Or, measuring attitudes could be like a claw machine, where a measure pulls from a mix of available responses that are present at any moment.

We also found that more diverse organizations did not lead to a higher rate of applications, both from majority and minority group members (if anything, having only racial or only gender diversity suppressed applications).

Job seekers (N > 30,000) were randomly assigned to view versions of an organization whose employees varied in racial and gender diversity. We then tracked how these images impacted applicant behavior (N > 1500 applicants).

Reading ‘When Prophecy Fails’ and love the occasional references to Mr. Keech, the beleaguered non-believer husband of Mrs. Keech, the group leader. On the night when the UFO was supposed to show up at midnight, with 15 followers eagerly awaiting their salvation, Mr. Keech went to bed at 9:00…