Erin Westgate
@ErinWestgate
Social psychologist, studying boredom, interest, and thinking (...and why it's so hard for so many of us!). Assistant Professor @ University of Florida 🐊
What makes life good? Some of us want a happy life, while others want a meaningful one. But still others want something else - an interesting life. Now in press at PsychRev, Shige Oishi & I make the case for the psychologically rich life as a desirable overlooked alternative 1/n
What makes a life "good"? Is happiness + meaning enough? @Shige_Oishi + @ErinWestgate make a case for "psychological richness" as another component of a good life. Here are my thoughts - I'd love to hear yours! #psychologicalrichness @Medium @sbkaufman medium.com/@nataliepens/p…
Yes. Writing is not a second thing that happens after thinking. The act of writing is an act of thinking. Writing *is* thinking. Students, academics, and anyone else who outsources their writing to LLMs will find their screens full of words and their minds emptied of thought.
Very excited about Alejandro's first paper as a graduate student in my laboratory! Check out his thread describing recent efforts investigating representational geometries for similarity properties. With Megan Peters and Vincent T.D. Looking forward to feedback on this one!
Happy to share my first-ever pre-print !!!! 🚨 on the representational geometry across similarity properties using behavioral judgments, fMRI, and AI/CNNs models 🚨 !! 1/n🧵 preprint: osf.io/preprints/psya…
Two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of speaking at #AspenIdeasHealth about what fuels a good life. Special thanks to @AubreyNPR for asking wonderful questions and @aspenideas for having me! Check out the full conversation: aspenideas.org/sessions/what-… #Wellbeing #PsychologicalRichness
I am once again pitching my romantic comedy: - two academics start dating - discover they are each other's terrible reviewer - hijinks ensue Working title: Love is Double-Blind
Cool paper in Nature using data for a few million kids in France: no gender gap in Maths test scores at the start of first grade, big gap by the end. nature.com/articles/s4158…
Would you prefer to get $0.10 for sure, or a 0.01% chance of getting $1,000 for every bottle recycled? My PhD student extraordinaire Jade Radke tested it with people in British Columbia and Alberta by setting up recycling tables and asking people to return beverage containers.…
People returned more bottles for a .01% chance of $1,000 than a guarantee of 10 cents.
Would you prefer to get $0.10 for sure, or a 0.01% chance of getting $1,000 for every bottle recycled? My PhD student extraordinaire Jade Radke tested it with people in British Columbia and Alberta by setting up recycling tables and asking people to return beverage containers.…
Dads are spending 3-4x as much time with their kids as their dads did with them. When father figures are engaged, kids show better cognitive development, boys have fewer behavioral problems, and girls have fewer emotional problems. Every child deserves strong parental bonds.
What happened when the U.S. sent 400,000 Mexican workers back to Mexico in the 1930s? The employment rate of native workers went down noticeably as a direct result. (Yes, you read that correctly.)
Clear evidence that employers discriminate against nonbinary individuals. All-else-equal, disclosing that one uses "they/them” pronouns substantially lowers the chances of getting a job interview.
What happens when @Airbnb enters an area? Rent and home prices increase as a direct result.
🚨 New paper alert 🚨 In my new paper out now in JPSP (w/@brianjlucas & @jonj), we show across 10 studies (including w/nurses, teachers, & PhD students) that people considering giving up a passion pursuit overestimate how harshly others will judge them 🧵 doi.org/10.1037/pspa00…
Does racial diversity in colleges courses improve academic outcomes? Yup.
honestly didn't expect this is what would happen when i joined a menswear forum 15 years ago
Paper w/ @tcarpenter216 & @Alexgoedderz at PSPB!🚨 The standard IAT is only 5 min long. We found that making the IAT longer by taking it multiple times greatly improves predictive validity. Paper link and 🧵below, with practical advice about how to run IATs!
"having a name that takes longer to pronounce is associated with... 1) a significantly lower likelihood of...obtaining a tenure track position; 2) an initial placement at an institution with lower research productivity"
The tendency to lie is a trait that is consistent across time and settings. If you know someone who lies to other people... they are probably lying to you as well. Another great paper by @IsabelThielmann and colleagues. psycnet.apa.org/record/2025-70…
Psychological richness offers a third path to a good life Review by Shigehiro Oishi (@Shige_Oishi) & Erin Westgate (@ErinWestgate) tinyurl.com/2w65k9vd
J.P. Morgan says get rich - psychologically! It is exciting to see "Life in Three Dimensions" kicking off the @jpmorgan Summer Reading List 2025. lnkd.in/dwunHbrm #PsychologicalRichness #WellBeing #Curiosity #SummerReading