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matan rubin

Comparing the value of perceived humanversus AI-generated empathy

16 July, 2025

new paper published in Nature Human Behaviour by Matan Rubin, Prof. Anat Perry, and colleagues, explores whether empathic responses are perceived differently when attributed to a human versus artificial intelligence.

Across nine studies with over 6,000 participants, the researchers found that identically generated empathic messages were rated as more empathic, supportive, and authentic when thought to come from a human.

oded leshem

Congratulation to Dr. Oded Adomi Leshem

2 July, 2025

Who won ISPP’s 2025 David O. Sears Best Book Award for his book "Hope Amidst Conflict: Philosophical and Psychological Explorations," Published by Oxford University Press.

Leshem is a senior researcher at the PICR lab and the founder of the new International Hub for Hope Research.

David O. Sears Best Book on Mass Politics Award

Amir Tal

Welcome Dr. Amir Tal

24 June, 2025

The Department of Psychology is excited to welcome Dr. Amir Tal, a new faculty member joining the department in collaboration with the Department of Cognitive Science and the Brain. Amir will join us in the upcoming academic year (2025–2026) and will lead the Computational Psychology cluster.

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If you don’t let it in, you don’t have to get it out: Thought preemption as a method to control unwanted thoughts

21 July, 2022
Eran Eldar

Trying to stop thinking unwanted, often repetitive thoughts is a familiar experience. However, being aware of such attempts implies that the thought has already reached consciousness. Can we preempt an unwanted thought from coming to mind in the first place?

In a new study, Dr. Isaac Fradkin and Dr. Eran Eldar have examined this question using a free association task where people were instructed to avoid repeating associations. The study has shown that to meet the task, people principally reject and replace unwanted associations after they have already reached consciousness. Another prominent finding was that, in general, thinking and reporting a thought dramatically increases its strength, making it even more likely to be generated the future. However, people instructed to suppress repeated associations were able to partially avoid this self-reinforcing effect of thoughts. Thus, whereas people cannot completely avoid unwanted thoughts, this study suggests a novel mechanism allowing people to make sure unwanted thoughts do not become excessively repetitive.

See full article here