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How does imagining future events – whether positive or negative – influence our choices in the present? Prior work has shown the simulation of hypothetical future events, dubbed episodic future thinking, can alter the propensity to engage in delay discounting (the tendency to devalue future rewards) and does so in a valence specific manner. Some research shows that positive episodic future thinking reduces delay discounting, whereas negative future thinking augments it. However, more recent research indicates that both positive and negative episodic future thinking reduce delay discounting, suggesting an effect of episodic future thinking that is independent of valence (Bulley et al., 2019). In the present study, we sought to replicate and extend these latter findings. Here, participants ( N=604; N=572 after exclusions) completed an online study. In the baseline task, participants completed a delay discounting task. In the experimental task, they engaged in episodic future thinking before completing a second delay discounting task. Participants were randomly assigned to engage in either positive, neutral, or negative episodic future thinking. In accordance with Bulley et al., we found that episodic future thinking, regardless of valence, reduced delay discounting. Although episodic future thinking shifted decision-making in all conditions, the effect was stronger when participants engaged in positive episodic future thinking, even after accounting for personal relevance and vividness of imagined events. These findings suggest that episodic future thinking may promote future-oriented choices by contextualizing the future, and this effect is further strengthened when the future is tied to positive emotion.

How much we value the welfare of others has critical implications for the collective good. Yet, it is unclear what leads people to make more or less equal decisions about the welfare of those from whom they are socially distant. The current research sought to explore the psychological mechanisms that might underlie welfare judgments across social distance. Here, a social discounting paradigm was used to measure the tendency for the value of a reward to be discounted as the social distance of its recipient increased. Across two cohorts (one discovery, one replication), we found that a more expansive identity with all of humanity was associated with reduced social discounting. Additionally, we investigated the specificity of this association by examining whether this relationship extended to delay discounting, the tendency for the value of a reward to be discounted as the temporal distance to its receipt increases. Our findings suggest that the observed association with identity was unique to social discounting, thus underscoring a distinction in value-based decision-making processes across distances in time and across social networks. As data were collected during the COVID-19 pandemic, we also considered how stress associated with this global threat might influence welfare judgements across social distances. We found that, even after controlling for COVID-19 related stress, correlations between identity and social discounting held. Together these findings elucidate the psychological processes that are associated with a more equal distribution of generosity.

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Introduction Most burn injuries are preventable, and appropriate first aid post-injury results in improved outcomes for the patient as well as a reduced burden on the healthcare system. Many patients turn to internet resources for education and management approaches for their burn injuries. With the rising popularity of social media platforms for the promotion of health information, this creates a more accessible educational realm for those who may not know where to otherwise access informational resources. However, most content on social media is not validated or reliable. Previous studies have investigated the quality of online burn prevention, education, and management videos on platforms such as YouTube. In this study, we attempt to assess the quality of such videos on TikTok, a newer and rapidly growing platform. Methods Videos on TikTok were searched for using 27 keywords (hashtags) such as #burn, #education, #prevention, #management, and #firstaid. The first 30 videos for each hashtag were reviewed. The Global Quality Scale (GQS) was used to assess the quality of the videos that fell within the inclusion criteria. Metrics such as views, viewer engagement, commentary, and likes were also examined. Results Of 525 reviewed videos, 72 met inclusion criteria. 47.2% (n=34) were on first aid or medical management, 33.4% (n=31) were on basic information, and 9.7% (n=7) were on prevention. Only 5.6% (n=4) videos cited sources. The mean GQS score was 2.45. 50% of videos (n=36) were made by creators with medical training, and of those videos, the GQS score was 3.13, whereas content made by creators with no medical training had a mean GQS of 1.81 (p < 0.001). The excluded videos (n=453) fell into 6 main categories: unrelated (n=273), burn wounds (n=106), personal experiences (n=49), advertisements (n=8), questions (n=2), and non-English videos (n=15). Viewership varied from 41 to 4.2 million views. Conclusions Overall, information regarding burns on TikTok is unsatisfactory. Additionally, viewers are more drawn to lower quality videos. While quality varies amongst the different sources and is dependent on the creator, there is a significant gap in reliable content regarding burns, demonstrating an opportunity for validated content creation in this realm. Patients must exert caution and be selective when using TikTok as an educational resource regarding burns. Applicability of Research to Practice This review addresses key gaps in the knowledge base on TikTok for reliable burn information. This will later be used as a framework to create a series of educational videos for patients.