Participant diversity in Psychophysiology

Abstract

The Society for Psychophysiological Research and accompanying journal, Psychophysiology, have increasingly incorporated diversity and inclusion into their posted values, conference programming, and science. Much of this focus on equity, diversity, and inclusion work has occurred since 2010. The current review content analyzed the articles published in Psychophysiology from 2010 through 2020 to determine if SPR and Psychophysiology's commitment to diversity and inclusion has resulted in changes to reporting and analysis of participant demographics. Demographic reporting practices were compared to APA reporting standards and the use of demographic variables assessed according to the guidance proffered in the introduction to Psychophysiology's 2016 Special Issue on Diversity and Representation. Results of the content analysis indicated near perfect reporting of biological sex and frequent reporting of average age. Age range and educational attainment were reported in over half of studies, while race or ethnicity were reported in only 17%. Socioeconomic status, income, gender identity, and sexual orientation were almost never reported. In over 60% of studies at least one major demographic variable was reported, but was not used in preliminary, main, or supplementary analyses as a covariate, moderator, or otherwise. SPR and Psychophysiology should continue advocating for increased reporting of major demographic variables and ethical analysis of demographic modulation of various psychophysiological mechanisms. We provide a preliminary template of reporting standards and call for the inclusion of more open science practices by psychophysiologists.

Task-Specific Relationships Between Error-Related ERPs and Behavior: Flanker, Stroop, and Go/Nogo Tasks

“…There is evidence that different versions of the same task can moderate ERP scores (Clayson, Rocha, et al, 2023;Clayson, 2024), and it is possible that other versions of each task might show stronger (or weaker) relationships between previous-trial ERPs and subsequent behavior. Nonetheless, the present study demonstrated a number of strengths including the large sample size for an ERP study (Clayson et al, 2019;Kissel & Friedman, 2023) Taken together, task-specific relationships were observed for the relationships between performance monitoring indices of ERP and behavior. Although only the Stroop task showed consistent relationships between previous-trial ERN/Pe and subsequent behavior, future research might consider using multiverse-like approaches to understand whether the task used for recording performance monitoring indices is an important moderator of ERP-behavior relationships (for review of multiverse approaches in psychophysiological research, see Clayson, 2024).…”

Participant diversity in ACER: 2010–2022

“…As such, content analyses like that in the current paper can provide information about who is included in research, as well as published research articles' alignment with reporting standards applicable to that field. Most content analyses have examined APA journals, though there is a growing interest in participant diversity in biomedical-related methods and journals (e.g., Jones et al, 2020;Kissel & Friedman, 2023;Lee, 2009;Pedersen et al, 2022;Schick et al, 2022). Of these recent content analyses, Pedersen et al (2022) found limited reporting of sociodemographic information of participants and inaccuracies in language regarding identities in psychiatry research, and Schick et al (2022) Schick et al (2022) noted that studies failed to list or address lack of representative samples as a limitation.…”

Psychophysiology in 2024: Publishing on the science of brain, body, and behavior

“…Across the behavioral and biological sciences, technological advancements have in many ways increased fragmentation rather than fostering standardization of methods and research records (Botvinik-Nezer et al, 2020). Questions have been asked regarding replicability and reproducibility of published findings (Dreber et al, 2015); the ethics of publishing behind paywalls and limiting access to affluent readers, institutions, or nations have been scrutinized (Garrett-Ruffin et al, 2021); the lack of diversity, equity, and inclusivity in the scientific record has been identified as problematic (Kissel & Friedman, 2023). Where does this leave a journal such as Psychophysiology?…”