For centuries, the ubiquity of language and music across human societies has prompted scholars to speculate about their cross-cultural origins as well as their shared and unique characteristics. Depending on the extent to which contemporary theories emphasise the role of biology vs. culture, a range of hypotheses have been proposed concerning expected similarities and differences in song and speech. One class of hypotheses stemming from cultural relativism assumes a lack of universal regularities in song and speech, and therefore predicts no systematic cross-cultural relationships. On the other hand, more recent evolutionary hypotheses such as the social bonding hypothesis, motor constraint hypothesis, and sexual selection hypothesis all predict differences or similarities in specific characteristic of vocalisations, such as pitch regularity, pitch interval size, and melodic contour. Existing results are mixed in their support of these predictions.

 

In the current study, Ozaki et al. (2022) embark on an ambitious project to elucidate cross-cultural similarities and differences between speech and song in 81 different linguistic varieties spanning 23 language families. Understanding precisely how song and speech are related is methodologically challenging due to the multitude of confounds that can arise in comparing natural recordings. Here the authors overcome these difficulties with four types of carefully controlled recordings: singing, recitation of sung lyrics, spoken description of the song, and instrumental version of the sung melody. The authors will then examine six features that are amenable to reliable comparison, including pitch height, temporal rate, pitch stability, timbral brightness, pitch interval size, and pitch declination. With this data in hand, the authors will ask which acoustic features differ reliably between song and speech across cultures, with the expectation that song will exhibit higher pitch, slower rate and more stable pitch than speech. At the same time, the authors expect song and speech to be reliably similar in the characteristics of timbral brightness, pitch intervals and pitch contours. In addition to these confirmatory tests, the authors will explore variation across a range of additional stimulus characteristics and ancillary research questions.

 

The Stage 1 manuscript was evaluated over two rounds of in-depth review. Based on detailed responses to the reviewers' comments, the recommender judged that the manuscript met the Stage 1 criteria and therefore awarded in-principle acceptance (IPA).

 

 

Level of bias control achieved: Level 2. At least some data/evidence that will be used to answer the research question has been accessed and partially observed by the authors, but the authors certify that they have not yet observed the key variables within the data that will be used to answer the research question AND they have taken additional steps to maximise bias control and rigour.

 

 

 

1. Ozaki, Y., Savage P. E. et al. (2022). Similarities and differences in a global sample of song and speech recordings, in principle acceptance of Version 2 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/jdhtz

​​We are bombarded with news about current events from multiple sources: print media, digital media, friends, family, and more. At the same time, there is an imperative to “stay informed” and be knowledgeable of happenings both local and global. But how much knowledge do we actually gain from this bombardment of information? How informed are we really? It turns out that our perceptions of our knowledge tends to overstate our actual knowledge of a topic. This “illusion of knowledge” effect has been studied across a wide variety of contexts, but is especially relevant for understanding how people learn about and interact with politicized topics.

 

In the current study, Ruzzante et al. (2023) propose to further our understanding of the illusion of knowledge effect in the context of news exposure on social media. They will use an online pre-post experimental design that assesses participants’ perceived knowledge of a number of topics prior to the manipulation, which involves exposure to different social media news feeds, coming two weeks later. Central to the study, participants will be randomized to news stories that differ in their degree of self-involvement, that is how emotionally involved the topics are. Ruzzante et al. will test the hypothesis that more highly self-involved topics (e.g., abortion) will lead to a greater illusion of knowledge effect than less self-involved topics (e.g., feline immunodeficiency).

 

The Stage 1 manuscript was evaluated over two rounds of in-depth peer review, the first consisting of substantial comments from three scholars with relevant expertise, and the second consisting of a close review by the recommender. Based on detailed responses to the reviewers' comments, the recommender judged that the manuscript met the Stage 1 criteria and was therefore awarded in-principle acceptance (IPA).

 

URL to the preregistered Stage 1 protocol: https://osf.io/qa7tb
 
Level of bias control achieved: Level 6. No part of the data or evidence that will be used to answer the research question yet exists and no part will be generated until after IPA.
 
List of eligible PCI RR-friendly journals:
 

 

 

1. Ruzzante, F., Cevolani, G., & Panizza, F. (2023). Scrolling to wisdom: The impact of social media news exposure on knowledge perception. In principle acceptance of Version 5 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/qa7tb

Comparative research is how evidence is generated to support or refute broad hypotheses (e.g., Pagel 1999). However, the foundations of such research must be solid if one is to arrive at the correct conclusions. Determining the external validity (the generalizability across situations/individuals/populations) of the building blocks of comparative data sets allows one to place appropriate caveats around the robustness of their conclusions (Steckler & McLeroy 2008).

 

In this registered report, Alley and colleagues plan to tackle the external validity of comparative research that relies on subjects who are either university students or participating in experiments via an online platform (Alley et al. 2023). They will determine whether data from these two types of subjects have measurement equivalence - whether the same trait is measured in the same way across groups. Although they use data from studies involved in the Many Labs replication project to evaluate this question, their results will be of crucial importance to other comparative researchers whose data are generated from these two sources (students and online crowdsourcing). If Alley and colleagues show that these two types of subjects have measurement equivalence, then this indicates that it is more likely that equivalence could hold for other studies relying on these type of subjects as well. If measurement equivalence is not found, then it is a warning to others to evaluate their experimental design to improve validity. In either case, it gives researchers a way to test measurement equivalence for themselves because the code is well annotated and openly available for others to use.

The Stage 1 manuscript was evaluated over two rounds of in-depth review. Based on detailed responses to the reviewers' comments, the recommender judged that the manuscript met the Stage 1 criteria and therefore awarded in-principle acceptance (IPA).

 

Level of bias control achieved: Level 2. At least some data/evidence that will be used to answer the research question has been accessed and partially observed by the authors, but the authors certify that they have not yet observed the key variables within the data that will be used to answer the research question AND they have taken additional steps to maximise bias control and rigour (e.g. conservative statistical threshold; recruitment of a blinded analyst; robustness testing, multiverse/specification analysis, or other approach) 

 

 

• Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science
• F1000Research
• Peer Community Journal
• PeerJ
• Royal Society Open Science
• Swiss Psychology Open

 

 

Alley L. J., Axt, J., & Flake J. K. (2023). Convenience Samples and Measurement Equivalence in Replication Research, in principle acceptance of Version 4 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/7gtvf

 

Steckler, A. & McLeroy, K. R. (2008). The importance of external validity. American Journal of Public Health 98, 9-10. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2007.126847

 

Pagel, M. (1999). Inferring the historical patterns of biological evolution. Nature, 401, 877-884. https://doi.org/10.1038/44766

The Spatial-Numerical Association of Response Codes (SNARC) effect refers to the fact that smaller numbers receive faster responses with the left hand, and larger numbers with the right hand (Dehaene et al., 1993). This robust finding implies that numbers are associated with space, being represented on a mental number line that progresses from left to right. The SNARC effect is held to depend on relative number magnitude, with the mental number line dynamically adjusting to the numerical range used in a given context. This characterisation is based on significant effects of relative number magnitude, with no significant influence of absolute number magnitude. However, a failure to reject the null hypothesis, within the standard frequentist statistical framework, is not firm evidence for the absence of an effect. In this Stage 1 Registered Report, Roth and colleagues (2023) propose two experiments adapted from Dahaene’s (1993) original methods, with a Bayesian statistical approach to confirm—or rule out—a small effect (d = 0.15) of absolute number magnitude in modulating the classic SNARC effect.

 

The study plan was refined across two rounds of review, with input from two external reviewers and the recommender, after which it was judged to satisfy the Stage 1 criteria for in-principle acceptance (IPA).

 

URL to the preregistered Stage 1 protocol: https://osf.io/ae2c8
 
Level of bias control achieved: Level 6. No part of the data or evidence that will be used to answer the research question yet exists and no part will be generated until after IPA.
 
List of eligible PCI RR-friendly journals:
 

 
References

 

Dehaene, S., Bossini, S., & Giraux, P. (1993). The mental representation of parity and number magnitude. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 122(3), 371–396. https://doi.org/10.1037/0096-3445.122.3.371

 

Roth, L., Caffier, J., Reips, U.-D., Nuerk, H.-C., & Cipora, K. (2023). One and only SNARC? A Registered Report on the SNARC Effect’s Range Dependency. In principle acceptance of Version 3 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/ae2c8

The detour task, where an individual has to navigate around a see-through barrier in order to reach a goal, is one of the oldest paradigms used in animal cognition research (Kabadayi et al. 2018). While these previous tests have documented variation in the ability of animals to inhibit going straight for the visible but blocked reward, the cognitive underpinnings of this behaviour are as yet not fully understood. In the current study, Dewulf et al. (2023) propose to assess one of the specific cognitive processes that might be involved in this behaviour. Through experimental procedures, they will compare the role of signal detection in inhibitory response performance in a detour task. To assess whether variation in detection of the barrier might be linked to the ecological niche of a species, they will compare four bird species who live in different environments. Individuals from these four species were previously tested in a detour task (Regolin et al. 1994, Zucca et al. 2005), and the proposed research plan therefore also involves a partial replication of previous studies on the same issue, but improving some critical aspects.

 

The Stage 1 manuscript was evaluated over one round of in-depth review. Based on detailed responses to the reviewers' comments, the recommender judged that the manuscript met the Stage 1 criteria and therefore awarded in-principle acceptance (IPA).

 

Level of bias control achieved: Level 6. No part of the data or evidence that will be used to answer the research question yet exists and no part will be generated until after IPA. 

 

 

 

• Experimental Psychology
• Journal of Cognition
• Peer Community Journal
• PeerJ
• Royal Society Open Science

 

 

Dewulf, A., Garcia-Co, C., Müller, W., Madden, J.R., Martel, A., Lens, L. & Verbruggen, F. (2023). Do Ecological Valid Stop Signals Aid Detour Performance? A Comparison of Four Bird Species. In principle acceptance of Version 2 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/qvxgh

 

Kabadayi, C., Bobrowicz, K., & Osvath, M. (2018). The detour paradigm in animal cognition. Animal Cognition, 21, 21-35. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-017-1152-0

 

Regolin L, G Vallortigara, and M Zanforlin (1994). Perceptual and motivational aspects of detour behaviour in young chicks. Animal Behaviour 47, 123–131. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1006/anbe.1994.1014

 

Zucca P, F Antonelli, and G Vallortigara (2005). Detour behaviour in three species of birds: quails (Coturnix sp.), herring gulls (Larus cachinnans) and canaries (Serinus canaria). Animal Cognition, 8, 122–128. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-004-0243-x