This article reviews the state of the art of available theories and data regarding the psychology of terrorism. Data and theoretical material were gathered from the world’s unclassified literature. Multiple theories and some demographic data have been published, but very few controlled empirical studies have been conducted investigating the psychological bases of terrorism. The field is largely...

Psychological theories and research often assume nations are culturally homogeneous and stable. But global demographic, political, and economic changes and massive immigration have sparked new scholarly and policy interest in cultural diversity and change within nations. This chapter reviews interdisciplinary advances linking culture and psychological development. These challenge and strengthen...

What psychological factors drive the popularity of conspiracy theories, which explain important events as secret plots by powerful and malevolent groups? What are the psychological consequences of adopting these theories? We review the current research and find that it answers the first of these questions more thoroughly than the second. Belief in conspiracy theories appears to be driven by mot...

In a recent article entitled ‘What has functional neuroimaging told us about the mind (so far)?’ Coltheart ( 2006 ) concludes that the answer to this question is: ‘nothing’. The essential reason for this gloomy assessment about the value of functional neuroimaging for cognitive psychology boils down to this essential argument, namely, that since psychological theories do not make predictions ab...

The doctrine of double effect (DDE) is a moral principle that distinguishes between harm we cause as a means to an end and harm that we cause as a side-effect. As a purely descriptive matter, the DDE is well established that it describes a consistent feature of human moral judgment. There are, however, several rival theories of its psychological cause. I review these theories and consider their...

Advances in autonomous agent technology have resulted in the potential for implementations of multiple agents to act as psychological theories of complex social and affective phenomena. Simulating attachment behaviours in infancy provides a relatively simple starting point for this type of theory development. The presence of neurophysiological, psychological and other types of data facilitates ...

According to the World Health Organization every 40 seconds, someone somewhere in world dies from suicide. The number of suicide attempts that do not end with death is twenty times larger than deaths. For decades researchers have been developing theories and models aiming explain why people kill themselves. At same time, they are trying provide tools for successful prediction emphasize differen...