Nilám Ram
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View article: Better together: Coexperienced positive emotions and cortisol secretion in the daily lives of older couples.
Better together: Coexperienced positive emotions and cortisol secretion in the daily lives of older couples. Open
An emerging body of research suggests that shared positive emotions predict health and longevity over and above individually experienced positive emotions. However, the extent to which relationship partners coexperience positive emotions i…
View article: Examining the Temporal Dynamics of Risk Communication During Extreme Weather Events: Insights From a Scoping Review
Examining the Temporal Dynamics of Risk Communication During Extreme Weather Events: Insights From a Scoping Review Open
As extreme weather events unfold on a timescale of minutes, hours, or days, individuals must respond accordingly. Dynamic risk communication —that is, risk communication that updates alongside evolving risks—can support individuals in maki…
View article: Time-Related Considerations for Modeling Event-Based Data Collected via Ecological Momentary Assessment
Time-Related Considerations for Modeling Event-Based Data Collected via Ecological Momentary Assessment Open
Ecological momentary assessments (EMAs) and wearable devices afford opportunities to collect real-time data on events experienced in daily life. Examples of event-based data in the psychological and behavioral sciences include smoking a ci…
View article: Smartphone Use Among Adolescents During School Hours: High-Intensity Objective Observations Across Different Instructional Contexts
Smartphone Use Among Adolescents During School Hours: High-Intensity Objective Observations Across Different Instructional Contexts Open
Adolescent smartphone use in school, and how it shapes learning and development, has gained substantial attention. Yet, objective data on digital behavior during school hours is limited. This study uses high-intensity smartphone observatio…
View article: Stanford Screenomics: An Open-source Platform for Unobtrusive Multimodal Digital Trace Data Collection from Android Smartphones
Stanford Screenomics: An Open-source Platform for Unobtrusive Multimodal Digital Trace Data Collection from Android Smartphones Open
Smartphone-based digital trace data can offer powerful insights for identifying behavioral patterns and health risks. However, existing tools for comprehensive data collection lack scalability, customizability, transparency, and accessibil…
View article: Smartphone screen time and suicide risk in daily life captured through high-resolution screenshot data
Smartphone screen time and suicide risk in daily life captured through high-resolution screenshot data Open
Suicide rates are rising in the U.S., prompting interest in contributing factors like smartphone use. While screen time has been linked to mental health, its role in suicide risk is unclear. This study examined bidirectional associations b…
View article: How spousal bereavement shapes life satisfaction: Stability and change across historical time
How spousal bereavement shapes life satisfaction: Stability and change across historical time Open
Spousal bereavement is one of the most disruptive life events encountered during adulthood. However, we know little about whether and how the impacts of spousal loss on well-being have changed over the past decades. To examine such histori…
View article: Digital Inequality and Access by Low-Income Individuals to Public Benefits
Digital Inequality and Access by Low-Income Individuals to Public Benefits Open
This study presents novel data on digital inequality to describe differences in individuals’ online interactions with public and private sector services. Using two-month smartphone tracking data collected every five seconds from 65 low- an…
View article: Media Content Atlas: A Pipeline to Explore and Investigate Multidimensional Media Space using Multimodal LLMs
Media Content Atlas: A Pipeline to Explore and Investigate Multidimensional Media Space using Multimodal LLMs Open
As digital media use continues to evolve and influence various aspects of life, developing flexible and scalable tools to study complex media experiences is essential. This study introduces the Media Content Atlas (MCA), a novel pipeline d…
View article: Relationship Transitions and Well-Being in Middle-Aged and Older Men and Women
Relationship Transitions and Well-Being in Middle-Aged and Older Men and Women Open
Objectives. Previous research indicates that men benefit more in their well-being from cohabitation and marriage than women. Accordingly, we examined whether men's well-being improves more than women’s well-being when moving in with a part…
View article: Person-Specific Analyses of Smartphone Use and Mental Health: Intensive Longitudinal Study
Person-Specific Analyses of Smartphone Use and Mental Health: Intensive Longitudinal Study Open
Background Contrary to popular concerns about the harmful effects of media use on mental health, research on this relationship is ambiguous, stalling advances in theory, interventions, and policy. Scientific explorations of the relationshi…
View article: Smartphone-based text obtained via passive sensing as it relates to direct suicide risk assessment
Smartphone-based text obtained via passive sensing as it relates to direct suicide risk assessment Open
Background Recent research highlights the dynamics of suicide risk, resulting in a shift toward real-time methodologies, such as ecological momentary assessment (EMA), to improve suicide risk identification. However, EMA’s reliance on acti…
View article: A functionalist perspective of young children’s anger and sadness.
A functionalist perspective of young children’s anger and sadness. Open
Functional emotion theory defines anger as appraisal that a goal is blocked and readiness to act to overcome the obstacle-to approach, and sadness as appraisal that a goal is lost and readiness to relinquish effort-to withdraw. We test rel…
View article: Agreement between self-reported and objectively measured smartphone use among adolescents and adults
Agreement between self-reported and objectively measured smartphone use among adolescents and adults Open
Almost everything we think we know about the prevalence, correlates, risks, and benefits of smartphone use is based on individuals’ self-reported estimates of use. Addressing the need for research on digital recall accuracy among adolescen…
View article: LATE-LIFE SINGLEHOOD AND WELL-BEING: THE ROLE OF MARITAL STATUS AND SOCIAL RESOURCES
LATE-LIFE SINGLEHOOD AND WELL-BEING: THE ROLE OF MARITAL STATUS AND SOCIAL RESOURCES Open
Singlehood has long been identified as a potential risk factor for undermining well-being across adulthood, particularly in older ages. However, it is an open question what role other social resources may play. In the current study, we exa…
View article: PREDICTING MORTALITY IN ADULTS USING TRANSFORMERS: INSIGHTS FROM THE HEALTH AND RETIREMENT STUDY
PREDICTING MORTALITY IN ADULTS USING TRANSFORMERS: INSIGHTS FROM THE HEALTH AND RETIREMENT STUDY Open
We introduce a natural language processing (NLP)-based prediction model to predict next-wave mortality in respondents from the US-based Health and Retirement Study (HRS). Akin to how NLP models can be used to predict future words in a sent…
View article: Personality Differences Drive Conversational Dynamics: A High-Dimensional NLP Approach
Personality Differences Drive Conversational Dynamics: A High-Dimensional NLP Approach Open
This paper investigates how the topical flow of dyadic conversations emerges over time and how differences in interlocutors' personality traits contribute to this topical flow. Leveraging text embeddings, we map the trajectories of $N = 16…
View article: Can Social Media Engagement Predict Election Results? Bandwagon Effects of Tweets About US Senate Candidates
Can Social Media Engagement Predict Election Results? Bandwagon Effects of Tweets About US Senate Candidates Open
The social media platform X (formerly Twitter) has grown to become an important venue for political discourse, with candidates using it integrally in their election campaigns. However, it is not clear if activity on Twitter can be used to …
View article: Developmental differences in young children's implied use of cognitive resources in their self‐regulation strategies
Developmental differences in young children's implied use of cognitive resources in their self‐regulation strategies Open
The emergence of self‐regulation during the preschool years is due, in part, to children's development of cognitive resources that can regulate their behavior. However, there is little direct evidence that age influences the extent to whic…
View article: Affective Sensitivity to Air Pollution (ASAP): Person-specific associations between daily air pollution and affective states
Affective Sensitivity to Air Pollution (ASAP): Person-specific associations between daily air pollution and affective states Open
Individuals’ sensitivity to climate hazards is a central component of their vulnerability to climate change. In this paper, we introduce and outline the utility of a new intraindividual variability construct, affective sensitivity to air p…
View article: (Mis)measurement of Political Content Exposure within the Smartphone Ecosystem
(Mis)measurement of Political Content Exposure within the Smartphone Ecosystem Open
The affordances of the smartphone are shifting individuals toward ever smaller and more fragmented units of political experience. In this piece, we make use of a novel approach to granular assessment of political exposure on smartphones, r…
View article: “What’s yours is mine”: Partners’ everyday emotional experiences and cortisol in older adult couples
“What’s yours is mine”: Partners’ everyday emotional experiences and cortisol in older adult couples Open
The existing literature consistently finds that emotional experiences and cortisol secretion are linked at the within-person level. Further, relationship partners tend to covary in emotional experience, and in cortisol secretion. However, …
View article: How are Conversations via an On-Demand Peer-To-Peer Emotional Well-Being App Associated with Emotional Improvement?
How are Conversations via an On-Demand Peer-To-Peer Emotional Well-Being App Associated with Emotional Improvement? Open
Non-clinical, on-demand peer-to-peer (PtP) support apps have become increasingly popular over the past several years. Although not as pervasive as general self-help apps, these PtP support apps are usually free and instantly connect indivi…
View article: Modeling and managing behavior change in groups: A Boolean network method
Modeling and managing behavior change in groups: A Boolean network method Open
Social influence processes can induce desired or undesired behavior change in individual members of a group. Empirical modeling of group processes and the design of network-based interventions meant to promote desired behavior change is so…
View article: Person-Specific Analyses of Smartphone Use and Mental Health: Intensive Longitudinal Study (Preprint)
Person-Specific Analyses of Smartphone Use and Mental Health: Intensive Longitudinal Study (Preprint) Open
BACKGROUND Contrary to popular concerns about the harmful effects of media use on mental health, research on this relationship is ambiguous, stalling advances in theory, interventions, and policy. Scientific explorations of the relationsh…