An International Journal of Innovative Theory in Psychology

New Ideas in Psychology is a journal for theoretical psychology in its broadest sense. We are looking for new and seminal ideas, from within Psychology and from other fields that have something to bring to Psychology. We welcome presentations and criticisms of theory, of background metaphysics, and of fundamental issues of method, both empirical and conceptual. We put special emphasis on the need for informed discussion of psychological theories to be interdisciplinary. Empirical papers are accepted at New Ideas in Psychology, but only as long as they focus on conceptual issues and are theoretically creative. We are also open to comments or debate, interviews, and book reviews.

Special Issue on Probabilistic nature of perception and cognition
Submission Date: 2024-11-30

This special issue aims to provide an interdisciplinary platform for researchers and theoreticians to discuss the most recent developments on this topic with the goal of assessing the explanatory value of probabilistic theories in perceptual and cognitive psychology.

Guest editors:

Omer Daglar Tanrikulu,
University of New Hampshire
Email: omerdaglar.tanrikulu@unh.edu

Árni Kristjánsson
University of Iceland
Email: ak@hi.is

Special issue information:

Within cognitive psychology, the brain is considered an information-processing system, making inferences about the external environment from sensory input and stored information. However, the available information incorporates uncertainty due to external and internal noise. This inherent uncertainty in perceptual and cognitive representations suggests that the nature of these inferences is probabilistic. With advances in mathematical modeling, such probabilistic (esp. Bayesian) approaches have become a unifying framework for studying human cognition, and are becoming increasingly dominant in contemporary research in perceptual psychology.

Despite the popularity of the assumption that perception/cognition represents the environment as an array of probabilistically weighted options, there has yet to be a consensus on the psychological and neural validity of such models. Experiments that directly investigate whether the brain represents information as probability distributions are currently limited. Designing experiments to test the core assumptions of such probabilistic accounts has proved challenging. The high computational complexity of probabilistic calculations can be regarded as a challenge to the feasibility of the brain implementing such computations. Even if the brain approximates such complex computations, the exact nature of this approximation is unknown. These probabilistic theories appear to clash with our everyday visual experience since we don't perceive the world as a constantly shifting “Bayesian blur”.

Manuscript submission information:

The Journal’s submission system is open for receiving submissions to our Special Issue. To ensure that all manuscripts are correctly identified for inclusion into the special issue, it is important to select “VSI: Probabilistic cognition” when you reach the “Article Type” step in the submission process.

Please submit your manuscript via submission portal before 30 November 2024.

For any inquiries about the appropriateness of contribution topics, please contact Dr. Omer Daglar Tanrikulu via omerdaglar.tanrikulu@unh.edu

All the submissions deemed suitable to be sent for peer review will be reviewed by at least two independent reviewers. Upon its editorial acceptance, your article will go into production immediately. It will be published in the latest regular issue, while be presented on the specific Special Issue webpage simultaneously. In regular issues, Special Issue articles will be clearly marked and branded.

Please ensure you read the Guide for Authors before writing your manuscript. The Guide for Authors and link to submit your manuscript is available on the Journal’s homepage here.

Keywords:

(probability) OR (probabilistic) AND
(perception) OR (vision) AND
(cognition) AND
(cognitive science) OR (cognitive psychology)
(Bayesian) AND
(representation) or (mental representation)

Special Issue on Motivation and meaning
Submission Date: 2025-04-30

The special issue main theme is motivational factors and meaning in life, from theory to practice.Passion, perseverance, growth mindset, self-efficacy, flow, meaning in life and well-being are concepts which are gaining an increasing amount of interest in the research community. 

Guest editors:
Hermundur SigmundssonDepartment of Psychology,Norwegian University of Science and Technology - NTNU, NorwayEmail: hermundur.sigmundsson@ntnu.no
Ruben Rodriguez-CanoDepartment of Psychology,Norwegian University of Science and Technology - NTNU, NorwayEmail: ruben.cano@ntnu.no

Special issue information:
The special issue main theme is motivational factors and meaning in life, from theory to practice. Passion, perseverance, growth mindset, self-efficacy, flow, meaning in life and well-being are concepts which are gaining an increasing amount of interest in the research community. It would be interesting to focus on both the interaction between these constructs, and to see their relation to achievement and personal well-being.Both empirical and perspective papers are welcome.Possible topics involve:- Passion- Grit/perseverance- Mindset/Growth mindset- Self-efficacy- Flow- Meaning in Life- Well-being

Manuscript submission information:
The Journal’s submission system is open for receiving submissions to our Special Issue. To ensure that all manuscripts are correctly identified for inclusion into the special issue, it is important to select “VSI: Motivation and meaning” when you reach the “Article Type” step in the submission process.
Please submit your manuscript via submission portal before 30 April 2025.
For any inquiries about the appropriateness of contribution topics, please contact Dr. Hermundur Sigmundsson at email: hermundur.sigmundsson@ntnu.no
All the submissions deemed suitable to be sent for peer review will be reviewed by at least two independent reviewers. Upon its editorial acceptance, your article will go into production immediately. It will be published in the latest regular issue, while be presented on the specific Special Issue webpage simultaneously. In regular issues, Special Issue articles will be clearly marked and branded.
Please ensure you read the Guide for Authors before writing your manuscript. The Guide for Authors and link to submit your manuscript is available on the Journal’s homepage here.
Submission Deadline: 30th April 2025