Everyday aversive experiences, such as a crying infant or the sound of construction, are not life-threatening, yet they can strongly shape affective experience and physiological state. While most affective imagery research has focused on fear and anxiety, the mechanisms underlying imagery of mild, everyday aversive events remain underexplored. Across five experiments, we systematically investigated behavioral and physiological responses to aversive and appetitive mental imagery. Experiment 1 revealed robust corrugator EMG potentiation but comparatively weaker autonomic responses during aversive imagery compared with audiovisual and auditory stimulation. Experiments 2 and 3 identified key methodological factors that determine imagery potency, including imagery duration, instructional focus, and prompt design. Using an optimized paradigm, Experiment 4 demonstrated coherent changes across subjective valence and arousal ratings, EMG corrugator potentiation, heart rate deceleration, and skin temperature decreases for aversive compared with appetitive imagery, with effects modulated by individual differences in imagery vividness. Experiment 5 confirmed that these effects reflected genuine affective experience rather than semantic knowledge of the prompts. Together, these findings establish baseline physiological and subjective markers of everyday aversive imagery in typical young adults and emphasize the critical role of paradigm optimization in eliciting reliable affective imagery responses. By shifting focus from extreme to everyday aversive experiences, this work provides a framework for studying heightened sensitivity to ordinary stimuli in both basic and clinical contexts.

Misophonia is characterized by decreased tolerance to specific trigger sounds, yet the underlying physiological mechanisms remain poorly understood. Misophonic responses are also often reported to be elicited not only by the auditory triggers themselves, but also by visual cues associated with those sounds. However, direct empirical evidence for visual cues associated with auditory triggers remains limited. Moreover, it is not known if misophonic responses can be elicited in the absence of any sensory input, such as during auditory mental imagery. The present study systematically examined physiological responses to misophonic trigger stimuli across auditory and visual sensory modalities, as well as auditory imagery, using multi-channel psychophysiological measures and both trial-wise and time-resolved approaches. Individuals with misophonia and matched control participants were exposed to trigger, generally aversive, and non-aversive stimuli presented in auditory, visual (silent video), and auditory imagery conditions. Physiological responses were recorded across five channels, including electromyographic activity over corrugator supercilii (EMGc) and zygomaticus major (EMGz) muscles, electrodermal activity (EDA), heart rate (HR), and fingertip skin temperature. Compared with generally aversive stimuli, auditory trigger sounds elicited significantly greater physiological responses in individuals with misophonia than in control participants, characterized by increased EMGc, EMGz, EDA, and HR, indicating heightened affective and autonomic engagement beyond general aversiveness. Silent visual trigger cues also evoked greater trigger-specific physiological responses, although these effects were observed in fewer physiological channels (primarily EMGc and HR). Auditory mental imagery produced weaker group-level physiological effects, with significant differentiation limited to EDA. Across all three modalities, greater trial-wise subjective distress was consistently associated with greater EMGc, EMGz, and EDA responses, as well as greater HR responses in the auditory and visual modalities, indicating a close correspondence between physiological activation and the subjective experience of misophonic distress. In contrast, physiological overactivation was not significantly associated with overall misophonia severity or auditory imagery ability. Together, these findings provide the most comprehensive characterization to date of peripheral physiological responses in misophonia across auditory and visual perception, as well as auditory imagery. They demonstrate that misophonia is characterized by exaggerated affective and autonomic physiological responses to trigger sounds, extend this response profile to silent visual cues associated with trigger sounds, and provide initial evidence that auditory mental imagery can engage selected components of the misophonic response.

We examined differences in physiological responses to aversive and non-aversive naturalistic audiovisual stimuli and their auditory and visual components within the same experiment. We recorded five physiological measures that have been shown to be sensitive to affect: electrocardiogram, electromyography (EMG) for zygomaticus major and corrugator supercilii muscles, electrodermal activity (EDA), and skin temperature. Valence and arousal ratings confirmed that aversive stimuli were more negative in valence and higher in arousal than non-aversive stimuli. Valence also showed an emotional enhancement effect for cross-modal integration. Both heart rate deceleration and facial EMG potentiation for corrugator supercilii were larger for aversive compared to non-aversive conditions for audiovisual stimuli and their auditory components, even after controlling for arousal. Facial EMG potentiation for zygomaticus major was greater for aversive compared to non-aversive conditions for audiovisual stimuli and EDA was greater for aversive compared to non-aversive conditions for visual stimuli. Neither of these effects remained significant after controlling for arousal. These findings provide a benchmark for examining atypical sensory processing of mundane aversive stimuli for clinical populations.

Urban green spaces (UGS) can mitigate urban waterlogging disasters and improve subjective well-being. The study presents an integrated framework combining subjective and objective perceptions to assess the socioeconomic value of UGS, using InfoWorks ICM model and the Life Satisfaction Approach. Central Beijing was selected as a case study. From the objective perception perspective, UGS significantly mitigated waterlogging risks, particularly in low and high rainfall return periods, with green space hotspots overlapping with areas of severe waterlogging risk. From the subjective perception perspective, women, younger groups, and non-car owners perceived a stronger relationship between UGS and waterlogging based on CGSS 2021. The waterlogging mitigation value of UGS was largely undervalued, with 67.33 % of the total value coming from indirect effects. During the 5-year rainfall return period, the reasonable threshold of UGS area was 33.36 km2, and each household was willing to pay 1.3468 RMB/m2 ($0.1921).

The ecological restoration of river basin is sensitive to ecosystem service variation. However, previous ecological restoration effectiveness assessments often ignore the social perception of ecosystem services. This paper proposed an integrated effectiveness assessment framework for ecological restoration incorporating public satisfaction level. The InVEST model was deployed to compute four key ecosystem services, which are water conservation, water purification, soil retention, and carbon storage, by using both market price and in-lieu cost methods. Then, public satisfaction as incorporated into cultural services was quantified via social media analytics using the travel cost method. Taking the Yongding River as a case, we analyzed its pre- and post-ecological restoration performance during 2015–2021 using the proposed framework. The results showed that the ecosystem service value surged by $2664.19 million, resulting in an ecosystem service change index (ESCI) of 24.49%. In particular, a 20.27% increase in the public satisfaction level was found. Public satisfaction contributed 39.25% to the total increase in the ecosystem service value of the Yongding River. Our study may provide support for ecological restoration strategies concerning both physical and public demand aspects.

Understanding the somatovisceral responses to auditory affective imagery has important implications in disorders like misophonia. The current study compared physiological responses to aversive and nonaversive states across three modalities: audiovisual, auditory, and auditory imagery. Electromyographic activity over corrugator supercilii (EMGc) and zygomaticus major (EMGz), electrodermal activity (EDA), heart rate (HR), and finger skin temperature (SKT) were measured. There was significant differentiation in EMGc, EDA, and HR deceleration between aversive and nonaversive audiovisual stimuli. EMGc potentiation was the only physiological measure showing consistent differentiation across the three modalities. Cross-modal aversiveness classification results revealed a similar physiological response pattern between audiovisual and auditory modalities. The physiological response pattern during auditory affective imagery was useful for predicting the aversiveness in audiovisual modality but not the other way around. Vividness in auditory imagery correlated with subjective hedonic valence ratings, but not physiological responses. Taken together, the current data suggest that the aversiveness of auditory imagery is differentiable in subjective affective experience and facial muscle potentiation. These results of the physiological responses to imagined aversive sounds in nonclinical population would serve as a comparison baseline for the study of misophonia.### Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.

Naturalistic paradigms can assure ecological validity and yield novel insights in psychology and neuroscience. However, using behavioral experiments to obtain the human ratings necessary to analyze data collected with these paradigms is usually costly and time-consuming. Large language models like GPT have great potential for predicting human-like behavioral judgments. The current study evaluates the performance of GPT as a substitute for human judgments for affective dynamics in narratives. Our results revealed that GPT’s inference of hedonic valence dynamics is highly correlated with human affective perception. Moreover, the inferred neural activity based on GPT-derived valence ratings is similar to inferred neural activity based on human judgments, suggesting the potential of using GPT’s prediction as a reliable substitute for human judgments. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.

Large Language Models (LLMs) have shown remarkable abilities recently, including passing advanced professional exams and demanding benchmark tests. This performance has led many to suggest that they are close to achieving humanlike or 'true' understanding of language, and even Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Here, we provide a new open-source benchmark that can assess semantic abilities of LLMs using two-word phrases using a task that can be performed relatively easily by humans without advanced training. Combining multiple words into a single concept is a fundamental aspect of human language and intelligence. The test requires meaningfulness judgments of 1768 noun-noun combinations that have been rated as meaningful (e.g., baby boy) or not meaningful (e.g., goat sky). by 150 human raters. We provide versions of the task that probe meaningfulness ratings on a 0-4 scale as well as binary judgments. We conducted a series of experiments using the TWT on GPT-4, GPT-3.5, and Bard, with both versions. Results demonstrated that, compared to humans, all models perform poorly at rating meaningfulness of these phrases. GPT-3.5 and Bard are also unable to make binary discriminations between sensible and nonsense phrases as making sense. GPT-4 makes a substantial improvement in binary discrimination of combinatorial phrases but is still significantly worse than human performance. The TWT can be used to understand the limitations and weaknesses of current LLMs, and potentially improve them. The test also reminds us that caution is warranted in attributing 'true understanding' or AGI to LLMs. TWT is available at: https://github.com/NickRiccardi/two-word-test

Rapid expansion and upgrading of wastewater treatment facilities globally, driven by stricter wastewater policies, significantly contribute to carbon emissions. China has contributed 30 % of carbon emissions in the world, 1 % of which comes from wastewater treatment, necessitating more understanding of the impact of policies, especially the stringent "10-Point Water Plan" policy. From a micro perspective, this study uses the difference-in-differences method to analyze the impact of wastewater treatment policies on water and carbon issues in China's 2894 wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), and delves into the heterogeneity, and mechanisms across various dimensions. The results show that stricter sewage treatment policy decrease effluent concentration of the chemical oxygen demand (COD) by 2.35 %, and also cause a 1.74 % rise in carbon emissions per 10,000 m3 of wastewater treated, intensifying the short-term contradiction, while the contradictions may fall in the long term. It is more significant in southern regions and the cities with lower environmental regulation intensity. Also, there are significant differences in different wastewater treatment technology and scale. Significant improvements in effluent water quality are observed in WWTPs with 100,000 to 200,000 m3/day capacity and those using biofilm treatment technology. Through mechanism analysis, reasonable expansion of urban pipelines and WWTPs, promotion of biofilm treatment technology, reduction of energy consumption, and improvement of pollutant reduction efficiency are feasible paths to improve water quality and reduce carbon emissions. This research provides a perspective on solving water-carbon contradictions in WWTPs, holding critical significance for urban wastewater treatment and carbon emission management.

Growing evidence suggests that conceptual knowledge influences emotion perception, yet the neural mechanisms underlying this effect are not fully understood. Recent studies have shown that brain representations of facial emotion categories in visual-perceptual areas are predicted by conceptual knowledge, but it remains to be seen if auditory regions are similarly affected. Moreover, it is not fully clear whether these conceptual influences operate at a modality-independent level. To address these questions, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study presenting participants with both facial and vocal emotional stimuli. This dual-modality approach allowed us to investigate effects on both modality-specific and modality-independent brain regions. Using univariate and representational similarity analyses, we found that brain representations in both visual (middle and lateral occipital cortices) and auditory (superior temporal gyrus) regions were predicted by conceptual understanding of emotions for faces and voices, respectively. Additionally, we discovered that conceptual knowledge also influenced supra-modal representations in the superior temporal sulcus. Dynamic causal modeling revealed a brain network showing both bottom-up and top-down flows, suggesting a complex interplay of modality-specific and modality-independent regions in emotional processing. These findings collectively indicate that the neural representations of emotions in both sensory-perceptual and modality-independent regions are likely shaped by each individual's conceptual knowledge.

People can seamlessly integrate a vast array of information from what they see and hear in the noisy and uncertain world. However, the neural underpinnings of audiovisual integration continue to be a topic of debate. Using strict inclusion criteria, we performed an activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis on 121 neuroimaging experiments with a total of 2,092 participants. We found that audiovisual integration is linked with the coexistence of multiple integration sites, including early cortical, subcortical, and higher association areas. Although activity was consistently found within the superior temporal cortex, different portions of this cortical region were identified depending on the analytical contrast used, complexity of the stimuli, and modality within which attention was directed. The context-dependent neural activity related to audiovisual integration suggests a flexible rather than fixed neural pathway for audiovisual integration. Together, our findings highlight a flexible multiple pathways model for audiovisual integration, with superior temporal cortex as the central node in these neural assemblies.

Anxiety and depressive symptoms are associated with dysregulated emotional processing. However, less is known about the intra-personal and inter-personal impacts of anxiety and depressive symptoms on emotional processing in children and their parents. In a community sample of 36 parent-child dyads (total N = 72), the current study investigated the intra- and inter-personal effects of anxiety and depressive symptoms on the child’s and the parent’s neurophysiological responses to emotional (i.e., pleasant and unpleasant) stimuli, indexed by the late positive potential (LPP). The results indicated that children’s anxiety symptoms were correlated with their enhanced LPPs to pleasant versus neutral pictures. Additionally, children’s depressive symptoms related to their increased LPPs to unpleasant stimuli. Importantly, children’s anxiety symptoms were associated with their parents’ increased LPPs to both unpleasant and pleasant information. These findings suggest that anxiety symptoms in community children were related to their own as well as their parents’ emotional processing. The findings contribute to cognitive and family models of anxiety and depression and further highlight the potential role of dyadic interventions for the alleviation of impairing symptoms in children and their caregivers.

Objectives Parenting children with autism spectrum disorder may be different from parenting typically developing children. The current study systematically compared mindful parenting and parenting practices in families of children with autism spectrum disorder and in families of typically developing children in China. Methods 167 biological parents (M-age = 37.87) of Chinese children with autism spectrum disorder and 167 biological parents (M-age = 38.04) of typical developing children completed questionnaires regarding mindful parenting and parenting practices. A multivariate analysis of variance was conducted to compare between the two types of families with parent/child gender effects on mindful parenting and parenting practices. Then a series of path analyses were also conducted to examine the associations between mindful parenting and parenting practices in the two types of families. Results Compared to parents of typically developing children, parents of children with autism spectrum disorder showed less listening with full attention, less proactive parenting, less supportiveness, more lax control, and more physical control to their children; in families of children with autism spectrum disorder (but not in families of typically developing children), fathers showed less proactive parenting and supportiveness to their children than mothers. We also found that parents' listening with full attention and awareness of children's emotions were significantly related to both positive and negative parenting practices in families of children with autism spectrum disorder. Conclusions Chinese parents of children with autism spectrum disorder and parents of typically developing children display different parenting behaviors. These findings can provide us more future directions in studying parenting behaviors in Chinese families of children with autism spectrum disorder.

Objectives Adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) display a variety of verbally aggressive, physically aggressive, and destructive behaviors. Meditation on the Soles of the Feet ( SoF ) as an informal mindfulness-based practice has been effective in managing aggressive behaviors in adolescents with ASD. The aim of this study was to assess its effectiveness and social validity in a Chinese context. Methods Mothers of three Chinese adolescents with ASD were taught a basic foundational meditation practice, followed by instructions in the SoF practice. Once proficient in these two practices, the mothers taught their adolescents with ASD to use SoF for triggers of their aggressive and destructive behaviors. The mothers rated the social validity of the SoF practice. Results Visual analysis and weighted average Tau-U scores across participants showed that the SoF practice had a very strong effect on reducing the verbally aggressive, physically aggressive, and destructive behaviors of the three adolescents. Conclusions Data regarding effectiveness and social validity indicated that the SoF practice was effective and socially valid as a self-management practice for aggressive and destructive behavior of adolescents with ASD. Further studies of the SoF practice are needed to validate its effectiveness for Chinese children with ASD.