Dr Lindsie Arthur and Ally Alblas
Lowe Theatre, L1, Redmond Barry Building, Parkville VIC 3052
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Welcome to the MSPS Colloquium with Dr Lindsie Arthur and PhD Candidate Ally Alblas
Individual differences in premenstrual sensitivity moderate menstrual cycle effects on social emotions
Menstrual cycle research has traditionally assumed uniformity in women’s responses to hormonal fluctuations, yet substantial individual variability exists. This work examines how sensitivity to hormonal changes, indexed by premenstrual symptom severity, shapes social motivation and attachment across the menstrual cycle. Drawing on intensive daily data and advanced modelling approaches, the findings demonstrate that meaningful cycle-related patterns in social experiences emerge only when individual differences in hormone sensitivity are taken into account. This framework offers a means of reconciling inconsistent results in the literature and underscores the importance of incorporating within- and between-person variability into models of hormonal influences on behaviour.
About Lindsie Arthur
Lindsie Arthur is a social psychologist whose research examines social behaviour and organisational dynamics, with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion, sexual harassment prevention, and coercive control. My doctoral work at the University of Melbourne investigated hormone-mediated social behaviour and the interpersonal effects of hormonal contraceptives. Lindsie's work aims to bridge rigorous psychological research with practical strategies that promote safe and equitable workplaces and educational settings.
Neither extraversion nor anhedonia predict reward sensitivity in a probabilistic reward task: A pre-registered replication
Variation in reward sensitivity is thought to reflect individual differences in extraversion and anhedonia, yet behavioural evidence remains scarce for extraversion and mixed for anhedonia. An exception to this is a study by Blain et al. (2021) that reported that broad extraversion, but not anhedonia, predicted reward sensitivity in a probabilistic reward task (PRT). In this talk, I will present two studies (Study 1, N = 371; Study 2, N = 398) that aimed to replicate and extend these findings by including a range of anhedonia scales and leveraging the hierarchical structure of extraversion, assessing each level from the domain to specific facets. Across both studies, we found no evidence that either extraversion or anhedonia consistently predicted reward sensitivity, a finding that held across both structural equation models and computational modelling. I will also discuss our meta-analysis of 26 studies examining the association between anhedonia and PRT response bias, an index of reward sensitivity, which similarly revealed no significant effect. Together, these findings challenge the validity of the PRT as a behavioural index of anhedonia and highlight the need for further investigation into how extraversion and anhedonia relate to reward-related behaviours more broadly.
About Ally Alblas
Ally Alblas is a second-year PhD Student supervised by Prof. Luke Smillie in the Personality Processes Lab and co-supervised by Dr. Daniel Bennett in the Cognition and Emotion Lab. Her research focusses on the associations between extraversion, anhedonia, and behavioural indices of reward sensitivity.