I am an experimental psychologist primarily interested in foundational questions about the psychology and philosophy of beliefs.

My research has wide-ranging implications both for basic theory and for changing problematic beliefs.

I am currently a Research Assistant Professor in the Psychology Department at Arizona State University. I completed my Ph.D. in Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara (2018). I was there advised by Leda Cosmides and John Tooby at the Center for Evolutionary Psychology.

I've published in the best journals in psychology such as American Psychologist, Psychological Review, and Perspectives on Psychological Sciences. My research has been supported by the Templeton World Charity Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation. I received the New Investigator Award from the Human Behavior and Evolution Society.

I take an interdisciplinary approach to my research, combining foundational insights and tools from social psychology, computational cognitive science, adaptationist evolutionary biology, cultural evolution, and the humanities.


mlbarlev (at) gmail.com | Google Scholar | X/Twitter

Preprints:


Moon, J. D. & Barlev, M. (under review). Google search data for social scientists: A tutorial and best practices. [PsyArXiv] [OSF]


Kwon, J., Barlev, M., Guevara Beltran, D., Kenrick, D., & Varnum, M. E. W. (under review). What Are Social Norms For? [PsyArXiv] [OSF]


Barlev, M., Arai, S., Tooby, J., & Cosmides, L. (under review). Willingness to physically protect, independent of the ability to do so, guides social decision-making. [PsyArXiv] [OSF]


Barlev, M., Taves, A., & Kinsella, M. (under review). Mapping nonordinary experiences across cultures in the U.S. and India. [PsyArXiv]



Published and in press manuscripts:


Barlev, M. & Neuberg, S. L. (2024). Rational reasons for irrational beliefs. American Psychologist. [Link] [PDF]


Wiezel, A., Barlev, M., Martos, C., & Kenrick, D. T. (2024). Stereotypes versus preferences: Revisiting the alpha male stereotype of leadership. Evolution and Human Behavior. [Link] [PDF] [OSF] [ASU News]

* Target article with commentaries. [Commentaries] [Response to commentaries]


Taves, A., Ihm, E., Gordon Wolf, M., Barlev, M., Kinsella, M., & Vyas, M. (2023). The Inventory of Nonordinary Experiences (INOE): Evidence of validity in the United States and India. PLOS ONE, 18(7): e0287780. [Link] [PDF] [OSF]


Wormley, A. S., Kwon, J. Y., Barlev, M., & Varnum, M. E. W. (2023). How much cultural variation around the globe is explained by ecology? Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 290(2000), 20230485. [Link] [PDF] [OSF] [The Conversation]


Taves, A. & Barlev, M. (2023). A feature-based approach to the comparative study of nonordinary experiences. American Psychologist, 78(1), 50-61. [Link] [PDF] [SPSP Character & Context Blog]


Wormley, A. S., Kwon, J. Y., Barlev, M., & Varnum, M. E. W. (2022). The EcoCultural dataset: A new resource for investigating cultural variation. Scientific Data, 9, 615. [Link] [PDF] [OSF]


Manson, J. H, Chua, K. J., Rodriquez, N. N., Barlev, M., Durkee, P. K., & Lukaszewski, A. W. (2022). Sex differences in fearful personality traits are mediated by physical strength. Social Psychological and Personality Science. [Link] [PDF]


Quillien, T. & Barlev, M. (2022). Causal judgment in the wild: evidence from the 2020 US presidential election. Cognitive Science, 46, e13101. [Link] [PDF] [OSF]

* Nominated for the William James Prize at the Society for Philosophy and Psychology (2021).

 

Barlev, M., Ko, A., Krems, J. A., & Neuberg, S. L. (2022). Weight location moderates weight-based self-devaluation and perceived social devaluation in women. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 13(8), 1199–1209. [Link] [PDF] [OSF] [HBES 2021 Talk] [ASU News]

 

Barlev, M., & Shtulman, A. (2021). Minds, bodies, spirits, and gods: Does widespread belief in disembodied beings imply that we are inherent dualists? Psychological Review, 128(6), 1007-1021. [Link] [PDF]

 

Mermelstein, S., Barlev, M., & German, T. C. (2021). She told me about a singing cactus: Counterintuitive concepts are more accurately attributed to their speakers than ordinary concepts. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 150(5), 972-982. [Link] [PDF] [OSF]

 

Ko, A., Pick, C. M., Kwon, J. Y., Barlev, M., Krems, J. A., Varnum, M. E. W., … Kenrick, D. T. (2020). Family Matters: Rethinking the Psychology of Human Social Motivation. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 15(1), 173–201. [Link] [PDF] [Corrigendum]

* Awarded the Outstanding Research Award from the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (2020).

 

Barlev, M., Mermelstein, S., Cohen, A. S., & German, C. T. (2019). The Embodied God: Core intuitions about person physicality coexist and interfere with acquired Christian beliefs about God, the Holy Spirit, and Jesus. Cognitive Science, 43(9), e12784. [Link] [PDF] [OSF]

 

Barlev, M., Mermelstein, S., & German, C. T. (2018). Representational co-existence in the God concept: Core knowledge intuitions of God as a person are not revised by Christian theology despite lifelong experience. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 25, 2330-2338. [Link] [PDF]

* Awarded the New Investigator Award from the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (2018).

 

Barlev, M., Mermelstein, S., & German, C. T. (2017). Core intuitions about persons coexist and interfere with acquired Christian beliefs about God. Cognitive Science, 41(S3), 425-454. [Link] [PDF]

 


Book reviews and commentaries:


Barlev, M. & Neuberg, S. L. (2023). Strange Bedfellows and Their Irrational Pillow Talk. [Commentary on Strange Bedfellows: The Alliance Theory of Political Belief Systems.] Psychological Inquiry, 34(3), 161-163. [Link] [PDF] [Target Article] [Reply to commentaries]


Taves, A., & Barlev, M. (2015). [Review of the book Past Minds: Studies in Cognitive Historiography, by L. H. Martin & J. Sørensen (Eds.).] Numen, 62(4), 474–480. [Link] [PDF]