Nature Human Behaviour

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 17 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02557-7 In this Perspective, Fehr and Wu argue that applying fairness research to markets, organizations and public policy requires solving fundamental unresolved questions about how fairness concerns are activated, shaped and measured. They propose a research agenda to address these challenges.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 18 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02545-x Speaking requires the brain to rapidly convert planned speech into precisely ordered vocal movements. Intracranial recordings reveal a cascade of neural processes in which syllable-level plans in the prefrontal cortex are linked to phoneme sequences in the motor cortex, which enables fluent speech articulatio…

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 20 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02531-3 Using a quasi-experimental approach to national data from 1989 to 1994 in Japan, Yanagawa et al. find that a gestational limit change was associated with a shift to earlier abortions just below the new limit.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 17 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02541-1 Mizrachi et al. show that directing attention to bodily sensations, rather than away, promotes more regulated acute inflammatory responses in healthy volunteers, revealing sensory and vagal pathways linking mind and immune function.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 17 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02556-8 Reconstructing parental haplotypes for up to 440,209 UK and Estonian Biobank participants, the authors estimate genetic assortative mating across 69 traits and find that assortment for height and education has intensified in recent generations.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 18 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02555-9 We developed a method that detects the genetic footprint of partner choice without requiring the input of partners’ genotypes. Instead, it reconstructs maternal and paternal genomes within a single individual, capturing half of each parental genome. Applied to nearly half a million people in the UK and Estoni…

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 17 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02537-x Courellis et al. examine how neurons in the human medial frontal cortex and hippocampus persistently represent context.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 13 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02554-w Fuchs-Schündeln and Holub show evidence of a homophily bias in scientific grant application review—evaluators are more favourable to applicants from their own country and, to a lesser extent, of their own gender.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 14 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02512-6 Global media gives less cross-border attention to climate-linked hazards (such as floods, storms and droughts) than to geophysical disasters. Attention rises with deaths and is stronger between socially connected countries.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 13 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02546-w Direct recordings from the human brain reveal a hierarchy in planning to speak, with neural activity organizing whole syllables before the individual sounds that compose them are sequenced.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 13 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02548-8 Weber et al. show that the normally conserved spatial organization of the digit response maps in primary somatosensory cortex is altered in patients with surgically repaired hand nerves.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 14 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02547-9 Using US household grocery data from 2017–2022, Hu et al. find that lockdowns temporarily shifted purchases towards less processed foods, while ultraprocessed food spending later rose above pre-pandemic levels.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 14 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02536-y Robey and Light decompose declines in US imprisonment by race and offence category and find that in most cases, declines in imprisonment and racial disparities are better explained by falling crime rates than changes in arrests or case processing.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 10 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02534-0 This work shows that human reading behaviour can be explained as hierarchical resource-rational control, unifying eye movements, memory and comprehension in one computational principle.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 10 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02535-z Ticklishness is a familiar but poorly understood experience. Xiong and Kilteni show that ticklishness is culturally shared and follows a distinct bodily topography. They evaluate different theories on why some body regions are more ticklish than others.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 06 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02511-7 McCartan and Kenny develop a framework for quantifying the individual-level impacts of redistricting in the USA, showing its applicability for identifying partisan gerrymandering and differential effects across populations.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 10 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02542-0 Across 14 studies, the authors show that when clinical providers offer reassurance through normalization, this can have paradoxical effects on patients, reducing their inclination to pursue treatment.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 10 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02526-0 Open practices have grown in popularity across domains, such as open science and open-source software. However, these domains have remained siloed. Meluso et al. develop a common definition and implementation guidance to support the use of open practices across diverse fields.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 03 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02523-3 A longitudinal study of Italian students revealed a significant negative effect of early use of social media on later academic performance during lower-secondary school years (grades 6 to 8 in Italy, corresponding to ages 11–14 years old) in mathematics and Italian compared with later social media adoption.

Nature Human Behaviour, Published online: 05 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41562-026-02533-1 Li, Marble et al. examine how moment-to-moment fluctuations in arousal optimize behaviour by signalling environmental transitions and facilitate rapid adjustments of mental context.