Why the colonial-sounding framework, right down to the old British laws? The justice system is more important than the tax breaks: a functional code of laws is a leading indicator of economic success

The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land. Lizette Chapman. December 20, 2019. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-20/silicon-valley-seasteaders-go-looking-for-low-tax-sites-on-land
Patri Friedman started Pronomos Capital, with more money from Peter Thiel, to establish mini-city-states.


Patri Friedman is sick of the jokes about floating tax havens. About a decade ago, the former Google software engineer (and grandson of Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman) co-founded the Seasteading Institute, a nonprofit with the stated aim of developing a model for self-governing offshore communities. The idea was to allow people to set up more laissez-faire laws for themselves on mobile, artificial islands resting in international waters. An invaluable experiment, he calls it now. Also: “Baggage.”

The institute’s Silicon Valley backers most prominently included Peter Thiel, the conservative billionaire and future Trump adviser, and traded in no small part on Thiel’s imprimatur. But the effort was as impractical as it sounds, and it drew criticism from local leaders and good-government groups as a form of neocolonialism. In 2018 locals defeated a commercial spinoff’s attempt to establish a seastead off the coast of Tahiti. Seasteading, like vampirism, is now on the unofficial list of topics not to raise with Thiel, who hasn’t written the institute a check in at least five years. Nonetheless, he’s become the anchor investor for Friedman’s new venture capital firm, which is trying to create some similar-sounding communities on land.

Pronomos Capital, which Friedman incorporated in August, is supposed to bankroll the construction of experimental cities on vacant tracts of land in developing countries. Pronomos is set up like a venture fund, making investments in local organizations that do the work of securing government approvals, finding tenants, and hiring retired U.K. judges to enforce the new legal framework, to be based on British common law. The firm says it’s discussing semi-autonomous cities of varying sizes with foreign and local businesspeople in countries where officials have seemed receptive to exempting them from area laws, including Ghana, Honduras, the Marshall Islands, Nigeria, and Panama. A given community could start as small as an industrial park, Friedman says. Most will be aimed at foreign businesses seeking friendlier tax treatment.

While other organizations with names such as Free Private Cities and Charter Cities Institute are advising similar efforts around the world, Pronomos is the only one with seed money from boldface names including Thiel, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, and Bitcoin evangelists Roger Ver and Balaji Srinivasan. In describing his new firm, Friedman isn’t shy to use seasteading as a reference point. “I’ve been putting these ideas out there for 20 years, and they’ve grown and compounded,” he says, sipping well water at his mountaintop compound south of San Jose. “What we get excited about is the ability to do this repeatedly.”

Why the colonial-sounding framework, right down to the old British laws? Dressed in a well-loved Slytherin sweatshirt, Friedman says it’s the best fuel for a fledgling economy and property values, and to assure global investors that their money will be safe in Pronomos projects. The justice system is more important than the tax breaks, he says, citing research that suggests faith in a functional code of laws is a leading indicator of a region’s economic success.

That’s been less than reassuring to politicians and residents leery of ceding land to unaccountable foreigners, in exchange for theoretical network effects. Fierce local opposition has halted a plan to create an independent area on a stretch of coastal land in Honduras, for example. The proposed tax incentives and other benefits for foreign investors were about as popular as you’d expect. “That land belongs to someone,” says Silvio Carrillo, the nephew of assassinated Honduran rights advocate Berta Cáceres.

Pronomos “will only go where we are wanted,” according to Friedman. He also says, with a straight face, that if Pronomos can get local officials to agree to its plans, “we have a credible shot at eliminating poverty.”

Friedman’s grandfather spent his life attacking government oversight in the field of economics, but his father, a law professor at Santa Clara University, has advocated for a kind of anarcho-capitalism on a legal basis. At age 43, Patri Friedman has pushed his family’s do-what-you-feel ethos to some other extremes, advocating for communal living, polyamory, and human-machine hybridization. He’s spent most of his career at Google, including his Seasteading Institute years. He left Google this summer to work full time on Pronomos.

“Do I want to create the first venture-backed city-state? Hell yeah”

The venture firm has raised about $9 million so far (more than half from Thiel), well short of Friedman’s initial goal. He says that’s only enough to cover basic fact-finding expenses for his local partners, and he’ll raise more to buy and develop land once governments approve the plans.

Similar ideas have gained some support beyond fringe libertarian circles. Honduras amended its constitution in 2013 to allow the creation of special economic zones outside the country’s legal framework. Erick Brimen, a startup founder who has coordinated development projects in Central America, is informally working with Friedman and others on Prospera Honduras, a local business advocacy group there. Brimen says it’s too early to discuss publicly. Other groups aiming for these kinds of extralegal territories have announced priorities including tax holidays and privatized health care and police forces.

“Our vision aligns” with Friedman’s, says Taavi Kotka, who runs an Estonian organization advocating for looser employment and tax laws to attract immigrants. “He’s a pioneer in setting up these special zones,” blockchain enthusiast Barak Ben Ezer says of Friedman. He and Friedman are working to turn the Marshall Islands into a tax haven similar to the Caymans. Friedman says he hopes to back more than a dozen projects in the next four years.

Yet even if Friedman and the other landsteaders can assuage concerns about colonial-style exploitation and the flouting of local laws, there are few guarantees in the world of quasi-sovereign states. In April a couple proclaimed their small fiberglass pod, 14 miles off Thailand’s coast, was its own nation, and the Thai government sent its military to destroy their new home, calling the proclamation an act of war. The couple has been in hiding since then. That’s why, says Friedman, he’s making sure any Pronomos projects have local officials on board. Further out, “Do I want to create the first venture-backed city-state? Hell yeah,” he says. “That’s what I’m in it for. That’s the long-term goal.”

Correction to The reverse racism effect: Are cops more hesitant to shoot Black than White suspects?

Correction to The reverse racism effect: Are cops more hesitant to shoot Black than White suspects?

Text: We would like to acknowledge our misuse of the term “Reverse Racism” within this article's title and content. We did not account for the deeply controversial racial context surrounding the term within race/racism scholarship, and its implication that subordination of communities of color no longer occurs or has been replaced by subordination of whites. In hindsight, our use of the term to describe officers fearing the consequences of being perceived as biased and modifying behavior accordingly would have been better titled “The Counter Bias Effect.”

Check, from 2016... The reverse racism effect: Are cops more hesitant to shoot Black than White suspects? Lois James, Stephen M. James, Bryan J. Vila. Criminology & Public Policy, January 14 2016. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12187

Research Summary: Race‐related debates often assume that implicit racial bias will result in racially biased decisions to shoot. Previous research has examined racial bias in police decisions by pressing “shoot” or “don't‐shoot” buttons in response to pictures of armed and unarmed suspects. As a result of its lack of external validity, however, this methodology provides limited insight into officer behavior in the field. In response, we conducted the first series of experimental research studies that tested police officers and civilians in strikingly realistic deadly force simulators.

Policy Implications: This article reports the results of our most recent experiment, which tested 80 police patrol officers by applying this leading edge method. We found that, despite clear evidence of implicit bias against Black suspects, officers were slower to shoot armed Black suspects than armed White suspects, and they were less likely to shoot unarmed Black suspects than unarmed White suspects. These findings challenge the assumption that implicit racial bias affects police behavior in deadly encounters with Black suspects.

American Heart Ass'n recently published a meta-analysis that confirmed their 60-year-old recommendation to limit saturated fat (SFA, saturated fatty acid); but design and methodological flaws reduce the recommendation's strength

Dietary saturated fat and heart disease: a narrative review. Jeffery L Heileson. Nutrition Reviews, nuz091, December 16 2019, https://doi.org/10.1093/nutrit/nuz091

Abstract: The American Heart Association (AHA) recently published a meta-analysis that confirmed their 60-year-old recommendation to limit saturated fat (SFA, saturated fatty acid) and replace it with polyunsaturated fat to reduce the risk of heart disease based on the strength of 4 Core Trials. To assess the evidence for this recommendation, meta-analyses on the effect of SFA consumption on heart disease outcomes were reviewed. Nineteen meta-analyses addressing this topic were identified: 9 observational studies and 10 randomized controlled trials. Meta-analyses of observational studies found no association between SFA intake and heart disease, while meta-analyses of randomized controlled trials were inconsistent but tended to show a lack of an association. The inconsistency seems to have been mediated by the differing clinical trials included. For example, the AHA meta-analysis only included 4 trials (the Core Trials), and those trials contained design and methodological flaws and did not meet all the predefined inclusion criteria. The AHA stance regarding the strength of the evidence for the recommendation to limit SFAs for heart disease prevention may be overstated and in need of reevaluation.

Keywords: heart disease, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, meta-analysis, polyunsaturated fat, saturated fat, trans fat

Strong, negative link between worship attendance & cat ownership; maybe pets are a partial substitute for human bonding and interaction & those embedded within a religious community may have less need (or time) for pets

How Religion Predicts Pet Ownership in the United States. Samuel L. Perry, Ryan P. Burge. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, December 18 2019. https://doi.org/10.1111/jssr.12637

Abstract: Over 60 percent of Americans have some sort of family pet. Although studies have explored the personality and demographic correlates of pet ownership, none have considered whether religious characteristics may influence not only pet ownership, but the kind of pet Americans own. Drawing on data from the 2018 General Social Survey, we examine the religious antecedents of pet ownership in general as well as owning a cat or a dog, taking into account factors previously associated with owning certain pets (e.g., urban vs. rural residence, political affiliation). Although religious tradition and biblical literalism generally do not predict pet ownership, frequent worship attendees and the most conservative evangelicals report owning fewer pets. Religious characteristics also predict Americans’ ownership of particular pets. Most notably, we find a strong, negative association between worship attendance and cat ownership. We theorize potential mechanisms. On the one hand, certain personality types might simultaneously attract some Americans toward religious participation and away from pets, and cats in particular. Alternatively, to the extent that pet ownership is a partial substitute for human bonding and interaction, Americans more deeply embedded within a religious community may have less need (or time) for pets generally, and specifically more independent “roommate pets,” like cats.

Women sexual fluidity as: Overall erotic responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender; situational variability in erotic responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender; instability in day-to-day attractions over time; & other types

Who Counts as Sexually Fluid? Comparing Four Different Types of Sexual Fluidity in Women. Lisa M. Diamond et al. Archives of Sexual Behavior, December 9 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-019-01565-1

Abstract: Previous research has examined the phenomenon of “sexual fluidity,” but there is no current consensus on the specific meaning and operationalization of this construct. The present study used a sample of 76 women with diverse sexual orientations to compare four different types of sexual fluidity: (1) fluidity as overall erotic responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender, (2) fluidity as situational variability in erotic responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender, (3) fluidity as discrepancy between the gender patterning of sexual attractions and the gender patterning of sexual partnering, and (4) fluidity as instability in day-to-day attractions over time. We examined how these four types of fluidity relate to one another and to other features of women’s sexual profiles (bisexual vs. exclusive patterns of attraction, sex drive, interest in uncommitted sex, age of sexual debut, and lifetime number of sexual partners). The four types of fluidity were not correlated with one another (with the exception of the first and fourth), and each showed a unique pattern of association with other features of women’s sexual profiles. The only type of fluidity associated with bisexuality was overall erotic responsiveness to the less-preferred gender. The findings demonstrate that future research on sexual fluidity should distinguish between its different forms.

Keywords: Bisexuality Sexual orientation Sexual fluidity Individual differences Women


Discussion
These results provide the first systematic study differentiating
between distinct forms of sexual fluidity, and they provide
powerful evidence that sexual fluidity is not a single overarching
individual difference dimension, but a multifaceted
phenomenon that takes different forms and which has different
implications for sexual experience. We theorized four
potential types of fluidity: (1) overall erotic responsiveness
to one’s less-preferred gender, (2) situational variability in
erotic responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender, (3)
discrepancy between the gender patterning of one’s sexual
attractions and the gender patterning of one’s sexual partnering,
and (4) instability in day-to-day attractions over time.
We used a combination of questionnaire data, daily diary
assessments, and laboratory data to derive meaningful indices
of each form of fluidity, and tested how they related to
one another and to other features of sexuality in a sexually
diverse sample of women. The results significantly expand
our understanding of sexual fluidity by demonstrating that it
is not, in fact, a unitary construct. The four types of fluidity
were uncorrelated with one another (with one exception), and
each showed a different pattern of associations with other
features of women’s sexuality.
A notable finding is that the only type of fluidity associated
with bisexuality (i.e., the lack of polarization in a
woman’s attractions) was overall erotic responsiveness to the
less-preferred gender. This concords with previous research
suggesting that heightened erotic responsiveness to one’s
less-preferred gender is a defining feature of bisexual attractions,
and it helps to explain why the construct of sexual
fluidity is often conflated with (or attributed to) bisexuality.
Yet the findings of the present research substantially expand
our understanding of the association between sexual fluidity
and bisexuality by demonstrating that this association
only holds for one specific type of fluidity: general erotic
responsiveness to one’s less-preferred gender. Women with
less polarized (i.e., more bisexual) attractions were not more
likely to show any of the other types of fluidity we assessed
(situational variability in attractions, discrepancies between
sexual attraction and sexual partnering, or temporal instability
in day-to-day attractions). Additionally, we found that
although the first type of fluidity was also associated with
women’s sociosexuality (interest in uncommitted sex) and
total number of sexual partners, these associations were no
longer significant after controlling for women’s bisexuality.
Hence, one possible interpretation of our findings is that the
first form of fluidity—erotic responsiveness to the less-preferred
gender—should not be considered fluidity at all, but
rather bisexuality.
The second form of fluidity—situational variability in a
woman’s attractions—is theoretically closest to the notion
that fluidity represents a heightened sensitivity to contextual
influences on sexuality (Diamond, 2008a, 2008b), since it
captures the degree to which a woman’s erotic responsiveness
to the less-preferred gender varies across different domains
of assessment (self-report of attractions over the past year,
average day-to-day attractions reported in the diary, and selfreported
arousal to sexual stimuli in the laboratory). Unlike
the first type of fluidity (average responsiveness to the LPG
across different contexts), the second type of fluidity was
unassociated with the polarization of a woman’s overall
attractions. Hence, women with more bisexual patterns of
attraction do not show more variation in their erotic responsiveness
to the less-preferred gender across different contexts.
This finding significantly clarifies the persistent debate
over links and distinctions between fluidity and bisexuality.
As argued by Diamond et al. (2017), the key difference
between the construct of fluidity and the construct of bisexuality
concerns the element of change: Bisexuality is typically
theorized as a consistent pattern of sexual responsiveness
to both genders, whereas situational fluidity represents as
a capacity for variation in responsiveness across different
contexts. Whereas women with greater situational variability
in their erotic responsiveness did not have less polarized
attractions, they reported an earlier age of sexual debut and
a greater total number of sexual partners, perhaps reflecting
the fact that women with high situational variability in erotic
responsiveness are more responsive to situation-specific
opportunities for sexual contact. This might amplify their
total opportunities for sexual contact, thereby increasing their
total number of sexual partners and accelerating their initial
transition into sexual activity.
Discrepancies between women’s attractions and their
sexual partnering were not associated with any other features
of women’s sexuality, which may be attributable to the
aforementioned fact that sexual partnering is more directly
circumscribed by cultural and opportunistic factors than
subjective sexual responsiveness. Hence, when a woman’s
sexual partnering deviates from her pattern of attraction, it is
impossible to know whether this reflects her own desires, her
responsiveness to an unexpected opportunity, social pressure,
or the dynamics of a specific relationship. Additionally, our
measure of sexual partnering focused on the ratio of same-sex
to other-sex partners in adulthood. This is clearly not the only
way to represent the gender patterning of women’s behavior:
consider a woman who has 50 sexual encounters with the
same man, and a single sexual encounter with a woman. Her
percentage of same-sex partners would be 50%, but her percentage
of same-sex sexual activity would be less than 2%.
Future research investigating fluidity between one’s attractions
and one’s behavior should explore different assessments
of behavior, across different time scales, in order to determine
the relevance of different types of discrepancy. Additionally,
qualitative research should investigate women’s motives for
engaging in “uncharacteristic” or “less desirable” patterns of
sexual activity, the proximal contexts for such activity, and
women’s interpretations of their subjective meaning (Diamond,
2008a, 2008b).
The last type of sexual fluidity—temporal instability in
attractions—is the most conceptually and empirically novel,
having been used in only one other investigation of temporal
variability in sexuality (Diamond et al., 2017, although
see Farr, Diamond, & Boker [2014] for a related dynamical
systems approach to modeling temporal change in attractions).
A particular advantage of this approach is that it
focuses not on the simple observation of change in attraction,
but on what happens after this change occurs. Does the
original pattern reassert itself? If so, the underlying pattern
can be viewed as stable, anchored to the individual’s own
personal setpoint. If not, the underlying pattern can be viewed
as unstable, and more prone to perturbations from and disruptions
in the setpoint. This type of instability is conceptually
quite distinct from the other types of fluidity assessed
in the present study. The only form of fluidity with which it
was associated was the magnitude of women’s average erotic
responsiveness to the less-preferred gender (and this association
was independent of the overall polarization of a woman’s
attractions). We found that women who showed greater overall
erotic responsiveness to their less-preferred gender across
different contexts also showed more temporal instability (i.e.,
less “anchoring” to their own setpoint) over the 2-week diary
assessment. This concords with the notion that individuals
with a greater readiness to be attracted to their less-preferred
gender are more fluid than those whose attractions are more
strongly anchored to their more-preferred gender.
The lack of an association between temporal instability
and situational variability presents interesting questions: On
the one hand, one might expect that women with high situational
variability in their erotic responsiveness will show
less temporal “anchoring” in their responsiveness within a
single situation. Yet this presumes that similar factors drive
both temporal and situational change in attractions, and this
presumption remains untested. A key direction for future
research is to assess temporal instability across different
time scales, and to compare the proximal “drivers” of both
temporal change (across different situations) and situational
change (over time).
Notably, all forms of fluidity were unrelated to sex drive
and sociosexuality (as described above, general attraction
to the less-preferred gender was initially correlated with
sociosexuality, but this was no longer the case after controlling
for the polarization of women’s attractions). The lack
of associations involving sex drive runs counter to previous
research. As noted above, Lippa (2006, 2007) found that
among heterosexual and bisexual women, high sex drive was
associated with greater attraction to both their more-preferred
and less-preferred genders, suggesting that sex drive might
amplify non-dominant sexual responses. Yet we did not
find that women with higher sex drive were more erotically
responsive to the less-preferred gender (the first form of fluidity)
or to the other forms of fluidity. Given that Lippa found
different linkages between sex drive and sexual attraction
among lesbian, heterosexual, and bisexual respondents, we
conducted ancillary analyses to examine potential interactions
between the polarization of a woman’s attractions and
her sex drive in predicting any of the types of fluidity, and
found no such effects.
One potential explanation for the difference between Lippa’s
findings and the present research may concern cohort
effects. Lippa’s research was conducted over a decade ago,
during which there was less cultural visibility and more skepticism
regarding individuals who described their attractions
as “bisexual” or “mostly heterosexual” (Savin-Williams &
Vrangalova, 2013). Hence, one possibility is that the individuals
in Lippa’s study who were most likely to notice and
disclose attractions to their less-preferred gender were those
whose high sex drives made it harder to ignore them. Presently,
individuals may be more familiar with, and comfortable
disclosing, attractions to the less-preferred gender even when
those attractions are relatively mild in intensity. Clearly, further
investigation of the link between sex drive and different
forms of fluidity (not to mention investigation of fluidity in
sex drive itself) is an important direction for future research.

Tinder-Grindr use: More frequently having 3+ sex partners in the last year, having hookups in the last 2 months, having hookups involving alcohol or drug use, condomless sexual activity with new partners in the last 2 months

Is Tinder–Grindr Use Risky? Distinguishing Venue from Individuals’ Behavior as Unique Predictors of Sexual Risk. Ronald D. Rogge, Dev Crasta, Nicole Legate. Archives of Sexual Behavior, December 12 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-019-01594-w

Abstract: Geosocial networking apps (GSN; e.g., Tinder, Grindr) have rapidly increased in popularity, showing associations with greater sexual risk-taking. This study sought to distinguish between risks associated with intensive partner-seeking (i.e., individuals seeking out casual sex frequently across many venues) and risks associated with specific venues (e.g., GSNs, dating websites, offline activities). Expanding upon a literature predominantly focused on the population of men who have sex with men (MSM), we recruited a broader range of sexual identities. A convenience sample of 3180 participants from the U.S. (18–75 years old, 69% female, 75% Caucasian, 68% heterosexual) completed an anonymous, cross-sectional online survey. Logistic regressions yielded adjusted odds ratios highlighting the unique links between each predictor and sexual risk-taking. MSM/WSW indicators, quantity of partner-seeking and specific venues—particularly GSN use—emerged as robust predictors of sexual risk, increasing the odds of reporting all six outcomes examined: (1) having three or more sex partners in the last year, (2) having hookups in the last 2 months, (3) having hookups involving alcohol or (4) drug use, (5) condomless sexual activity with new partners in the last 2 months, and (6) ever having had a sexually transmitted infection. Although a large portion of risk originated from the proclivities of the individuals seeking casual sex, both online and offline methods of partner-seeking also contributed significant risk, suggesting that specific venues like GSN apps could be used as methods of targeting higher-risk behaviors. The results also highlight the importance of moving beyond MSM when addressing sexual risk.

Keywords: Geosocial networking apps Sexual risk Sexually transmitted infections Hookups Condomless sex

Online political hostility reflects the behavior of individuals predisposed to be hostile in all (also offline) contexts; but since this is more likely to be witnessed on public online platforms, these are perceived to induce more hostility

Bor, Alexander, and Michael Bang Petersen. 2019. “The Psychology of Online Political Hostility: A Comprehensive, Cross-national Test of the Mismatch Hypothesis.” PsyArXiv. December 19. doi:10.31234/osf.io/hwb83

Abstract: Why are online discussions about politics experienced as more hostile than offline discussions? A popular answer builds on the argument that human psychology is tailored for face-to-face interaction and, accordingly, people’s behavior changes for the worse in impersonal online discussions. We provide the first theoretical formalization and empirical test of this explanation: the mismatch hypothesis. We argue that mismatches between human psychology and novel features of online communication environments could (a) change people’s behavior, (b) bias their perceptions and (c) create adverse selection effects. We leverage five cross-national representative surveys and online behavioral experiments (total N=7510) to test the mismatch hypothesis but find little to no evidence. Rather, we find that online political hostility reflects the behavior of individuals predisposed to be hostile in all (including offline) contexts. Yet, because their behavior is more likely to be witnessed on public online platforms, these are perceived to induce more hostility.

Young Children Rationally Revise and Maintain What Others Think of Them

Asaba, Mika, and Hyowon Gweon. 2019. “Young Children Rationally Revise and Maintain What Others Think of Them.” PsyArXiv. December 19. doi:10.31234/osf.io/yxhv5

Abstract: We care tremendously about what others think of us. However, others’ beliefs about us critically hinge on what they did and did not observe; given limited evidence, their beliefs can be inaccurate, undesirable, or misaligned with what we think of ourselves. Thus, the ability to reason about and manage others’ beliefs about the self is critical for navigating social interactions and constructing healthy self-concepts. However, prior work on Theory of Mind has largely focused on children’s reasoning about others’ beliefs about the external world (e.g., Where does Sally think her toy is?), leaving open important questions about children’s ability to reason about others’ beliefs about the self. Here we report four experiments investigating how children reason about others’ beliefs about the self based on others’ past observations of their own performance. Three- and four-year-old children chose to demonstrate their success to someone who had only observed their failures but not their successes (Exp.1); children readily overrode their desire to demonstrate a novel toy to show their success on a familiar toy when the observer falsely believed that the child cannot operate the familiar toy (Exp. 2-3). Furthermore, when the observer had an inflated (i.e., false but desirable) belief about the self, children engaged in a task that would maintain the observer’s belief rather than a task that would reveal their true abilities (Exp.4). Building on prior work on Theory of Mind and reputation management, these results suggest that the inferential and representational capacities to reason about others’ beliefs about the self emerge early in life, and powerfully influence children’s social interaction, communication, and even task choice.

Considerable performance and representation gaps in competitive chess: Female chess players underperform their male counterparts in fast chess games; the performance gap becomes larger as the time constraint is tightened

Gender Differences in Performance under Time Constraint: Evidence from Chess Tournaments. Maryam Dilmaghani. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics, December 19 2019, 101505. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socec.2019.101505

Highlights
•    There are considerable performance and representation gaps in competitive chess between men and women. This paper examines the extent of the gaps when chess performance is time-constrained.
•    The World Chess Federation data, containing about 1.8 million individual observations, are used to construct a panel dataset.
•    The analysis shows that female chess players underperform their male counterparts in fast chess games. The female performance gap becomes larger as the time constraint is tightened.

Abstract: The economic literature on time-pressured decisions is slim and has mainly relied on laboratory collected data. Within this literature, only few studies have investigated the gender differences in the effects of time constraint on decision making. The World Chess Federation reports the official player ratings in Standard, Rapid and Blitz Chess. Standard, Rapid, and Blitz Chess only differ from each other in the stringency of the time constraint they impose on the players. While Standard Chess can last several hours, Rapid (Blitz) Chess allocates each player (30) 10 minutes or less for the entire game. The present paper uses 2012 to 2019 chess tournament data of the World Chess Federation to investigate the gender differences in the effects of time constraint on performance. These data, containing more than 1.8 million individual observations, are analyzed using several approaches to ensure the robustness of the findings. The results indicate that the Rapid and Blitz ratings of female chess players are below the ratings of male chess players of the same skills. While female underperformance is largely robust even at the country level, its magnitude is rather small. Finally, reexamining the question by chess skill thresholds produces evidence that female underperformance is greater among the elite players. The findings are discussed in light of the past literature.

Keywords: Gender, Competitiveness, Time Constraint, Time Pressure

Anti-Natalism from an Evolutionary Psychological Perspective & the moral processes that shape the decision to remain childless

Anti-Natalism from an Evolutionary Psychological Perspective. Faith L. Brown & Lucas A. Keefer. Evolutionary Psychological Science, Dec 19 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40806-019-00226-9

Abstract: Although research has investigated both moral psychology and evolutionary motivations behind reproduction, psychological issues at the intersection of these two domains remain relatively unexplored. In this paper, we describe anti-natalism, the ethical position that it is immoral to reproduce (e.g., Benatar 2006), and make a first outline of its potential as an area of psychological research. We note three critical gaps in knowledge: (1) extent of endorsement, (2) predictors or causes of this view, and (3) behavioral consequences of its endorsement. Although this position may seem obscure, we point to its practical relevance in understanding decisions to remain childless and its potential to contribute to a theoretical understanding of the moral processes that shape these decisions.

Emotion Dynamics Across Adulthood in Everyday Life: Older Adults Are More Emotionally Stable and Better at Regulating Desires, even though they experienced more intense desires than younger adults

Burr, Daisy A., Jaime J. Castrellon, David Zald, and Gregory R. Samanez-Larkin. 2019. “Emotion Dynamics Across Adulthood in Everyday Life: Older Adults Are More Emotionally Stable and Better at Regulating Desires.” PsyArXiv. July 18. doi:10.31234/osf.io/a3ku2

Abstract: Older adults report experiencing improved emotional health, such as more intense positive affect and less intense negative affect. However, there are mixed findings on whether older adults are better at regulating emotion—a hallmark feature of emotional health—and most research is based on laboratory studies that may not capture how people regulate their emotions in everyday life. We used experience sampling to examine how multiple measures of emotional health, including mean affect, dynamic fluctuations between affective states and the ability to resist desires—a common form of emotion regulation—differ in daily life across adulthood. Participants (N = 122, ages 20-80) reported how they were feeling and responding to desire temptations for 10 days. Older adults experienced more intense positive affect, less intense negative affect and were more emotionally stable, even after controlling for individual differences in global life satisfaction. Older adults were more successful at regulating desires, even though they experienced more intense desires than younger adults. In addition, adults in general experiencing more intense affect were less successful at resisting desires. These results demonstrate how emotional experience is related to more successful desire regulation in everyday life and provide unique evidence that emotional health and regulation improve with age.

Imagining the future has a moderate to strong impact on affect, and it has a stronger influence on affect compared to remembering the past

How imagining personal future scenarios influences affect: Systematic review and meta-analysis. Torben Schubert et al. Clinical Psychology Review, December 18 2019, 101811. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2019.101811

Highlights
• Instructed positive personal future imagination boosts positive affect.
• Future worry increases negative affect equally in high-anxious and low-anxious individuals.
• Imagining the future evokes stronger affect than remembering the past.
• Magnitude of effects depends on how an imagination is applied.
• Future research needs to focus more on clinical application of future imagination.

Abstract: Imagining the future is a fundamental human capacity that occupies a large part of people's waking time and impacts their affective well-being. In this meta-analysis, we examined the effect of (1) positive future imagination and (2) negative future imagination on affect, and (3) compared the affective responses between imagining the future and remembering the past; lastly, we (4) examined potential moderating variables in this regard. We identified 63 experimental studies (N = 6813) from different research areas and combined studies that applied the best possible self imagination task, future worry induction, and episodic future simulation, respectively. Findings yielded that imagining the future has a moderate to strong impact on affect, and it has a stronger influence on affect compared to remembering the past. Relevant moderator variables in each research area were also identified. We discuss the findings for the field of psychology in general and clinical psychology in particular. More elaborate research on personal future imagination seems crucial for the further advancement of clinical applications for mental health complaints. We conclude with recommendations for future research on the impact of future imagination on affective well-being.

Keywords: Future imaginationAffectBest possible selfFuture worryEpisodic future simulationMeta-analysis

Bacterial species belonging to families known to be part of the modern human gut microbiome already populated the intestinal microbiome of Homo since as far back as the last common ancestor between humans & Neanderthals

Rampelli, Simone and Turroni, Silvia and Mallol, Carolina and Hernandez, Cristo and Galvan, Bertila and Sistiaga, Ainara and Biagi, Elena and Astolfi, Annalisa and Brigidi, Patrizia and Benazzi, Stefano and Lewis, Cecil M. and Warinner, Christina and Hofman, Courtney A. and Schnorr, Stephanie L. and Candela, Marco, Components of a Neanderthal Gut Microbiome Recovered from Fecal Sediments from El Salt. Current Biology D-19-01987. SSRN: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3497736

Abstract: A comprehensive view of our evolutionary history cannot ignore the ancestral features of our gut microbiota. To provide some glimpse into the past, we searched for human gut microbiome components in ancient DNA from 14 archeological sediments spanning four stratigraphic units of El Salt Middle Paleolithic site (Spain), including layers of unit X, which has yielded well-preserved Neanderthal occupation deposits dating around 50 kya. According to our findings, bacterial species belonging to families known to be part of the modern human gut microbiome are abundantly represented across unit X samples, showing that well-known probiotic gut components such as Blautia, Dorea, Roseburia, Ruminococcus, Faecalibacterium and Bifidobacterium already populated the intestinal microbiome of Homo since as far back as the last common ancestor between humans and Neanderthals.

Keywords: human gut microbiome, ancient DNA, microbiome-host coevolution, health-promoting microbes

Brother-brother Incest: Findings are consistent with other reports of early and persistent hyper-eroticization of incest victims

From 2013...  Brother-brother Incest: Data from an Anonymous Computerized Survey. Keith W. Beard et al. Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity, Volume 20, 2013 - Issue 3, Pages 217-253. Aug 12 2013. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10720162.2013.807483

Abstract: Retrospective data were entered anonymously by 1,178 adult men using computer-assisted self-interview. Twenty-five were victims of brother-brother incest (BBI), 26 were victims of child sexual abuse by an adult male (CSA-AM) before 18 years of age, 1,127 were controls. BBI was often the first sexual experience for the victim. Our findings were consistent with other reports of early and persistent hyper-eroticization of incest victims. BBI and CSA-AM increased the likelihood of engaging in behaviors as an adult consistent with a co-existing or primary male-male sexual orientation, and both had deleterious impacts on adult men's sexual adjustment with their adult partners.

Check also Sister-brother Incest: Data from Anonymous Computer Assisted Self Interviews.
Stephen L. O'Keefe, Keith W. Beard, Sam Swindell, Sandra S. Stroebel, Karen Griffee & Debra H. Young. Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity, Volume 21, 2014 - Issue 1, https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/09/sister-brother-incest-findings-were.html

Also  Brother–Sister Incest: Data from Anonymous Computer-Assisted Self Interviews
Sandra S. Stroebel , Stephen L. O'Keefe , Keith W. Beard , Shih-Ya Kuo , Samuel Swindell & Walter Stroupe. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, Volume 22, 2013 - Issue 3, Pages 255-276. Apr 16 2013. https://doi.org/10.1080/10538712.2013.743952

Abstract: Retrospective data were entered anonymously by 1,521 adult women using computer-assisted self interview. Forty were classified as victims of brother–sister incest, 19 were classified as victims of father–daughter incest, and 232 were classified as victims of sexual abuse by an adult other than their father before reaching 18 years of age. The other 1,230 served as controls. The victims of brother–sister incest had significantly more problematic outcomes than controls on many measures (e.g., more likely than the controls to endorse feeling like damaged goods, thinking that they had suffered psychological injury, and having undergone psychological treatment for childhood sexual abuse). However, victims of brother–sister incest also had significantly less problematic outcomes than victims of father–daughter incest on some measures (e.g., significantly less likely than the father–daughter incest victims to endorse feeling like damaged goods, thinking that they had suffered psychological injury, and having undergone psychological treatment for childhood sexual abuse).

Keywords: father–daughter incest, child sexual abuse, sexual satisfaction, intimacy, conflict, divorce

Performance at the ballot box is associated with high conscientiousness, openness to experience and psychopathy; extraversion is negatively associated with better results

The Electoral Success of Angels and Demons: Big Five, Dark Triad, and Performance at the Ballot Box. Alessandro Nai. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, Vol 7, No 2 (2019). Nov 2019. https://doi.org/10.5964/jspp.v7i2.918

Abstract: The article tests whether the personality of candidates – in terms of their Big Five (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness) and Dark triad (narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism) – is associated with their electoral results. Via a novel dataset based on expert ratings for 122 candidates having competed in 55 recent national elections worldwide, and controlling for several covariates, results show that a better performance at the ballot box is associated with high conscientiousness, openness to experience and psychopathy. Extraversion is negatively associated with better results. Analyses also reveal profile effects; extraversion is linked to worse results especially for incumbents and younger candidates, conscientiousness and narcissism are associated with better results especially for candidates on the right-hand side of the ideological spectrum, and openness is associated with better results for male candidates.

Keywords: electoral success; Big Five; Dark Triad; personality; candidates; comparative data

Main Results and Discussion

The electoral success of 122 candidates having competed in 55 elections worldwide was regressed on their personality profile (plus controls). Several significant effects, which resist most robustness checks, were found. A better performance at the ballot box is associated with high conscientiousness, virtually on par with the “incumbency bonus” and confirming a known trend in studies on business job (Salgado, 1997). Openness to experience is also linked positively with success (Joly et al., 2018) and so is psychopathy – again, in line with studies on job performance and business (Babiak & Hare, 2006; Boddy et al., 2010). Extraversion is linked with lower success, perhaps because extroverted might be perceived as lacking seriousness – thus, in line with what found for conscientiousness. Results also reveal profile effects, that is, significant interactions between the profile of candidates and their personality. Extraversion is linked with worse results especially for incumbents and younger candidates, conscientiousness and narcissism are linked with stronger success in candidates on the right-hand side of the ideological spectrum, and openness is associated with greater success for men.

The rather strong effect of psychopathy might seem disturbing. After all, character components often associated with this trait are high impulsivity, thrill-seeking, low empathy and anxiety (Paulhus & Williams, 2002), definitely not ideal traits one could hope for in people we elect to lead us. Yet, the results seem more likely to support the idea that “successful psychopaths” – that is, individuals scoring high in non-clinical psychopathy which nonetheless show high levels of extrinsic success, e.g., in their career – benefit from high conscientiousness (Mullins-Sweatt et al., 2010). In the particularly antagonistic “social niche” of political competition, both psychopathy and conscientiousness are linked with extrinsic success. The fact that conscientiousness is the trait with virtually the strongest association with electoral success, also considering other powerful alternatives, sheds a somewhat positive light over electoral competition: if being likeable and nice counts less than being serious and dependable, then the much discussed “Americanisation” of politics, where exchanges about ideas are replaced by “beauty contests” where only the image matters, has not yet achieved the dramatic levels some fear.

Limitations

This article describes the first cross-national large-scale comparative study of how the (perceived) personality of candidates drives their electoral success. Yet, although covering a large number of cases across virtually all regions of the globe, the representativeness of the geographical coverage is contingent to the elections that took place in the period under investigation. Data collection in the study is still under way, and future iterations of the dataset will expand the scope – ideally towards full coverage of the countries around the globe. A second limitation comes directly from the use of expert judgments to measure the personality of elites. As discussed above, expert ratings provide evaluations of perceived personality traits, and the question whether these judgments reflect only a perceived public persona or, instead, are able to capture differences in the elites’ personality structure is still up for grabs. Also contested by some is whether external observers are able in the first place to provide an objective assessment of public figures, especially in light of potential ideological biases of “experts” (e.g. Wright & Tomlinson, 2018). Yet, evidence in several studies suggests that external observers are often able to provide relatively unbiased estimations (e.g., Nai & Maier, 2019; Vazire, 2006); furthermore, from a normative standpoint the importance of ethical concerns such as those expressed by the “Goldwater rule” are increasingly contested (e.g., Lilienfeld et al., 2018). Finally, the large-scale scope of the comparison made impossible the use of granular data about support for different candidates at the voter level (e.g., by pairing the dataset with representative mass post-electoral surveys in each country). Yet, reasons exist to believe that the personality of elites has unique effects on different voters. Voters tend to appreciate and support political figures with personalities that “match” their own (Caprara & Zimbardo, 2004; Caprara et al., 2003; Caprara et al., 2007b; Fortunato et al., 2018), and certain candidate personality profiles might seem more appealing for some voters but not for others – for instance the “drunken dinner guest” brash style of populists (Arditi, 2007) could be particularly appreciated by voters scoring low on agreeableness (Bakker et al., 2016). Future research should strive to develop a better understanding of whether individual differences moderate the effect of candidates’ personality in a comparative setting.

Conclusion: Theoretical, Methodological and Applied Implications

The research in the political consequences of elites’ personality is still in its infancy. The few existing studies are either limited to specific traits (e.g., psychopathy; Lilienfeld et al., 2012) or cases (e.g., Belgian elected officials; Joly et al., 2018). Yet, results presented in this article were globally in line with the evidence discussed in those studies. From a theoretical perspective, the results contribute to both the fields of political decision-making and behavioural consequences of individual differences. First, the results suggest that contemporary accounts of electoral competition are overlooking an important component – who the candidates are, beyond what they propose and how they frame it – which seems likely to drive part of their electoral fortune. In this sense, integrated models of voting choices should include, beyond citizens’ attitudes and preferences, a more nuanced account of the “supply” side, for instance in terms of candidates’ personality. Second, the results are consistent with findings in other disciplines (e.g., business; Babiak & Hare, 2006; Hochwarter et al., 2000), suggesting that personality plays a similar role in different contexts.

From a methodological standpoint, because obtained with an alternative approach – expert ratings – the results discussed here suggest that attention should be granted in further research to initiatives that triangulate alternative approaches for the measure of elite personality. Beyond comparative initiatives yielding self-ratings of elites via standardized surveys, quite promising is the avenue of machine learning automated coding of political speeches (Ramey et al., 2017, 2019), especially if coupled in the future with the automated coding (e.g., via computer vision) of non-verbal cues – facial expression, voice pitch, bodily gestures. Forthcoming research should strive to integrate alternative approaches towards a comprehensive and multimodal understanding of personality as a performative act, where the textual and lexical dimension of the communication is overlapped with the emotional behavior of the individuals under investigation (Poria et al., 2017).

Finally, from an applied standpoint, the results are can be seen as new recipes to be added to the cookbook of campaign consultants and spin doctors – or, at the very least, as new variations of old recipes. Modern campaign consultants are naturally drawn towards the use of more antagonistic communication techniques (e.g., Francia & Herrnson, 2007; Geer, 2012), seen as efficient tools to bolster candidates’ standings while keeping the opponents at bay. This recipe seems consistent with the positive effects played by psychopathic traits on electoral success, as described in the study. Yet, the fact that high extraversion harms electoral performances while high conscientiousness enhances them is a call for caution when designing excessively aggressive campaigns; if boldness is rewarded in competitive social dynamics, candidates are still expected to perform their duties seriously and in a competent manner. Recent studies have started exploring the link between communication strategies and candidates’ personality traits (e.g., Nai et al., 2019), and abrasive political figures such as the 45^th occupant of the White House will undoubtedly renew the attention of the discipline, the media, and the public at large towards the role of personality and character in politics.

Religiosity modestly increased 2006-2011 & modestly decreased 2011-2017; people's psychological & physical health in religious countries is particularly good once economic development is accounted for

Joshanloo, M., & Gebauer, J. E. (2019). Religiosity’s nomological network and temporal change: Introducing an extensive country-level religiosity index based on Gallup World Poll data. European Psychologist, Dec 2019. https://doi.org/10.1027/1016-9040/a000382

Abstract: Countries differ in their religiosity and these differences have been found to moderate numerous psychological effects. The burgeoning research in this area creates a demand for a country-level religiosity index that is comparable across a large number of countries. Here, we offer such an index, which covers 166 countries and rests on representative data from 1,619,300 participants of the Gallup World Poll. Moreover, we validate the novel index, use it to examine temporal change in worldwide religiosity over the last decade, and present a comprehensive analysis of country-level religiosity’s nomological network. The main results are as follows. First, the index was found to be a valid index of global religiosity. Second, country-level religiosity modestly increased between 2006 and 2011 and modestly decreased between 2011 and 2017—demonstrating a curvilinear pattern. Finally, nomological network analysis revealed three things: it buttressed past evidence that religious countries are economically less developed; it clarified inconsistencies in the literature on the health status of inhabitants from religious countries, suggesting that their psychological and physical health tends to be particularly good once economic development is accounted for; and finally, it shed initial light on the associations between country-level religiosity and various psychological dimensions of culture (i.e., Hofstede’s cultural dimensions and country-level Big Five traits). These associations revealed that religious countries are primarily characterized by high levels of communion (i.e., collectivism and agreeableness). We are optimistic that the newly presented country-level religiosity index can satisfy the fast-growing demand for an accurate and comprehensive global religiosity index.

Concluding Remarks

Countries differ widely in their degree of religiosity, and those country-level differences qualify numerous psychological effects that have been deemed universal (e.g., psychological health benefits of religiosity – Gebauer, Sedikides, et al., 2012; psychological health benefits of income – Gebauer, Nehrlich, et al., 2013; life satisfaction benefits derived from affective experience – Joshanloo, 2019). Hence, there is a great demand for a valid index of country-level religiosity that is available for a large number of countries. The present study provided such an index. The index is based on representative data from 1,619,300 individuals and spans 166 countries worldwide. We made use of that index to examine temporal change in worldwide religiosity over the last decade and to gain a more complete understanding of country-level religiosity’s nomological network. We found strong evidence that our country-level religiosity index is a valid and robust index of global religiosity. More precisely, its correlation with an external four-item index of global religiosity was near-perfect.10 Moreover, we randomly divided the full GWP sample into two independent subsamples and used those subsamples to compute two additional country-level religiosity indices. Those two entirely independent country-level religiosity indicators, too, correlated near-perfectly with the external country-level index of global religiosity. That finding speaks for the robustness of our index. The two independent country-level religiosity indices also demonstrated a near-perfect correlation, a finding that attests to the validity and reliability of our index. In addition, we estimated the worldwide temporal change in religiosity between 2006 and 2017. We found a quadratic trajectory (Figure 2). For the year 2006, we estimated that 73.039% of the world population considered religiosity an important part of their daily lives. From 2006 to 2011, we found an increase in worldwide religiosity levels. By 2011, we estimated the highest level of religiosity worldwide – 74.044% of the world population considered religiosity an important part of their daily lives. Finally, from 2011 to 2017, we found a decrease in worldwide religiosity. By 2017, the worldwide level of religiosity was (descriptively) lower than in 2006 – 72.725% of the world population considered religiosity an important part of their daily lives. Additional analyses identified a subset of 101 countries which drove the just-described quadratic trajectory (Figure 3). Finally, we estimated the worldwide temporal changes in Christianity and Islam between 2008 and 2017. We found a small linear decline in Christianity from 41.753% in 2008 to 40.582% in 2017 and no significant change in Islam within the same period of time (25.484% in 2008 and 25.508% in 2017). The small temporal change over the last decade buttressed our decision to base our country-level religiosity index on the cumulative data from 2005 to 2017. A detailed analysis of why we observed the just-described pattern of temporal change is beyond the scope of the present work, but it certainly is an interesting and timely topic for future research. We acknowledge that the temporal patterns we discovered in the present analyses may be subject to unexpected changes in the near future, and at present, it does not seem possible to predict the future of worldwide religiosity.

Moreover, the present research includes the most complete analysis of country-level religiosity’s nomological network ever conducted, involving 36 external variables. First, in replication of much previous research, country-level religiosity was associated with lower economic development. It is noteworthy that previous research typically capitalized on a single indicator of economic development, whereas we used several complementary indicators and found highly convergent results. Second, we examined the association between country-level religiosity and a large array of country-level health indicators (psychological health, physical health, and health security). The results were less consistent than in the case of economic development. However, on the whole it seems fair to conclude that country-level religiosity was mostly negatively related to health, but that negative relation was driven almost entirely by the poor economic conditions in most religious countries. In fact, after accounting for country-level differences in economic conditions, religious countries were by and large healthier than non-religious countries. Mediation analyses were largely consistent with Oishi and Diener’s (2014) proposal that the health benefits of country-level religiosity are partly due to higher levels of purpose in life in religious countries. Finally, little has been known about the associations between country-level religiosity and psychological dimensions of culture (i.e., Hofstede’s cultural dimensions and country-level Big Five traits). We found that religious countries primarily differed from their non-religious counterparts on dimensions that belong to the fundamental communion dimension (i.e., collectivism and agreeableness; Abele & Wojciszke, 2014). This finding squares with the high importance that all world religions place on communal values and norms (Gebauer, Paulhus, et al., 2013; Gebauer, Sedikides, & Schrade, 2017). Overall, the nomological network analysis conducted here buttressed previous research, increased the confidence in our country-level religiosity index, and expanded our understanding of country-level religiosity.

In conclusion, the present research introduced and validated the most extensive country-level religiosity index to date, examined its worldwide temporal trajectory over the last decade, and clarified its nomological network. We (optimistically) hope that our country-level religiosity index will be helpful for the large and fast-growing community of scholars interested in the powerful role of country-level religiosity for human thought, feelings, and behavior.

Voluntary castration: They felt penile removal made them more physically attractive; & at least two individuals thought that a penectomy would make them a better submissive sexual partner

Characteristics of Males Who Obtained a Voluntary Penectomy. Erik Wibowo, Samantha T. S. Wong, Richard J. Wassersug & Thomas W. Johnson. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Dec 16 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-019-01607-8

Abstract: We report here on survey data from 11 genetic males, who had voluntary penectomies without any explicit medical need, yet did not desire testicular ablation. This group was compared to a control group of men who completed the same survey but had no genital ablation. The penectomy group was less likely to identify as male than the control group. They were also more likely to have attempted self-injury to their penis (at a median age of 41.5 years), been attracted to males without penises, and felt that they were more physically attractive without a penis than the controls. Motivations for voluntary penectomy were aesthetics (i.e., a feeling that the penile removal made them more physically attractive) or eroticism (i.e., at least two individuals thought that a penectomy would make them a better submissive sexual partner). In terms of sexual function, the penectomized and control groups reported comparable sexual function, with six penectomized individuals claiming to still be able to get and keep an erection, suggesting possible incomplete penile ablation. In their childhood, penectomized individuals were more likely than the controls to have pretended to be castrated and to have involved the absence of genitals of their toys in their childhood play. We discuss characteristics and sexual outcomes for individuals who have had a voluntary penectomy. A future study with a larger sample size on men who desire penectomies is warranted.



                              Discussion

In this study, we compared various self-reported data from
genetic males, who elected voluntary penectomy, with data
from men with intact genitals, who did not express any
desire for genital removal. We found some differences
between the two groups, in that penectomized men were
more likely (1) to identify as non-male for their gender, (2)
to have attempted self-genital injury, (3) to be attracted to
males without penises, (4) to feel attractive without penis,
(5) to have pretended to be genital-less in their childhood
and (6) to have involved the absence of genitals of their toys
in their childhood play. Other psychosexual outcomes that
can be affected by hormonal levels such as sexual function,
depression and anxiety were comparable between the two
groups.

Psychiatric Condition
From this study, a majority (8 out of 11) of the penectomized individuals
felt attractive without a penis and this feeling may have
contributed to their desire for a penectomy. In addition, at least
two individuals thought that the absence of penis allowed them
to be a better submissive sexual partner, i.e., their penectomy
desire was sexually motivated. However, we cannot explicitly
conclude if the penectomized individuals in our study have a
psychiatric condition without psychiatric evaluation. We asked if
they had been diagnosed for any medical conditions, and only two
answered, one with inflammatory bowel disease and the other
with anxiety/depression. Neither alluded to a major psychiatric
disorder. Collectively our data suggest that there are two motivations
for desiring a penectomy in our sample. Some individuals
feel that their penis is not part of their body and they may have
body integrity dysphoria. Others have a paraphilic motivation,
where they eroticize not having a penis as making them a better
submissive sexual partner.
Early Life Experience
One unexpected finding from this study was that most of
the penectomized individuals grew up in a medium-large
city, had not observed animal castration nor had been threatened
with castration in their childhood. This is in contrast
to data on individuals with an orchiectomy, many of whom
were raised on a farm, had reported participating in animal
castration and were threatened with castration during their
childhood (Vale et al., 2013). However, the Vale et al. study
included predominantly men who had just an orchiectomy,
with only 7.5% of the men penectomized. We compared data
from the penectomized men in the Vale et al. study and the
current study, but no difference was found in terms of living
conditions during childhood. The fact of being raised
in a populous location, unlike on a farm, may explain why
the penectomized individuals had never witnessed animal
castration. These findings suggest that the etiology for voluntary
penectomy and voluntary castration are likely to be
different. It remains unknown to what extent social setting
and population density influenced interest in penectomy for
these individuals.
Among those who had played with male toy figurines
that lacked external genitalia, the penectomized individuals
were more likely to notice and incorporate the absence of
genitals in their play than non-penectomized individuals.
Although our sample size is small, it suggests that for
some individuals an extreme desire for a penectomy may
be linked to their childhood exposure to such anatomically
inaccurate male action figures. Half of the penectomized
individuals (as compared to 21% of the controls), who had
played with such toys, acknowledged eroticizing their play.
It is unclear whether interest in genital ablation for these
individuals preceded play with the toys or whether interest
in such toys came from an existing displeasure with their
external genitalia. Previously, studies on girls suggest that
exposure to Barbie dolls may influence their perception
of what is an ideal body (Dittmar, Halliwell, & Ive 2006;
Rice, Prichard, Tiggemann, & Slater, 2016). Thus, there is
a possibility that, in a similar fashion, exposure to genitalless
male toys may partially contribute to the penectomy
desire by some individuals in our study sample.
In addition, we found that the penectomized individuals
were more likely to have pretended to lack male external
genitalia than the controls. Interestingly, among those in
both groups, who had pretended to lack male genitalia,
they reported starting to pretend to be genital free at about
5 years of age and after playing with genital-less male toy
figurines. To what extent this earlier experience contributed
to the desire for a penectomy or its early emergence remains
unclear. However, years (for most, decades) later, the penectomized
individuals were more likely to have attempted selfinjury
to their penis than the controls. While we did not ask
when the desire for a penectomy first arose, possibly they
delayed getting a penile ablation because they were aware of
the medical risks associated with the procedure.
There are further differences between our results and what
Vale et al. (2013) reported on childhood abuse in their study
of the Eunuch Archive community. We did not find any difference
between the penectomized men and the controls, but
Vale et al. found a higher likelihood of experiencing sexual
abuse among individuals, who had or were considering having
genital ablations, than their control group. Again, that
study included mostly castrated individuals, and the questions
for assessing childhood trauma differed between the two
studies. However, the varied results raise again the possibility
of different etiology for genital ablation for the two populations,
with penectomized individuals less likely to experience
childhood abuse than the castrated individuals. Additional
data on this topic have been collected by our team, and further
analyses are warranted.

Sexual Parameters
In this study, the religiosity levels were comparable between
the penectomized and control groups. Previously, one study
showed that individuals who had voluntary genital ablations
were more likely to attend religious services and had been
raised in a religious household than men with intact genitalia
(Vale et al., 2013). However, again, that study included participants,
who had received genital removal, with less than
10% being penectomized. Thus, their data may be skewed
toward those who were solely castrated.
We found that the self-report sexual function for the two
groups was similar. This is not surprising as penectomized individuals
were not orchiectomized and, thus, are not deprived of
natural gonadal hormones. What is intriguing is that six out
of 11 penectomized individuals reported that they still could
easily “get and keep” an erection despite having been penectomized.
Unfortunately, we do not know the extent of the penile
ablation in our sample, i.e., we do not know, for example, if the
individuals were fully or only partially penectomized. Those
with partial penectomy may still be able to have some penetrative
sex by using the remaining penile stump. Even with a
full penectomy, the roots of the penis remain embedded in the
perineum, and such individuals may still sense some erection
in the penile root.
Our data on erection contrast with what has been reported
for the majority of penectomized penile cancer patients, who
report impaired erectile function (Maddineni, Lau, & Sangar,
2009; Sosnowski et al., 2016). However, most penile cancer
is in men over the age of 55 (www.cance r.org/cance r/penil
e-cance r/cause s-risks -preve ntion /risk-facto rs.html), and older
than the average age of the penectomized individuals in our
study. This comparison suggests that the reasons for having
a penectomy may contribute to one’s perceived erection after
the procedure—penile cancer patients undergo the treatment to
survive, whereas the individuals in our study purposely sought
penectomy when it was not explicitly medically necessary.
What we cannot deduce is how much of these perceived
erections are phantom erections, where one feels an erection
in the absence of a penis (Wade & Finger, 2010). Previous
studies have indicated that some male-to-female transsexuals
(Ramachandran & McGeoch, 2008), men penectomized for
other reasons such as penile cancer (Fisher 1999; Crone-Münzebrock,
1951 as cited in Lawrence 2010) experience phantom
erections after penectomy.

Limitations
Our study has several limitations. First, our sample size of individuals,
who have been penectomized but retained their testicles,
was small, i.e., just 11 individuals out of the 1023 who responded
to our survey. This affirms, however, how uncommon it is for men
to seek a penectomy in the absence of other genital modifications.
It is important to note that our survey was posted on Eunuch.org,
a website for people who are primarily interested in “castration”
and not necessarily “penectomy.” Respondents to our survey
were men with interest in all castration-related topics, but only
approximately 10% of the respondents claimed to have had genital
ablations. We know of no dedicated website for people who are
interested in penectomy alone.
Secondly, as the data were self-reported and anonymously
obtained, we cannot confirm the veracity of the data on genital
ablations. Participants were asked broadly about their genital
ablation status, but not interrogated about the exact extent of
penile tissue removal. Information on childhood experiences
is susceptible to recall bias. Lastly, regarding the controls, that
group was composed of men who visited the Eunuch Archive
website and thus have interest in genital removal, which may
be rarer in the general population.

We overestimate our performance when anticipating that we will try to persuade others & bias information search to get more positive feedback if given the opportunity; this confidence increase has a positive effect on our persuasiveness

Strategically delusional. Alice Soldà, Changxia Ke, Lionel Page & William von Hippel. Experimental Economics, Dec 16 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10683-019-09636-9

Abstract: We aim to test the hypothesis that overconfidence arises as a strategy to influence others in social interactions. To address this question, we design an experiment in which participants are incentivized either to form accurate beliefs about their performance at a test, or to convince a group of other participants that they performed well. We also vary participants’ ability to gather information about their performance. Our results show that participants are more likely to (1) overestimate their performance when they anticipate that they will try to persuade others and (2) bias their information search in a manner conducive to receiving more positive feedback, when given the chance to do so. In addition, we also find suggestive evidence that this increase in confidence has a positive effect on participants’ persuasiveness.

Keywords: Overconfidence · Motivated cognition · Self-deception · Persuasion · Information sampling · Experiment

4 General discussion and conclusion

In the current research we tested the hypothesis that overconfidence emerges as a
strategy to gain an advantage in social interactions. In service of this goal, we conducted
two studies in which we manipulate participants’ anticipation of strategic
interactions and also the type of feedback they receive.
    In our design, participants undertake both a Persuasion Task and an Accuracy
Task in all treatments. By switching the order of these tasks, we can manipulate
participants’ goals (being accurate vs. persuasive). Because they were not aware of
the nature of the second task when undertaking the first task, we prevent participants
from engaging in a cost-benefit analysis between the two goals. However, we
acknowledge that this choice of design has its own limitations.
First, self-deception might be possible in between the Accuracy and Persuasion
Task in the Accuracy-first treatments. Because we did not elicit beliefs again after
the Persuasion Task in the Accuracy-first treatments, we cannot rule out this possibility
directly. However, there is empirical evidence showing that the way people
interpret information tends to be sticky. For example, Chambers and Reisberg
(1985) presented participants with the famous duck/rabbit figure, which could be
interpreted as either of these animals. They found that once participants arrived at
an initial interpretation that it was a duck, they were unable to re-interpret it as a
rabbit without seeing it again. In the same manner, our hypothesis was established
on the expectation that once an (accurate) belief is formed, it is “on record”. It can
therefore not be consciously ignored by participants (even if they have incentives
to form overconfident beliefs in the next task). Hence, without additional data, participants
would not be able to re-construe their beliefs easily in our Accuracy-first
treatment after the Accuracy Task. In contrast, if a participant does not have a prior
accurate belief “on record”, it may be easier to interpret information in a self-serving
manner. Similarly, we conjecture that once an inflated belief has been formed in
the Persuasion-first treatment through motivated reasoning, it is also hard to “debias”
it, even though the subsequent Accuracy Task required them to form the most
accurate beliefs. There is no obvious reason to believe that participants were able to
easily inflate beliefs (after forming well-calibrated beliefs in Accuracy Task) later in
the Persuasion Task, but unable to easily deflate the overconfident beliefs (formed
in the Persuasion Task) in the subsequent Accuracy Task. Our experimental results
can be seen as justifying our assumptions ex-post, because we would have not found
any treatment difference in belief elicitations if participants were able to adjust their
beliefs flexibly depending on the incentives they were given in each task.
Second, the process of writing an essay in the Persuasion Task could lead participants
to form inflated self-assessment of their performance, even in the absence of
any self-deception motives. While there is evidence showing that self-introspection
may lead to overconfident self-assessment (Wilson and LaFleur 1995), Sedikides
et al. (2007) find that written self-reflection actually decreases self-enhancement
biases and increases accuracy.34 If the writing task made it harder for the participants
to form inflated beliefs, the treatment effect identified in the Self-Chosen Information
condition might be underestimated. On the contrary if the writing task helped
them form inflated beliefs, the effect size measured in the Self-Chosen Information
condition might be overestimated. However, if the Persuasion Task itself inflated
self-beliefs, we should have observed a significant treatment (Persuasion-first vs.
Accuracy-first) difference in overconfidence in the No Information condition. The
fact that it is not the case can be seen as tentative evidence that even if the Persuasion
Task itself could inflate self-beliefs, this effect is unlikely to be big enough
to undermine the main effect we have identified in the Self-Chosen Information
condition.
Our findings from both studies support the idea that self-beliefs respond to variations
in the incentives for overconfidence. In our experiments, participants were put
in situations where they could receive higher payoffs from persuading other players
that they performed well in a knowledge test. We observe that their confidence
in their performance increased in such situations. Consistent with the interpretation
that overconfidence is induced by strategic motivated reasoning, we observe that
when given the freedom to choose their feedback, participants who were motivated
to persuade chose to receive more positive information. This choice, in turn, helped
them form more confident beliefs about their performance. Participants holding
higher beliefs tend to be more successful at persuading the reviewers that they did
well through a written essay, particularly in the laboratory study.
These results support the hypothesis that people tend to be more overconfident
when they expect that confidence might lead to interpersonal gains, which helps to
explain why overconfidence is so prevalent despite the obvious costs of having miscalibrated
beliefs. Future research should investigate whether the type of interpersonal
advantage observed in the context of this experiment can also be observed in
different strategic contexts (e.g. negotiation, competition).

USA: Evidence of a negative Flynn effect on the attention/working memory and learning trials; as expected, education level, age group, and ethnicity were significant predictors of California Verbal Learning Test performance

Cohort differences on the CVLT-II and CVLT3: evidence of a negative Flynn effect on the attention/working memory and learning trials. Lisa V. Graves, Lisa Drozdick, Troy Courville, Thomas J. Farrer, Paul E. Gilbert & Dean C. Delis. The Clinical Neuropsychologist, Dec 12 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/13854046.2019.1699605

Abstract
Objective: Although cohort effects on IQ measures have been investigated extensively, studies exploring cohort differences on verbal memory tests, and the extent to which they are influenced by socioenvironmental changes across decades (e.g. educational attainment; ethnic makeup), have been limited.

Method: We examined differences in performance between the normative samples of the CVLT-II from 1999 and the CVLT3 from 2016 to 2017 on the immediate- and delayed-recall trials, and we explored the degree to which verbal learning and memory skills might be influenced by the cohort year in which norms were collected versus demographic factors (e.g. education level).

Results: Multivariate analysis of variance tests and follow-up univariate tests yielded evidence for a negative cohort effect (also referred to as negative Flynn effect) on performance, controlling for demographic factors (p = .001). In particular, findings revealed evidence of a negative Flynn effect on the attention/working memory and learning trials (Trial 1, Trial 2, Trial 3, Trials 1–5 Total, List B; ps < .007), with no significant cohort differences found on the delayed-recall trials. As expected, education level, age group, and ethnicity were significant predictors of CVLT performance (ps < .01). Importantly, however, there were no interactions between cohort year of norms collection and education level, age group, or ethnicity on performance.

Conclusions: The clinical implications of the present findings for using word list learning and memory tests like the CVLT, and the potential role of socioenvironmental factors on the observed negative Flynn effect on the attention/working memory and learning trials, are discussed.

Keywords: Cohort differences, Flynn effect, verbal memory, California Verbal Learning Test


Discussion
In the present study, we examined differences in performance on the immediate- and
delayed-recall trials between the CVLT-II and CVLT3 normative samples. Specifically,
we explored the extent to which verbal learning and memory skills were influenced
by the cohort year in which norms were collected (i.e. 1999 for the CVLT-II versus
2016–2017 for the CVLT3) versus differences in education level. Of note, differences in
education level between the CVLT-II and CVLT3 normative samples mirrored an
increase in the proportion of U.S. adults who completed post-secondary education
during the time period spanning the development of the CVLT-II and CVLT3.
The present study revealed evidence of a negative Flynn effect on the attention/
working memory and learning trials of the CVLT-II/CVLT3, with the CVLT3 cohort performing
significantly worse than the CVLT-II cohort on Trial 1, Trial 2, Trial 3, Trials 1–5
Total, and List B). In contrast, no significant cohort differences were found on the
delayed-recall trials. Consistent with past research, education level, age group, and
ethnicity were shown to be significant predictors of overall CVLT performance.
Education level and age group were positively and negatively associated with CVLT-II/
CVLT3 performance, respectively. With regard to ethnicity, performance on multiple
immediate- and delayed-recall trials was significantly higher among White and
Hispanic individuals relative to African-American individuals. Nevertheless, none of these
demographic variables were shown to have an interactive effect with cohort year of
norms collection on performance.
The present study overcomes some of the limitations of previous studies that examined
Flynn or cohort effects on learning and memory of word lists (e.g. use of relatively
small sample sizes; limited age ranges; confounding time of testing with changes in the
target words; using data harmonization techniques to convert Logical Memory scores to
CERAD Word List scores). Of note, the present study offers the advantage of using the
same word lists administered to large normative samples that represent a wide age
range and that were matched to the demographic makeup of the U.S. census at the time
that the testing occurred in order to explore potential cohort effects on a standardized
measure of verbal learning and memory. Further, the present findings are in line with
recent research suggesting that a negative Flynn effect may be occurring not only on IQ
tests, but also on measures of auditory attention/working memory and learning of word
lists. That is, given that negative cohort effects were observed only on immediate-recall
trials (and appeared to be driven by cohort differences on the first three learning trials in
particular), the present findings provide further evidence that the attention/working
memory aspects of verbal memory may be particularly vulnerable to negative cohort
effects (Wongupparaj et al., 2017).
As discussed above, the present study indicated that the CVLT3 normative sample
was more highly educated, on average, than the CVLT-II normative sample, and this
difference mirrored the increase over the past two decades in the proportion of U.S.
adults who completed post-secondary education. However, while the present study
yielded evidence for a significant positive (albeit relatively small) association between
education level and CVLT-II/CVLT3 performance, the evidence for a negative cohort
effect on performance persisted even after accounting for differences in education
level and cohort year education interactions (which were nonsignificant).
Furthermore, the observed negative cohort effect on immediate recall was present
across all age and ethnic groups, with cohort year x age group and cohort year x ethnicity
interactions also being nonsignificant.
The present results are consistent with the findings from a meta-analysis of cohort
effects on attention and working memory measures conducted by Wongupparaj et al.
(2017), who found a gradual decline in more complex auditory attention/working
memory skills (e.g. digit span backward) over the past four decades. Although the current
findings differ from those of Dodge et al. (2017), in which a positive cohort effect
was reported for word list learning and memory performance (including immediate
and delayed recall), there were a number of limitations in that study that make it difficult
to directly compare results from the two investigations (e.g. investigating only
older adults [65 years or older]; notable differences in the proportions of adults in
each age cohort within the pooled sample who were tested in the first versus second
data collection period; not addressing the fact that age cohort and period of testing
were potentially confounded; and using data harmonization techniques to convert
Logical Memory scores from a subset of its data pool into CERAD Word List scores to
facilitate analyses of cohort differences on verbal memory performance).
The results of the present study raise intriguing questions about the effects of socioenvironmental
changes that have unfolded during the time period spanning the
development of the second and third editions of the CVLT. In particular, the present
findings suggest that socioenvironmental changes may have occurred since 2000 that
(a) might be negatively impacting working memory and verbal learning skills, (b) are
not disproportionately affecting certain age or ethnic groups, and (c) are occurring
independent of generational changes in educational attainment. While education level
was examined in the present study, a number of researchers have highlighted distinctions
between educational attainment and education quality, and have suggested that
“educational attainment” as a homogeneous variable may have become diluted in
recent years due to varying standards and quality required for degrees across educational
settings (Allen & Seaman, 2013; Bratsberg & Rogeberg, 2018; Hamad et al., 2019;
Jaggars & Bailey, 2010; Nguyen et al., 2016; Rindermann et al., 2017). The lack of an
observed cohort year x education level interaction effect found in the present study
may reflect, in part, these recent concerns about the homogeneity of educational
attainment. This is important to consider for the present findings given that the negative
Flynn effect that has recently been found on IQ measures has been partly attributed
to reduced quality of education in those studies (Allen & Seaman, 2013; Jaggars
& Bailey, 2010).
It is difficult to escape the observation that the time period spanning the development
of the second and third editions of the CVLT (1999/2000 versus 2016/2017) also
coincided with a profound societal change: the digital revolution. As noted in recent
reviews (Rindermann et al., 2017; Wilmer, Sherman, & Chein, 2017), the use of digital
technology, while offering multiple advantages, may have subtle but significant
adverse effects on working memory and rote memorization skills. While relationships
between the use of digital technology and verbal learning and memory performance
were not formally investigated in the present study, the current findings invite the
intriguing hypothesis that increased use of digital tools may inadvertently have an
adverse effect on working memory and learning abilities. Unfortunately, there has
been a paucity of studies investigating associations of self-reported and performancebased
internet use with cognition. While there is evidence that the ability to perform
different tasks on the internet is significantly correlated with performance on cognitive
tests (Woods et al., 2019), no studies have directly investigated whether varying
degrees of internet, mobile phone, or other digital technology usage may positively or
negatively affect the development and maintenance of different domains of cognition.
Future research should explore potential differences between high and low internet
users on neuropsychological test performance. In addition, the present study was also
limited in that we were unable to assess relationships between other socioenvironmental
changes that may have occurred in the years spanning the development of
the CVLT-II and CVLT3 (e.g. generational changes in healthcare or standard of living;
see Dutton & Lynn, 2013; Rindermann et al., 2017).
The present findings were likely related to true cohort differences in verbal learning
and memory skills, and not to differences between the makeup of the CVLT-II versus
the CVLT3, given that (a) the lists of target words are identical across the two versions
of the test; (b) the negative cohort effect was only observed on select trials, thereby
indicating that one version is not uniformly harder or easier than the other; and (c)
other recent studies have also found evidence for a negative Flynn effect on attention/
working memory components of verbal memory (Wongupparaj et al., 2017). One
question that arises is whether the observed negative cohort effect found on the CVLT
in the present study was due to a negative Flynn effect specifically on attention/working
memory and learning skills versus a broader effect on IQ in general, which has
also been reported in recent years (Bratsberg & Rogeberg, 2018; Dutton & Lynn, 2013,
2015; Dutton et al., 2016; Flynn & Shayer, 2018; Pietschnig & Gittler, 2015; Shayer &
Ginsburg, 2007, 2009; Sundet et al., 2004; Teasdale & Owen, 2005, 2008; Woodley &
Meisenberg, 2013). Given that the CVLT-II and CVLT3 were not co-normed with IQ
tests, we cannot directly investigate this relationship. However, IQ has been shown to
correlate robustly with education level, and education was not shown to drive or moderate
any of the observed cohort effects in the present study. These findings suggest
that the present findings were related to true cohort differences in attention/working
memory and learning skills independent of any cohort changes that might also be
occurring for IQ functions in general.
It is also worth noting that the negative cohort effects observed in the present
study were associated with relatively small effect size estimates (i.e. gp
2 < .010 on
immediate-recall trials). However, the cohort effects are unlikely due to random chance
given the robust statistical power rendered by our large sample size. Moreover, from a
clinical perspective, even a small difference in raw scores can have a notable impact
on the conversion to standardized scores, which in turn can impact decisions about
an examinee’s level of cognitive functioning. For example, for an individual within the
age range of 45–54 years, a raw score of 4 on Trial 1 yields a z-score of –1.5 based on
CVLT-II norms versus a scaled score of 7 based on CVLT3 norms (note that the CVLT3
now uses scaled scores rather than z-scores); thus, this individual’s Trial 1 performance
could be interpreted as mildly impaired using CVLT-II norms and low average using
CVLT3 norms.
The present results have other important implications for clinical practice. In a
recent position paper, Bush et al. (2018) discussed the advantages and disadvantages
of using newer versus older versions of neuropsychological tests. The authors note
that an advantage of an older version of a neuropsychological test is that it may be
grounded more in empirical data supporting its validity, whereas a newer version may
lack such empirical support. Additionally, older versions of tests offer the advantage of
increased familiarity and ease of interpretation for clinicians. However, Bush et al.
(2018) also note that if cohort differences are found in the normative data between
the older and new versions of a test, then the use of the older version may provide
inaccurate standardized scores in a present-day evaluation (see also Alenius et al.,
2019). Given the present findings, the continued use of the CVLT-II’s 1999 norms in
today’s assessments may provide artificially lower standardized scores on indices of
attention/working memory and learning across the immediate-recall trials (e.g. Trial 1,
Trial 2, Trial 3, Trials 1–5 Total, List B). Further, given that the target lists and Yes/No
Recognition trial are the same on the CVLT3 as those used on the CVLT-II, 1) the validity
studies that have been conducted to date for the CVLT-II (over 1,000 published
studies; Delis et al., 2017) likely still have relevance for the CVLT3, and 2) familiarity
and ease of interpretation should be relatively equivalent across the two test versions.
Finally, the present results also suggest that the normative data that are currently
being used for other verbal learning and memory tests (e.g. California Verbal Learning
Test – Children’s Version; Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test; Hopkins Verbal Learning
Test), which were initially collected before 2000 and have not undergone any major
revisions since the early 2000s, may also have become outdated and are in need of
re-norming in the near future.
In summary, the current study found evidence of a negative Flynn effect on the
attention/working memory and learning trials of the CVLT-II/CVLT3. The findings have
clinical implications for the use of word list learning and memory tests like the CVLT,
and raise intriguing questions about the possible adverse effects of recent socioenvironmental
changes on attention, working memory, and learning skills.