Allow Fracking To Avoid An Energy Crisis: Nuclear is not being modernized & tankers/pipelines will fail some day and the uproar will left us with no spare capacity

We Need To Allow Fracking To Avoid An Energy Crisis. Stephen Glover, Daily Mail, January 24 2019. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-6625661/STEPHEN-GLOVER-need-allow-fracking-avoid-energy-crisis.html
We have an energy crisis. And it so happens that we appear to have lots of shale gas. A whole new industry could be created if only the Luddites would see sense.


Almost everyone I know is against fracking. Not that many of them understand much about it. But this doesn’t prevent them from pursing their lips and shaking their heads while looking solemn and generally disapproving whenever the subject is raised.

What about the United States, I sometimes ask, where fracking on a massive scale has made the country much less reliant on expensive imports of oil and gas? America has vast unpopulated areas, they reply. Britain is a crowded island. They may then add that fracking — which involves extracting gas from underground rocks by injecting high-pressure chemicals — causes earthquakes and ruins the countryside.

It is because of views like these that fracking in the UK has barely got going despite there being enormous reserves of potentially recoverable shale gas, which if extracted would greatly improve our chances of keeping the lights on and the wheels of the economy turning.

Labour is against fracking. As are the Lib Dems. So is the SNP government in Scotland, which has banned all exploration north of the border. Opinion polls suggest a majority of the public is against. And of course every environmentalist you care to mention thinks fracking is the work of the Devil.

As for the Conservative Government, although supposedly pro-fracking, it proceeds cautiously, and seldom defends the practice. I can’t recall the underwhelming Greg Clark, Business Secretary and the Minister with overall responsibility, ever singing its praises.

The Government’s greatest terror is that the process might cause earthquakes. In 2011, shale gas test-drilling triggered tremors in Lancashire, and fracking was banned for a time.

So it’s no surprise that Mr Clark’s department is apparently ignoring the conclusion of two advisers in the government’s Oil and Gas Authority that the existing low limit on tremors caused by fracking be raised because the risk of harm is ‘vanishingly small’.

All in all, it is hard to find anyone in public life who will speak up for fracking, excepting Natascha Engel, the former Labour MP for North East Derbyshire, who was appointed Commissioner for Shale Gas last autumn by the Government. She recently told the Mail that fracking, if safely and sensibly pursued, could create tens of thousands of jobs, and provide Britain’s energy needs for 50 years.

[...].

It’s a roaring shame we can’t have a reasoned debate. Consider this: on Tuesday, which was unpleasantly cold, the National Grid could supply enough power only by relying on energy produced by the coal-fired power stations that environmentalists hate (13 per cent of the total) and on imported electricity from France and Holland (five per cent).

Because there was very little wind on Tuesday, less than three per cent of our energy was supplied by off-shore and on-shore turbines. That’s the trouble with wind power. When demand is high, as it is bound to be in cold weather, all the wind turbines in the world won’t help if there isn’t even a gentle breeze.

Isn’t it a bit alarming that in a country of around 65 million people, which is the fifth or sixth biggest economy in the world, the National Grid can only keep the show on the road by cranking up coal power stations and depending on imported electricity?

It wouldn’t take much to go wrong — a ruptured pipeline carrying gas from Norway or Europe, or a tanker carrying the stuff to our shores running aground — for us to discover there isn’t any spare capacity in the system, and for everything to go kaput.

Looking to the future, plenty of people believe the danger of shortages is likely to increase. Britain’s coal-fired power plants will all be shut down by the mid-2020s. Several have already been closed under EU anti-pollution rules.
 
Meanwhile, the country’s ageing nuclear power stations, which provide 21 per cent of current power supplies, are expected to be de-commissioned by the 2030s. But the replacement programme has been severely dented by the recent decision of two Japanese companies to pull out of building two nuclear power stations with state-of-the-art reactors in Cumbria and on Anglesey.

With the £20 billion Chinese-financed Hinkley Point now the only new nuclear reactor being built, it seems possible, if not probable, that, in 15 years’ time, nuclear power stations will supply a smaller proportion of our energy needs than they do at present.

In short, as coal-fired power stations are certain to be cashiered, and nuclear power seems likely to be curtailed, there is a looming energy gap which new off-shore turbines can’t be guaranteed to fill because the wind does not always blow.

Nor would it be sensible to make up the impending shortfall by importing more gas from Russia. It would be foolhardy to put ourselves at the mercy of a hostile regime. That is the perilous path down which Germany has recklessly gone — 20 per cent of its energy needs are supplied by Moscow — and we would be mad to follow suit.

How easy it is for virtue-signalling or ignorant politicians to condemn fracking without giving any thought to the consequences in ten or 20 years’ time, or indeed for the thousands of new jobs, often in depressed areas of northern England, which it might create. […]

If we still had vast reserves of oil and gas in the North Sea, this weakness and indecision on the part of the authorities might not matter. But we don’t. We have an energy crisis. And it so happens that we appear to have lots of shale gas.

Rolf Degen summarizing: Default manipulations, the magic bullets of the "Nudge" approach for improving decision making, work the least well when individuals care deeply about the choice

When and why defaults influence decisions: a meta-analysis of default effects. Jon M Jachimowicz et al. Behavioural Public Policy, https://doi.org/10.1017/bpp.2018.43

Abstract: When people make decisions with a pre-selected choice option – a ‘default’ – they are more likely to select that option. Because defaults are easy to implement, they constitute one of the most widely employed tools in the choice architecture toolbox. However, to decide when defaults should be used instead of other choice architecture tools, policy-makers must know how effective defaults are and when and why their effectiveness varies. To answer these questions, we conduct a literature search and meta-analysis of the 58 default studies (pooled n = 73,675) that fit our criteria. While our analysis reveals a considerable influence of defaults (d = 0.68, 95% confidence interval = 0.53–0.83), we also discover substantial variation: the majority of default studies find positive effects, but several do not find a significant effect, and two even demonstrate negative effects. To explain this variability, we draw on existing theoretical frameworks to examine the drivers of disparity in effectiveness. Our analysis reveals two factors that partially account for the variability in defaults’ effectiveness. First, we find that defaults in consumer domains are more effective and in environmental domains are less effective. Second, we find that defaults are more effective when they operate through endorsement (defaults that are seen as conveying what the choice architect thinks the decision-maker should do) or endowment (defaults that are seen as reflecting the status quo). We end with a discussion of possible directions for a future research program on defaults, including potential additional moderators, and implications for policy-makers interested in the implementation and evaluation of defaults.

Men in the short-term mating context allocated more points to bodily traits, but only when in the low budget condition—in the high budget condition, men showed more interest in facial traits

Mate-by-Numbers: Budget, Mating Context, and Sex Predict Preferences for Facial and Bodily Traits. Carin Perilloux, Jaime M. Cloud. Evolutionary Psychological Science, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40806-019-00187-z

Abstract: Unlike women, or men considering long-term mates, men pursuing short-term mating have shown a tendency to prioritize bodily information over facial information when assessing potential mates. Prior studies have documented this tendency across a variety of methods ranging from photograph ratings to forcing a choice between faces and bodies, but have yet to ask participants to prioritize individual traits in faces and bodies. The current study used a budget allocation method to do just that. We randomly assigned participants (N = 258) to a mating context (short-term or long-term) and a budget (high or low) and asked them to allocate points across 10 traits (five facial, five bodily) to design their ideal mate within their budget. As expected, men in the short-term mating context allocated more points to bodily traits, but only when in the low budget condition—in the high budget condition, men showed more interest in facial traits. Women, also as expected, and in contrast to men, showed a general trend toward favoring facial traits regardless of budget and condition. Overall, the results are consistent with the hypothesis that women’s bodies provide better information regarding immediate fertility and are thus more important for men to assess in short-term mating contexts.

Keywords: Physical attractiveness Mate preferences Face Body Traits Evolution

Raising mice in an enriched environment (better opportunities for social interaction, voluntary physical exercise & explorative behaviour) boosts cortical plasticity & now ocular dominance plasticity

Transgenerational transmission of enhanced ocular dominance plasticity from enriched mice to their non-enriched offspring. Evgenia Kalogeraki, Rashad Yusifov and Siegrid Löwel. eNeuro January 21 2019, ENEURO.0252-18.2018; https://doi.org/10.1523/ENEURO.0252-18.2018

Abstract: In recent years, evidence has accumulated that non-Mendelian transgenerational inheritance of qualities acquired through experience is possible. In particular, it has been shown that raising rodents in a so-called enriched environment (EE) can not only modify the animals’ behaviour and increase their susceptibility to activity-dependent neuronal network changes, but also influences both behaviour and neuronal plasticity of the non-enriched offspring. Here, we tested whether such a transgenerational transmission can also be observed in the primary visual cortex (V1) using ocular dominance (OD) plasticity after monocular deprivation (MD) as a paradigm. While OD-plasticity after 7 days of MD is absent in standard-cage (SC) raised mice beyond postnatal day (P) 110, it is present lifelong in EE-raised mice. Using intrinsic signal optical imaging to visualize cortical activity, we confirm these previous observations and additionally show that OD-plasticity is not only preserved in adult EE-mice but also in their adult non-enriched offspring: mice born to enriched parents, but raised in SCs at least until P110 displayed similar OD-shifts towards the open eye after 7 days of MD as age-matched EE-raised animals. Furthermore, testing the offspring of EE-female versus EE-males with SC-mating partners revealed that only pups of EE-females, but not of EE-males, preserved OD-plasticity into adulthood, suggesting that the life experiences of the mother have a greater impact on the continued V1-plasticity of the offspring. The OD-plasticity of the non-enriched pups of EE-mothers was, however, mechanistically different from that of non-enriched pups of EE-parents or EE-mice.

Significance statement:  Recently evidence is accumulating that life experiences and thus acquired qualities of parents can be transmitted across generations in a non-Mendelian fashion and have a significant impact on the fitness of offspring. Raising mice in a so-called enriched environment with enhanced opportunities for social interaction, voluntary physical exercise and explorative behaviour has been shown to boost cortical plasticity. Our results now show that the plasticity-promoting effect of enrichment on ocular dominance plasticity, a well-established plasticity paradigm in a primary sensory cortex, can also be transmitted from enriched parents to their non-enriched offspring. Thus cortical plasticity is not only influenced by an animal’s life experiences but can also be modified by the life experiences of its parents.

Fake News & Ideological (a)symmetries in Perceptions of Media Legitimacy: Partisans are motivated to believe fake news & dismiss true news that contradicts their position as fake news

Harper, Craig A., and Thom Baguley. 2019. ““you Are Fake News”: Ideological (a)symmetries in Perceptions of Media Legitimacy” PsyArXiv. January 23. doi:10.31234/osf.io/ym6t5

Abstract: The concept of ‘fake news’ has exploded into the public’s consciousness since the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency in late 2016. Since then, this phrase has witnessed a more than 350% increase in its popular usage, and was named Collins Dictionary’s word of the year for 2017. However, the concept of fake news has received surprisingly little attention within the social psychological literature. We present three well-powered studies (combined N = 2,275) using American and British samples to establish whether liberal and conservative partisans are motivated to believe fake news (Study 1; n = 722) or dismiss true news that contradicts their position as being fake (Study 2; n = 570). We found support for both of these hypotheses. Further, these effects were asymmetrically moderated by collective narcissism, need for cognition, and faith in intuition (Study 3; n = 983). Together, our findings suggest that partisans of both sides of the political spectrum engage with the ‘fake news’ label (and perceive media story legitimacy) in a way that is consistent with a motivated reasoning approach, though these motivations appear to differ between-groups. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed, particularly in relation to growing levels of political polarization and incivility in modern Western democracies.

There were to Neanderthals two effective methods of minimizing C vitamin loss and prevent scurvy: eating meat raw (fresh or frozen); and eating the meat after it has been putrefied

Neanderthals, vitamin C, and scurvy. John D.Speth. Quaternary International, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2018.11.042

Abstract: This paper explores the role of vitamin C (ascorbic acid) in the foodways of hunter-gatherers—both ethnohistoric and Paleolithic—whose diet seasonally or over much of the year, of necessity, was comprised largely of animal foods. In order to stave off scurvy, such foragers had to obtain a minimum of about 10 mg per day of vitamin C. However, there is little to no vitamin C in muscle meat, being concentrated instead in various internal organs and brain. Even ruminant stomach contents, despite the abundance of partially digested plants, contains almost none. Moreover, many of the “meatiest” anatomical units in a carcass, such as the thigh muscles or “hams” associated with the femur, are extremely lean in most wild ungulates, making them nutritionally much less valuable to northern foragers than archaeologists commonly assume (for example, Inuit and other indigenous peoples of the arctic and subarctic commonly use the thigh meat as dog food). Vitamin C is also the most unstable vitamin, rapidly degrading or disappearing when exposed to water, air, light, heat, and pH levels above about 4.0. As a consequence, common methods of preparing meat for storage and consumption (e.g., drying, roasting, boiling) may lead to significant loss of vitamin C. There are two effective methods of minimizing such loss: (1) eating meat raw (fresh or frozen); and (2) eating the meat after it has been putrefied. Putrefaction has distinct advantages that make it a common, if not essential, way of preparing and preserving meat among northern latitude foragers and, for the same reasons, very likely also among Paleolithic foragers in the colder climes of Pleistocene Eurasia. Putrefaction “pre-digests” the meat (including the organs), making it much less costly to ingest and metabolize than raw meat; and it lowers the pH, greatly increasing the stability of vitamin C. These observations offer insights into critical nutritional constraints that likely had to be addressed by Neanderthals and later hominins in any context where their diet was heavily meat-based for a substantial part of the year.

10.1016/j.quaint.2018.09.003

Many animals show evidence of culture (innovations in multiple domains whose frequencies are influenced by social learning), but only humans show strong evidence of complex, cumulative culture. Why?

Teaching and curiosity: sequential drivers of cumulative cultural evolution in the hominin lineage. Carel P. van Schaik, Gauri R. Pradhan, Claudio Tennie. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, January 2019, 73:2, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00265-018-2610-7

Abstract: Many animals, and in particular great apes, show evidence of culture, in the sense of having multiple innovations in multiple domains whose frequencies are influenced by social learning. But only humans show strong evidence of complex, cumulative culture, which is the product of copying and the resulting effect of cumulative cultural evolution. The reasons for this increase in complexity have recently become the subject of extensive debate. Here, we examine these reasons, relying on both comparative and paleoarcheological data. The currently best-supported inference is that culture began to be truly cumulative (and so, outside the primate range) around 500,000 years ago. We suggest that the best explanation for its onset is the emergence of verbal teaching, which not only requires language and thus probably coevolved with the latter’s evolution but also reflects the overall increase in proactive cooperation due to extensive allomaternal care. A subsequent steep increase in cumulative culture, roughly 75 ka, may reflect the rise of active novelty seeking (curiosity), which led to a dramatic range expansion and steep increase in the diversity and complexity of material culture. A final, and continuing, period of acceleration began with the Neolithic (agricultural) revolution.

Keywords: Cumulative culture Stone tools Out of Africa Imitation Verbal instruction Teaching

Short periods of unoccupied waking rest can facilitate consolidation in a manner similar to that proposed to occur during sleep

Memory Consolidation during Waking Rest. Erin J. Wamsley. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2018.12.007

Abstract: Recent studies show that brief periods of rest after learning facilitate consolidation of new memories. This effect is associated with memory-related brain activity during quiet rest and suggests that in our daily lives, moments of unoccupied rest may serve an essential cognitive function.

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In fact, a growing body of evidence suggests that short periods of unoccupied waking rest can facilitate consolidation in a manner similar to that proposed to occur during sleep [1–3,5,6] (quiet wake conditions, Figure 1). Our group and others have demonstrated that a 15min period of eyes-closed rest following encoding enhances memory for both procedural [5] and declarative [1,2] memory tasks, compared to an equivalent period spent completing a distractor task. Other recent studies have demonstrated that post-learning rest enhances subsequent memory for spatial and temporal information [7] , facilitates insight into a complex problem [3] , and enhances auditory statistical learning [6]. These memory effects can be maintained for a week or more after the rest intervention [2,7]. Together, these observations suggest that even during wakefulness, memory is preferentially consolidated during offline states characterized by reduced attentional demands.

Thus, the fundamental insight yielded by these new studies of waking rest is not so much that consolidation can occur during wakefulness but that consolidation is not uniformly distributed throughout all of wakefulness. Instead, memory is preferentially facilitated during periods of unoccupied time in which attentional and cognitive demands are reduced [1,2,5]. This insight helps us to understand the necessary and sufficient conditions for consolidation to occur. Increasingly, it appears that for many forms of consolidation, sleep-specific neural mechanisms may not be strictly required. Instead, both sleep and other of fl ine states share common neurobiological features essential for consolidation to take place.

Indeed, many of the same neurobiological mechanisms thought to underlie sleep’s effect on memory are shared in common by waking rest. First, cellular-level memory ‘reactivation’ occurs during quiescent waking rest in the hippocampus as well as in other brain regions. During this process, sequences of neuronal fi ring representing recent experience are reiterated of fl ine. Blocking these reactivations impairs learning and memory [8]. In humans, a growing number of neuroimaging studies demonstrate memory-related brain activity during periods of post-training rest that predicts subsequent memory. For example, fMRI has been used to demonstrate that patterns of hippocampal activity characterizing encoding persist into post-learning rest and that this predicts subsequent memory [9]. Our own group has meanwhile reported that low-frequency electroencephalogram oscillations thought to support consolidation during sleep similarly predict memory retention across quiet waking rest [1]. And the neuromodulatory environment during quiet rest is also well own group has meanwhile reported that low-frequency electroencephalogram oscillations thought to support consolidation during sleep similarly predict memory retention across quiet waking rest [1]. And the neuromodulatory environment during quiet rest is also well suited to facilitate consolidation; in both sleep and quiet rest, acetylcholine levels are substantially reduced from active waking levels, thought to promote hippocampal-cortical communication dynamics that benefit consolidation, as opposed to new learning. Thus, converging lines of evidence suggest that like sleep, rest benefits memory by enabling an active process of consolidation, facilitated by the offline reactivation and synaptic plasticity.

Emotion Perception in Members of Mensa: Better at differentiating emotion, above all anger; the positive manifold extends also to social cognition, & runs counter to the concept of a cost to giftedness

Emotion Perception in Members of Norwegian Mensa. Jens Egeland. Front. Psychol., Jan 23 2019, https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00027

Abstract: Are people with superior intelligence also superior in interpreting the emotions of others? Some studies find that an underlying g-factor links all mental processes leading to an expectation of a positive answer to the question, while other studies find that there is a cost to giftedness. No previous study have tested social cognition among highly gifted, or the Mensa society specifically. The study measures emotion recognition in 63 members of the Norwegian Mensa and 101 community controls. The Mensa group had a higher total score on the EmoBio test and was specifically better at differentiating the anger emotion, otherwise hypothesized to be mediated by subcortical processes. There was no difference in heterogeneity between the groups, contrary to the expectation of an autistic subgroup in Mensa. The study indicate that the positive manifold extends also to social cognition, and runs counter to the concept of a cost to giftedness.

Supermarket Access and Childhood Bodyweight: Supermarket openings reduce the weight of low-income children, although by little

Supermarket Access and Childhood Bodyweight: Evidence from Store Openings and Closings. Di Zeng et al. Economics & Human Biology, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2019.01.004

Highlights
•    We assess the child weight impacts of supermarket openings and closings.
•    There is little overall impact with either supermarket openings or closings.
•    Supermarket openings reduce the weight of low-income children.
•    Supermarket closings does not have a clear impact on children.

Abstract: Retail food environment is increasingly considered in relation to obesity. This study investigates the impacts of access to supermarkets, the primary source of healthy foods in the United States, on the bodyweight of children. Empirical analysis uses individual-level panel data covering health screenings of public schoolchildren from Arkansas with annual georeferenced business lists, and utilizes the variations of supermarket openings and closings. There is little overall impact in either case. However, supermarket openings are found to reduce the BMI z-scores of low-income children by 0.090 to 0.096 standard deviations. Such impact remains in a variety of robustness exercises. Therefore, improvement in healthy food access could at least help reduce childhood obesity rates among certain population groups.

Sexual arousal was associated with reduced disgust & reduced judgments of disease risk, & with enhanced willingness to have sex with all (risky & non-risky) targets; trait disgust was a predictor

The Role of Disgust in Male Sexual Decision-Making. Megan Oaten et al. Front. Psychol., Jan 22 2019, https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02602

Abstract: Sexual arousal is known to increase risky behaviors, such as having unprotected sex. This may in part relate to the emotion of disgust, which normally serves a disease avoidant function, and is suppressed by sexual arousal. In this report we examine disgust's role in sexual decision-making. Male participants received two study packets that were to be completed at home across two different time-points. Participants were asked to complete one packet in a sexually aroused state and the other in a non-aroused state. Participants were asked to rate: (1) arousal, (2) disgust, (3) willingness for sex, and (4) disease risk toward a range of female targets, which varied in level of potential disease risk (sex-worker vs. non sex-worker) and attractiveness. A measure of trait disgust was also included along with other related scales. Sexual arousal was associated with reduced disgust and reduced judgments of disease risk for all targets—these latter two variables being correlated—and with enhanced willingness to have sex with all of the depicted persons. Willingness to have sex when aroused (in contrast to non-aroused) was predicted by disease risk judgments and trait disgust, suggesting both direct (state) and indirect (trait) effects of disgust on sexual decision-making.

Mistaken belief that genetic influence implies genetic essentialism, and is therefore tantamount to prejudice, is raised as possible reason why heritability is often ignored in the social sciences

Nature vs. nurture is nonsense: On the necessity of an integrated genetic, social, developmental, and personality psychology. Fiona Kate Barlow. Australian Journal of Psychology, https://doi.org/10.1111/ajpy.12240

Abstract: The field of behavioural genetics unambiguously demonstrates that heritable individual differences exist and are important in explaining human behaviour. Despite this, some psychological perspectives ignore this research. If we wish to comprehensively understand the impact of parenting, the environment, or any social factor, however, we must engage with genetics. In this article, I review research that reveals that genes affect not only our personalities, but the way that we understand and react to the social world. Studies further reveal that notable life events are in part explained by genetic variance. I detail how this could be the case through active, evocative, and passive genetic correlations, and go on to argue that all complex psychological traits are likely the result of multifaceted gene by environment interactions. A mistaken belief that genetic influence implies genetic essentialism, and is therefore tantamount to prejudice, is raised as possible reason why heritability is often ignored in the social sciences. The article concludes with practical suggestions for how we can embrace behavioural genetics as our methods struggle to match the divine complexity of human existence.

Monty Hall Dilemmas in capuchin monkeys, rhesus macaques, and humans

Monty Hall Dilemmas in capuchin monkeys, rhesus macaques, and humans. Watzek, Julia, Whitham, Will, Washburn, David A, Brosnan, Sarah. International Journal of Comparative PsychologyVolume 31, https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1jn0t21r

Abstract: The Monty Hall Dilemma (MHD) is a simple probability puzzle famous for its counterintuitive solution. Participants initially choose among three doors, one of which conceals a prize. A different door is opened and shown not to contain the prize. Participants are then asked whether they would like to stay with their original choice or switch to the other remaining door. Although switching doubles the chances of winning, people overwhelmingly choose to stay with their original choice. To assess how experience and the chance of winning affect decisions in the MHD, we used a comparative approach to test 264 college students, 24 capuchin monkeys, and 7 rhesus macaques on a nonverbal, computerized version of the game. Participants repeatedly experienced the outcome of their choices and we varied the chance of winning by changing the number of doors (three or eight). All species quickly and consistently switched doors, especially in the eight-door condition. After the computer task, we presented humans with the classic text version of the MHD to test whether they would generalize the successful switch strategy from the computer task. Instead, participants showed their characteristic tendency to stick with their pick, regardless of the number of doors. This disconnect between strategies in the classic version and a repeated nonverbal task with the same underlying probabilities may arise because they evoke different decision-making processes, such as explicit reasoning versus implicit learning.

On the associations between indicators of resting arousal levels, physiological reactivity, sensation seeking, and psychopathic traits

On the associations between indicators of resting arousal levels, physiological reactivity, sensation seeking, and psychopathic traits. Nicholas Kavish et al. Personality and Individual Differences, Volume 141, 15 April 2019, Pages 218-225. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.01.013

Abstract: Despite consistent findings associating autonomic activity, such as resting heart rate, with antisocial behavior, the research connecting autonomic variables to related phenotypes, such as psychopathy and sensation seeking, has been mixed. The existing research in this area has been limited by underpowered samples, focused predominantly on incarcerated males, frequently dichotomized samples into “psychopaths” and controls, and failed to consider potential gender differences. The current study sought to address some of these limitations using a relatively large undergraduate sample (N = 453), four measures of autonomic activity (e.g., resting heart rate, resting skin conductance, heart rate reactivity, and skin conductance reactivity), a sensation seeking scale, and two measures of psychopathic traits. In order to thoroughly assess possible gender differences, the analyses were conducted for males and females separately. Few significant associations were found between the autonomic and psychological variables, and most became insignificant after controlling for age and race and correcting for multiple comparisons. The current study offers little support for an association between autonomic activity and sensation seeking or psychopathic traits.

Extensive comparison 22 kHz vocalizations in rats with human cry: 76% of common features; vocalizations may be an evolutionary vocal homolog of human crying, expressing anxiety, not depression

Emission of 22 kHz vocalizations in rats as an evolutionary equivalent of human crying: Relationship to depression. Stefan M. Brudzynski. Behavioural Brain Research, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbr.2019.01.033

Highlights
•    Rat 22 kHz ultrasonic vocalizations (USVs) were compared with human crying
•    Extensive comparison of 22 kHz USV with human cry showed 76% of common features
•    Rat 22 kHz USVs may be treated as an evolutionary vocal homolog of human crying
•    Rat 22 kHz USVs and human crying are both expressing anxiety and not depression

Abstract: There is no clear relationship between crying and depression based on human neuropsychiatric observations. This situation originates from lack of suitable animal models of human crying. In the present article, an attempt will be made to answer the question whether emission of rat aversive vocalizations (22 kHz calls) may be regarded as an evolutionary equivalent of adult human crying. Using this comparison, the symptom of crying in depressed human patients will be reanalyzed. Numerous features and characteristics of rat 22 kHz aversive vocalizations and human crying vocalizations are equivalent. Comparing evolutionary, biological, physiological, neurophysiological, social, pharmacological, and pathological aspects have shown vast majority of common features. It is concluded that emission of rat 22 kHz vocalizations may be treated as an evolutionary vocal homolog of human crying, although emission of 22 kHz calls is not exactly the same phenomenon because of significant differences in cognitive processes between these species. It is further concluded that rat 22 kHz vocalizations and human crying vocalizations are both expressing anxiety and not depression. Analysis of the relationship between anxiety and depression reported in clinical studies supports this conclusion regardless of the nature and extent of comorbidity between these pathological states.

In Canada, the gap in Atheism prevalence of men and women is widening

The evolution of the gender religiosity gap among the Canadian-born. Maryam Dilmaghani. Review of Social Economy, https://doi.org/10.1080/00346764.2018.1562198

Abstract: The higher religiosity of women in the Western Christian societies is one of the best documented findings in the religious scholarship. In spite of the recent vibrancy of secular movements in North America, the higher religiosity of women appears persistent. As a result, the gender ratio is greatly skewed in the secular groups in favour of males. For instance, for every atheist female in North America, there are at least three males. Using the Canadian General Social Surveys of 1985–2014, this paper examines how the gender religiosity gap has evolved among the Canadian-born. Throughout the period, Canadian-born women are found less likely to be unaffiliated and show a greater frequency of religious attendance. The religious attendance gap is found to be closing. The unaffiliation gap, on the other hand, seems to have widened in the 21st century. Limiting the analyses to the gainfully employed respondents only reduces the religious attendance gap. For the high earners, the attendance gap effectively disappears, while a large unaffiliation gap persists into the 2010s. This pattern is best explained by the recent literature asserting that men and women are differentially socially sanctioned for the adoption of a secularized identity. The alleged sexism of the new secular movements is also noted as a potential explanation. The examination of the recent Canadian data on perceived religious and gender discrimination produces evidence congruent with both of these potential explanations.

Keywords: Gender, religiosity, secularity, Canada

Is Meat Sexy? Meat symbolizes status both evolutionarily & in modern times; men’s sexual motivation system might increase preference for meat; women, when are sexually motivated, might have less meat

Is Meat Sexy? Meat Preference as a Function of the Sexual Motivation System. Eugene Y.Chan, Natalina Zlatevska. Food Quality and Preference, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodqual.2019.01.008

Highlights
•    Meat symbolizes status both evolutionarily and in modern times.
•    Thus, men’s sexual motivation system might increase their preference for meat.
•    Men’s desire for status mediates the effect.
•    An internal meta-analysis shows that women, when they are sexually motivated, might lower meat consumption.
•    The findings add to knowledge about how evolutionary processes shape food preferences.

Abstract: When their sexual motivation system is activated, men behave in ways that would increase their desirability as a mating partner to women. For example, they take greater risks and become more altruistic. We examine the possibility that men’s sexual motivation, when elicited, can influence their preference for meat because meat signals status to others, including women—and signalling status is one way to help men achieve their mating goals. We find support for this hypothesis in three studies involving consumption (Study 1) and preference (Studies 2 and 3) for meat. Men’s desire for status mediates their liking for meat. In contrast, when their sexual motivation system is activated, women like meat less, possibly since they pursue other strategies such as beauty and health to make themselves desirable to men. Thus, we suggest that evolutionary processes shape food preferences. We discuss the contributions and limitations of our results as well as practical implications for reducing meat consumption—to not only improve one’s physical health but food sustainability.

Demographic, phenotypic, and genetic characteristics of centenarians in Okinawa and Japan: Part 1—centenarians in Okinawa

Demographic, phenotypic, and genetic characteristics of centenarians in Okinawa and Japan: Part 1—centenarians in Okinawa. Bradley J. Willcox, Donald Craig Willcox, Makoto Suzuki. Mechanisms of Ageing and Development, Volume 165, Part B, July 2017, Pages 75-79, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mad.2016.11.001

Highlights
•    Okinawa has among the longest lifespans and highest prevalence rates of centenarians in the world − greater than 85% are female.
•    The Okinawan centenarian phenotype is typically shorter, leaner, has less prevalent age-related disease, and healthier metabolic profiles than other Japanese.
•    Despite consumption of a diet consistent with natural caloric restriction, which likely contributed to the longevity phenotype, Okinawans are also genetically distinct from other Asian populations.
•    The relative contribution of environment versus genetics to the longevity phenotype in Okinawa is still under investigation.

Abstract: A study of elderly Okinawans has been carried out by the Okinawa Centenarian Study (OCS) research group for over four decades. The OCS began in 1975 as a population-based study of centenarians (99-year-olds and older) and other selected elderly persons residing in the main island of the Japanese prefecture of Okinawa. As of 2015, over 1000 centenarians have been examined. By several measures of health and longevity the Okinawans can claim to be the world’s healthiest and longest-lived people. In this paper we explore the demographic, phenotypic, and genetic characteristics of this fascinating population.

Republicans have greater longevity compared to Democrats, adjusting for demographics; partly explained by Republican's higher socioeconomic status, & partly by their personal responsibility ethos

Political parties and mortality: The role of social status and personal responsibility. Viji Diane Kannan et al. Social Science & Medicine, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2019.01.029

Highlights
•    Republicans have greater longevity compared to Democrats, adjusting for demographics.
•    This relationship is partly explained by Republican's higher socioeconomic status.
•    This relationship is partly explained by Republican's personal responsibility ethos.

Abstract: Previous research findings across a variety of nations show that affiliation with the conservative party is associated with greater longevity; however, it is thus far unclear what characteristics contribute to this relationship. We examine the political party/mortality relationship in the United States context. The goal of this paper is two-fold: first, we seek to replicate the mortality difference between Republicans and Democrats in two samples, controlling for demographic confounders. Second, we attempt to isolate and test two potential contributors to the relationship between political party affiliation and mortality: (1) socioeconomic status and (2) dispositional traits reflecting a personal responsibility ethos, as described by the Republican party. Graduate and sibling cohorts from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study were used to estimate mortality risk from 2004 to 2014. In separate Cox proportional hazards models controlling for age and sex, we adjusted first for markers of socioeconomic status (such as wealth and education), then for dispositional traits (such as conscientiousness and active coping), and finally for both socioeconomic status and dispositional traits together. Clogg's method was used to test the statistical significance of attenuation in hazard ratios for each model. In both cohorts, Republicans exhibited lower mortality risk compared to Democrats (Hazard Ratios = 0.79 and 0.73 in graduate and sibling cohorts, respectively [p < 0.05]). This relationship was explained, in part, by socioeconomic status and traits reflecting personal responsibility. Together, socioeconomic factors and dispositional traits account for about 52% (graduates) and 44% (siblings) of Republicans' survival advantage. This study suggests that mortality differences between political parties in the US may be linked to structural and individual determinants of health. These findings highlight the need for better understanding of political party divides in mortality rates.

Sexual Activity the Night Before Exercise Does Not Affect Various Measures of Physical Exercise Performance; the more pleasurable the orgasm, the lower the systolic blood pressure on the day after

Zavorsky GS, Vouyoukas E, Pfaus JG. Sexual Activity the Night Before Exercise Does Not Affect Various Measures of Physical Exercise Performance. Sex Med 2019;XX:XXX–XXX. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esxm.2018.12.002

Abstract
Introduction: The idea that sexual activity can affect athletic performance has been a matter of conjecture for the past several decades.

Aim: To provide preliminary data on whether sexual activity the evening before several physical exercise performance tests affects performance the next day.

Methods: Eight participants (mean age, 28 ± 5 years) underwent several physical exercise performance tests on 3 different mornings, under 3 conditions: (i) no sexual intercourse the night before the tests (control), (ii) sexual intercourse the night before the tests, and (iii) yoga the night before the tests (randomized, single-blinded).

Main Outcome Measures: Physical work capacity, lower body muscular power (standing vertical jump), upper body strength (handgrip strength), reaction time, and upper body musculoskeletal endurance (number of push-ups completed).

Results: All participants experienced orgasm through intercourse. The more pleasurable the orgasm, the lower the systolic blood pressure (SBP) on the day after intercourse (Spearman’s rho = -0.86; P = .007). For every 2% increase in the total orgasm score, SBP decreased by 1 mmHg. Intercourse lasted 13 minutes; mean heart rate (HR) and caloric expenditure ranged from 88 to 145 beats/minute and from 53 to 190 kcal, respectively. There were no significant differences in the physical working capacity that elicited an HR of 170 beats/minute, number of push-ups completed, vertical jump height, grip strength, or reaction time across the 3 conditions.

Conclusion: Orgasm through sexual activity on the night before physical exercise may reduce SBP; however, we were unable to demonstrate a statistically significant difference in physical exercise performance in any of the 3 conditions.

From 2018: Predicting sex from brain rhythms with deep learning

Predicting sex from brain rhythms with deep learning. Michel J. A. M. van Putten, Sebastian Olbrich & Martijn Arns. Scientific Reports, volume 8, Article number: 3069, Feb 2018. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-21495-7

Abstract: We have excellent skills to extract sex from visual assessment of human faces, but assessing sex from human brain rhythms seems impossible. Using deep convolutional neural networks, with unique potential to find subtle differences in apparent similar patterns, we explore if brain rhythms from either sex contain sex specific information. Here we show, in a ground truth scenario, that a deep neural net can predict sex from scalp electroencephalograms with an accuracy of >80% (p < 10−5), revealing that brain rhythms are sex specific. Further, we extracted sex-specific features from the deep net filter layers, showing that fast beta activity (20–25 Hz) and its spatial distribution is a main distinctive attribute. This demonstrates the ability of deep nets to detect features in spatiotemporal data unnoticed by visual assessment, and to assist in knowledge discovery. We anticipate that this approach may also be successfully applied to other specialties where spatiotemporal data is abundant, including neurology, cardiology and neuropsychology.

Cruelty against minorities, in writing, in a public forum: Calling them uneducated minds (???)

As a comment to this question (https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/01/is-female-brain-diffrent-from-males-and.html), someone says:

him: according to muslims the female brain is 1/4 of a man's brain, not in size but function.

This comment was reported. I discarded the report and kept the post. To soften things a bit, I replied. Dialog ensues:

me: I don't remember that... Do you have some reference of mainstream clerics?

him: There are many that speak this, quoting the koran. But obviously its all drivel and not worth spending too much time investigating aside from pure curiosity .

          https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-41361123
          Women have 'quarter of brain' says cleric

The idea in a group where people is working with patients with anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts, etc., is to make things easy. Obviously, the guy was not understanding the message. I quote from his link, to make clear that the cleric's opinions are not mainstream:

me: "The cleric, who is head of fatwas (legal opinions) in the kingdom's Assir governorate, was banned on Thursday from preaching, leading prayers and other religious activities."

him: [my name] my intent here was only to insert a bit of humor...nothing they say would I ever take seriously. I have read the koran and I know how it does not apply to western society and the educated mind.

me: Your comment was reported, and it is giving me a lot of work.

him: [my name] what??? dont create drama where none was intended. just move on

An intelligent and considerate guy, who adapts to the public space we are on and is helpful to others. :-(

Is the female brain diffrent from male's ? and which gender is more likely to have a psychological disorder

Someone asked: Is the female brain diffrent from male's ? and which gender is more likely to have a psychological disorder (statisticly women but does that have anything to do with the previous question or is it simply because there is more women than men)


1 from 2017, differences in brain, by sex:  https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/how-mens-and-womens-brains-are-different.html

2 prevalence (age, sex, etc.), also percentages: https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06988/SN06988.pdf

section 1.1: Depression, anxiety and other common mental disorders

section 1.2: Post-traumatic stress disorder

section 1.3: Bipolar disorder

section 1.4: Psychotic disorder

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Predicting sex from brain rhythms with deep learning. Michel J. A. M. van Putten, Sebastian Olbrich & Martijn Arns. Scientific Reports, volume 8, Article number: 3069, Feb 2018. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/01/predicting-sex-from-brain-rhythms-with.html

Conservatives prefer political ideas that connect to the past; the preference is so strong, that they can be convinced of any idea, including liberal ones, if framed to connect to the past

Political conservatism as preference for the past.  Joris Lammers, Matt Baldwin. 51. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Psychologie, Frankfurt, Sep 2018, https://osf.io/sk4uj/

Abstract: Differences in political ideology are traditionally seen as differences in preference what direction the country should head toward: more or less taxes, stricter or more lenient treatment of immigrants, etc. We test instead the effect of differences in temporal orientation. Specifically, we propose that political conservatives (those at the right) are more focused on the past, compared to liberals (those on the left).  Therefore, conservatives prefer political ideas that connect to the past. We propose that this preference is so strong, that conservatives can be convinced of any political idea – including liberal ideas – if these are framed to connect to the past. We find robust support for this idea in more than 20 experiments. In each study, conservatives disliked liberal political plans, but accepted those same liberal plans if they were framed to connect to the past. Using a past-focused frame leads political conservatives to misattribute their warm and nostalgic feelings for the past onto liberal ideas and therefore support them. For example, American conservatives opposed climate change policies (e.g. the Paris Agreement), but they support them if they were framed as attempts at restoring the pristine nature of the past. German conservatives opposed admitting more refugees from Syria, but embraced them if immigration was framed as part of a German tradition. All in all, temporal framing reduced conservatives’ disagreement with liberal ideas by between 30 percent and 100 percent. Furthermore, the effect replicates across various countries, including the USA, Britain, and Germany. We also show the process behind this effect, by focusing on the mediating role of nostalgia and moderating role of processing style. All in all, these studies suggest that a large portion of the political disagreement between conservatives and liberals is not (only) about the content, but also largely about the stylistics of how political ideas are presented. This suggests that political differences are much easier to solve than previously though.

In comparatively religious counties religious individuals (i.e., persons buried in graves with religious imagery) lived longer than non-religious individuals did; no such an effect in comparatively secular counties

What the dead tell us about the living: Regionally varying associations between religiosity and longevity based on gravestone inscriptions. Tobias Ebert, Jochen E Gebauer, Jildou Talman, P. Jason Rentrow. 51. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Psychologie, Frankfurt, Sep 2018, https://osf.io/sk4uj/

Abstract: A large array of psychological research shows that religiosity can be a valuable source of health benefits and may even prolong the life. However, it is still unclear whether this relationship is universal or specific to contexts where religiosity is part of the normative lifestyle. We argue that, before reaching a conclusion, it is important to acknowledge two important limitations of existing research. Specifically, previous research a) solely relied on self-report survey information to measure an individual’s religiosity and b) mainly compared nations, while almost fully neglecting intranational variation. We suggest an innovative approach that employs an alternative, arguably more objective measure of religiosity and a very fine-grained resolution of the socio- cultural context. Specifically, we operationalize individuals’ religiosity and longevity by the inscriptions and imagery on their gravestone. To this end, we used an online database to draw a sample of 1,600 graves from 16 counties in the USA and coded the appearance of each gravestone. We find that in comparatively religious counties religious individuals (i.e., persons buried in graves with religious imagery) lived longer than non-religious individuals did. Speaking in favor of a culturally specific relationship, we do not find such an effect in comparatively secular counties. Finally, we also discuss the potentials and limitations of gravestone data as an unused source to inform psychological research in general.

An Evolutionary Perspective on Why Food Overconsumption Impairs Cognition

An Evolutionary Perspective on Why Food Overconsumption Impairs Cognition. Mark P. Mattson. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2019.01.003

Highlights

*  Neuronal networks in brain regions critical for spatial navigation and decision-making evolved to enable success in competition for limited food availability in hazardous environments.

*  A major ecological factor that drove the evolution of cognition, namely food scarcity, has been largely eliminated from the day-to-day experiences of modern-day humans and domesticated animals.

*  Continuous availability and consumption of energy-rich food in relatively sedentary modern-day humans negatively impacts the lifetime cognitive trajectories of parents and their children.

*  Epigenetic molecular DNA and chromatin protein modifications are impacted by energy intake and can propagate to future generations.

*  The cellular and molecular mechanisms by which intermittent food deprivation enhances cognition and overfeeding impairs cognition are being elucidated.

*  A better understanding of the food-centric evolutionary foundations of human brain neuroplasticity is leading to the development of novel bioenergetic challenge-based patterns of eating and exercise aimed at improving cognitive health and resilience.

Abstract: Brain structures and neuronal networks that mediate spatial navigation, decision-making, sociality, and creativity evolved, in part, to enable success in food acquisition. Here, I discuss evidence suggesting that the reason that overconsumption of energy-rich foods negatively impacts cognition is that signaling pathways that evolved to respond adaptively to food scarcity are relatively disengaged in the setting of continuous food availability. Obesity impairs cognition and increases the risk for some psychiatric disorders and dementias. Moreover, maternal and paternal obesity predispose offspring to poor cognitive outcomes by epigenetic molecular mechanisms. Neural signaling pathways that evolved to bolster cognition in settings of food insecurity can be stimulated by intermittent fasting and exercise to support the cognitive health of current and future generations.

The Psychology of Morality: A Review and Analysis of Empirical Studies Published From 1940 Through 2017

The Psychology of Morality: A Review and Analysis of Empirical Studies Published From 1940 Through 2017. Naomi Ellemers et al. Personality and Social Psychology Review, https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868318811759

Abstract: We review empirical research on (social) psychology of morality to identify which issues and relations are well documented by existing data and which areas of inquiry are in need of further empirical evidence. An electronic literature search yielded a total of 1,278 relevant research articles published from 1940 through 2017. These were subjected to expert content analysis and standardized bibliometric analysis to classify research questions and relate these to (trends in) empirical approaches that characterize research on morality. We categorize the research questions addressed in this literature into five different themes and consider how empirical approaches within each of these themes have addressed psychological antecedents and implications of moral behavior. We conclude that some key features of theoretical questions relating to human morality are not systematically captured in empirical research and are in need of further investigation.

Keywords: moral reasoning, moral behavior, moral judgment, moral self-views, moral emotions

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Paradoxically too, those who care less about their moral identity may actually be more consistent in their behavior and more accurate in their self-reports as they are less bothered by appearing morally inadequate. As a result, all the research that reveals self-defensive responses when people are unable to live up to their own standards or those of others, or when they are reminded of their moral lapses, implies that there is limited value in relying on people’s self- stated moral principles or moral ideals to predict their real- life behaviors.

On an applied note, this paradox of morality also clarifies some of the difficulties of aiming for moral improvement by confronting people with their morally questionable behav- iors. Such criticism undermines people’s moral self-views and likely raises guilt and shame. This in turn elicits self- defensive responses (justifications, victim blaming, moral disengagement) in particular among those who think of themselves as endorsing universal moral guidelines prescrib- ing fairness and care. Furthermore, questioning people’s moral viewpoints easily raises moral outrage and aggression toward others who think differently. This is also visible in studies examining moral rebels and moral courage (those who stand up for their own principles) or moral entrepreneurship and moral exporting (those who actively seek to convince others of their own moral principles). While the behavior of such individuals would seem to deserve praise and admiration as exemplifying morality, it also involves going against other people’s convictions and challenging their values, which is not always welcomed by these others. All these responses stand in the way of behavioral improve- ment. Instead of focusing on people’s explicit moral choices to make them adapt their behavior, it may therefore be more effective to nudge them toward change by altering goal primes, situational features, or decision frames.

Patients who lost their ability to retrieve episodic facts (severe head injury, Alzheimer’s, stroke) were able to describe their traits despite inability to remember their lives' details

Robinson, M. D., & Sedikides, C. (in press). Personality and The Self. In P. Corr & G. Matthews (Eds.), Cambridge University Press handbook of personality (2nd ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329828901

Abstract:  People draw from the self-concept when they report on their personality traits. Accordingly, researchers should be able to understand personality traits in terms of self-related processes. This chapter addresses the interface between personality and the self, presenting an integration whereby trait-related knowledge is considered in terms of its abstract and generalized qualities.  These qualities contribute to personality stability over time, but they also allow for discrepancies between trait-related views of the self and momentary tendencies toward thought, feeling, or action. The chapter also explores ways in which individual differences in personality can be understood in terms of mechanisms postulated by self-enhancement theory and raison oblige theory. Altogether, the chapter illustrates the benefits of integrating the personality trait and self concept literatures.

Keywords: personality, traits, self, self-enhancement

Other consequences of mindfulness in the moral domain: Attenuated repair intentions after having read a scenario in which participants caused harm to a friend & attenuated intentions to change bad eating habits

Potential negative consequences of mindfulness in the moral domain. Simon Schindler, Stefan Pfattheicher, Marc-Andre Reinhard. To appear in the European Journal of Social Psychology, January 2019, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330224967

Abstract: Mindfulness is a state of paying conscious and nonjudgmental attention to present-moment experiences. Previous research relates this state to more effective emotion regulation and less emotion reactivity. We therefore hypothesized an attenuating effect of a mindfulness exercise on moral reactions that usually results from a bad conscience when having caused harm. Across five studies, we experimentally induced mindfulness via a short breathing exercise and then assessed harm-based moral reactions. As hypothesized, participants in the mindfulness (vs. control) exercise condition showed a) attenuated repair intentions after having read a scenario in which participants caused harm to a friend (Study 3) and b) attenuated intentions to change harm-causing eating habits (Study 4). Results of Studies 1, 2 and 5 did not provide evidence for our hypothesis. A following meta-analysis across all five studies yielded an overall significant effect of mindfulness in the harm-condition, providing preliminary evidence for a potential downside to mindfulness.

Check also Gebauer, Jochen, Nehrlich, A.D., Stahlberg, D., Sedikides, Constantine, Hackenschmidt, D, Schick, D, Stegmaie, C A, Windfelder, C. C, Bruk, A and Mander, J V (2018) Mind-body practices and the self: yoga and meditation do not quiet the ego, but instead boost self-enhancement. Psychological Science, 1-22. (In Press). https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/05/yoga-and-meditation-are-highly-popular.html

Political ideology shapes the amplification of the accomplishments of disadvantaged vs. advantaged group members

Political ideology shapes the amplification of the accomplishments of disadvantaged vs. advantaged group members. Nour S. Kteily, Matthew D. Rocklage, Kaylene McClanahan, Arnold K. Ho. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Jan 2019, 201818545; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1818545116

Significance: Inequality prospers when successes of advantaged group members (e.g., men, whites) get more attention than equivalent successes of disadvantaged group members (e.g., women, blacks). What determines whose successes individuals deem worth promoting vs. those they ignore? Using hundreds of thousands of tweets from the 2016 Olympics, we show that liberals are much more likely than conservatives to shine a spotlight on black and female (vs. white and male) US gold medalists. Two further experiments provide evidence that such differential amplification of successful targets is driven by a motivation—higher among liberals—to raise disadvantaged groups’ standing in service of equality. We find that liberals drive differential amplification more than conservatives and establish a behavioral mechanism through which liberals’ egalitarian motives manifest.

Abstract: Recent years have witnessed an increased public outcry in certain quarters about a perceived lack of attention given to successful members of disadvantaged groups relative to equally meritorious members of advantaged groups, exemplified by social media campaigns centered around hashtags, such as #OscarsSoWhite and #WomenAlsoKnowStuff. Focusing on political ideology, we investigate here whether individuals differentially amplify successful targets depending on whether these targets belong to disadvantaged or advantaged groups, behavior that could help alleviate or entrench group-based disparities. Study 1 examines over 500,000 tweets from over 160,000 Twitter users about 46 unambiguously successful targets varying in race (white, black) and gender (male, female): American gold medalists from the 2016 Olympics. Leveraging advances in computational social science, we identify tweeters’ political ideology, race, and gender. Tweets from political liberals were much more likely than those from conservatives to be about successful black (vs. white) and female (vs. male) gold medalists (and especially black females), controlling for tweeters’ own race and gender, and even when tweeters themselves were white or male (i.e., advantaged group members). Studies 2 and 3 provided experimental evidence that liberals are more likely than conservatives to differentially amplify successful members of disadvantaged (vs. advantaged) groups and suggested that this is driven by liberals’ heightened concern with social equality. Addressing theorizing about ideological asymmetries, we observed that political liberals are more responsible than conservatives for differential amplification. Our results highlight ideology’s polarizing power to shape even whose accomplishments we promote, and extend theorizing about behavioral manifestations of egalitarian motives.

Removing Hand Information Specifically Impairs Emotion Recognition for Fearful and Angry Body Stimuli

Ross, Paddy, and Tessa Flack. 2019. “Removing Hand Information Specifically Impairs Emotion Recognition for Fearful and Angry Body Stimuli.” PsyArXiv. January 18. doi:10.31234/osf.io/wbkgd

Abstract: Emotion perception research has largely been dominated by work on facial expressions, but emotion is also strongly conveyed from the body.  Research exploring emotion recognition from the body tends to refer to ‘the body’ as a whole entity.  However, the body is made up of different components (hands, arms, trunk etc.), all of which could be differentially contributing to emotion recognition.  We know that the hands can convey action, and in particular are important for social communication through gestures, but we currently do not know to what extent the hands influence emotion recognition from ‘the body’.  Here, 93 adults viewed static emotional body stimuli with either the hands, arms, or both components removed and completed a forced-choice emotion recognition task.  Removing the hands significantly reduced recognition accuracy for fear and anger, but made no significant difference to the recognition of happiness and sadness. Removing the arms had no effect on emotion recognition accuracy compared to the full-body stimuli.  These results demonstrate the key role played by the hands in the recognition of threat-based emotions conveying action information.

Massive redundancy: The great majority of nerve cells in the intact brain are permanently silent, in inhibited state at high energetic costs, until stress and disease attack, developing psychiatric symptoms

The dark matter of the brain. Saak V. Ovsepian. Brain Structure and Function, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00429-019-01835-7

Abstract: The bulk of brain energy expenditure is allocated for maintenance of perpetual intrinsic activity of neurons and neural circuits. Long-term electrophysiological and neuroimaging studies in anesthetized and behaving animals show, however, that the great majority of nerve cells in the intact brain do not fire action potentials, i.e., are permanently silent. Herein, I review emerging data suggesting massive redundancy of nerve cells in mammalian nervous system, maintained in inhibited state at high energetic costs. Acquired in the course of evolution, these collections of dormant neurons and circuits evade routine functional undertakings, and hence, keep out of the reach of natural selection. Under penetrating stress and disease, however, they occasionally switch in active state and drive a variety of neuro-psychiatric symptoms and behavioral abnormalities. The increasing evidence for widespread occurrence of silent neurons warrants careful revision of functional models of the brain and entails unforeseen reserves for rehabilitation and plasticity.

Keywords: Silent neurons Brain evolution fMRI Synchronous activity Schizophrenia; disinhibition; neuronal plasticity

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Similar to cosmology and genomic research, advances in functional brain imaging have been also highly contin-gent on the arrival of cutting-edge technologies and research tools. The glorious custom of functional brain studies set by Hans Berger, Charles Sherrington, Graham Brown, and others prompted major breakthroughs, which climaxed in arrival of innovative methods enabling non-invasive visuali-zation of intrinsic and task-driven changes in brain activity and metabolism (Roy and Sherrington 1890; Berger 1940; Logothetis 2008). The gold standard here has been relat-ing selected brain structures to specific neural functions, to gain critical information for elucidating normal and diseased brain activity and assisting in diagnostics of neu-rological and psychiatric disease. Like in cosmology and genomic studies, the explosive advances in neuroscience research and imaging have unveiled major and surprising unknowns at the core of functional models of the brain. In particular, analysis of energy consumption changes related to brain activity showed that baseline expenditure of calo-ries at rest is remarkably stable, with extra energy required for processing environmental inputs comprising only a very small percentage (~ 1%) of the total energy usage. While the general notion is that bulk of the brain energy is allocated for maintenance of intrinsic activity, the nature and func-tionality of processes absorbing massive amount of calories remain to be determined. According to Raichle, the meta-bolic state of the brain circuits could be the cause, rather than the consequence of neural activity, with best part of neural energy expenditure remaining unaccounted (Raichle 2010, 2015). Recent estimates, which are largely based on positron emission tomography (PET) and functional mag-netic resonance imaging (fMRI) are especially revealing, and propose that with a fierce appetite for glucose and oxygen, the human brain, which constitutes only ~ 2% of the body weight, consumes over ~ 20% of the total body energy. The mechanistic analysis of this intriguing phenomenon is cur-rently hindered by limited sensitivity and resolution of imag-ing methods, which despite major improvements, remain indirect and crude sensors of neuronal mass action, unable to distinguish even basic neurobiological processes such as excitation and inhibition (Logothetis 2008; Poplawsky et al. 2017). Remarkably, hemodynamic measurements combined with autoradiography studies showed that similar to excita-tion, inhibition can be associated with increased perfusion of neural tissue and rise in metabolic activity, although these effects can vary depending on the experimental paradigm, partly owning to effects GABA on micro-vessel dynamics (Jueptner and Weiller 1995).Despite the results of cost-based analysis suggesting greater significance of intrinsic as opposed to evoked brain activity, single-unit electrophysiological recordings and cellular resolution imaging in animal models show that the overwhelming majority of neurons (60–90%) in anesthetized and awake animals are permanently silent (i.e., do not fire action potentials) or show very sparse firing (Berger 1940; Shoham et al. 2006) (Table 1). These findings not only prompt questions concerning the share of inactive neurons in brain energy expenditure, but also their neurochemical identity, phylogenetic origin, and place in functional brain models. In the following, I consider emerging data suggest-ing that vast numbers of inactive neurons are not a result of experimental intervention but reflect the generic state of brain affairs. I discuss numerous evidence, implying that these neurons could emerge as a result of the trade-off for high conservation of neural evolution, through selection of loss of function, which favored retention of dormant neu-rons in permanently inhibited state. I review remarkable examples of reactivation of silent neurons and circuits by disinhibition, with their entry into the realm of psyche and behavior, producing an array of maladaptive fits or relict activity. Finally, I propose that neural circuits neutralized by persistent inhibition can afford vast reserves for plasticity and neo-functionalization, with invigorating or disruptive consequence.

It is often claimed that 97 per cent of scientists conclude that humans are causing global warming. Is that really true? No. It is a zombie statistic.

Ian Plimer: 97% Of Scientists Agree On Nothing. The Australian, January 17 2019. https://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/climate-debate-97pc-of-scientists-agree-on-nothing

It is often claimed that 97 per cent of scientists conclude that humans are causing global warming. Is that really true? No. It is a zombie statistic.

In the scientific circles I mix in, there is an overwhelming scepticism about human-induced climate change. Many of my colleagues claim that the mantra of human-induced global warming is the biggest scientific fraud of all time and future generations will pay dearly.

If 97 per cent of scientists agree that there is human-induced climate change, you’d think they would be busting a gut to vanquish climate sceptics in public debates. Instead, many scientists and activists are expressing confected outrage at the possibility of public debates because the science is settled. After all, 97 per cent of scientists agree that human emissions drive global warming and there is no need for further discussion.

In my 50-year scientific career, I have never seen a hypothesis where 97 per cent of scientists agree. At any scientific conference there are collections of argumentative sods who don’t agree about anything, argue about data, how data was collected and the conclusions derived from data.

Scepticism underpins all science, science is underpinned by repeatable validated evidence and scientific conclusions are not based on a show of hands, consensus, politics or feelings. Scientists, just like lawyers, bankers, unionists, politicians and those in all other fields, can make no claim to being honest or honourable, and various warring cliques of scientists have their leaders, followers, outsiders and enemies. Scientists differ from many in the community because they are allegedly trained to be independent. Unless, of course, whacking big research grants for climate “science” are waved in front of them.

The 97 per cent figure derives from a survey sent to 10,257 people with a self-interest in human-induced global warming who published “science” supported by taxpayer-funded research grants. Replies from 3146 respondents were whittled down to 77 self-appointed climate “scientists” of whom 75 were judged to agree that human-induced warming was taking place. The 97 per cent figure derives from a tribe with only 75 members. What were the criteria for rejecting 3069 respondents? There was no mention that 75 out of 3146 is 2.38 per cent. We did not hear that 2.38 per cent of climate scientists with a self-interest agreed that humans have played a significant role in changing climate and that they are recipients of some of the billions spent annually on climate research.

Another recent paper on the scientific consensus of human-induced climate change was a howler. Such papers can be published only in the sociology or environmental literature.

The paper claimed that published scientific papers showed there was a 97.1 per cent consensus that man had caused at least half of the 0.7C global warming since 1950. How was this 97.1 per cent figure determined? By “inspection” of 11,944 published papers. Inspection is not rigorous scholarship. There was no critical reading and understanding derived from reading 11,944 papers. This was not possible as the study started in March 2012 and was published in mid-2013, hence only a cursory inspection was possible.

What was inspected? By whom?

The methodology section of the publication gives the game away. “This letter was conceived as a ‘citizen science’ project by volunteers contributing to the Skeptical Science website (www.skepticalscience.com). In March 2012, we searched the Institute for Scientific Information Web of Science for papers published from 1991-2011 using topic searches for ‘global warming’ or ‘global climate change’.”

This translates as: This study was a biased compilation of opinions from non-scientific, politically motivated volunteer activists who used a search engine for key words in 11,944 scientific papers, were unable to understand the scientific context of the use of “global warming” and “global climate change”, who rebadged themselves as “citizen scientists” to hide their activism and ignorance, who did not read the complete papers and were unable to evaluate critically the diversity of science published therein.

The conclusions were predictable because the methodology was not dispassionate and involved decisions by those who were not independent.

As part of a scathing critical analysis of this paper by real scientists, the original 11,944 papers were read and the readers came to a diametrically opposite conclusion. Of the 11,944 papers, only 41 explicitly stated that humans caused most of the warming since 1950 (0.3 per cent). Of the 11,944 climate “science” papers, 99.7 per cent did not say that carbon dioxide caused most of the global warming since 1950. It was less than 1 per cent and not one paper endorsed a man-made global warming catastrophe.

Political policy and environmental activism rely on this fraudulent 97 per cent consensus paid for by the taxpayer to rob the taxpayer further with subsidies for bird-and-bat-chomping wind turbines, polluting solar panels and handouts to those with sticky fingers in the international climate industry. It’s this alleged 97 per cent consensus that has changed our electricity from cheap and reliable to expensive and unreliable.

Activists with no skin in the game are setting the scene for economic suicide. Time for yellow shirts to shirt-front politicians about their uncritical acceptance of a fraud that has already cost the community hundreds of billions of dollars.

Emeritus professor Ian Plimer’s latest book, The Climate Change Delusion and the Great Electricity Ripoff, is published by Connor Court. He is a member of the GWPF’s Academic Advisory Council

Check also Consensus? What Consensus? Andrew Montford, GWPF, Sep 2013, https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2013/09/Montford-Consensus.pdf

Early adoption of recusant identities & oppositional agencies leading to a polarized choice: Either seek self-verification elsewhere by avoiding institutions such as schools, labor markets, & marriage or intensely engage them

Jaynes, Gerald D., A Behavioral Interpretation of the Origins of African American Family Structure (November 30, 2018). Cowles Foundation Discussion Paper No. 2156. https://ssrn.com/abstract=3303260

Abstract: 1960 to 1980 doubling (21% to 41%) of black children in one-parent families emerged from 1940-to-1970 urbanization converging population toward urbanized blacks’ historically stable high rate, not post-1960 welfare liberalization or deindustrialization. Urban and rural child socializations structured different Jim Crow Era black family formations. Agrarian economic enclaves socialized conformity to Jim Crow and two-parent families; urban enclaves rebellion, male joblessness, and destabilized families. Proxying urban/rural residence at age 16 for socialization location, logistic regressions on sixties census data confirm the hypothesis. Racialized urban socialization negatively affected two-parent family formation and poverty status of blacks but not whites.

Keywords: Behavioral Economics, Logistic Regression

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The hypothesis underlying my reinterpretation of the origins of contemporary black family structure is, through the late 20th Century, throughout American history, structural differences in the race relations and economic discrimination confronting blacks in rural versus urban locations produced distinct childhood socialization experiences. These distinct socialization experiences exposed urbanized black children (north and south) to large numbers of recusant adults -- men and women socially alienated by urban job ceilings and truculently refusing to acquiesce to race relations based in white supremacy. Observation of and interaction with recusant adults and discriminatory economic institutions put urbanized black children at great risk of early projection of a failure to achieve self-verification of an acceptable social identity. The developmental outcome was early adoption of recusant identities and oppositional agencies leading to a polarized choice: either seek self-verification elsewhere by avoiding institutions such as schools, labor markets, and marriage (causing high rates of single parent families), or (attempting to alter one’s receptionn such institutions) intensely engage them leading to civil rights activism and a rising black middle class. In contrast, rural black children were more likely exposed to adults seeking self-verification by striving to climb the agricultural tenure ladder a life goal requiring conforming to behavioral norms based in the era’s white supremacist race relations. Failure to self-verify a positive self-image by achieving land ownership or rental tenancy occurred later in life when the adoption of oppositional agencies was greatly mitigated.

Cerebellar modulation of the reward circuitry and social behavior: Deep cerebellar nuclei implicated in addictive behavior and autism spectrum disorder, cognitive affective syndrome, and schizophrenia

Cerebellar modulation of the reward circuitry and social behavior. Ilaria Carta et al. Science Jan 18 2019:Vol. 363, Issue 6424, eaav0581. DOI: 10.1126/science.aav0581

The cerebellum and reward-driven behavior
Damage to the cerebellum manifests itself in various forms of cognitive impairment and abnormal social behavior. However, the exact role the cerebellum plays in these conditions is far from clear. Working in mice, Carta et al. found direct projections from the deep cerebellar nuclei to the brain's reward center, a region called the ventral tegmental area (see the Perspective by D'Angelo). These direct projections allowed the cerebellum to play a role in showing a social preference. Intriguingly, this pathway was not prosocial on its own. Cerebellar inputs into the ventral tegmental area were more active during social exploration. Depolarization of ventral tegmental area neurons thus represents a similar reward stimulus as social interaction for mice.

Abstract
INTRODUCTION: Although the cerebellum has long been considered to be a purely motor structure, recent studies have revealed that it also has critical nonmotor functions. Cerebellar dysfunction is implicated in addictive behavior and in mental disorders such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), cognitive affective syndrome, and schizophrenia. The cerebellum is well poised to contribute to behavior because it receives a wide array of cortical and sensory information and is subject to control by a number of neuromodulators. To perform its function, the cerebellum is believed to integrate these diverse inputs to provide the rest of the brain with predictions required for optimal behavior. Although there are many pathways for this to occur in the motor domain, fewer exist for the nonmotor domain.

RATIONALE: There are no direct pathways emanating from the cerebellum that have been shown to serve nonmotor functions. We hypothesized that the cerebellum may contribute to motivated behavior by a direct projection to the ventral tegmental area (VTA), a structure that is critical for the perception of reward and control of social behaviors. Such a projection would explain why functional imaging experiments indicate that the cerebellum plays a role in addiction and would provide one potential mechanism by which cerebellar dysfunction might contribute to the symptoms of mental disorders.

RESULTS: In mice, we found that monosynaptic excitatory projections from the cerebellar nuclei to the VTA powerfully activate the reward circuitry and contribute to social behavior. Using anatomical tracing, we showed that axonal projections from the cerebellar nuclei form synapses with both dopaminergic and nondopaminergic neurons in the VTA. The cerebello-VTA (Cb-VTA) projections were powerful and their optogenetic stimulation robustly increased the activity of VTA neurons both in vivo and in vitro. Behavioral tests to examine reward processing showed that stimulation of the Cb-VTA projections was sufficient to cause short-term and long-term place preference, thereby demonstrating that the pathway was rewarding. Although optogenetic inhibition of Cb-VTA projections was not aversive, it completely abolished social preference in the three-chamber test for sociability, which suggests that the cerebellar input to the VTA is required for normal social behavior. A role for the cerebellum in social behavior was also indicated by correlation between calcium activity in these axons and performance in the three-chamber test. However, optogenetic activation of the Cb-VTA inputs was not prosocial, hence the pathway was not sufficient for social behavior.

CONCLUSION: The Cb-VTA pathway described here is a monosynaptic projection from the cerebellum to a structure known primarily for its nonmotor functions. Our data support a role for the cerebellum in reward processing and in control of social behavior. We propose that this Cb-VTA pathway may explain, at least in part, the association between the cerebellum and addictive behaviors, and provides a basis for a role for the cerebellum in other motivated and social behaviors. In addition to contributing to reward processing, the VTA also targets a number of other brain regions, such as the prefrontal cortex, that in turn sustain a large repertoire of motor and nonmotor behaviors. Direct cerebellar innervation of the VTA provides a pathway by which the cerebellum may modulate these diverse behaviors. The Cb-VTA pathway delineated here provides a mechanism by which cerebellar dysfunction, by adversely affecting the VTA and its targets, might contribute to mental disorders such as ASD and schizophrenia.

Also:
Also: http://www.einstein.yu.edu/news/releases/1323/brains-cerebellum-found-to-influence-addictive-and-social-behavior

Elders were less likely to recollect their original judgment than young adults, & had to reconstruct it more frequently; & outcome knowledge distorted more the reconstruction of original judgment in elders

Groß, J., & Pachur, T. (2019). Age differences in hindsight bias: A meta-analysis. Psychology and Aging, http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/pag0000329

Abstract: After people have learned a fact or the outcome of an event, they often overestimate their ability to have known the correct answer beforehand. This hindsight bias has two sources: an impairment in direct recall of the original (i.e., uninformed) judgment after presentation of the correct answer (recollection bias) and a reconstruction of the original judgment that is biased toward the correct answer (reconstruction bias). Research on how cognitive aging affects these two sources of hindsight bias has produced mixed results. To synthesize the available findings, we conducted a meta-analysis of nine studies (N = 366 young, N = 368 older adults). We isolated the probabilities of recollection, recollection bias, and reconstruction bias with a Bayesian, three-level hierarchical implementation of the multinomial processing tree model of hindsight bias (Erdfelder & Buchner, 1998). Additionally, we quantified the magnitude of bias in the reconstructed judgment. Overall, older adults were less likely to recollect their original judgment than young adults, and thus had to reconstruct it more frequently. Importantly, whereas outcome knowledge impaired recollection of the original judgment (i.e., recollection bias) to a similar extent in both age groups, outcome knowledge was more likely to distort reconstruction of the original judgment (i.e., reconstruction bias) in older adults. In addition, the magnitude of bias in the reconstructed judgments was slightly larger in older than in young adults. Our results provide the basis for a targeted investigation of the mechanisms driving these age differences.

Aggression in mice is differentially predicted by the volumes of anterior and midcingulate cortex

Aggression in BALB/cJ mice is differentially predicted by the volumes of anterior and midcingulate cortex. Sabrina van Heukelum et al. Brain Structure and Function, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00429-018-1816-9

Abstract: Anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and midcingulate cortex (MCC) have been implicated in the regulation of aggressive behaviour. For instance, patients with conduct disorder (CD) show increased levels of aggression accompanied by changes in ACC and MCC volume. However, accounts of ACC/MCC changes in CD patients have been conflicting, likely due to the heterogeneity of the studied populations. Here, we address these discrepancies by studying volumetric changes of ACC/MCC in the BALB/cJ mouse, a model of aggression, compared to an age- and gender-matched control group of BALB/cByJ mice. We quantified aggression in BALB/cJ and BALB/cByJ mice using the resident–intruder test, and related this to volumetric measures of ACC/MCC based on Nissl-stained coronal brain slices of the same animals. We demonstrate that BALB/cJ behave consistently more aggressively (shorter attack latencies, more frequent attacks, anti-social biting) than the control group, while at the same time showing an increased volume of ACC and a decreased volume of MCC. Differences in ACC and MCC volume jointly predicted a high amount of variance in aggressive behaviour, while regression with only one predictor had a poor fit. This suggests that, beyond their individual contributions, the relationship between ACC and MCC plays an important role in regulating aggressive behaviour. Finally, we show the importance of switching from the classical rodent anatomical definition of ACC as cingulate area 2 and 1 to a definition that includes the MCC and is directly homologous to higher mammalian species: clear behaviour-related differences in ACC/MCC anatomy were only observed using the homologous definition.

Keywords: Prefrontal cortex Rodent Brain volume Aggression Mouse model

Is Language Required to Represent Others’ Mental States? Language does not form an essential part of the process of reasoning online (“in the moment”) about false beliefs

Is Language Required to Represent Others’ Mental States? Evidence From Beliefs and Other Representations. Steven Samuel et al. Cognitive Science, https://doi.org/10.1111/cogs.12710

Abstract: An important part of our Theory of Mind—the ability to reason about other people's unobservable mental states—is the ability to attribute false beliefs to others. We investigated whether processing these false beliefs, as well as similar but nonmental representations, is reliant on language. Participants watched videos in which a protagonist hides a gift and either takes a photo of it or writes a text about its location before a second person inadvertently moves the present to a different location, thereby rendering the belief and either the photo or text false. At the same time, participants performed either a concurrent verbal interference task (rehearsing strings of digits) or a visual interference task (remembering a visual pattern). Results showed that performance on false belief trials did not decline under verbal interference relative to visual interference. We interpret these findings as further support for the view that language does not form an essential part of the process of reasoning online (“in the moment”) about false beliefs.