The United States as a Developing Nation: Revisiting the Peculiarities of American History

The United States as a Developing Nation: Revisiting the Peculiarities of American History. Stefan Link, Noam Maggor. Past & Present, gtz032, December 24 2019. https://doi.org/10.1093/pastj/gtz032

Abstract: It has recently been suggested that the economic departure of the United States after the Civil War marked a ‘Second Great Divergence’. Compared to the ‘First’, the rise of Britain during the Industrial Revolution, this Second Great Divergence is curiously little understood: because the United States remains the template for modernization narratives, its trajectory is more easily accepted as preordained than interrogated as an unlikely historical outcome. But why should development have been problematic everywhere but the United States? This Viewpoint argues that a robust explanation for the United States's rise is lacking: it can neither be found in an economic history literature focused on factor endowments nor in internalist Americanist historiography, which often reproduces overdetermined accounts of modernization inspired by Max Weber. The most promising avenue of inquiry, we argue, lies in asking how American political institutions configured what should properly be called an American developmental state. Such a perspective opens up a broad comparative research agenda that provincializes the United States from the perspective of development experiences elsewhere.

IV

THE AMERICAN DEVELOPMENTAL STATE

But let us return to our starting question: how did the US manage to break from the position it inhabited in the global division of labour during the nineteenth century? That is, how did this nation not only accelerate growth, but also effect a profound structural transformation of the economy, register not only quantitative increases, but qualitative economic change? A framework that persuasively engages with this shift has to go beyond models that associate development, alternately, with territorial consolidation (Maier), competitive markets (Lamoreaux and Wallis), or a well-regulated corporate economy (Novak, Sparrow and Sawyer). It ought to grant political institutions an even more pervasive role than conquering and administering territory, liberalizing economic life and overseeing private firms. The only framework that has extensively dealt with these types of structural shifts in global economic history emerges from the literature on ‘developmental states’. This heterodox literature has drawn its insights from the experience of East Asian ‘catch-up’ developers such as Korea, Japan, Taiwan and, most recently, China.66 Just like the US a century earlier, these nations have managed to pull off something extraordinarily difficult and rare: they radically altered their positions in the global division of labour by way of sustained industrial and technological development. Is there anything to be learnt from this literature that may apply to the US?

At first glance, the core features identified by this literature seem hopelessly at odds with conventional understandings of the US since the nineteenth century that cast it as the quintessential market society.67 East Asian nations developed in direct violation of stylized notions of Anglo-Saxon market dispensations. They were (often authoritarian) states with strong bureaucracies pursuing purposive industrial policies. They defied ‘Washington Consensus’-style liberalization and instead protected and subsidized domestic firms, built up ‘national champions’, and strategically controlled the inflow and outflow of foreign capital. Their governing ideologies arose from the predicament of the late developer.

Nevertheless, the ‘developmental state’ literature can deliver a strong tonic to how we think about development more broadly, including in the American case. That is because the generalizable kernel of this literature does not reside in its empirical descriptions, but in its analytical insights. The most instructive lesson of the literature on ‘developmental states’ is the deconstruction of received dichotomies between state policy and market development.68 Successful developmental states did not create spaces for competitive markets to operate freely, as neoclassical models, or indeed the prescriptions of Northian institutionalism, would expect them to. Instead, they harnessed, managed and manipulated markets. Rather than receding from the flows of supply and demand, developmental state institutions nested themselves in them and channelled them by tinkering with price incentives.69 They cajoled, nudged and pushed private interests in economically desired directions by tying ‘carrots’ — subsidies, protection and incentives – to the ‘discipline’ of demands such as moving investment towards industrial development and technological upgrading, which capitalists, despite their much inflated reputation as ‘risk-takers’, did only reluctantly.70 Successful development, understood as engendering not only ‘growth’ but structural economic transformation, required not institutions that ‘protect’ markets, and ‘encase’71 or ‘preserve’72 them, but rather, development arose from institutions that disciplined and channelled the generative power of markets.

The second important lesson of this literature is about the politics of development. Though developmental states were ‘strong’, they were not aloof, monolithic behemoths but rather regimes with deep support in development-oriented social coalitions.73 Within an overarching ideological and social commitment to development, there was ongoing contestation between bureaucrats and industrialists over resource trade-offs, or over strategy, direction and the speed of economic transformation. Developmental policies involved state institutions and private actors in tense and ongoing confrontations and re-alignments. Nowhere did developmental states arise fully fledged — instead, they grew out of friction-ridden processes of trial and error, of overcoming political antagonisms and creating new institutional compromises.74 From this literature emerges an image that matches neither the Hayekian caricature of an all-powerful and impervious state of planner-bureaucrats nor the Smithian metaphysics of a beehive of self-interested economic actors magically creating superior outcomes. Development, this literature suggests, arose from the politics of institutional wrangling.

Both of these key insights — the emphasis on market-managing institutions and on ongoing political contestation over their precise set-up — offer rich potential for an analysis of development in the US. In contrast to Weberian narratives, which insinuate the inexorable fashion of capitalist development and remove it from the realm of political conflict, the insights of the ‘developmental state’ literature put politics and contestation squarely at the centre. Where Northian institutionalism is interested in political contestation up to an inflection point that gives birth to the ‘highest’ form of institutions — ‘open access’ systems, and the state as parsimonious arbiter of functioning markets — the ‘developmental state’ literature insists on ongoing conflict and the immersion of institutions in creating, shaping and harnessing markets. The US in the late nineteenth century harboured nothing resembling the powerful East Asian state bureaucracies that supervised and orchestrated development. The American state, we contend, nevertheless gained the ‘institutional capacity’ to effect and sustain structural economic change. It gained, that is, the capacities of a developmental state.75

Where might we begin to discern the sources of this institutional capacity? Where did the American state gain the most traction vis-à-vis private actors? Here, we point to the state’s highly decentralized and devolved structure. Contra the territorialists’ emphasis on the federal government’s role in integrating a coherent national market, American institutions in fact engendered remarkable regulatory unevenness and variability. This was not simply a feature of ‘federalism’ as such, but the product of historically specific political arrangements. As Gary Gerstle has recently argued, federal authorities and state governments in the US did not merely differ in terms of geographical scale. The two levels of government deployed fundamentally different — almost contradictory — modes of power. Whereas the liberal Constitution strictly constrained federal authority, state governments were endowed with broad ‘police power’. They enjoyed a much more capacious mandate to proactively shape economic life, a mandate that showed no sign of eroding at the end of the nineteenth century. Collectivist and majoritarian, rather than liberal, state governments also allowed greater space for contentious politics to set priorities, with fewer layers of mediation between electoral outcomes and the formation of policy.76

The majoritarian political drive behind state activism during the critical decades of American industrialization came most forcefully (but of course not exclusively) from rural constituencies, mostly located in the country’s periphery and semi-periphery. As Elizabeth Sanders and Monica Prasad have pointed out, farmers in this period mobilized to advance an aggressive regulatory agenda. They sought broad access to credit, leverage against railroad corporations, and protection from the competitive advantages of monopolies, even at the cost of higher prices for the goods they acquired and consumed.77 They enacted not liberal non-interventionism but an intensely proactive agenda, including progressive taxation, robust anti-trust policies, bankruptcy protections, banking reform, and corporate regulation (of railroad freight rates in particular). These measures were launched in different iterations and configurations by state-level legislation before migrating — only partially and with much difficulty — to the federal level in the twentieth century. The net result was not a level playing field shaped by liberal policy but a dense patchwork of overlapping, unevenly regulated and highly politicized markets. This ‘productive incoherence’ (Hirschman) — disconnected, experimental, even erratic procedures that were forged politically over time — generated a long catalogue of incentives and constraints.78 Cumulatively, we surmise, these policies obstructed the drive towards economic specialization, channelled and disciplined the flows of capital, and nurtured a robust, diverse and technologically sophisticated manufacturing base.

The economic effects of this ‘productive incoherence’ could most readily be observed in the American Midwest. Here, as the literature on the developmental state would predict, the institutional capacity to exert public sway over market forces — by regulating railroad freight charges, combating monopolies and channelling the flow of credit — yielded impressive developmental effects. This frontier region departed from the prevailing patterns in other world peripheries, becoming not simply the site for the extraction and cultivation of primary commodities but also a heavily urbanized industrial market for those commodities. Michigan, to take one important state among many, grew as a resource-rich periphery over the second half of the nineteenth century. It absorbed huge infusions of out-of-state capital to build the necessary infrastructure for the removal of large amounts of lumber, iron and copper. Michigan was no different in this respect from Montana, Wisconsin or Nevada, but, more importantly, no different from Chile, Australia and South Africa. What set apart Michigan’s economic profile by the end of the century was the state’s broad and diverse manufacturing base, which other peripheries struggled to foster. In 1900, Detroit, Michigan, had a broad-based industrial foundation atypical for peripheral settlements, including nearly three thousand different manufacturing establishments of medium size in more than a hundred different industrial categories. On this frontier, Dutch disease was nowhere to be found. But to further magnify this point, Detroit, the largest city in the state, had only half of the wage earners within the overall manufacturing economy of Michigan. It accounted for only half of Michigan’s ‘value added’. The state had at least a dozen other lesser known cities and towns (Lansing, Muskegon, Saginaw, Grand Rapids, and so on), each with its own manufacturing base, ranging from ploughs, wagons and stoves to foundry machine shops, forks and hoes, furniture and chemical works.79

Michigan’s dispersed urban–industrial pattern was representative of the Midwest as a whole. Throughout the nineteenth century, the Midwest fostered home-grown manufacturing in a variety of sectors, beyond the processing of agricultural commodities.80 This pattern accelerated after the Civil War, despite rapid improvements in transportation that drastically lowered the costs of interregional commerce. Midwestern industries like apparel, furniture, printing and publishing, building materials and fabricated metals that sold products in local and regional markets flourished and grew, despite competition from mass producers in the East that had access to national markets and thus, all else being equal, should have enjoyed a competitive advantage. But all things were not equal — state policies tipped the scale in favour of local producers — and so these regional industries continued to grow and employ large numbers of industrial workers, by some measures the majority of workers.81

The same policies also limited the gravitational pull of the region’s largest cities. Despite their prodigious growth, the major metropolises of the Midwest operated as part of a broader territorial production complex that included a dense network of small- and medium-sized cities. Chicago’s meatpackers famously dominated the meatpacking industry but never monopolized it. Its meatpackers worked alongside St. Louis, Omaha, Kansas City, St. Joseph and Sioux City, not to mention smaller centres like Cedar Rapids, Waterloo, Ottumwa and Indianapolis. McCormick and Co., also of Chicago, became the most well-known manufacturer of agricultural machinery, but it competed in a diversified industry with producers from Racine, Springfield, Peoria, Decatur, Rockford and South Bend. Overall, about half the industrial workforce of the Midwest, in a very wide range of manufacturing sectors, was employed in smaller cities. Meanwhile, workers in the top eight industrial cities (an unusually dense urban network) — Chicago, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Detroit, Louisville and Indianapolis — represented a steady, and perhaps even declining, percentage of the overall Midwestern industrial labour force. The expansion of this multi-layered urban–industrial geography — at odds with the trend towards the growing dominance of single large metropolises in other countries, especially elsewhere in the Americas — continued into the twentieth century.82

What was most remarkable about the economic geography of the region was not the differentiated sizes of its production units or their decentralized locations.83 The regional pattern we observe did not simply enhance, diversify or spatially disperse the familiar arc of American capitalism. Rather, it cut hard against the dominant global trends of the late nineteenth century. Instead of regional specialization, in the Midwest, industry and agriculture intermingled. Instead of an exclusive focus on resource extraction and commercial farming for national and global markets, the Midwestern economic geography ensured that a significant share of accumulation redounded regionally. Instead of corporate behemoths sponsored by metropolitan finance, the region harboured a plethora of mid-sized shops in a wide array of sectors. If the dominant sectors of the age — railroads, steel, coal, resource extraction and food processing — followed the logic of the Great Specialization, the political economy of the Midwest pursued a competing logic of regional development, complementarity and economic diversification.

Not by coincidence, from this institutional and economic landscape arose the industry that encapsulated the ‘second great divergence’ like no other — the automobile industry.84 It is rarely appreciated that automotive mass production was a sharp departure from the extractive focus of corporate-led growth during the late nineteenth century. The automobile emerged from the workshops of the Midwest’s skilled mechanics, who nurtured a particular vision of development, one that advocated growing regional independence from the circuits of Eastern capital and championed a political economy based on popular participation in both production and consumption. Indeed, automotive mass production grew, not from corporate headquarters, but from an eclectic industrial landscape of machine shops deeply embedded in the regional political economy. The product, the affordable automobile, shot across the grain of the specialization economy: neither good for large-scale extraction nor for long-haul transport, the car instead supported short farm-to-market commutes. The automobile’s success took financial elites by surprise, and they attempted to thwart the industry by cornering the patent rights over the gasoline-powered motor car. That scheme foundered upon a legal ruling that rejected a narrow conception of intellectual property rights in favour of the open-source stance towards technological innovation that animated the industry’s mechanics.85 It was not before the 1920s that corporate capitalism began to assimilate automotive mass production, in the process transforming both it and itself.86

V

CONCLUSION

This Viewpoint began with a puzzle: how come one of the most momentous shifts of global economic history, America’s second great divergence, has been flying under the radar of historical scrutiny, or at least has not garnered the scholarly attention among historians commensurate to its significance? We traced the reasons back to pervasive patterns of thinking about American development as somehow natural and self-evident, as though situated in a preter-political realm. Transnational economic histories have continued to evade the question. Americanist historiography has not shaken free of modernization templates that, whether Whiggish or not, evacuate a substantive sense of contingency and political contestation from their purview. The literature about the American state, by contrast, offers a promising point of departure. The literature on East Asian developmental states provides a salubrious distancing effect that validates this state-centred approach. It calls for greater attention to markets as thoroughly political institutions, as well as to political contestation over the institutional design of markets. America’s ‘sprawling disarray’ (Novak) of subnational political arrangements, it leads us to believe, had developmental effects that collectively propelled the economic transformation of the US in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

We might conclude by taking a step back and inserting these insights into a genealogy of American development dispensations, from Alexander Hamilton’s mercantilism via Henry Clay’s ‘American system’, to the late-nineteenth-century developmental state identified here, usurped slowly and incompletely by federal institutions in the early twentieth century. This genealogy also shines fresh light on the federal aspirations of the New Deal and the warfare state of the 1940s, which harnessed big business in unprecedented ways to national goals and more closely begins to resemble the ideal-type of the developmental state spelt out in the example of East Asia.87 From there it was but a short step to the defence-related technological upgrading engendered by the post-war military–industrial complex, and the modern, post-1980 ‘networked’ American developmental state whose pervasive mechanisms remained solidly ‘hidden’ behind the deafening noise of free-market incantations.88 Market politics and developmental institutions, in this view, have been the rule, rather than the exception, with far-reaching implications. As we approach the challenges of the twenty-first century — ‘Green New Deal’, climate change, equitable growth — a better understanding of the politics and the institutions of large-scale, qualitative, economic transformations in the context of the US is sorely needed.

Previously unknown tool-use behavior for wild birds, in Wales and Iceland, so far only documented in the wild in primates and elephants

Evidence of tool use in a seabird. Annette L. Fayet, Erpur Snær Hansen, and  Dora Biro. PNAS, December 30, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1918060117

Abstract: Documenting novel cases of tool use in wild animals can inform our understanding of the evolutionary drivers of the behavior’s emergence in the natural world. We describe a previously unknown tool-use behavior for wild birds, so far only documented in the wild in primates and elephants. We observed 2 Atlantic puffins at their breeding colonies, one in Wales and the other in Iceland (the latter captured on camera), spontaneously using a small wooden stick to scratch their bodies. The importance of these observations is 3-fold. First, while to date only a single form of body-care-related tool use has been recorded in wild birds (anting), our finding shows that the wild avian tool-use repertoire is wider than previously thought and extends to contexts other than food extraction. Second, we expand the taxonomic breadth of tool use to include another group of birds, seabirds, and a different suborder (Lari). Third, our independent observations span a distance of more than 1,700 km, suggesting that occasional tool use may be widespread in this group, and that seabirds’ physical cognition may have been underestimated.

Keywords: tool useseabirdanimal cognition

“We all want justice, but not at the expense of truth” Historian Gordon Wood responds to the New York Times’ defense of the 1619 Project

“We all want justice, but not at the expense of truth” Historian Gordon Wood responds to the New York Times’ defense of the 1619 Project. World Socialist, Published by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), Dec 24 2019. https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/12/24/nytr-d24.html

Historian Gordon Wood, author of the 1993 Pulitzer Prize winning book The Radicalism of the American Revolution and the 1970 Bancroft Prize winning The Creation of the American Republic 1776-1787, was one of five signatories to write a letter to the editor of the New York Times asking the paper to correct “factual errors” in the 1619 Project which evinced “a displacement of historical understanding by ideology.” Professor Wood is the leading historian of the American Revolution.

The other signatories were historians Victoria Bynum, James McPherson, Sean Wilentz and James Oakes. The Times responded on December 20 in a letter by editor-in-chief of The New York Times Magazine Jake Silverstein and refused to make any corrections. Wood then wrote the following response.

* * *
Dec. 21 2019

Dear Mr. Silverstein,

I have read your response to our letter concerning the 1619 Project. I have no quarrel with the idea behind the project. Demonstrating the importance of slavery in the history of our country is essential and commendable. But that necessary and worthy goal will be seriously harmed if the facts in the project turn out to be wrong and the interpretations of events are deemed to be perverse and distorted. In the long run the Project will lose its credibility, standing, and persuasiveness with the nation as a whole. I fear that it will eventually hurt the cause rather than help it. We all want justice, but not at the expense of truth.

I have spent my career studying the American Revolution and cannot accept the view that “one of the primary reasons the colonists decided to declare their independence from Britain was because they wanted to protect the institution of slavery.” I don’t know of any colonist who said that they wanted independence in order to preserve their slaves. No colonist expressed alarm that the mother country was out to abolish slavery in 1776. If southerners were concerned about losing their slaves, why didn’t they make efforts to ally with the slaveholding planters in the British West Indies? Perhaps some southern slaveholders were alarmed by news of the Somerset decision, but we don’t have any evidence of that. Besides, that decision was not known in the colonies until the fall of 1772 and by that date the colonists were well along in their drive to independence. Remember, it all started in 1765 with the Stamp Act. The same is true of Dunmore’s proclamation of 1775. It may have tipped the scales for some hesitant Virginia planters, but by then the revolutionary movement was already well along in Virginia.

There is no evidence in 1776 of a rising movement to abolish the Atlantic slave trade, as the 1619 Project erroneously asserts, nor is there any evidence the British government was eager to do so. But even if either were the case, ending the Atlantic slave trade would have been welcomed by the Virginia planters, who already had more slaves than they needed. Indeed, the Virginians in the years following independence took the lead in moving to abolish the despicable international slave trade.

How could slavery be worth preserving for someone like John Adams, who hated slavery and owned no slaves? If anyone in the Continental Congress was responsible for the Declaration of Independence, it was Adams. And much of our countrymen now know that from seeing the film of the musical “1776.” Ignoring his and other northerners’ roles in the decision for independence can only undermine the credibility of your project with the general public. Far from preserving slavery the North saw the Revolution as an opportunity to abolish the institution. The first anti-slave movements in the history of the world, supported by whites as well as blacks, took place in the northern states in the years immediately following 1776.

I could go on with many more objections, some of which I mentioned in my interview with the World Socialist Web Site. But for now this may be enough to justify some correction and modification of the project. Again, let me emphasize my wholehearted support of the goal of the project to demonstrate accurately and truthfully to all Americans the importance of slavery in our history.

If you are willing to publish this letter, you may.

Sincerely,

Gordon S. Wood

Adolescents reveal a paradoxical effect: Prosocial behaviors which involved either going against the group majority or other personal costs generate less, not more, moral pride

Moral Pride: A Paradoxical Effect Also Present in Young Adults? Aitziber Pascual,Susana Conejero & Itziar Etxebarria. The Journal of Psychology, Interdisciplinary and Applied, Volume 154, 2020 - Issue 1. Sep 16 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/00223980.2019.1661344

Abstract: Moral pride acts as an intrinsic reinforcement of moral behavior. However, a study with adolescents revealed a paradoxical effect: prosocial behaviors which involved either going against the group majority or other personal costs (dedication of time and effort, a possible punishment, etc.) generated less, not more, moral pride, indicating that moral pride is weakened just when it is needed most. Does this effect reflect a specific characteristic of adolescent morality or a relatively stable weakness in moral functioning? The aim of the present study was to determine whether or not this effect continues beyond adolescence. The sample was made up of 152 young adults, 78 women and 74 men. Participants were given 8 scenarios in which someone needed help (two for each combination of the two variables considered: going against the majority and other costs) and were asked how proud they would feel if they helped. Among this age group, the negative effect of other costs was reversed (higher costs, more pride); that of going against the majority had weakened, but had not been reversed. Women scored higher for moral pride than men.

Keywords: Moral pride, moral emotions, young adulthood, group influence, personal costs, gender differences

Discussion

[...]

In relation to the measure of general moral pride (pride in all 8 scenarios, regardless
of whether or not participants said they would actually help), the results revealed that,
among young adults, the negative and paradoxical effect of the other personal costs factor had disappeared altogether. Indeed, our study found the opposite effect, which, in
principle, is more logical from a psychological perspective, namely that more costly
actions generated significantly greater pride. Moreover, the effect size was relevant: g2 ¼
.096 (medium effect size, see Richard, Bond, & Stokes-Zoota, 2003). Nevertheless, the
negative effect of the going against the group majority factor had not disappeared (i.e.
behaviors which involved going against the majority continued to generate significantly
less pride), although it was considerably weaker in the present sample of young adults,
g2 ¼ .120, than in the adolescent sample, g2 ¼ .301 (Etxebarria et al., 2014).
If we analyze the pride felt in situations in which participants said they would actually help (a measure we feel is more appropriate), among the young adults in our sample, the negative effect of the personal costs factor was not only not significant, as
indeed occurred in this measure of pride in the adolescent sample (Etxebarria et al.,
2014), it was again totally reversed. This, more logical, opposite effect was found to be
both significant and large (g2 ¼ .221), indicating that, among young adults, more costly
actions one believes one would actually carry out generate more moral pride. As regards
going against the group majority, a certain amount of progress was observed in comparison with the adolescent sample (Etxebarria et al., 2014), since the negative effect
was no longer found to be significant. In other words, behaviors which involved going
against the majority did not generate significantly less pride among young adults.
Nevertheless, the effect was not completely reversed, since this type of behavior still was
not found to generate significantly more pride.

In sum, we can conclude that, among young adults, and unlike that observed with
adolescents, behaviors which involve a personal cost of some kind do indeed generate
significantly more pride. However, behaviors that involve going against the group
majority do not, although, at least in relation to the pride felt due to actions one thinks
one would take, neither do they generate less pride. In short, the results presented here
indicate that, in this age group, the negative effect of the other personal costs factor has
completely disappeared, to the point of being reversed (the more costly the behavior,
the more pride generated). In contrast, the negative effect of the going against the group
majority factor is considerably weakened, but has not yet been reversed.

The effects outlined above were similar in both men and women, although –as
hypothesized– women scored significantly higher for moral pride (or, more specifically,
authentic moral pride, as specified earlier). This is an interesting result. In the same
context, Etxebarria et al. (2018) found no significant gender differences in authentic
moral pride in four studies focusing on this emotion: two with children aged between 9
and 11, and two with adolescents aged between 14 and 16. They did, however, find significant differences in a fifth study with adolescents aged between 16 and 18. For their
part, Krettenauer and Casey (2015) found significant differences in favor of women
among Canadian adolescents and young adults (M ¼ 17.72 years, SD ¼ 3.65). Taken
together, these findings suggest that gender differences in moral pride may be clearer
from late adolescence onwards. Evidently, further research is required to determine
whether or not this is truly the case and, above all, if it is, to what it is due.

We shall now discuss the most relevant findings of the present study. The total disappearance, and even reversal, of the negative effect of the other personal costs factor
on moral pride among young adults not only supports our initial hypothesis, but actually goes one step further than we ventured to predict. Unlike that observed in adolescents (Etxebarria et al., 2014), among young adults the effect of this factor is positive,
with more costly actions generating more moral pride. This finding is consistent with
the changes that occur during this developmental stage transition in the assessment of
moral actions (Eisenberg, Cumberland, Guthrie, Murphy, & Shepard, 2005; Kohlberg,
1984; Walker, 1989). As regards the weakening of the negative effect of the group opinion on moral pride, this result also supports our original hypothesis and is consistent
with the increase in resistance to peer pressure observed by Steinberg and Monahan
(2007) between the ages of 14 and 18. Also consistent with the results of the aforementioned study is the absence here of interactions between the gender variable and the
going against the group majority variable, since Steinberg and Monahan (2007)
observed that, although women were more resistant to peer pressure than men, the
increase in this resistance between the ages of 14 and 18 was identical for both genders.

Our results reveal that the negative effect of others’ opinion on pride when the
behavior involves going against the group majority is not limited to adolescence, a stage
in which the group opinion carries particular weight (Allen et al., 2005; Berndt, 1979;
Brown, 2004; Hart & Carlo, 2005). Although to a lesser degree, among young adults
also, fear of the group reaction and opinion also undermines the moral pride that may
be expected following a particularly costly moral action (precisely because it goes against
the group majority opinion), thereby preventing a significantly greater level of pride
from being generated in comparison with a behavior that does not involve this difficulty. This is consistent with the work of several authors (Asch, 1951; Suhay, 2015;
Turner, 1991) who have highlighted the fact that group opinion has a major effect on
people’s actions and judgments throughout the entire course of their lives.

The present study has a series of limitations that should be taken into account. In
addition to the measure of pride being based on participants’ own responses, a common
problem in this type of study (Hart & Carlo, 2005), it also uses a fairly low number of
scenarios. An attempt was made to control for the effect of the specific content of the
situations by having various different scenarios for each combination of the variables
studied. Nevertheless, in order to avoid tiring participants (which may have had a detrimental effect on their responses), we opted to include only 2 scenarios for each of the 4
combinations of the two variables analyzed. Future research may wish to include a
higher number of scenarios for each combination, and it would also be useful to replicate this study using different scenarios.

It would also be interesting to analyze what happens after young adulthood. Does the
paradoxical effect observed in adolescence become even weaker? Do older adults feel
significantly more moral pride also when their prosocial actions go against the group
majority? While this would be the ideal outcome, the data do not suggest that this is
indeed the case. In their study, Steinberg and Monahan (2007) found no evidence of
any increase in resistance to peer pressure between the ages of 18 and 30. Alongside age
differences, it would also be interesting to analyze possible cultural differences in this
sense. It may be that this paradoxical effect and its continued presence beyond adolescence are stronger in cultures characterized by an interdependent self than in those with
an independent self (Markus & Kitayama, 2010; Mesquita & Markus, 2004).

We believe that the results of the study by Etxebarria et al. (2014), as well as those
presented here, are vital to attaining a more comprehensive understanding of moral
pride. Moral pride is an emotion that, without doubt, plays a very important regulatory
role in moral action, since it acts as an intrinsic booster of this particular type of behavior (Boezeman & Ellemers, 2007, 2008; Etxebarria et al., 2015; Hart & Matsuba, 2007;
Ortiz et al., 2018). However, it is also a weak emotion, overly influenced by the opinions of others, and often disappears just when it is most needed.

From a practical perspective, the results of these studies highlight the need for resources designed to ensure that not only children and adolescents, but also young people and adults in general, understand that moral action often requires diverging from, or even going against the group majority opinion, and that this should not be a reason to feel shame or embarrassment, but rather should give rise to legitimate feelings of authentic moral pride.

This is an idea that should be promoted at home, at school and in the media, with careful attention being paid in all three contexts to the messages being conveyed. Each context and each age group requires a different approach, but in one way or another, in all cases it is important to underscore the fact that it is ultimately up to the individual him or herself to assess actions ethically and that the goodness of an act cannot be measured simply in terms of the majority opinion. There are (unfortunately) many situations, in both the personal and the social-historical fields, which we could use to illustrate this. In short, from childhood onwards, we need to develop the resources necessary to ensure individuals are capable of withstanding this (often pernicious) group influence and that they understand that, in moral terms, being in the minority does not necessarily invalidate one’s position, but rather, on the contrary, sometimes even increases one’s merit. By doing this, we can help people conserve the legitimate moral pride they feel as a result of actions which justify it, thereby safeguarding the important moral motivation that this emotion generates.

Posting Explicit Images or Videos of Oneself Online Is Associated with Impulsivity and Hypersexuality but Not Measures of Psychopathology in a Sample of US Veterans

Turban JL, Shirk SD, Potenza MN, et al. Posting Sexually Explicit Images or Videos of Oneself Online Is Associated with Impulsivity and Hypersexuality but Not Measures of Psychopathology in a Sample of US Veterans. J Sex Med 2020;17:163–167. https://www.jsm.jsexmed.org/article/S1743-6095(19)31447-X/fulltext

Abstract
Introduction Sending sexually explicit text messages (“sexting”) is prevalent among US adults; however, the mental health correlates of this behavior among adults have not been studied adequately. Furthermore, there are few studies examining the related but distinct behavior of posting sexually explicit photos or videos of oneself online (posting sexual images [PSI]) and the mental health correlates of this behavior.

Aim To examine associations between sexting, PSI, impulsivity, hypersexuality, and measures of psychopathology.

Methods Using a national convenience sample of 283 US post-deployment, post-9/11 military veterans, we evaluated the prevalence of 2 behaviors: sexting and PSI and the associations of these behaviors with psychopathology, suicidal ideation, sexual behaviors, hypersexuality, sexually transmitted infections, trauma history, and measures of impulsivity.

Main Outcome Measure Measures of psychopathology including depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, insomnia, substance dependence, hypersexuality, and suicidal ideation, as well as measures of impulsivity, sexual behavior, and trauma.

Results Sexting was found to be common among post-9/11 veterans (68.9%). A smaller number of veterans engaged in PSI (16.3%). PSI veterans were more likely to be younger, male, less educated, and unemployed. After adjusting for covariates, no associations were detected between PSI or sexting and the examined measures of psychopathology. However, PSI was associated with higher levels of impulsivity and hypersexuality, whereas sexting was not associated with these measures.

Clinical Implications Results from this study suggest that not all digital sexual behaviors are associated with psychopathology. However, PSI was associated with hypersexuality and impulsivity. Those who engage with PSI may benefit from guidance on how to manage their impulsivity to prevent ego-dystonic sexual behaviors.

Strengths & Limitations The strengths of this study include differentiating PSI from sexting broadly, highlighting that digital sexual behaviors are heterogeneous. Limitations include the study's cross-sectional design, which limits causal interpretations. More research is also needed in civilian populations.

Conclusion PSI was less prevalent than sexting in our sample. This behavior was associated with impulsivity and hypersexuality but not with elevated levels of psychopathology. Sexting was not associated with any of these measures.

Erotic target identity inversions (ETIIs) are poorly studied paraphilias that involve sexual arousal by the idea or fantasy of being the object of one’s sexual desires

Brown A, Barker ED, Rahman Q. Erotic Target Identity Inversions Among Men and Women in an Internet Sample. J Sex Med 2020;17:99–110. https://www.jsm.jsexmed.org/article/S1743-6095(19)31509-7/fulltext

Abstract
Introduction: Erotic target identity inversions (ETIIs) are poorly studied paraphilias that involve sexual arousal by the idea or fantasy of being the object of one’s sexual desires.

Aim: To conduct a large non-clinical online survey to investigate self-reported sexual arousal, behavioral expression, and psychological correlates of 4 proposed ETIIs.

Methods: A total of 736 natal males and 549 natal females responded to items about self-reported sexual arousal to the idea of acting as an animal (autoanthropomorphozoophilia) or the idea of acting as a child or infant (autonepiophilia), natal males reporting arousal to the idea of acting as a woman (autogynephilia), and natal females reporting arousal to the idea of acting as a man (autoandrophilia). Data pertaining to sexual orientation, childhood gender nonconformity, gender identity discomfort, autism, masochism, and humiliation were also collected.

Main Outcome Measures: The main outcome was a measure of self-reported arousal and expression of the ETIIs being explored using 4 items: arousal level (–3 to 3) when imagining being the erotic target exemplar; frequency of engagement in dressing or behaving like their preferred target (0–4); strength of feeling that they would be better off as the target (0–4); and the frequency of consideration of making physical changes to look or function more like the target (0–4).

Results: Mild levels of reported sexual arousal to the idea of being the preferred erotic target were common among the 4 groups, characterizing about half of them. Gender identity discomfort was associated with autogynephilia, autoandrophilia, and autoanthropomorphozoophilia. Greater gender nonconformity was associated with autogynephilia, autoandrophilia, and autonepiophilia. Autism scores were associated with autoandrophilia and autonepiophilia. Masochism was not associated with ETII scores, but humiliation was.

Clinical Implications: Findings suggest that it may be important to distinguish between subgroups of those with different levels and types of ETII arousal/expression.

Strengths & Limitations: Strengths of this study include the large, non-clinical sample of men and women for the investigation of ETIIs and the inclusion of measures of psychological correlates. The use of an Internet sample with self-report measures may be unrepresentative, although the Internet has the advantage of allowing recruitment from stigmatized or unusual groups. The cross-sectional nature limits our conclusions, as no causal inferences can be made.

Conclusion: The results support the concept of ETIIs as a paraphilic dimension in non-clinical samples and the possible role of gender-related psychological factors.

The Power of Bad: How the Negativity Effect Rules Us and How We Can Rule It. John Tierney, Roy F. Baumeister

The Power of Bad: How the Negativity Effect Rules Us and How We Can Rule It. John Tierney, Roy F. Baumeister. December 31, 2019. https://www.amazon.com/Power-Bad-Negativity-Effect-Rules/dp/1594205523

Why are we devastated by a word of criticism even when it's mixed with lavish praise? Because our brains are wired to focus on the bad. This negativity effect explains things great and small: why countries blunder into disastrous wars, why couples divorce, why people flub job interviews, how schools fail students, why football coaches stupidly punt on fourth down. All day long, the power of bad governs people's moods, drives marketing campaigns, and dominates news and politics.

Eminent social scientist Roy F. Baumeister stumbled unexpectedly upon this fundamental aspect of human nature. To find out why financial losses mattered more to people than financial gains, Baumeister looked for situations in which good events made a bigger impact than bad ones. But his team couldn't find any. Their research showed that bad is relentlessly stronger than good, and their paper has become one of the most-cited in the scientific literature.

Our brain's negativity bias makes evolutionary sense because it kept our ancestors alert to fatal dangers, but it distorts our perspective in today's media environment. The steady barrage of bad news and crisismongering makes us feel helpless and leaves us needlessly fearful and angry. We ignore our many blessings, preferring to heed—and vote for—the voices telling us the world is going to hell.

But once we recognize our negativity bias, the rational brain can overcome the power of bad when it's harmful and employ that power when it's beneficial. In fact, bad breaks and bad feelings create the most powerful incentives to become smarter and stronger. Properly understood, bad can be put to perfectly good use.

As noted science journalist John Tierney and Baumeister show in this wide-ranging book, we can adopt proven strategies to avoid the pitfalls that doom relationships, careers, businesses, and nations. Instead of despairing at what's wrong in your life and in the world, you can see how much is going right—and how to make it still better.

Relationship Between Masturbation and Partnered Sex in Women: Does the Former Facilitate, Inhibit, or Not Affect the Latter?

Rowland DL, Hevesi K, Conway GR, et al. Relationship Between Masturbation and Partnered Sex in Women: Does the Former Facilitate, Inhibit, or Not Affect the Latter? J Sex Med 2020;17:37–47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsxm.2019.10.012

Abstract
Introduction: The relationship between masturbation activities and their effect on partnered sex is understudied.

Aim: The aim of this study was to assess the alignment of activities between masturbation and partnered sex, and to determine whether different levels of alignment affect orgasmic parameters during partnered sex.

Methods: 2,215 women completed an online survey about activities during masturbation and reasons for orgasmic difficulty during masturbation, and these were compared with activities and reasons for orgasmic difficulty during partnered sex.

Main Outcome Measure: Degree of alignment between masturbation activities and partnered sex activities was used to predict sexual arousal difficulty, orgasmic probability, orgasmic pleasure, orgasmic latency, and orgasmic difficulty during partnered sex.

Results: Women showed only moderate alignment regarding masturbation and partnered sex activities, as well as reasons for masturbation orgasmic difficulty and reasons for partnered sex orgasmic difficulty. However, those that showed greater alignment of activities showed better orgasmic response during partnered sex and were more likely to prefer partnered sex over masturbation.

Clinical Implications: Women tend to use less conventional techniques for arousal during masturbation compared with partnered sex. Increasing alignment between masturbation and partnered sexual activities may lead to better arousal and orgasmic response, and lower orgasmic difficulty.

Strength & Limitations: The study was well-powered and drew from a multinational population, providing perspective on a long-standing unanswered question. Major limitations were the younger age and self-selection of the sample.

Conclusion: Women that align masturbation stimulation activities with partnered sex activities are more likely to experience orgasm and enhanced orgasmic pleasure, with sexual relationship satisfaction playing an important role in this process.

Key Words:Masturbation, Partnered Sex, Orgasm, Women, Orgasmic Difficulty, Orgasmic Pleasure

Check also Women reporting the greatest difficulty reaching orgasm have the longest latencies & are likely to find masturbation more satisfying:

Orgasmic Latency and Related Parameters in Women During Partnered and Masturbatory Sex. David L. Rowland et al. J Sex Med 2018;XX:XXX–XXX. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/09/womens-and-mens-orgasmic-latencies.html

---
DISCUSSION
This analysis afforded an in-depth look at the relationship
between masturbatory and partnered sex activities in a multinational sample of women. In addition, it has, for the first time
to our knowledge, provided an empirically based answer to the
question as to whether and how masturbation affects the experience of partnered sex.

Relationships Between Activities, and Reasons for Orgasmic Difficulty, During Masturbation and Partnered Sex

Activities
Most women included clitoral stimulation in masturbatory
activity, and of these women, nearly all included some form of
clitoral stimulation during partnered sex. Although only about
half the women included vaginal stimulation during masturbation, again, of these, nearly all included it during partnered sex.
Thus, for these 2 types of activities (vaginal and clitoral stimulation) during masturbation, there was significant generalization
to partnered sex. However, for other types of stimulation,
transferability from masturbation to partnered sex was much
lower: only about half the women who engaged in anal stimulation or used a particular body position during masturbation
also did so during partnered sex. In addition, the use of aids/
enhancements or sexual fantasies during masturbation often did
not translate to similar activities during partnered sex. Thus, we
found that although more conventional types of sexual activities6
show substantial transferability across sexual activities, those activities that are less common during masturbation, such as anal
stimulation, use of enhancements/aids, and sexual fantasies, did
not readily generalize to partnered sex. In this respect, not only
are the purposes/goals of masturbation and partnered sex quite
different,7,8,10 but the types of sexual stimulation used to achieve
arousal and orgasm (other than vaginal and clitoral) are quite
different as well. Indeed, we surmise that some women use less
conventional activities during masturbation precisely because
such activities may increase sexual arousal and orgasmic capacity,
yet these strong arousal techniques are often not included within
the repertoire of activities with the partner.

Reasons
A substantial number of women indicated difficulty reaching
orgasm during partnered sex due to “partner” issues, primarily a
lack of a good or sexually satisfying relationship. Beyond such
reasons for orgasmic difficulty during partnered sex, we found
moderate association between women’s reasons for orgasmic
difficulty during masturbation and those for orgasmic difficulty
during partnered sex. Specifically, women attributed their
orgasmic difficulty during both masturbation and partnered sex
to issues such as lack of adequate arousal/time, general or sexualspecific anxiety, medical/medication, and pain/discomfort. That
is, these factors were often invoked to explain general orgasmic
difficulty (whether masturbation or partnered sex) compared
with such factors as insufficient experience or general inhibition/
lack of interest. These latter attributions were used more
frequently to explain orgasmic difficulty during masturbation,
but less frequently during partnered sex. Perhaps most relevant
are the findings that lack of arousal/time and general and sexspecific anxiety were viewed as factors that interfere with
orgasmic response, no matter what the situation—findings that
align with other research identifying factors affecting orgasmic
response in women.36e40

Masturbation Predictors of Partnered Sexual Arousal and Orgasmic Parameters
As indicated in the regression model, individual reasons for,
and stimulation activities during, masturbation had no predictive
value in and of themselves on sexual arousal, orgasmic probability, or orgasmic response (latency, pleasure, and difficulty)
during partnered sex, the exception being that lack of satisfaction
during partnered sex was a reason for masturbation. Not surprisingly, these women typically reported lower orgasmic pleasure during partnered sex. Such findings are generally consistent
with research suggesting that those women who masturbate
enjoy no particular advantage in orgasmic capacity during partnered sex.24,33 Masturbation frequency, on the other hand, did
attenuate sexual arousal difficulties during partnered sex, suggesting that greater experience with masturbation—as is sometimes encouraged for women who struggle to reach orgasm
during partnered sex21—expands women’s sexual repertoire and
helps them identify sexual pleasure points and maximize stimulation efficacy during partnered sex.23 Our methodology, however, does not rule out other possible interpretations, for
example, that women who have less arousal difficulty during
partnered sex are also, for whatever reason, more likely to enjoy
masturbation and, thus, engage in it more frequently.
Regression analysis also affirmed the role of several other
covariates on sexual response during partnered sex, including age
and sexual relationship satisfaction, as had been reported elsewhere,9,41e43 with increasing values generally associated with
greater arousal and better orgasmic experiences (ie, greater
orgasmic probability, greater orgasmic pleasure, and less orgasmic
difficulty).

Alignment of Activities During Masturbation and Partnered Sex
Although masturbation per se does not enhance orgasmic
experience during partnered sex, orgasmic experience during
partnered sex is facilitated by aligning activities across masturbation and partnered sex, with such alignment likely imparting
benefits independent of whether orgasm is experienced as primarily a clitoral or primarily a vaginal phenomenon, a factor that
was not examined in this study. Consistent with our general
findings, de Bruijn29 concluded that sex play during partnered
sex that corresponded with masturbation techniques improved
orgasmic capacity during partnered sex. More recently, Kontula
and Meittinen25 concluded that masturbation activity that
typically included vaginal penetration was associated with better
responsivity during partnered sex. Our findings strongly support
this notion: the greater the alignment between masturbation and
partnered sex activities, the lower the arousal and orgasmic difficulty, the greater the duration of the sex (ensuring adequate
arousal), and the greater the probability of reaching orgasm.
Thus, masturbation can have significant positive effects on the
experience of partnered sex, as long as the types of activities share
at least some common stimulatory pathways. When alignment of
activities exceeded 75%, additional benefits were realized. Not
only, then, does alignment of activities impart positive effects on
the experience of partnered sex, but lack of alignment may be
detrimental to orgasmic likelihood and pleasure during partnered
sex, to the point where nonalignment of activities was more
characteristic of women who preferred masturbation over partnered sex. Although such assumptions by therapists have long
formed the rationale for guided masturbation exercises as a
means to improve sexual pleasure and satisfaction within relationships,44 the current findings are, to our knowledge, the first
to provide clear empirical evidence supporting such strategies in a
large multinational sample of women. Indeed, such findings
recapitulate the importance of addressing women’s sexual issues
within a relational context that stresses the value of sexual
communication, techniques that optimize arousal for women,
and overall relationship quality as important parameters for
sexual satisfaction.33,36,37,45

Humans can frequently give children to others to sustain and educate: Grandmothers can be crucial, even when alloparenting is common and breastfeeding is frequent and highly visible

Crucial Contributions: A Biocultural Study of Grandmothering During the Perinatal Period. Brooke A. Scelza, Katie Hinde. Human Nature, Volume 30, Issue 4, pp 371–397, December 4 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12110-019-09356-2

Abstract: Maternal grandmothers play a key role in allomaternal care, directly caring for and provisioning their grandchildren as well as helping their daughters with household chores and productive labor. Previous studies have investigated these contributions across a broad time period, from infancy through toddlerhood. Here, we extend and refine the grandmothering literature to investigate the perinatal period as a critical window for grandmaternal contributions. We propose that mother-daughter co-residence during this period affords targeted grandmaternal effort during a period of heightened vulnerability and appreciable impact. We conducted two focus groups and 37 semi-structured interviews with Himba women. Interviews focused on experiences from their first and, if applicable, their most recent birth and included information on social support, domains of teaching and learning, and infant feeding practices. Our qualitative findings reveal three domains in which grandmothers contribute: learning to mother, breastfeeding support, and postnatal health and well-being. We show that informational, emotional, and instrumental support provided to new mothers and their neonates during the perinatal period can aid in the establishment of the mother-infant bond, buffer maternal energy balance, and improve nutritional outcomes for infants. These findings demonstrate that the role of grandmother can be crucial, even when alloparenting is common and breastfeeding is frequent and highly visible. Situated within the broader anthropological and clinical literature, these findings substantiate the claim that humans have evolved in an adaptive sociocultural perinatal complex in which grandmothers provide significant contributions to the health and well-being of their reproductive-age daughters and grandchildren.

Keywords: Cooperative breeding Breastfeeding Grandmothers Maternal and child health

Discussion

Grandmothers have long been touted as one among a suite of important alloparents in the human cooperative breeding system (Hrdy 2005; Kramer 2010). But despite their prominence in the literature, data demonstrating positive effects of grandmaternal support is somewhat equivocal. For food sharing and intergenerational transfers, grandmothers in some places play a critical role (Hawkes et al. 1997; Hooper et al. 2015), but in others their efforts are outweighed by other helpers (Kramer 2005; Kramer and Veile 2018). Similarly, the amount of direct care provided to infants and toddlers by grandmothers, compared with other allomothers, is quite variable (Kramer 2010). Despite this disparate evidence, reviews demonstrate strong and consistent patterns showing an association between presence of the maternal grandmother and improved child survival (Fox et al. 2010; Sear and Mace 2008). Taken together, these lines of evidence suggest that supplemental provisioning and childcare are just two pieces of the grandmothering puzzle. Other elements of the grandmaternal niche remain to be systematically investigated. Here we emphasize how multifaceted perinatal support has the potential to improve the health and well-being of mothers and their babies, not only expanding our understanding of grandmothers but bridging to other constructs of human evolution such as the role of emotional support and perinatal care during the difficult childbirths and challenging transitions to motherhood experienced by humans (Trevathan 2017).

Social Learning in the Perinatal Period

Here we explored the perinatal period embedded in the context of subsistence nutrition, disease ecology, energy balance, kin networks, traditional knowledge, and maternal-infant dynamics atypical of WEIRD populations (Henrich et al. 2010). Populations characterized by predominant subsistence activities and traditional sociocultural practices reveal aspects of adaptive reproductive ecology often disrupted in industrialized contexts. Importantly though, no present-day subsistence culture or population represents the human past nor exclusively occupies the environments in which humans emerged (Crittenden and Schnorr 2017; Lee 1992). From an infant’s perspective, however, the “normalized” breastfeeding dynamic of the mother-infant dyad represents the adaptively relevant environment in which the human neonate evolved. Our findings about breastfeeding difficulties and other maternal anxieties counter widely held perceptions, expectations, and attitudes suggesting that breastfeeding and infant care are intrinsic to womanhood, easily learned through exposure and observation, and only become difficult in contexts where these pathways are disrupted.

Among Himba, breastfeeding is “normalized”; breastfeeding initiation is universal and sustained for many months, nursing is on demand, and clothing does not cover breasts so nursing is highly visible. This is the cultural context in which Himba grow up. But despite this normalization and ubiquity of breastfeeding, Himba women often reported struggling in the early postpartum period following their first births. The women we interviewed spontaneously described difficulties typically encountered by women living in industrialized settings, including nipple/breast pain, difficulty with latch, and concerns about insufficient milk production (Bergmann et al. 2014; Lamontagne et al. 2008; Waller 1946; Williamson et al. 2012). While their struggles are similar, we argue that the consistent, multifaceted support and teaching that Himba grandmothers provide during the first weeks after a birth seems to have an appreciable impact on women’s ability to overcome these difficulties, going on to successfully breastfeed for months and years to come. Similarly, Himba women’s descriptions of the fear and anxiety they experienced during the early postpartum period and their lack of knowledge about basic infant care (e.g., how to hold an infant) further counter common tropes about motherhood in its “natural state.” Again, the main difference appears to be one of timescale. The consistent support that Himba women receive during the perinatal period helps them to overcome difficulties and quell their anxieties in a matter of days, whereas it is not uncommon for women in WEIRD settings to struggle for weeks, or even months, after a birth.

The rapid learning curve that Himba women describe, combined with an intensive period of perinatal co-residence and support, leads us to suggest that social learning from grandmothers and other female kin may be critical to facilitating women’s ability to successfully breastfeed and provide infant care. In some cases, Himba grandmothers were reported to provide very direct instruction. Women reported that their mothers physically and gesturally showed them how to position their babies for improved latch, provided detailed guidance on how often to feed, and explained techniques to protect infants, such as putting them to sleep on their backs and to nurse sitting up rather than lying down. Others described techniques that have presumably been developed and fine-tuned over generations, such as the postpartum steam “bath” described above, or knowledge about which foods and herbs serve as lactogogues. Our findings mirror those of other studies that have similarly shown how the presence of cultural practices and beliefs, acquired through social learning, can positively impact reproductive health. For example, several studies of pregnancy food taboos have been shown to map closely onto species that pose particular dangers to pregnant women and their fetuses (Henrich and Henrich 2010; McKerracher et al. 2016; Placek et al. 2017). Other studies have shown the importance of ideational factors, shared within groups and socially learned, to the practice of early infant care (Hadley et al. 2010; Wutich and McCarty 2008).

Further study might enhance our understanding of perinatal care as a case of social learning and answer questions we are unable to address with our current data. For example, we rely here on self-reports, which have the potential for bias and are not useful for quantifying behavior beyond coarse categories. Observational data would provide exceptional insight into the prevalence of teaching and learning behaviors and would be less subject to bias; however, such data would be very difficult to obtain. The scenarios we describe take place in intimate settings, often during the night in a private sleeping space. Nighttime observations are notoriously rare in time allocation data and present logistical and ethical challenges (Scaglion 1986). Other, less direct types of data could speak to some of these issues. For example, repeated measures of infant health and maternal pain and anxiety could track the effectiveness of grandmothers’ help, particularly in a case-control design comparing women who are and are not co-resident with their mothers after a first birth. Focal follows that concentrate on the first week or two after a birth (particularly first births) would also be extremely useful, as this would increase the chances of capturing otherwise rare instances of potential teaching and provide greater insight into how new mothers learn to breastfeed and care for their infants.

Air Filters, Pollution and Student Achievement

Gilraine, Michael. (2020). Air Filters, Pollution and Student Achievement. (EdWorkingPaper: 20-188). Retrieved from Annenberg Institute at Brown University: https://www.edworkingpapers.com/ai20-188

Abstract: This paper identifies the achievement impact of installing air filters in classrooms for the first time. To do so, I leverage a unique setting arising from the largest gas leak in United States history, whereby the offending gas company installed air filters in every classroom, office and common area for all schools within five miles of the leak (but not beyond). This variation allows me to compare student achievement in schools receiving air filters relative to those that did not using a spatial regression discontinuity design. I find substantial improvements in student achievement: air filter exposure led to a 0.20 standard deviation increase in mathematics and English scores, with test score improvements persisting into the following year. Air testing conducted inside schools during the leak (but before air filters were installed) showed no presence of natural gas pollutants, implying that the effectiveness of air filters came from removing common air pollutants and so these results should extend to other settings. The results indicate that air filter installation is a highly cost-effective policy to raise student achievement and, given that underprivileged students attend schools in highly polluted areas, one that can reduce the pervasive test score gaps that plague public education.

Keywords: Air Pollution; Human Capital; Air Filters; Spatial Regression Discontinuity; Cost Effectiveness.

Explaining Fairness: Theories of genetic evolution, cultural evolution, and gene-culture coevolution identify plausible mechanisms for the evolution of fairness in humans

Explaining Fairness. Lukas Boesch & Roger Berger. Human Nature volume 30, pages398–421, November 16 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12110-019-09353-5

Abstract: Fairness is undoubtedly an essential normative concept in humans and promotes cooperation in human societies. The fact that fairness exists is puzzling, however, because it works against the short-term interest of individuals. Theories of genetic evolution, cultural evolution, and gene-culture coevolution identify plausible mechanisms for the evolution of fairness in humans. Such mechanisms include kin selection, the support of group-beneficial moral norms through ethnic markers, free partner choice with equal outside options, and free partner choice with reputation as well as spite in small populations. Here, we present the results of a common-pool resource game experiment on sharing. Based on data from 37 multiethnic villages in a subsistence agricultural population in Foutah Djallon, Guinea, we show that fair behavior in our experiment increased with increasing ethnic homogeneity and market integration. Group size and kinship had the opposite effect. Overall, fair behavior was not conditional on reputation. Instead, the ability of the different village populations to support individuals’ fairness in situations lacking the opportunity to build a positive reputation varied significantly. Our results suggest that evolutionary theory provides a useful framework for the analysis of fairness in humans.

Discussion

In our experiment, fairness was influenced by some mechanisms that have been suggested in the literature. First, as expected (Table 1), the subjects’ fairness was positively influenced by the ethnic homogeneity of villages (Table 3). The predicted behavior of subjects was on average only fair in ethnically homogeneous villages (Fig. 3) and became more selfish with increasing ethnic heterogeneity. This result corroborates the existing empirical evidence regarding the influence of ethnic homogeneity on prosociality (Alesina and La Ferrara 2000; Alesina et al. 1999; Anderson and Paskeviciute 2006; Costa and Kahn 2003; Gustavsson and Jordahl 2008; Habyarimana et al. 2007; Leigh 2006; Miguel and Gugerty 2005; Newton and Delhey 2005; Pennant 2005; Putnam 2007). 

Second, as expected (Table 1), the subjects’ behavior in our experiment became increasingly fair with increasing market integration (Table 3, Fig. 3). This result confirms the positive effect of market integration on fairness found in other experimental studies (Emsinger 2004; Henrich et al. 2001, 2010).

Third, as expected (Table 1), the capacity of villages to support fairness decreased with population size (Table 3). The behavior of subjects was on average fair only for villages below 200 individuals and became selfish with increasing population size (Fig. 3). This result adds to the inconsistent experimental evidence related to the effect of population size on fairness (Henrich et al. 2010; Stahl and Haruvy 2006).

On the other hand, for some other mechanisms generally considered to be important, we found contradicting evidence. Surprisingly, the predicted positive effect of kinship on the fairness of subjects (Table 1) was not confirmed: subjects in our experiment became more selfish with increasing kinship (Table 3). Predicted behavior was on average only fair in the village populations with the lowest kinship (Fig. 3). This finding does not match the results of previous studies: although the extensive foodsharing literature widely supports a positive effect of kinship on fair or generous sharing (Essock-Vitale and McGuire 1980; Gurven 2004; Gurven et al. 2000, 2001; Nolin 2011; Patton 2005; Wiessner 2002; Ziker and Schnegg 2005), the experimental literature does not find convincing evidence for any effect of kinship on fairness (Barr 2004; Macfarlan and Quinlan 2008). Interestingly, our measure for kinship at the individual level, the proportion of the subjects’ kin group in the village population, did not provide any additional insights into the relationship between kinship and fairness (Table 3). This means that we cannot resort to mechanisms at the individual level of the subjects’ kinship to explain this unexpected finding. Two such plausible mechanisms could be the following: in villages with high kinship at the aggregate level, either subjects with high individual kinship took more than their share to redistribute it to kin afterwards, or, from the opposite point of view, subjects with low individual kinship took more than their share because they were not related to the majority of the other inhabitants of the village. Both would imply significant estimates of the measure of kinship at the individual level of the subjects (kin group): the first mechanism would imply a positive estimate, the second a negative one.

Finally, lack of an opportunity for reputation building did not lead to a general increase in selfish behavior (Table 1). Instead, the effect on fairness of such an opportunity varied significantly, depending on the village. We found the expected increase in selfish behavior in two thirds of the villages. Some individuals were extremely selfish in the treatment condition without observation. Interestingly, our experimental treatment also led to fairer, or even generous behavior (Table 3; A19 in the ESM). This result is not consistent with the broad experimental literature supporting the notion that observability of behavior triggers prosociality (Bereczkei et al. 2007, 2010; Bull and Gibson-Robinson 1981; Kurzban 2001; Milinski et al. 2002; Satow 1975; Soetevent 2005). We can only speculate about reasons for this finding. From a methodological point of view, we can think of two explanations for this finding. First, our experimental stimulus may not have been only a measure of reputation, but also of the willingness to defy instructions or the fear for punishment. Those different dimensions might have interacted and led to such a varying effect. Second, our experimental stimulus may not have worked as expected in all the villages. The villages where our experimental treatment worked as expected must have differed in some ways we did not control for from the villages where the treatment did not work as expected. In theory, an important factor is the feeling of privacy of the subjects, not only within the village communities in general, but also after the experiment, when leaving the hut with the salt: in some instances, others were waiting outside for their turn; in other cases, nobody was waiting. Unfortunately, we did not record this information. The random slopes for reputation (A19 in the ESM) and the amount of salt (A21 in the ESM) did capture such situational differences to some extent.

The results of our analysis show that the behavior of subjects in our experiment was mainly driven by the characteristics of their village (Table 3, Figs. 2 and 3). Unlike in previous studies (Cronk 2007; Henrich 2000; Paciotti and Hadley 2003; Roth et al. 1991; Tracer 2003), we did not find an effect of the subjects’ ethnicity on fairness. We believe that this is because we sampled several villages containing the studied ethnic groups. Those villages represented a broad range of different ethnic responses (Fig. 1, Table 2). Furthermore, we also controlled for the characteristics of the villages our subjects lived in (Table 3). If we had only selected one Malinke and one Fulbe village for our experiment (e.g., Boubere and Beleya Koko), we would not have been able to control for village characteristics and would have estimated a highly significant effect of ethnicity on fairness. We would have concluded that Malinke are much more selfish than Fulbe (A24 in the ESM) and probably would have speculated about the reasons for this ethnic difference in behavior. This finding highlights the necessity of sampling a multitude of populations for each cultural group of interest and controlling for contextual factors when conducting cultural comparative studies (Lamba and Mace 2011; Oosterbeek et al. 2004).

It is obvious that the social structure of the villages (kinship, ethnic homogeneity, market integration, population size, income inequality) shaped the behavior of subjects (Fig. 3). More research is needed to uncover the underlying mechanisms that work on these variables. This is especially true for kinship and ethnic homogeneity. Whereas the behavior of subjects in our experiment was significantly influenced by kinship and ethnic homogeneity at the aggregate level (the average kinship and the homogeneity of the village), measures at the individual level (the proportion of subjects’ kin or ethnic group to the total population) did not influence the behavior of subjects in our experiment (Table 3). This finding is puzzling. Although the individual and the aggregate measures correlate strongly (A16), only the aggregate measures influence individual behavior. A similar pattern was found in a study by Putnam (2007):

Diversity does not produce “bad race relations” or ethnically-defined group hostility, our findings suggest. Rather, inhabitants of diverse communities tend to withdraw from collective life, to distrust their neighbours, regardless of the colour of their skin, to withdraw even from close friends, to expect the worst from their community and its leaders, to volunteer less, give less to charity and work on community projects less often, to register to vote less, to agitate for social reform more, but have less faith that they can actually make a difference, and to huddle unhappily in front of the television. Note that this pattern encompasses attitudes and behavior, bridging and bonding social capital, public and private connections. Diversity, at least in the short run, seems to bring out the turtle in all of us (2007:150–51, italics in original).

Finally, we were dealing in our study with traditional, small-scale societies that are partly in transition to more complex and socially stratified societies. The different villages showed substantial variations in population characteristics, and also the inhabitants of the villages differed in key characteristics, although they were all located in the same area (Fig. 1, Table 2). We were able to include a substantial part of this population in our experiment, allowing us to test some general hypotheses related to the biological drivers of human social behavior. We believe that our study population and design allows us to put our results in a broader human context. Some scholars have argued that humans are a unique species because our altruism is not primarily based on kinship. The evolution of fairness and cooperation in large-scale societies cannot be explained solely by genetic evolution and is best accounted for with cultural evolution and gene-culture coevolution. The empirical evidence for these claims is based to an important extent on behavioral experiments (Fehr and Fischbacher 2003; Gintis et al. 2003; Henrich et al. 2010). However, most of these experiments do not include measures of kinship in their analysis. In our experiment, we found a statistically significant effect of kinship on fair behavior. We also found significant effects for all other discussed mechanisms that favor fairness through natural selection. We are therefore inclined to conclude that evolutionary biology is a useful tool to analyze human social behavior and explains the behavior of subjects in our experiment. However, we are well aware that cultural evolution makes the same predictions related to the effect of population size (Forber and Smead 2014; Huck and Oechssler 1999), market integration (Hoel 1987; Roth and Erev 1993; Rubinstein 1982), and reputation (Chiang 2008) as biological evolution. Similarly, ethnic markers can be conceived of as biological, cultural, or both (McElreath et al. 2003), and even kinship has an important cultural dimension (Jones 2000). Moreover, economic game theory, which makes use of rationality and utility maximization assumptions, comes to similar conclusions as evolutionary game theory (Skyrms 1994, 2000). Culture and nature are closely intertwined in humans. More research must therefore be conducted to develop tools allowing to empirically tease apart their contributions to human social behavior in samples that are not made up of twins. Considering the relevance of experimental game theory in this domain of research, these tools should be compatible with a gametheoretical experimental approach.

Is War in Our Nature? What Is Right and What Is Wrong about the Seville Statement on Violence

Is War in Our Nature? What Is Right and What Is Wrong about the Seville Statement on Violence. Azar Gat. Human Nature, June 2019, Volume 30, Issue 2, pp 149–154. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12110-019-09342-8

Abstract: The Seville Statement on Violence rejected the view that violence and war were in any way rooted in human nature and proclaimed that they were merely a cultural artifact. This paper points out both the valid and invalid parts of the statement. It concludes that the potential for both war and peace is embedded in us. The human behavioral toolkit comprises a number of major tools, respectively geared for violent conflict, peaceful competition, or cooperation, depending on people’s assessment of what will serve them best in any given circumstance. Conflict is only one tool—the hammer—in our diverse behavioral toolkit. However, all three behavioral strategies are not purely learned cultural forms. This naive nature/nurture dichotomy overlooks the heavy and complex biological machinery that is necessary for the working of each of them and the interplay between them. They are all very close under our skin and readily activated because they have all been very handy during our long evolutionary past. At the same time, they are variably calibrated to particular conditions through social learning, which means that their relative use may fluctuate widely. Thus, state authority has tilted the menu of human choices in the direction of the peaceful options in the domestic arena, and changing economic, social, and political conditions may be generating a similar effect in the international arena.

Check also The phylogenetic roots of human lethal violence. José María Gómez et al. Nature volume 538, pages 233–237 (October 13 2016). https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/02/the-phylogenetic-roots-of-human-lethal.html

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Seville Statement on Violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seville_Statement_on_Violence
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[The Seville statement] was published during the heyday of Rousseauism, the view that the aboriginal human past, before the advent of agriculture and the state, was nonviolent and peaceful. This view dominated anthropology and culture in general during that time and was itself a reaction against earlier scholarly theories and popular books, such as those by Ardrey (1966), Lorenz (1966), and Morris (1967), which presented war as unique to humans, a primary drive rooted in human nature and erupting irresistibly. Thus, the statement rejected the view that violence and war were in any way rooted in human nature and proclaimed that they were merely a cultural artifact.

In the context of the reaction against Rousseauism, the Seville Statement has been criticized as an example of false-consciousness and the subordination of scholarly integrity to an ideological cause, noble as it may be (e.g., Beroldi 1994; Manson and Wrangham 1987; Pinker 1997). While this criticism is fully justified, I take this opportunity to point out both the valid and invalid parts of the statement. In doing so, I hope to clarify why people actually fight; whether fighting is in human nature, and in what sense; and, consequently, whether violence and war can be eliminated or, more realistically, drastically reduced. Because the biological underpinning of war and peace has been the subject of much confusion and a heated controversy—among neurobiologists, ethologists, anthropologists, psychologists, political scientists and others—it is in great need of clarification. And the root of the confusion is this: People habitually assume that if widespread deadly violence has always been with us, it must be a primary, “irresistible” biological drive that is nearly impossible to suppress. Many find in this conclusion sufficient reason to object to the idea that human fighting is as old as our species, whereas others regard it as compelling evidence that war is inevitable.2 However, both sides are wrong. Contrary to fashionable 1960s notions, traced back to Freud’s latter-day theorizing about a death drive or instinct, thanatos (Freud 1920, 1923, 1930, 1933a, b), violence is not a primary drive that requires release, like hunger or sex. The Swiss or Swedes, for example, who have not fought another country for two centuries, show no special signs of deprivation on this account. But try to deny them food for more than a few hours, or sex, say, for more than a few days, and see what will happen. [...]

On the other hand, the fact that violence is not a primary drive does not mean that we are not hardwired for it. Studies on “warless” pre-state societies usually intend to prove that warfare, being neither primordial nor natural to humankind, was probably a late, and in any case wholly contingent, cultural phenomenon. Margaret Mead’s framing of the problem: “Warfare Is Only an Invention – Not a Biological Necessity” (1940), is the mother of all mistakes. It expresses the widespread assumption that violence must be either a primary drive or entirely learned, whereas in reality, its potential is deeply ingrained in us as a means or tool, ever ready to be employed. People can cooperate, compete peacefully, or use violence to achieve their objectives, depending on what they believe will serve them best in any given circumstance. In cooperation, the parties combine efforts, in principle because the synergic outcome of their efforts divided among them promises greater benefit to each of them than their independent efforts might. In competition, each party strives to outdo the other in order to achieve a desired good by employing whatever means they have at their disposal except direct action against the other. Competition runs parallel. By contrast, in a conflict, direct action against the competitor is taken in order to eliminate it or lessen its ability to engage in the competition (Simmel 1955).

Cooperation, competition, and conflict are the three fundamental forms of social interaction (in addition to avoidance, or zero interaction). People have always had all three options to choose from, and they have always assessed the situation to decide which option, or combination of them, seemed the most promising. Indeed, hunter-gatherer societies have elaborate procedures of conflict resolution, especially within their groups, precisely because conflict, often violent, is an ever-present and often occurring threat. People are well equipped biologically for pursuing any of the above behavioral strategies, with conflict being only one tool, albeit a major one—the hammer—in our diverse behavioral toolkit. Furthermore, Homo sapiens is a social species, whose local and regional groups—universally and uniquely bound together by ties of both kinship and shared cultural codes, including language and customs— cooperate within themselves in a variety of group activities, including fighting. Group fighting is often pursued for the attainment of collective goods, above all hunting territory and other scarce sources of food, as well as reproduction opportunities.

Thus, neither a late invention nor a compulsive inevitability independent of conditions, group fighting is part of our evolution-shaped behavioral menu. It is in this sense that both war and peace are “in our genes,” which accounts for their widely fluctuating prevalence in different sociohistorical contexts. The Seville Statement rightly puts it, in rejection of the view that human biology makes violence and war inescapable: “There is nothing in our neurophysiology that compels us to react violently. . . . We conclude that biology does not condemn humanity to war.” However, the statement fell into the opposite fallacy, proclaiming that warfare “is a product of culture” and solemnly prescribing that “IT IS SCIENTIFICALLY INCORRECT [emphasis in the original] to say that war or any other violent behavior is genetically programmed into our human nature.” The statement carelessly concluded: “Violence is neither in our evolutionary legacy nor in our genes.” In reality, the potential for both war and peace is imbedded in us. Although activated interchangeably and conjointly in response to the overall environmental and sociocultural conditions, all three behavioral strategies—violent conflict, peaceful competition, and cooperation—are not purely learned cultural forms. This naive nature/nurture dichotomy overlooks the heavy and complex biological machinery that is necessary for the working of each of these behavioral strategies and the interplay between them. Certainly, these deep, evolution-shaped patterns are variably calibrated to particular conditions through social learning. However, the reason why they are all there, very close under our skin and readily activated, is that they were all very handy during our long evolutionary history. They all proved highly useful and advantageous, thereby becoming part and parcel of our biological equipment. A number of scholars who have dealt with the question in fact express the view that human societies have always been Janus-faced, interchangeably resorting to both peace and violent conflict. According to Walker (2001:590): “Everywhere we probe into the history of our species we find evidence of a similar pattern of behavior: People have always been capable of both kindness and extreme cruelty.” Burch (2005), documenting the Alaskan Eskimos’ highly belligerent record, also devotes one part of his book to their peaceful interactions. Robert Kelly (2013:158, 165) writes: “To summarize so far, it is not useful to ask whether hunter-gatherers (inclusive of egalitarian and nonegalitarian types) are peaceful or warlike: we find evidence for both among them.” He adds: “Aggression appears in many species, suggesting that it has a long evolutionary history. . . . It is part of our behavioral repertoire, and at times served us well.”

Boehm (2013:333) similarly rejects the view “that there should be an either-or choice between setting up friendly, cooperative relations with neighbors, as opposed to fighting with them.” Both took place, interchangeably, with the same and with different neighbors. Based on his survey of 49 simple hunter-gatherer societies, Boehm (2013:334, also 327, 333) writes: “The finding here is that intergroup conflict and external peacekeeping would both seem to have been prominent in human political life, back to at least 45,000 BP and probably earlier.” Boehm (2013:327) puts both sides of simple hunter-gatherer societies’ behavioral repertoire in a proper perspective: “59 percent of the . . . forager sample has enough lethal intergroup conflict for this to be reported in an ethnography.” He adds (2013:330): “With human foragers, negotiations of some type (including truces and peacemaking) are found in more than half of the . . . societies surveyed (59 percent). However . . . formal and effective peacemaking is reported only for a few of the 29 societies.” 3 Hunter-gatherers suffered far greater violent mortality rates than state societies not because they lacked well-established and partly successful patterns of conflict resolution. It is just that hunter-gatherers’ anarchic condition, the absence of effective coercive authority, limited the effectiveness of these patterns as compared to state societies. Wars have been fought for the attainment of the same objects of human desire that underlie the human motivational system in general—only by violent means, through the use of force. Here I take issue with Pinker’s excellent The Better Angels of Our Nature (2011), with whom I am otherwise in much agreement. “Angels” versus “Demons” in the human behavioral system is an allusion to Lincoln’s first inaugural address and is largely invoked metaphorically. And yet not entirely, because Pinker points to particular human quests such as dominance or ideology as “demons” with which the blame for war rests. Yet, dominance or ideology, no less than the desire for sex, can just as well be counted on the side of the “angels”—when pursued by peaceful means and for peaceful ends. For example, there have always been peaceful ideologies—such as Buddhism, and, in principle, though all too often not in practice, Christianity—which have exercised a considerable pacifying effect.

Furthermore, the distinctions that Pinker draws between different categories of violence respectively related to the above “demons” are also questionable. He cites studies showing that separate parts of the brain may trigger violent behavior, which is true of nearly all behaviors. But this does not mean that all violent behaviors are not subject to, and regulated by, a unified evolutionary calculus originally designed to advance survival and reproduction, the very definition of the evolutionary rationale which Pinker as an evolutionist would surely be the first to accept. The “problem” of war is not these or other human desires. Rather, violence and war occur when the conflictual behavioral strategy is judged to be more promising than peaceful competition and cooperation for achieving scarce objects of human desire. Both our basic desires and the conditions that channel the efforts to fulfil them to the conflictual path are necessary for understanding why war occurs. Thus, the advent of coercive state authority and state policing has tilted the menu of the human behavioral strategies in the direction of the peaceful options in the domestic arena, affecting a great reduction in the rate of killings—in the form of homicide and blood revenge—within societies. Moreover, changing economic, social, and political conditions have been generating a similar effect in the international arena, most notably where a modern liberal economic and political order prevails and peaceful behavioral options become that much more rewarding than the violent option in achieving unprecedented levels of affluence and comfort (Gat 2006, 2017; Goldstein 2011; Morris 2014; Pinker 2011). It is not that modern war has become more costly compared with earlier times, as many believe—it has not; it is peace that has become more rewarding (Gat 2006, 2017). Thus, countries with (non-oil) GDP per capita higher than $20,000 no longer fight each other, nor experience civil war. The most developed parts of the world, such as Western Europe and North America, have become a zone of peace. Within them war is not even contemplated, or feared—the famous “Security Dilemma” has disappeared—a situation which is unparalleled in history. [...]

From 2018... The Sordid Truth behind Degas’s Ballet Dancers

From 2018... The Sordid Truth behind Degas’s Ballet Dancers. Julia Fiore. Artsy, Oct 1 2018. https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-sordid-truth-degass-ballet-dancers

Excerpts:

The coteries of young women in flowering tutus who populate the approximately 1,500 paintings, monotypes, and drawings Degas dedicated to the ballet are among the French artist’s most universally beloved artworks. At first glance, Degas has rendered the sort of pretty, innocent world one might associate with a 6-year-old’s first recital. These works actually speak to an insidious culture that would be shocking to contemporary audiences.

Although it enjoyed unprecedented popularity in Degas’s era, the ballet—and the figure of the ballerina—had suffered a demoralizing fate by the late 1800s. Performances had been reduced to tawdry interludes in operas, the spectacle serving as an enticing respite for concertgoers, who could ogle the dancers’ uncovered legs.

These relationships always involved an unbalanced power dynamic. Young female members of the corps de ballet entered the academy as children. Many of these ballerinas-in-training, derisively called “petits rats,” came from working-class or impoverished backgrounds. They often joined the ballet to support their families, working grueling, six-day weeks.

And so dancers’ earnings and careers were beholden to the abonnés prowling backstage. They were expected to submit to the affections of these subscribers, and were frequently encouraged by their own mothers to fan the flames of male desire. Such relationships could offer lifelines for the impoverished dancers; not only did these aristocrats and financiers hold powerful positions in society, their patronage underwrote the opera’s operations.

Men like these had authority over who obtained plum roles and who was cast off. As a girl’s “patron,” he could provide her with an opulent lifestyle, paying for a comfortable apartment or private lessons to elevate her standing in the ballet corps. The brothel culture of the ballet was so pervasive, as historian Lorraine Coons remarks in her essay “Artiste or coquette? Les petits rats of the Paris Opera ballet,” that even successful dancers who did not resort to prostitution would likely have been suspected to have done so anyway.

“People call me the painter of dancing girls,” Degas once explained to Parisian art dealer Ambroise Vollard. “It has never occurred to them that my chief interest in dancers lies in rendering movement and painting pretty clothes.” But Degas didn’t care tremendously about the ballet as an art form, let alone frilly pastel tutus. He endeavored to capture the reality of the ballet that lurked behind the artifice of the cool, carefully constructed choreography.

Life was cruel to French ballet dancers, and they didn’t have it much easier at the hands of Degas himself. Although the artist was known to reject the advances of his models, his callousness manifested in other ways. To capture the physicality and discipline of the dancers, Degas demanded his models pose for hours at a time, enduring excruciating discomfort as they held their contorted positions. He wanted to capture his “little monkey girls,” as he called them, “cracking their joints” at the barre. “I have perhaps too often considered woman as an animal,” he once told the painter Pierre Georges Jeanniot in a moment of revealing honesty.

Degas was undoubtedly a merciless, cantankerous man. He was a misogynist—peers seemed almost afraid of his antagonism towards women—an especially troubling reputation considering the already sexist norms of his society.