hidden biases in the WaPo

"If anyone in Washington is skeptical about these findings, they are in denial."

today the washington post has an interesting article on implicit racial bias and voter preference focusing on research suggesting white conservatives have stronger implicit bias against blacks than do liberals. the study's not published yet, so i can't say much about it except the following: the study seems to be utilizing an outdated - or at best simplistic - understanding of bias. recent studies have shown that, given an additional 500 milliseconds, most implicit reactions disappear and the brain utilizes more advanced regions, such as the frontal cortex, instead of the amygdala which is activated in the shorter-response-time studies (30 milliseconds).

so do these initial amygdala reactions matter at all for behavior? are conservatives in general really more racist? i don't know. either way, let's not forget about the frontal cortex either.

the 500 millisecond article was published in psychological science, but i forget the actual reference - if i find it i'll post it as an update here. i blogged about it before, but archives are temporarily missing b/c of the transition to a new URL.

thanks to nigel for the article.

a freedom of choice establishment

one restaurant in my lovely hometown of newark, ohio is bucking the smoking ban enacted on january 1st. the owner, teri paxson, has refused to comply with the ban despite warnings, dubbing her restaurant a "freedom of choice establishment."

four other restaurants in the area have been caught hosting smokers. violators can face $150 in fines and the loss of their liquor license.

unfortunately ms. paxson did not give comment to the newspaper, so that's about all i know. read the whole story here.

monkey business

i'm currently in the process of transferring my blog to my very own URL, so things will be a bit odd over here for a while...

until then, i'll continue posting here.

excellent post i missed last week

the whole post is worth a read, but here's an exerpt from psych pundit, the blog of a clinical psych professor and therapist:

If, as a psychologist, I can help change a patient's thoughts, I've also (by definition) helped change his brain. Changing behavior changes the brain. Changing feelings changes the brain.

In a nutshell: experience changes the brain.

Why is this important? Because when it comes to mental illness, so many people automatically assume, "Oh, well the doctor said I probably have a 'chemical imbalance' or something wrong with my brain, so that means I have to take drugs to fix it." But if we understand that experience changes the brain - that the mind and brain are flip sides of the same underlying reality - we won't make this logical error.

well said!

related news: meditation makes your brain bigger in areas of attention and sensory input.

self-medication for the medicated

schizophrenia drugs are notorious for, among other things, blunting mental ability. via world of psychology, nicotine may counteract this effect:

nicotine patches boosted schizophrenics’ performance on tests of short-term memory and of mental processing speed abilities with which Haloperidol, the leading antipsychotic drug, interferes. Nicotine also improved participants’ attention spans as they tackled a boring computer task for 14 mind-numbing minutes

flaws in democratic decision-making

"The study points to a total lack of reason in political decision-making. "

a new study suggests that political decision making and analytical thinking may be opposed, illustrating the neural substrates of confirmation bias (tendency to ignore facts opposing your view and seek those confirming it).

in the study, staunch political party members evaluated data critical of their candidate - george w or john kerry's - position on an issue. brain scans revealed no activity in areas of conscious analytical thought, but instead in emotional circuits including conflict and disgust. reward centers took over when subjects came to their decisions.

we are a jaded polity; most of us (justly) feel that politicians manipulate facts. i'm not sure the study says much more than that. once someone's convinced, by whatever method, that her party or candidate is usually correct, that trust makes her likely to be skeptical of any information contradicting the party tract. it's energy and time efficient; it's farming out work to an institution you trust.

so does this say something horrible about us? should we feel guilty for not being analytical enough? not necessarily. at most, it illustrates one of the dangers of direct democracy. perhaps we aren't really cut out to make decisions for everyone.

unfortunately, the study did not look at independent or swing voters, or even party folks who are less involved. i'd also like to see if brain activity differs between issues of greater or lesser personal and worldwide importance, and unfamiliar issues.

thanks to tenacious jdt for the link.

know thyself

money magazine has five cool tips on how to control for common errors in investing using lessons from neuroeconomics. a few are common sense and have little to do with neuroecon, but the best piece of advice is probably:

"It's important to realize," says Stanford University neuroeconomist Brian Knutson, "that the magnitude of a long-shot reward is going to drive your behavior far more than the probabilities, which are minuscule."

sustainable microfinance

kiva, which means "agreement" or "unity" in swahili, is a unique microfinance nonprofit that connects individuals with small businesses in the developing world:

By choosing a business on our website and then lending money online to that enterprise, you can "sponsor a business" and help the world's working poor make great strides towards economic independence. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive monthly email updates that let you know about the progress being made by the small business you've sponsored. These updates include reports on loan repayment progress, photos of new capital equipment, narratives on business growth and standard of living improvements, and more. As loans are repaid, you will get your original loan money back.

anyone with a credit card and paypal account can loan much-needed funds in $25 increments. interest goes to operating expenses only (partly due to massive SEC regulations on interest-bearing loans), so investors receive only their capital investment when the loan is repaid.

so why would a nonprofit choose microfinance instead of donations? insisting that poor entrepreneurs repay their loans seems much colder than handing out grants. yet it seems to me that requiring repayment engenders a feeling of obligation and indebtedness, possibly making entrepreneurs work harder to succeed. kiva's answer is focused on our behavior rather than that of the entrepreneur - we are more likely to give money when we get it back, increasing the number of loans and people they can help:

There is a limit to the amount of money people can give; loans, on the other hand, can be repaid and re-loaned indefinitely. We believe in the power of creating a more sustainable option for people to contribute.

visit kiva's website for more information. the founders also have a blog.

the female brain diets

prompted by a recommendation by brain waves, i went to amazon to pre-order myself a copy of the female brain by louann brizendine, MD.

i thought it was absolutely hilarious that amazon was kind enough to suggest i buy the south beach diet along with it.

price of pleasure

guerlain has found the solution to unhappiness: their new happylogy line contains pro-endorphins, meant to trigger endorphins in the skin and promote happiness (for only $80). is effectiveness (i'll wager happylogy lacks it) all that separates this from endorphin drugs such as opium?

endorphin-boosters aside, reserach suggests we should be more strategic about the kinds of things we purchase to make us happy:

In a nationwide phone survey of 1,279 adults, respondents were much more likely to claim that a prior experiential purchase made them happier than a material one—57 percent versus 34 percent—even after accounting for differences in price.

this makes sense, although the study seems methodologically flawed, relying solely on recall of items purchased. it is also difficult to account for life quality improvements, a standard complaint of happiness studies - for example, you may not report that a washer & dryer increases your happiness in the same way that a trip to aruba does, but it reduces hassle and frees up time and money for more enjoyable (experiential) activities, etc.

in addition, as the article notes the distinction between experiential and material goods is a bit blurry. most seem to contain both components, guerlain's happylogy products being a great example.

put down that TaB!

parents everywhere may want to stop nagging their kids about their soda consumption. a new report indicates that sugary drinks aid memorization by stimulating the hippocampus. memory is inherently linked to IQ, so have we discovered a true intelligence-enhancer? well, expanded memory lasts only as long as the extra glucose does, and consuming too much sugar may hurt in the long run considering the (albeit tenuous) inverse relationship between IQ and weight. perhaps it just means that diet drinkers are, on net, dumber:

in an age of low-sugar or artificially sweetened drinks, they suggest that too many low-calorie beverages could hamper mental performance.

i sincerely doubt that, considering most of us don't operate constantly with coke-in-hand. regardless, understanding more about the link between glucose and memory it's good news for folks with chronic memory or pancreatic disorders.

restoring a lost language

who knew good could come out of a colin farrell movie? hollywood director terence malick's greed for glory and money has partially restored virginia algonquian, pocahontas' language, for the new world. the scholar he funded to restore the language for the movie, blair rudes, told MSNBC:

"It might have been done anyway, but it would have taken much, much longer," Rudes said. "This type of work is very time-consuming and expensive. ... There are so many other projects, I probably wouldn't have turned to this one."

details on the restored language from the film, including CDs and scripts, will go to the descendants of the langage. a dictionary is also in-progress. many nations are attempting to reclaim some of the cultural heritage taken from them during assimilation, and language is an important key to this process. so even if the movie sucks, you'll be buying a bit of cultural preservation with your ticket.

missing the point again

A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth.
-- george bernard shaw

psychology today reports that hell-on-earth to others - marriage - may not increase one's every day happiness. we tend to return to our happiness "set point" after time, a process called "hedonic leveling."

this is interesting, but it really misses the point entirely (as with much pop happiness research). as happiness is only one small part of the purported benefits of marriage. finding that marriage doesn't help one cope with severe illness, family crises, child rearing, or other major events - now that would be a relevant study.

update: marriage may increase wealth (and therefore, in my opinion, possibly well-being):

Married people will see an increase in wealth that is more than just adding the assets of two single people, according to the study that was published in the Journal of Sociology.

for more on happiness, see will's excellent blog.