psychology

Virtual Horror: Reliving the Past in Virtual Environments to Deal with Post Traumatic Stress

Jerry Sheehan — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 12:12:06 -0700

Description

Psychologist are beginning to investigate the use of immersive virtual reality environments to help individuals effected by post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Traditional treatment for PSTD involves asking the sufferer to re-imagine the trauma in the hope that repeated recall in a controlled environment will help dull the pain. Dr. Albert Rizzo has been experimenting with replacing the active imagination of the patient with a virtual reality recreation of the experience.

Rizzo's experiments are aimed at Iraq War veterans and uses a customized version of the Full Spectrum Warrior game engine to immerse patients into a virtual war zone. Apart from the immersion which is done via a set of special goggles the patient also feels the rumble of explosions, smells diesel and body odor, and hears other native sounds. In his initial test, which involves gradually working up to the intensity of the simulation, they have been able to eliminate the symptoms of PSTD in 14 of 18 patients with the simulator.[1]

Rizzo's research has been funded by the Naval Research Office under the project name Virtual Iraq. Technologies used for visualization and sound are the Z800 3D Visor.[2]

Computer & Information Science

Source

[1]"Curing the Wounds of Iraq with Virtual Therapy", Kathleen McAuliffe, September 17, 2008, Discover Magazine, Curing the Wounds of Iraq with Virtual Therapy | Mental Health | DISCOVER Magazine
[2]"Virtual Iraq-VR Based Therapy for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder", Defense Update, http://www.defense-update.com/products/v/VR-PTSD.htm

Where's the line? Research is eroding some assumed differences between humans and other animals

Janie Busby Grant — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:02:31 -0700

Description

There was a time when we thought humans were special in so many ways. Now we know better. We are not the only species that feels emotions, empathises with others or abides by a moral code. Neither are we the only ones with personalities, cultures and the ability to design and use tools. Yet we have steadfastly clung to the notion that one attribute, at least, makes us unique: we alone have the capacity for language. Alas, it turns out we are not so special in this respect either.

The cover story of the May 24 edition of New Scientist focused on recent research from a range of sources suggesting that hitherto accepted delineations between humans and all other animal species may be incorrect with respect to language. While this particular article may focus excessively on similarities rather than differences, the overall theme is one resounding throughout many recent journal papers. That is, for a long time now we have repeatedly set the goal posts distinguishing humans from other animals oh so firmly, only to upend and move them somewhere else when careful research reveals that that distinction does not necessarily hold. Part of this is just 'the way science works', but it also reveals a great deal about our instinctual, perhaps unthinking belief in some kind of unsurpassable gap between us and other species.

In concrete terms, each of these new findings enables us to learn more not only about a particular other species, but our own capacities and evolution. They also engender interesting and important ethical dilemmas with respect to our treatment of other species. They may one day even force us to challenge some of our core beliefs.

Psychology

Source

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=MImg&_imagekey=B83WY-4SK64XD-25-1&_cdi=33799&_user=554534&_orig=browse&_coverDate=05%2F24%2F2008&_sk=99...

Research on happiness - is it finally feeding back into government policy?

Janie Busby Grant — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 19:33:23 -0700

Description

"Layard is quietly effecting a revolution in this miserable, materialistic, overworked country. A Labour peer since 2000, he has been able to influence first Blair's administration and then Brown's into making his happiness agenda government policy. His calls for cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), for school lessons in emotional intelligence, and other allegedly happiness-causing reforms have been greeted warmly by education secretary Ed Balls, health secretary Alan Johnson, the health guideline-setting National Institute for Clinical Excellence and by local authorities up and down the country. Layard is founder director of the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics, and runs its Well-Being programme. He speaks cheerfully of how the word "well-being" now figures in job titles at government departments, how the new government policy includes commitments to well-being, how the Office for National Statistics is developing the measurement of well-being, how Ed Balls's Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning programme is devoted to making secondary school children focused on well-being."

(see earlier post: New research examining well-being: Assessing and increasing happiness - http://sciencex2.org/en/node/359)

Psychology

Source

http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/wellbeing/story/0,,2287146,00.html

Conference on attention suggests fruitful interactions between experimental science and philosophy

Katy Armstrong — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:00:22 -0700

Description

The Philosophy Department of University College Dublin recently held a conference on the study of attention that brought together researchers in neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy. Although these disciplines have previously been united under the broad rubric of "cognitive science", opportunities for researchers with different academic backgrounds to consider and exchange ideas on a the same topic are relatively rare.

The areas discussed were diverse, from the philosophical relationship between attention and consciousness (is attention necessary and sufficient for consciousness?), to identifying the neurons capable of enhancing perception. However, some common themes emerged, such as the apparent link between attention and action, the inherent difficulty faced by cognitive neuroscientists who attempt to understand poorly defined but commonly understood cognitive concepts, like attention, in neural terms, and an examination of what is lost in the adoption of an operational definition of a particular cognitive process for experimental study.

Overall participants found the discussion to be highly stimulating, suggesting that a collaborative interplay between disciplines, wherein neuroscience and psychology can inform/constrain philosophical theories about cognition, and philosophical questions can drive experimental investigations, may prove synergistic.

Future of neuroscience

Source

http://www.ucd.ie/philosophy/attention/index.html

The Moral Instinct - New York Times

Max Marmer — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 14:08:58 -0700

Description

Great article by Steven Pinker providing a framework to understanding how morals work and how they might have evolved.

Today, a new field is using illusions to unmask a sixth sense, the moral sense. Moral intuitions are being drawn out of people in the lab, on Web sites and in brain scanners, and are being explained with tools from game theory, neuroscience and evolutionary biology.

Here's an excerpt from the article where Steven Pinker illuminates contradictions in how we think about morals.
It’s not just the content of our moral judgments that is often questionable, but the way we arrive at them. We like to think that when we have a conviction, there are good reasons that drove us to adopt it. That is why an older approach to moral psychology, led by Jean Piaget and Lawrence Kohlberg, tried to document the lines of reasoning that guided people to moral conclusions. But consider these situations, originally devised by the psychologist Jonathan Haidt:

Julie is traveling in France on summer vacation from college with her brother Mark. One night they decide that it would be interesting and fun if they tried making love. Julie was already taking birth-control pills, but Mark uses a condom, too, just to be safe. They both enjoy the sex but decide not to do it again. They keep the night as a special secret, which makes them feel closer to each other. What do you think about that — was it O.K. for them to make love?

A woman is cleaning out her closet and she finds her old American flag. She doesn’t want the flag anymore, so she cuts it up into pieces and uses the rags to clean her bathroom.

A family’s dog is killed by a car in front of their house. They heard that dog meat was delicious, so they cut up the dog’s body and cook it and eat it for dinner.

Most people immediately declare that these acts are wrong and then grope to justify why they are wrong. It’s not so easy. In the case of Julie and Mark, people raise the possibility of children with birth defects, but they are reminded that the couple were diligent about contraception. They suggest that the siblings will be emotionally hurt, but the story makes it clear that they weren’t. They submit that the act would offend the community, but then recall that it was kept a secret. Eventually many people admit, “I don’t know, I can’t explain it, I just know it’s wrong.” People don’t generally engage in moral reasoning, Haidt argues, but moral rationalization: they begin with the conclusion, coughed up by an unconscious emotion, and then work backward to a plausible justification.

Pinker goes on to describe many other blatant fallacies in what is considered morals - like why someone finds it morally acceptable to push a button that would kill one person but save five but would not push a person in front of a train to save five people, again sacrificing one for many...

Another very interesting aspect of the article talks about five common Universal Morals found around the globe that seem to form the blueprint for morality.
"The exact number of themes depends on whether you’re a lumper or a splitter, but Haidt counts five — harm, fairness, community (or group loyalty), authority and purity — and suggests that they are the primary colors of our moral sense. Not only do they keep reappearing in cross-cultural surveys, but each one tugs on the moral intuitions of people in our own culture."

Future of neuroscience

Source

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html

Yet more emotions research - trust

Janie Busby Grant — Mon, 26 May 2008 23:23:32 -0700

Description

An earlier post noted the recent emergence of research into emotions (http://sciencex2.org/en/node/364), bolstered by recent neuroscience investigations. This trend appears set to continue:

A new study shows that the hormone oxytocin may spur us to trust others even after they have betrayed us by suppressing a region of the brain that signals fear. The findings could lead to a better understanding of social phobias and related disorders.

The improved ability to track, influence and measure difficult constructs such as trust has important flow-on implications for a wide range of research, including the understanding of interpersonal relationships, disorders such as those mentioned above, and other growing fields such as the study of well-being (http://sciencex2.org/en/node/359).

Psychology

Source

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/521/3

DSM-V: The Future Manual

Janie Busby Grant — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:20:27 -0700

Description

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (known as the DSM) is a set of guidelines used to diagnose mental disorders. It is produced by the American Psychiatric Association and used ubiquitously by clinicians, researchers and organisations. The fourth edition (DSM-IV) was published in 1994 and consultation is now underway for the fifth edition. The decisions made will have significant and widespread effects, including on the conceptualisation of mental disorders at the broadest level.

The arguments currently underway include:
- debate over the current categorical (vs dimensional) delineation
- current lack of recognition of context effects on behaviour
- the role of etiology in illness categories (which was removed between edition II and III)

Psychology

Source

http://www.psych.org/dsmv

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/163/5/846

Luyten, P. & Blatt, S. J. (2007). Looking back towards the future: Is it time to change teh DSM approach to psychiatric disorders? The case of depression. Psychiatry, 70 (2), 85.

http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/64/4/433

Memory training improves brain function

Katy Armstrong — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:42:24 -0700

Description

A team of researchers at the University of Michigan reported that subjects were able to boost their "fluid intelligence", i.e. their ability to solve new problems without prior exposure. The researchers had subjects perform a series of cognitive exercises designed to challenge their working memory capacities. Working memory refers to the ability to remember and manipulate information over short periods of time, such as remembering a telephone number before you dial or calculating the appropriate tip on your restaurant bill. They found that the working memory training substantially improved subjects performance on a standard test of fluid intelligence.

This study was the first of its kind to demonstrate that fluid intelligence, long considered to be "principally an immutable inherited trait", could be improved through training. The improvements did not depend on subject's baseline levels of fluid intelligence, and the strength of improvement was related to how long the subject's trained.

Questions remain about the extent to which people will be able to improve their fluid intelligence, and about how long the subjects' improvements will last.

Reference:
Bakalar, N. "Memory Training Shown to Turn Up Brainpower", New York Times April 29, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/health/research/29brai.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1209496035-go/u2dCHvkVyQH4R8RWDLw

Future of neuroscience

Source

Knowledge versus action on climate change: Are they mutually exclusive?

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 00:47:24 -0700

Description

Political scientists at Texas A&M recently published an article arguing that public campaigns to educate the public about the dangers of global warming may make people less, not more, worried about climate change.*

People generally believe that when you have more information about a risk, you act to avoid or control that risk, and that there's some positive correlation between how much information you have, and how hard you try to fix a problem. This is the knowledge-deficit model.

As people are exposed to more information about what scientists know about how human activities like CO2 emissions are related to increasing global temperatures, then one should expect two things. First, one should expect to see higher amounts of information to be related to higher degrees of personal efficacy and responsibility for global warming and climate change. Second, one should expect to see higher amounts of information to be related to heightened perceptions about the risks of global warming and climate change. Together, these hypotheses are straightforward applications of the knowledge-deficit model to the issue of global warming.

That's not the case. In fact, they report two slightly counterintuitive, but disturbing, patterns. First,

more informed respondents both feel less personally responsible for global warming, and also show less concern for global warming. We also find that confidence in scientists has unexpected effects: respondents with high confidence in scientists feel less responsible for global warming, and also show less concern for global warming.... [C]ertainly contrary to the assumptions underlying the knowledge-deficit model, as well as the marketing of movies like Ice Age and An Inconvenient Truth, the effects of information on both concern for global warming and responsibility for it are exactly the opposite of what were expected. Directly, the more information a person has about global warming, the less responsible he or she feel for it; and indirectly, the more information a person has about global warming, the less concerned he or she is for it.

The authors themselves add the caveat that "The effects here are statistically significant, but they are modest in magnitude." Further, several people have argued that since the study is based on a survey taken in 2004, just before the release of An Inconvenient Truth, it doesn't capture how the terms of public debate around climate change, or the ways people respond to information about climate, changed after the movie.

* Paul M. Kellstedt, Sammy Zahran, Arnold Vedlitz (2008) "Personal Efficacy, the Information Environment, and Attitudes Toward Global Warming and Climate Change in the United States," Risk Analysis 28 (1), 113–126.

Source

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2008.01010.x?cookieSet=1
http://scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt/2008/03/al_gore_is_part_of_the_problem.php

Children with autism may learn from 'virtual peers'

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0800

NOTE: This content was aggregated from RSS feed. Original source is http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/nu-cwa022908.php

EurekAlert reports on new research using "virtual peers"-- essentially simple, avatar-like drawings of children-- to help high-functioning autistic children learn social skills.

Using “virtual peers” -- animated life-sized children that simulate the behaviors and conversation of typically developing children -- Northwestern University researchers are developing interventions designed to prepare children with autism for interactions with real-life children.

“Children with high-functioning autism may be able to give you a lecture on a topic of great interest to them but they can’t carry on a ‘contingent’ -- or two-way -- conversation,” said [Justine] assell, director of Northwestern’s Center for Technology and Social Behavior.

Cassell and researcher Andrea Tartaro collected data from six children with high-functioning autism aged 7 to 11 as they engaged in play during an hour-long session with a real-life child, and with a virtual peer named Sam.

In an analysis of those interactions, they found that children with autism produced more and more “contingent” sentences when they spoke with the virtual peer, while their sentences did not become increasingly contingent when they were paired with the real-life children....

[T]heir findings hold promise that virtual peers can be useful in helping children with autism develop communication and social skills.

And virtual peers have some distinct advantages over real-life children when it comes to practicing social skills. For starters, children with autism often like technology. “It interacts to us,” said one child with autism upon first meeting a virtual peer.

What’s more, said Cassell, virtual peers don’t get tired or impatient. “We can program their conversation to elicit socially-skilled behavior, and we can vary the way that they look and behave so children with autism are exposed to different kinds of behavior.”

Cassell and Tartaro’s study is part of larger efforts taking place in the Articulab, the Northwestern University laboratory where Cassell and colleagues explore how people communicate with and through technology.

One striking aspect of these virtual peers is that they're not very visually complex: the lack of complex social cues and facial expressions, which under "normal" circumstances is seen as a liability, may make it easier for high-functioning autistic children to interact with virtual peers.

Faux Fido eases loneliness in nursing home residents as well as real dog, SLU study finds

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0800

NOTE: This content was aggregated from RSS feed. Original source is http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/slu-ffe022508.php

EurekAlert reports on a new study indicating that robotic pets are as effective as live pets in alleviating loneliness in elders. This is particularly interesting because it offers another data-point on the ways we interact with electronic or digital characters like avatars.

A sophisticated robotic dog could be a good companion for your dog-loving grandmother who can’t care for a living pet, a new Saint Louis University study suggests.

The researchers compared how residents of three nursing homes interacted with Sparky, a living, medium-sized gentle mutt, and Aibo, a doggie robot once manufactured by Sony that looks like a three-dimensional cartoon.

“The most surprising thing is they worked almost equally well in terms of alleviating loneliness and causing residents to form attachments,” says William A. Banks, M.D., professor of geriatric medicine at Saint Louis University.

“For those people who can’t have a living pet but who would like to have a pet, robotics could address the issue of companionship,” Banks says.

Who's slowing you down?

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0800

NOTE: This content was aggregated from RSS feed. Original source is http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/uoc-wsy022008.php

EurekAlert reports:

You may not be aware of it - they might not be aware of it, but the people in your work environment might be slowing you down.

New research by University of Calgary, Faculty of Kinesiology researcher Dr. Tim Welsh says that regardless of their intentions, having an individual working on a different task - within your field of vision - could be enough to slow down your performance.

“Imagine a situation like a complex assembly line,” said Welsh If you are doing a particular task and the person across from you is doing a different task, you’ll be slowed down regardless of their performance.”

The reason for this is a built-in response-interpretation mechanism that is hard-wired into our central nervous systems. If we see someone performing a task we automatically imagine ourselves performing that task. This behaviour is part of our mirror neuron system.

The downside of a good idea

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0800

NOTE: This content was aggregated from RSS feed. Original source is http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/iu-tdo021908.php

EurekAlert reports:

When information is freely shared, good ideas can stunt innovation by distracting others from pursuing even better ideas, according to Indiana University cognitive scientist Robert Goldstone.

"How do you structure your community so you get the best solution out of the group?" Goldstone said. "It turns out not to be effective if different inventors and labs see exactly what everyone else is doing because of the human tendency to glom onto the current 'best' solution."

Goldstone's findings were published this month in the January/February issue of the journal "Current Directions in Psychological Science." Michael E. Roberts, a doctoral student in the Cognitive Science Program, and Todd M. Gureckis, assistant professor of psychology at New York University, are co-authors of the article "Emergent Processes in Group Behavior."

Goldstone's research examines and charts group behavior and the patterns in which people unknowingly participate -- much like ants creating colony structures about which they are clueless.

This study used a virtual environment in which study participants worked in specifically designed groups to solve a problem. Participants guessed numbers between 1 and 100, with each number having a hidden value. The goal was for individuals to accumulate the highest score through several rounds of guessing. Across different conditions, the relationship between guesses and scores could either be simple or complex. The participants saw the results of their own guesses and some or all of the guesses of the others in their group.

In the "fully connected" group, everyone's work was completely accessible to everyone else -- much like a tight-knit family or small town. In the "locally connected" group, participants primarily were aware of what their neighbors, or the people on either side, were doing. In the "small world" group, participants also were primarily aware of what their neighbors were doing, but they also had a few distant connections that let them send or retrieve good ideas from outside of their neighborhood.

Goldstone found that the fully connected groups performed the best when solving simple problems. Small world groups, however, performed better on more difficult problems. For these problems, the truism "The more information, the better" is not valid.

"The small world network preserves diversity," Goldstone said. "One clique could be coming up with one answer, another clique could be coming up with another. As a result, the group as a whole is searching the problem space more effectively. For hard problems, connecting people by small world networks offers a good compromise between having members explore a variety of innovations, while still quickly disseminating promising innovations throughout the group.

Old dogs: Prior knowledge affects how consumers accept new information

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0800

NOTE: This content was aggregated from RSS feed. Original source is http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-02/uocp-odp021208.php

EurekAlert reports:

Over time, consumers develop a set of cues that we then use to make inferences about products, such as "all French restaurants have great service" or "more expensive candles smell better." However, this set of predictable beliefs can make it difficult for us to learn and recognize other real, positive qualities that are indicated by the same cues, reveals a new study from the April issue of the Journal of Consumer Research.

“Once people learned that a cue predicted an outcome, they became less likely to learn about this very same cue with respect to a different outcome,” write Marcus Cunha Jr. (University of Washington), Chris Janiszewski, and Juliano Laran (both University of Florida)....

This research has important implications for marketers, policy makers and consumers.... Similarly, from a public policy standpoint, the results suggest that people may be resistant to adopt new health and safety standards when information conflicts with prior learning. Beyond creating awareness, successful campaigns might present new information in a way that does not utilize attributes already associated with another outcome.

Using experimental psychology to inform consumer psychology

Janie Busby Grant — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 22:07:39 -0800

Description

Consumer psychology researchers examine interactions between individuals and the products and services they use. Despite their vital role in many corporations and their ongoing work in universities, such researchers are traditionally given little (positive) attention in mainstream academia. However, the study of consumer behavior continues to grow, as corporations around the world seek to design and target their products appropriately, and consumer psychology is a large part of this push.

Experimental psychology involves using the scientific method to answer particular theoretical questions. In the past some in the field of consumer psychology have argued that experimental psychology has little to add to their search for practical solutions given that the approach usually uses artificial settings (Kardes, 1996). Although generalizability will always be an issue, the past decade has seen many of these issues addressed (Foxall, 2003), and a greater focus on the integration of experimental techniques into consumer behavior research.

One example of the renewed focus on experimental techniques in particular aspects of consumer science is research being undertaken at the Centre for Experimental Consumer Research, at Bangor University.

“Unlike most work in the area of "consumer science", the approach taken at the Centre (a) focuses on product design and use, (b) emphasizes experimental methods and behavioral measures (rather than just observation, verbal self-report, and survey techniques), (c) is solidly grounded in current theoretical advances in cognitive neuroscience, and (d) aims to take full advantage of state-of-the-art behavioral technologies.”

Thus it is also clear that the field of consumer psychology can over the next period also adopt many of the new neuroscientific and technological advances in order to further their own goals.

Resources for consumer psychology, particularly scientific peer-reviewed research, include the Journal of Consumer Psychology, the various offshoots of the Journal of Experimental Psychology (e.g., Learning, Memory and Cognition), the Journal of Consumer Behavior and the Journal of Consumer Research.

In the current consumer-driven world, the field of consumer psychology can only grow. The role of traditional scientific techniques may continue to be questioned by some, but there is little doubt that advances in the neurosciences and behavioral and cognitive psychology will inform consumer psychology, with follow-on effects for the end user. Implications abound, most particularly ethical. There is clearly an ongoing debate regarding the appropriateness of advertising, for example. Many question whether better targeted, more effective advertisements are really good for society. While this issue appears clear-cut to some, other related questions, such as the design of safer, easier to use household products, are also embedded in the same field of research. This is undoubtedly a field which blurs the line between empirical research and product generation, and knowledge acquisition and financial gain, and will remain contentious for such reasons.

Kardes, F. R. (1996). In defense of experimental consumer psychology. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 5, 279-296. Abstract available online at http://www.leaonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15327663jcp0503_04

Foxall, G. R. (2003). The behavior analysis of consumer choice: An introduction to the special issue. Journal of Economic Psychology, 24, 581-588. Abstract available online at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V8H-483278R-1&_user=10&_coverDate=10%2F31%2F2003&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&v....

The Centre for Experimental Consumer Research: http://www.psychology.bangor.ac.uk/research/domains/cecr.php

Signals

Psychology and industry meet, both scientifically and financially

Legal psychology: Future ethical challenges where the sciences meet the law

Janie Busby Grant — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 13:19:01 -0800

Description

Recent years have seen the incorporation of ever more aspects of psychological science into the legal process. The use of empirical psychological research in a courtroom setting has come to be known as legal psychology, and commonly involves research on topics such as eyewitness memory, decision-making, and group behavior. Forensic psychology, while overlapping with legal psychology, tends to involve a clinical focus and require a more detailed understanding of the legal process. The use of either type of psychology professional within the criminal justice system engenders a number of serious ethical issues, none of which constitute a serious flaw in the relationship between psychology and the law, but all of which need to be scrutinized carefully. The examples of risk evaluations and this issue of informed consent in assessments are discussed below.

A potentially tricky ethical issue is the practice of risk evaluations as performed by psychologists and reported to courts in order to determine an individual's risk for future violence. Critics argue that the use of such assessments in judicial forums is unethical, either because the methods used to gather the data do not meet the legal criteria for admissibility (e.g., scientific verifiability) or that the findings themselves are not appropriately accurate for use in this setting. Authors Tolman and Rotzien argue instead that, "sound ethical practice is about how one practices - the process of an evaluation". They suggest that the competing values of both public safety and potential negative outcomes for an individual need to be taken into account, or decisions could be made subjectively and incorporate emotional and cognitive bias. One major issue Tolman and Rotzien focus on is what they describe as a "tendency to see the role of the expert as a forecaster rather than as an adviser".

Knapp and VandeCreek (2001) discuss some of the ethical dilemmas confronting forensic psychologists, in particular the role of informed consent. Psychologists are ethically bound to inform both the hiring attorney and the client in understandable language of all necessary information.

"The Specialty Guidelines for Forensic Psychologists states that the psychologist should inform the party “of factors that might reasonably affect the decision to contract with the forensic psychologist” (CEGFP, 1991, p. 443). These factors include the fee structure, prior or current personal or professional activities that might produce a conflict of interest, areas of competence and limits to the areas of competence, and the known scientific bases and limitations of the methods and procedures that the psychologist will employ. It also means informing clients about the relevant limitations of confidentiality".

The difficulties involved in informed consent in the legal arena include mandatory evaluations, where by definition the client does not consent to the evaluation process by their own free will. In this context the psychologist still must provide all necessary information, but this issue raises serious questions about their role in mandatory vs traditional clinical psychological evaluations. For instance, do their actions differ in those two situations? Should it? The ability of the client to comprehend the information provided is also often in serious question, particularly when dealing with minors or with individuals with intellectual impairments. The dynamic nature of the legal process also puts additional requirements on the consulting psychologist to keep the client informed of any changes in their role or in the implications of their evaluation. The authors also note that these types of issues are all the more serious given that few psychologists acting as forensic psychologists have been specifically trained in that role.

There are clearly serious ethical issues that must be dealt with when science meet the legal system. If current trends continue psychologists are likely to play a more frequent role in the legal system in the future. In order to support this relationship, changes in education (both at and subsequent to university training) are required in order to appropriately prepare psychologists for work in the legal profession. Without informed debate and critique, scientists (particularly those working in the 'soft' sciences such as psychology) could potentially become a liability to the legal system, rather than an asset. The best-case scenario involves groups of traditional academics working hand-in-hand with those participating in the legal process, supporting them with data-driven findings, which would then be assessed for their applicability by experts in psychology and the law. In summary, it is clear that the field of psychology and other sciences can inform and improve the legal process (see Busey & Loftus, 2006 for a discussion), but it is imperative that any advances be met with considered critique in the context of the legal system.

Knapp, S. & VandeCreek, L. (2001). Ethical issues in personality assessment in forensic psychology. Journal of Personality Assessment, 77, 242-254. Abstract available online at http://www.leaonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/S15327752JPA7702_07?cookieSet=1&journalCode=jpa.

Tolman, A. O. & Rotzien, A. L. (2007). Conducting risk evaluations for future violence: Ethical practice is possible. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 38, 71-71. Abstract available online at http://content.apa.org/journals/pro/38/1/71.

Busey, T. A. & Loftus, G. (2006). Cognitive science and the law. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 11, 111-117.

Signals

Research on mirror neurons can inform psychological, neurological, sociological, evolutionary and even ethical debates

Janie Busby Grant — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 02:55:20 -0800

Description

The discovery of mirror neurons in the 1990s was an important finding that has, and is continuing to have, major ongoing repercussions for scientists of many different persuasions around the globe. Mirror neurons are brain cells that fire both when we perform an action, and intriguingly, when we watch someone else perform the same action. Giacomo Rizzolatti and his colleagues first discovered mirror neurons in the frontal lobes of macaque monkeys, but later research has identified similar cells in the human brain.

“Humans, it turns out, have mirror neurons that are far smarter, more flexible and more highly evolved than any of those found in monkeys, a fact that scientists say reflects the evolution of humans’ sophisticated social abilities. The human brain has multiple mirror neuron systems that specialize in carrying out and understanding not just the actions of others but their intentions, the social meaning of their behavior and their emotions” (Blakeslee, 2006).

“Rizzolatti, MD, who with his colleagues at the University of Parma first identified mirror neurons, says that the neurons could help explain how and why we "read" other people's minds and feel empathy for them” (Winerman, 2005).

The implications of these findings are far-reaching. The famous neuroscientist V. S. Ramachandran argued in 2001 that:

“The discovery of mirror neurons in the frontal lobes of monkeys, and their potential relevance to human brain evolution… is the single most important "unreported" (or at least, unpublicized) story of the decade. I predict that mirror neurons will do for psychology what DNA did for biology: they will provide a unifying framework and help explain a host of mental abilities that have hitherto remained mysterious and inaccessible to experiments” (Ramachandran, 2001).

Reviewing Ramachandran’s 2001 statements, in 2006 the editor of ‘Edge’, in which the original paper was published, made the following comments, providing a list of the notable new research in this field:

“In the past few years, mirror neurons have come into their own as the next big thing in neuroscience, and while the jury is still out on Rama[chandran]'s prediction, it's obvious that something important is unfolding:
Interesting new research is being conducted in neuroscience labs in the US and Europe and discussed at conferences and in the press:
• A team at UCLA led by Marco Iacoboni, Director of the Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation laboratory of the Ahmanson-Lovelace Brain Mapping Center at UCLA recently published important results ("Grasping the Intentions of Others with One's Own Mirror Neuron System", Iacoboni et al, 2005 );
• Christian Keysers, Associate Professor, Neuro-Imaging-Center of the University Medical Center Groningen (Netherlands) published a paper neural basis of social intelligence with mirror neuron pioneers Rizzolatti and Gallese ("A unifying view of the basis of social cognition" Gallese, Keysers, Rizzolatti, 2004);
• A virtual workshop — "What do Mirror Neurons Mean" — moderated by Gloria Origgi and Dan Sperber, and sponsored by the European Science Foundation, has an ongoing discussion on the theoretical implications of the discovery of mirror neurons.
• At a recent conference near Paris —"Contribution of Mirroring Processes to Human Mindreading" — on the implications of mirror neurons for science and philosophy, top neuroscientists, psychologists, philosophers, and anthropologists from Europe and the United States engaged in heated debates on the interpretation and the consequences of the discovery, but at least one thing was clear: mirror neurons matter, and we are only beginning to understand how much and how.
(Brockman, 2006).

Mirror neurons are that rare scientific finding that, for many scientists, forces a reassessment of their conceptualisation of their field. Prior to this work there was little to suggest that performing an action and watching an action performed by another could possibly be linked at such a basic level in the human mind. Mirror neurons thus provide a mechanism linking self and other, a bridge through which neuroscientists and psychologists can understand, at a fundamental level, many of the social interactions in which humans engage, including phenomena such as empathy, imitation and so-called ‘theory of mind’. The implications of mirror neurons are even more far-fetching, with significance for the study of ethics, language and human evolution.

Blakeslee, S. (2006). Cells that read minds. New York Times, January 10, 2006. Available online at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/10/science/10mirr.html?ei=5090&en=2d497999fb9a642a&ex=1294549200&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print.

Winerman, L. (2005). The mind’s mirror. Monitor on Psychology, 36, 48. Available online at http://www.apa.org/monitor/oct05/mirror.html

Ramachandran, V. S. (2001). Mirror neurons and imitation learning as the driving force behind “the great leap forward” in human evolution. Edge: Third Culture website. Available online at http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran/ramachandran_p1.html

Brockman, J. (2006). Introduction to V. S. Ramachandran’s “Mirror neurons and the brain in the vat”. Edge: Third Culture website. Available online at http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran06/ramachandran06_index.html

Signals

Who's slowing you down?

Neuroimaging and the argument that its ability to explain cognitive processes is limited

Janie Busby Grant — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 08:34:48 -0800

Description

The technological advances of the past few decades have allowed researchers for the first time to study the real-time functioning of the living human brain. Accordingly there has been much excitement about what data gathered this way could mean to the understanding of the human brain and psychological processes. However, some critics have expressed caution about the data gathered from imaging techniques, the most salient with regard to the ubiquitous use of these techniques to answer psychological questions.

Max Coltheart, a distinguished cognitive psychologist, recently published a paper in which he asked whether neurimaging data had actually been useful at the psychological level. He makes it clear that he believes such techniques are appropriate for linking specific psychological function to particular brain structure. However, he argues that such research is (to date) less than useful when it comes to drawing conclusions regarding different theories of cognitive function. “No functional neuroimaging research to date has yielded data that can be used to distinguish between competing psychological theories” (Coltheart, 2006). That is, scientists need to carefully consider the conclusions which can be drawn from potential neuroimaging data before initiating the study – too often the findings offer precious little explanatory power at the level of cognitive function. One researcher quoted in Coltheart’s article suggests that “imaging can, in principle, add nothing new. There is a level of psychological theorizing – the cognitive level – that can only be studied at this level, and information from lower levels will tell us nothing about what happens at the cognitive level”. A recent blog on this topic (PsyBlog, 2007) raised this issue, generating a range of responses from individuals within related fields, suggesting that the presentation of imagining data in scientific journals may be masking deeper questions about its ability to inform some of the ‘big questions’ some imaging researchers claim to address.

While there is no doubt that technological advances in neuroimaging have made significant contributions to science, there are clearly grounds for being wary about the way in which it is applied to theoretical discussions. All too often a new tool can be rather randomly applied and it is only later, when enthusiasm dies down, that the limited nature of the generated data becomes apparent. The key issue here is actually the gap between brain function and cognition, and until we better understand this relationship the ability of neuroimaging to provide answers is limited. The near future is likely to see a greater appreciation of the limits of neuroimaging, and more considered application of this tool. Convergence of results using a variety of different tools will be utilized more often, but certainly some researchers argue that for the foreseeable future the field may have to deal empirically with cognition and brain function as largely separate phenomena.

Coltheart, M. (2006). What has functional neuroimaging told us about the mind (so far)? Cortex, 42, 323-31.

Dean, J. (2007) PsyBlog Can cognitive neuroscience tell us anything about the mind? PsyBlog,
http://www.spring.org.uk/2007/02/can-neuroscience-tell-us-anything-about.php

Signals

Research into emotions can reap social and personal benefits

Janie Busby Grant — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 07:52:24 -0800

Description

Despite the significant role emotion plays in everyday life, mainstream scientific research has, with some exceptions, largely excluded the topic from traditional experimental study. However, there has been a rapid rise in interest into emotion research over the past several years, accompanied by a swathe of new research, including the incorporation of an understanding of emotion into a multitude of new and exciting disciplines.

One way in which increased interest in emotion can be indexed is simply through publications, in particular through the establishment of a new journal for the field, Emotion. One of the editors noted in an interview that “the journal was created in response to an explosive growth of research on emotion from many domains of psychology… it will serve as a catalyst for the field to have the research assembled together rather than segregated, and to have a journal that is focused on a set of phenomena”. Another sign of the growing acceptance of emotion research is that academics are now openly citing emotions as a key topic of interest, especially in the ever-growing field of neuroscience. For instance, when a new imaging laboratory was opened in the US recently, the stated focus included emotion along with more traditional themes such as learning and cognitive capacities. “The scientists will use the technology to expand their investigations of positive emotions and their relationships to health, studying, for example, people who show high levels of resilience and those who practice meditation” (Mattmiller, 2001).

Accompanying the rise in focused emotion research has been an increase in the number of other fields incorporating research into emotion. For instance, the new journal Research on Emotion in Organizations was established in 2005. It “presents empirical and conceptual articles at the forefront of research in this intriguing new area… the study of emotion and its antecedents and consequences in organizations is currently generating a torrent of new research. Topics include the effects on organizational behavior of mood and affective events, emotional labor and its effects, emotional intelligence, emotion and leadership, and the causes and effects of anger in the workplace”. Similarly, the role of emotion in the legal profession has recently been recognised. A blog post by Urs Gasser, the Director of the Research Center for Information Law at the University of St. Gallen, noted the important role of emotion in law, arguing that “law and emotion research and scholarship has an important agenda-setting function”. Yet other prominent fields recognising the role of emotion are computer science and artificial intelligence, as highlighted in a recent symposium including titles such as “Ethics and emotions in computer-mediated romantic relationships” and “From (artificial) intelligence to (artificial) emotions”. Paolo Petta, an organiser of the symposium, notes that “the introduction of computers-mediated environment has provided significant changes in the way emotions are generated and experienced”. Comparative researchers are also becoming interested in emotion, for instance work recently undertaken at the Max Plank Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology with chimpanzees. The researchers argued that their studies suggested that chimps are unable to feel spite as they have a lack of empathy.

Emotions play a profound role in our social exchanges, workplaces, and our personal mental and physical health. The recent focus on emotion in scientific research thus has important implications for individuals and society at large. For instance, a better understanding of emotions, how and why they occur, may well help researchers predict and reduce conflict on an interpersonal, intergroup (e.g., ethnic conflict), and international scale. Emotions are also known to have a strong effect on physical health - pinning down these links would enable individuals to better understand and control their own bodies. In addition, simply in terms of advancing knowledge, research into emotions may well plug many of the gaps we currently have in our understanding of the brain.

(2001). New journal is catalyst for cutting-edge emotion research. Monitor on Psychology, 32. Available online at http://www.apa.org/monitor/apr01/emotion.html.

Mattmiller, B. (2001). Reading the mind: New lab sharpens brain imagery. Brain & Emotions Research website. March 20, 2001. Available at http://www.news.wisc.edu/packages/emotion/5970.html

Ashkanasy, N., Zerbe, W. & Hartel, C. (Eds.) (2005-2007).
Description of new journal: Research on emotion in organisations. Elsevier Publications website. Available at http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/bookdescription.cws_home/BS_REO/description#description

Gasser, U. (2007). Law and emotion: Possible impacts of a new understanding of the role of emotion in law. Law and Information. Posted April 22, 2007. Available at http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/ugasser/2007/04/22/law-and-emotion-possible-impacts-of-a-new-understanding-of-the-role-of-emotion-in-law/

Petta, P. (Ed.) (2006). Ethics and emotions in computer-mediated environments. Humaine emotion-research.net. December 13, 2006. Available online at http://emotion-research.net/ws/wp10/presentation-materials/ethics-and-emotions-in-computer-mediated-environments/

Barras, C. (2007). Spite is a uniquely human emotion. New Scientist, Juluy 16 2007, Available online at http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12273-spite-is-a-uniquely-human-emotion.html

Signals

Mental time travel: A new theory with implications for cognition and human evolutionary history

Janie Busby Grant — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 03:17:52 -0800

Description

Mental time travel refers to the theory that remembering specific personal past events and imagining specific personal future events are based on the same underlying brain functions and structures, allowing people to “mentally project themselves backwards in time to re-live, or forward to pre-live events” (Suddendorf & Corballis, 2007). Pioneered by Thomas Suddendorf and Michael Corballis, based on previous work by Endel Tulving, the mental time travel hypothesis and the nest of theories in which it is embedded extend existing memory research and provide a host of new predictions and suggestions for future research. A relatively recent proposal, the concept has rapidly become both popular and contentious, particularly with respect to the claim that that mental time travel is a uniquely human capacity.

For many years now mainstream psychology has accepted a distinction between different memory systems (although debate as to the nature and extent of these differences remains fierce). This distinction between episodic, semantic and procedural memory is summarized in Figure 1 (from Suddendorf and Corballis, 2007). However, despite a recent surge of research into human understanding of the future, the terminology used in this area remains relatively contentious. In an upcoming paper Suddendorf and Corballis (2007) extend the taxonomy of memory systems to the processes by which individuals think about the future, suggesting that future-oriented cognition can also be categorized as episodic (conscious construction of personal future events) semantic (conscious, general knowledge-related predictive ability) or procedural (unconscious, stimulus-driven predictions of regularities). The key argument in the mental time travel hypothesis is that episodic memory and episodic future thinking allow humans to mentally travel backwards and forwards in personal time, re-experiencing past events and pre-experiencing future events. The authors suggest that there are significant adaptive advantages of such a system, “the emergence of mental time travel in evolution was a crucial step towards our current success” (Suddendorf & Corballis, 2007). They also argue that there is, as yet, no convincing evidence that non-human animals share this capacity.

Since the basics of this theory were proposed in 1997 it has been the subject of widespread debate in various academic circles, including cognition, neuroscience, evolutionary psychology and developmental psychology. In 2005 the journal Learning and Motivation devoted a special issue to the topic of whether non-human animals demonstrate mental time travel, with some authors arguing that there is preliminary evidence for such a capacity in animals such as chimpanzees and gorillas, and others suggesting that such data is fundamentally flawed. Similarly in the upcoming edition of Brain and Behavioral Sciences a whole series of commentators have the chance to critique the mental time travel argument. From this new treatment, it is clear that in the space of two years the idea has claimed more widespread acceptance, buoyed largely by neuropsychological and developmental evidence, most of which has only been generated in the last few years. For instance, imaging studies demonstrate that both remembering the past and imagining the future are associated with activity in the frontal and temporal lobes (e.g., Okuda et al., 2003) and amnesic studies suggest that patients who cannot recall events from yesterday similarly cannot predict tomorrow’s events (Klein et al., 2002).

The mental time travel hypothesis has a number of significant implications for different fields of research and everyday life. For example, if animals other then humans can imagine the future and remember the past in the way we can, this has ethical implications for animal rights. If children cannot remember the past or imagine the future before a certain age, this has implications for witness testimony and for educational strategies. In evolutionary terms, this proposal means we might be able to pinpoint a time at which mental time travel evolved in our ancestors, with associated implications for the ‘tree of life’ and explaining human dominance of the planet. There are also conceptual implications of this theory, particularly in terms of forcing a re-evaluation of memory research, as seen by recent recall imaging studies conducted at Princeton and receiving widespread media attention.

Suddendorf, T. & Corballis, M. C. (2007). The evolution of foresight: What is mental time travel, and is it unique to humans? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 30, 299-351. Available at http://www.bbsonline.org/Preprints/Suddendorf-04122006/Suddendorf-04122006.pdf.

Roberts W. A. (Ed.) (2005). Learning & Motivation. Special Edition: Cognitive Time Travel in People and Animals. Overview available at
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/622909/description#description

Okuda, J., Fujii, T., Ohtake, H., Tsukiura, T., Tanji, K., Suzuki, K., Kawashima, R., Fukuda, H., Itoh, M. & Yamadori, A. (2003). Thinking of the future and the past: The roles of the frontal pole and the medial temporal lobes. NeuroImage, 19, 1369-1380.

Klein, S. B., Loftus, J. & Kihlstrom, J. F. (2002b). Memory and temporal experience: The effects of episodic memory loss on an amnesic patient’s ability to remember the past and imagine the future. Social Cognition, 20, 353-379.

Quinones, E. (2005). News Release: Researchers develop new method for studying ‘mental time travel’. News@Princeton. December 22, 2005. Available at http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S13/52/87Q72/index.xml?section=newsreleases.

Signals

Progress understanding evolutionary theory and potential impacts on science and society

Janie Busby Grant — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 04:41:57 -0800

Description

Since the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859 evolutionary theory has progressed rapidly and had an unprecedented impact on the understanding of both the natural and social world. However, recent advances in biology, genetics and imaging technology have prompted many researchers to suggest that subsequent decades will see an even greater progression in terms of integrating evolutionary theory into a vast array of fields and debates.

First, technological and scientific advances are likely to allow a far better understanding of the process of evolution itself, and of the specifics of our evolutionary history. Michael Benton recently argued that the next 50 years will likely see the finalising of the ‘tree of life’, the details of and evolutionary links between both living and extinct species. This will be a powerful tool, allowing researchers to discern large-scale patterns and make theoretical leaps not currently possible. Such progress is also likely to refine our understanding of the development of the cognitive capacities of humans. Steven Pinker (2006) argues that the near future will bring “confirmation of the fundamental hypothesis of evolutionary psychology - that many aspects of human cognition and emotion are evolutionary adaptations.”

Second, these advances in evolutionary theory and related fields are likely to have significant flow-on effects to other areas of science and society. For instance, Paul Ehrlich asks whether we, reaching this point in our understanding of evolution, we now need to begin consider our ethical obligations to the preservation of biological systems. He argues that, “biologists should help to guide a process of cultural evolution in which society determines how much effort, if any, is ethically required to preserve options in biological evolution. Evolutionists, conservation biologists, and ecologists should be doing more research to determine actions that would best help to avoid foreclosing evolutionary options.” On a different tack, Geoffrey Miller suggests that this new understanding of evolutionary theory will contribute to studies of well-being, and that this information will inform significant changes in urban planning policies.

New developments in evolutionary theory, supported by technological advances, have important ramifications for biology, psychology, human culture and our understanding of society. As these ideas begin to integrate with more traditional subject topics they may help scientists and policy makers create more appropriate environments, encourage better interaction between individuals and groups, provide explanations for social/biological issues (e.g., obesity), and allow understanding of human behaviour.

Benton, M. (2006). Michael Benton forecasts the future. New Scientist, 2578, 54. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19225780.105-michael-benton-forecasts-the-future.html

Pinker, S. (2006). Steven Pinker forecasts the future. New Scientist, 2578, 39. Available at http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19225780.088-steven-pinker-forecasts-the-future.html

Miller, G. (2006). Geoffrey Miller forecasts the future. New Scientist, 2578, 59. Available at http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19225780.108-geoffrey-miller-forecasts-the-future.html

Ehrlich, P. R. (2002). Intervening in evolution: Ethics and actions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98, 5477-5480. Available at http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10499&page=89.

Signals

Palaeontologists and taxonomists look ahead to finished mapping of the 'tree of life'

Evolutionary psychology in the next 5-10 yrs: demonstrating that aspects of human cognition & emotion are evolutionary adaptions

New research examining well-being: Assessing and increasing happiness

Janie Busby Grant — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 00:57:36 -0800

Description

Research into subjective well-being and happiness has recently undergone a shift from being seen as ‘fluffy’ social research to being taken seriously by the scientific community. Previously the purview of positive psychology and development studies, subjective well-being is now investigated by bioscientists, judgement and decision-making psychologists, economists and mainstream social policy makers, and is marked by a search for valid, empirical measures of well-being.

In a recent Nature article Tony Reichhardt described the transition towards a more rigorous approach to the study of well-being, with researchers such as Daniel Kahneman (recipient of the Nobel Prize for economics) driving the field. For instance, Kahneman and Krueger (2006) examined a range of measures of subjective well-being, noting how these can be flawed by various effects or factors. Such measures traditionally ask people to make a global judgement regarding life satisfaction. They propose instead the use of the U-index, which “measures the proportion of time that people spend in an unpleasant state”. This type of research reflects a shift to longitudinal designs, wherein the same individuals are given repeated measures at several points in time. Using this approach researchers can address causal questions, whereas previous cross-sectional research cannot. Diener and Biswas-Diener (2000) argue that, “for instance, when married people report being happier in the U.S.A., is this because marriage leads to happiness or because happy people are more likely to get married and stay married? If we conduct longitudinal research in which people are sampled over time, we are likely to gain insights into the direction of causality between marriage and happiness”.

Studies seeking to assess levels of well-being are now also beginning to incorporate biological variables, for instance through measuring levels of the stress hormone cortisol. “By measuring factors such as hormone levels (cortisol or epinephrine), blood pressure or immune-system functioning, scientists hope to learn more about the physiological underpinnings of psychological well-being and distress” (Reichhardt, 2006)

Happiness and well-being research also provides a good example of cross-disciplinary collaboration. As argued in a paper by McGregor (2006), “the concept [of well-being] provides a timely and new opportunity for interchange between disciplines. Well-being has an important communicative function to fulfil within the global social science community…”. This is particularly noticeable through the incorporation of well-being research into social policy. For example, Sharpe and Smith (2006) recently produced a report for the Canadian government in which they review current means of measuring well-being and link it to developments in public policy.

There are several ‘big questions’ that research examining subjective well-being is seeking to answer:
- Are the happiness levels of a given individual relatively stable, or can they alter over time?
- Do different measures of subjective well-being index different aspects of happiness level, or are some simply more accurate than others?
- Can well-being be measured using biological indicators and do such measures tally with self-report scores?
- What terminology should be used to refer to different aspects of well-being, ill-being and happiness?
- Are there cultural differences in experienced well-being? How should measures designed to assess well-being be adapted to suit different cultures?

There has been a recent rise in interest shown by scientists and general society in quantifying and possibly improving individual well-being. Until recently, however, the field suffered from a lack of standardisation and strict scientific methodology. The advances discussed above will, if executed appropriately, lead to significant gains in the ability to assess well-being. The end goal of such research is, of course, to be able to improve individual subjective happiness, which is perhaps one of the most laudable but similarly most complex goals in science.

Reichhardt, T. (2006). Well-being research: A measure of happiness. Nature, 444, 418-419.

Kahneman, D. & Krueger, A. B. (2006). Developments in the measurement of subjective well-being, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 20, 3-24. Available through http://www.krueger.princeton.edu/Subjective.htm.

Diener, E. & Biswas-Diener, R. (2000). New directions in subjective well-being research: The cutting edge. Draft manuscript available at http://s.psych.uiuc.edu/~ediener/hottopic/NEW_DIRECTIONS.html

McGregor, J. A. (2006). Researching wellbeing: From concepts to methodology. Working Paper from the ESRC Research Group on Wellbeing in Developing Countries. Available at http://www.bath.ac.uk/econ-dev/wellbeing/research/workingpaperpdf/wed20.pdf

Sharpe, A. & Smith, J. (2005). Measuring the impact of research on well-being: A survey of indicators of well-being. Report prepared by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards for the Prime Minister’s Advisory Council on Science and Technology [Canada]. Available at http://www.csls.ca/reports/csls2005-02.pdf

Signals

New research into human understanding of the future

Janie Busby Grant — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 03:13:36 -0800

Description

The field of psychological science is large and multifaceted. However, a select number of topics have tended to dominate large portions of the field. Foremost among these is memory research, which has generated a huge body of literature. Although there is no doubt that this focus on how individuals recall and understand the past has produced informative and at times exciting findings, it has simultaneously stymied systematic psychological research into human understanding of the future. Certainly over the years a small number of researchers have examined aspects of the ‘future’ issue, for instance through study of delay of gratification, future-oriented time perspective, and clinical research into such topics as anxiety about the future. However, the past few years have seen a qualitative shift towards the study of the future that shows every sign of continuing rapid growth, marked by both an explosion of research into a range of topics, and an underlying change in theoretical perspective.

First, this transition is obvious through a move by many researchers into previously understudied future-related aspects of their own subfields. Consider cognitive neuroscience, which has already revealed a great deal about memory function, and is now enjoying a new focus on planning, foresight and links between understanding of the past and the future. For instance, Okuda and colleagues (2003) and Szpunar, Watson and McDermott (2007) report studies examining brain regions activated when mentally constructing future events. Developmental cognitive psychology has also made inroads into the study of how and when the ability to think about the future emerges during childhood (e.g., Atance & Meltzoff, 2005; Busby & Suddendorf, 2005). Comparative psychology, the study of behavior and cognitive abilities in both human and non-human animals, has also revealed intriguing insights into how other animals anticipate the future, including Mulcahy and Call’s (2006) study with apes and Emery and Clayton’s (2001) research with scrub jays.

Second, a new way of conceptualizing the role of the future in human functioning is emerging. Researchers are now beginning to question the ultimate value of many cognitive functions, and recognizing that they tie in with the ability to make predictions about the future. This is particularly clear in terms of the re-imagining of existing memory research, as illustrated by the argument by Suddendorf and Corballis that, “the adaptive advantage of any memory system can only lie in what it contributes for future survival”. That is, the essential benefit of remembering the past is that this information allows a better ability to predict the future, and hence improves survival chances.

The shift in research in the psychological sciences towards research that investigates how people think about future events addresses a huge gap in current knowledge. It is a vital step towards a fuller understanding of the human brain and the full spectrum of human behavior. Perhaps the key implication, however, is not the gathering of new knowledge, but the potential for a fundamentally new conceptualization of a whole range of psychological and behavioral phenomena. This opens the door for rapid leaps forward in understanding not just how we function, but why. It is likely that much relevant data has already been gathered, and it can simply be reinterpreted according to a focus on ultimate evolutionary value. The concrete benefits for general society could include better understanding and prediction of behaviors - explaining why an individual performs one action rather than another, or a particular cognitive process takes place rather than another, despite more proximate drives to the contrary.

Atance, C. M., & Meltzoff, A. N. (2005). My future self: Young children’s ability to anticipate and explain future states, Cognitive Development, 20, 341-361. Abstract available at http://tinyurl.com/33t787.

Busby, J., & Suddendorf, T. (2005). Recalling yesterday and predicting tomorrow. Cognitive Development, 20, 362-372. Abstract available at http://tinyurl.com/39vryz.

Emery, N. J. & Clayton, N. S. (2001). Effects of experience and social context on prospective caching strategies by scrub jays. Nature, 414, 443-446. Abstract available at http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v414/n6862/abs/414443a0.html.

Mulcahy, N. J. & Call, J. (2006). Apes save tools for future use. Science, 312, 1038-1040. Abstract available at http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/312/5776/1038.

Szpunar, K. K., Watson, J. M. & McDermott, K. B. (2007). Neural substrates of envisioning the future. PNAS Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104, 642-647. Available at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/104/2/642.

Signals

My future self: Young childrens' ability to anticipate and explain future states

Cognitive Development: Recalling yesterday and predicting tomorrow

Effects of experience and social context on prospective caching strategies by scrub jays

Apes Save Tools for Future Use

Global consciousness detector [draft]

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 10:45:26 -0700

Description

The Global Consciousness Project may be able to detect signals indicating immanent global events. The Global Consciousness Project, based at Princeton University, grew out of research conducted at Princeton in the 1970s. It has set up a network of Random Event Generators, electronic black boxes that proponents claim are affected by collective human brain activity-- i.e., changes in global consciousness.

The network appears to register impacts during large-scale events-- such as global sports events that attract billions of viewers-- but also sometimes BEFORE these events: most notably, the network registered a large anomaly several hours before the attacks on 9/11.

The significance of the phenomenon is still debated, though the results appear to be nonrandom.

Global Consciousness Project, http://noosphere.princeton.edu/.

"Can This Black Box See Into the Future?" Red Orbit (11 February 2005), http://www.redorbit.com/news/display/?id=126649#121.

Signals

More Accurate Modeling of Complex Economic Systems

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 11:10:30 -0700

Description

Advances in simulation tools and behavioural analysis may facilitate innovation in economic research methods.

Within 10 to 20 years, agent-based modelling may facilitate a significant improvement in the scope and utility of economic models. Accurate simulations could potentially give economists new confidence in their conclusions. The difference this could make to economics can be compared with the impact of structural engineering on building. In the past, people designed buildings by intuition, experience, and guesswork. Today novel structures can be built with confidence because we have theories of structures and materials and we can model buildings with computers before they are built. Agent-based modelling could have a similar impact on economics.

Two factors are driving change in economics: accessibility of computational power and the adoption of behaviourist approaches. The (increasing) accessibility of computational power permits the accurate and rapid modelling of complex economies. The availability of computational power may, for a new generation of researchers, facilitate a shift in economics from deductive formalism to an applied mathematical approach based on simulations. In addition, the fundamental simplifying assumptions underlying current economic theory (greed, rationality, and equilibrium) are tending now to be replaced by new insights from behavioural studies of economic actors (firms, consumers, etc.) Drawing upon psychological experiments, behavioural approaches to economics may provide a far more accurate model of economic behaviour, revealing how variations in behaviour contribute to complexity in economic systems.

The impact of behavioural approaches to economic theory and computer power combined, may provoke a widespread shift in economic research methods from rational-actor models towards large simulations of complex economies inhabited by behaviourally-sophisticated agents. Cheap grid computing power will allow massive experiments that will begin to explain many of the seemingly random everyday trends in complex economic systems like the financial markets and international trade.

Implications:
* Ability to explore a far wider range of public policy alternatives than previously
* Creation of large new areas of inquiry for economists
* Potential fo expansion of economic theories and analytical techniques in other social sciences

Early Indicators:
* Awarding of recent Nobel prizes that lay the foundation for doctoral student interest behavioural economics
* Increase in the number of doctoral dissertations having to do with agent-based modeling techniques, and increase in the funding of research taking these approaches
* Work by a consortium of universities in a project known as NEW-TIES -- New and Emergent World models Through Individual, Evolutionary, and Social Learning -- on developing a large-scale and highly complex computer-based society as a means to understand social learning and behaviour

What to Watch:
* Faculty research in economics reflects increasing interest in agent-based models and behavioural analysis.
* Graduate economics curricula change to encompass agent-based models and behavioural analysis.
* Results from behavioural/ABM analysis are increasingly used in policy debates.

Parallels/Precedents:
* Complexity revolution in the "hard" sciences -- physics, biology, and computing

Enablers/Drivers:
* Increasing availability of cheap desktop computational power
* Continued development of high-level programming languages for building models
* Continuing or expanding support for interdisciplinary work between economists and computer scientists, mathematicians, and psychologists
* Neurotechnology for gathering data about emotional state of experimental subjects

Signals

Simulation as a Method of Quantitative Analysis

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 11:10:30 -0700

Description

Simulations that take advantage of vastly increased computing power could be used more heavily in the social sciences, eventually replacing the analysis of causality as a method of predicting human behaviour.

Quantitative analysis methods in social sciences that use statistical and numerical rather than verbal data, have traditionally been limited by the amount of information and data that can be processed. Researchers have typically relied on smaller sets of variable data and as a result, have tended to use the same information in many different circumstances.

Computer simulations that borrow methods from applied physics and business decision making make it much easier to use a greater range of information and throughly evaluate each alternative. Increased computing power and storage capacity means that there are potentially no limits to the size of datasets and the number of variables that can be analysed and the variables can also be measured across time repeatedly. Social scientists are expected to increasingly use simulation, as they learn to rely on computers and an aleatory (random) approach to knowledge that takes into account the vastness of available data. The big challenge however will be to develop statistical techniques for finding patterns in these huge datasets."

This will be enabled by:

Increased computing power
Availability of large datasets and merging of data

Early indicators include:

Use of simulation by sociologists to contrast global network structures with the local patterning that generates the network
Use of agent-based modeling by consumer researchers to study shopping behaviour
Use of simulation by social scientists to explore discovery and diffusion of knowledge in an endogenous social network
Use of agent-based modeling of dynamic parties to study electoral behavior

What to watch:

Sociology and psychology departments at major universities offer required courses in using simulation for quantitative analysis.