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Posts

May 16, 2013

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1:00 PM | The Psychological Science of Storytelling
It hit me about two years ago, sometime after I started this blog. Somewhere between the comedy shows and alarming amount of documentaries I began watching, and the seemingly endless number of people I have met in the last few … Continue reading →

Lacey S, Stilla R & Sathian K (2012). Metaphorically feeling: comprehending textural metaphors activates somatosensory cortex., Brain and language, 120 (3) 416-21. PMID:

Skeptikai
Psychology | General Science
Citation
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6:12 AM | We’re All Just Looking For a Patsy
If often seems as though policy-making has devolved into nothing more than a contest where the goal is to blame as many people as possible (but not yourself) for the country’s problems. Fossil fuel companies blame environmental regulations for economic stagnation and high energy prices. Neocons blame civil libertarians for national security weaknesses. And of [...]

Rothschild, Z., Landau, M., Molina, L., Branscombe, N. & Sullivan, D. (2013). Displacing Blame over the Ingroup’s Harming of a Disadvantaged Group can Fuel Moral Outrage at a Third-Party Scapegoat, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, DOI:

Peer-reviewed by my neurons
Education | Psychology
Citation

May 14, 2013

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4:34 PM | Six Arguments For the Elimination of Cigarettes
Prohibition and the “tobacco control endgame.” Despite all our efforts in recent years to reduce the percentage of Americans who smoke cigarettes—currently about one in five—the idea of full-blown cigarette prohibition has not gained much traction. That may be changing, as prominent nicotine researchers and public police officials start thinking about what is widely referred to as the “tobacco control endgame.” Considering the new regulatory powers given the FDA under the terms […]

Proctor R.N. (2013). Why ban the sale of cigarettes? The case for abolition, Tobacco Control, 22 (Supplement 1) i27-i30. DOI:

Addiction Inbox
Health | Neuroscience
Citation
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5:49 AM | Teacher Expectations Have a Stronger Impact On Low-Income Students
In their 1968 book Pygmalion in the Classroom, Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson presented their groundbreaking research that showed teacher expectations are self-fulfilling prophecies. If two students start the school year at the same achievement level, the student the teacher is told is a high achiever will make more gains than the student the teacher believes is [...]

Sorhagen, N. (2013). Early teacher expectations disproportionately affect poor children's high school performance., Journal of Educational Psychology, 105 (2) 465-477. DOI:

Peer-reviewed by my neurons
Education | Psychology
Citation

May 13, 2013

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11:01 PM | Jane Austen, Game Theorist Although whiffs of game theory have...
Jane Austen, Game Theorist Although whiffs of game theory have been discerned in writings as old as Plato, its conventional history begins with the 1944 publication of von Neumann’s seminal “Theory of Games and Economic Behavior.” The techniques gained prominence as a means of anticipating attacks and counterattacks among superpowers during the Cold War, and they played a role in determining the quantity and positioning of U.S. nuclear warheads. “Austen’s novels are game theory […]
University of California Research
Academic Life | General Science

May 12, 2013

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8:59 PM | HORSEPOWER
Step 2 of my strategic plan: Post my favourite class assignments from the past year, which will start this week with manure and will eventually end with sewage. Enjoy. We tend to think of nineteenth century cities like Pittsburgh as industrializing under the power of steam. But Joel Tarr argues that an older technology also … Continue reading →
The Blobologist
Biology | General Science

May 11, 2013

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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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3:30 AM | Learning and evolution are different dynamics
A couple of weeks ago, if you randomly woke me in the middle of the night and demanded to know the fundamental difference between evolution and learning as adaptive processes, I would probably respond: “how did you get into my house? and umm… I guess they are mostly the same, it is just a matter […]

Brenner, T. (1998). Can evolutionary algorithms describe learning processes?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 8 (3) 271-283. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation

May 10, 2013

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3:05 AM | Stop to smell the flowers. Especially lavender.
(source)Hi Julie, WOW!Dogs in clothes.  Corgis in bikinis at the beach. Greyhounds in onesies.  We people do some weird things to our canine friends, no?! I'm pretty sure I wouldn't enjoy being dressed up in a padded outfit all day long, so I think I'll pass on sharing that experience with my dogs. As you said, cultural perceptions, ethics and expectations add a whole layer of extra consideration. It's not always easy to work out what dogs want or need. That's why I […]

Wells D.L. (2009). Sensory stimulation as environmental enrichment for captive animals: A review, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 118 (1-2) 1-11. DOI:

Graham L., Wells D.L. & Hepper P.G. (2005). The influence of olfactory stimulation on the behaviour of dogs housed in a rescue shelter, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 91 (1-2) 143-153. DOI:

Wells D.L. (2006). Aromatherapy for travel-induced excitement in dogs, Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, 229 (6) 964-967. DOI:

MOTOMURA N., SAKURAI A. & YOTSUYA Y. (2001). REDUCTION OF MENTAL STRESS WITH LAVENDER ODORANT, Perceptual and Motor Skills, 93 (3) 713-718. DOI:

Do you believe in dog?
Academic Life | Behavioral Biology
Citation
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3:05 AM | Stop to smell the flowers. Especially lavender.
(source)Hi Julie, WOW!Dogs in clothes.  Corgis in bikinis at the beach. Greyhounds in onesies.  We people do some weird things to our canine friends, no?! I'm pretty sure I wouldn't enjoy being dressed up in a padded outfit all day long, so I think I'll pass on sharing that experience with my dogs. As you said, cultural perceptions, ethics and expectations add a whole layer of extra consideration. It's not always easy to work out what dogs want or need. That's why I […]

Wells D.L. (2009). Sensory stimulation as environmental enrichment for captive animals: A review, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 118 (1-2) 1-11. DOI:

Graham L., Wells D.L. & Hepper P.G. (2005). The influence of olfactory stimulation on the behaviour of dogs housed in a rescue shelter, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 91 (1-2) 143-153. DOI:

Wells D.L. (2006). Aromatherapy for travel-induced excitement in dogs, Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, 229 (6) 964-967. DOI:

MOTOMURA N., SAKURAI A. & YOTSUYA Y. (2001). REDUCTION OF MENTAL STRESS WITH LAVENDER ODORANT, Perceptual and Motor Skills, 93 (3) 713-718. DOI:

Do you believe in dog?
Academic Life | Behavioral Biology
Citation
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3:05 AM | Stop to smell the flowers. Especially lavender.
(source)Hi Julie, WOW!Dogs in clothes.  Corgis in bikinis at the beach. Greyhounds in onesies.  We people do some weird things to our canine friends, no?! I'm pretty sure I wouldn't enjoy being dressed up in a padded outfit all day long, so I think I'll pass on sharing that experience with my dogs. As you said, cultural perceptions, ethics and expectations add a whole layer of extra consideration. It's not always easy to work out what dogs want or need. That's why I […]

Wells D.L. (2009). Sensory stimulation as environmental enrichment for captive animals: A review, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 118 (1-2) 1-11. DOI:

Graham L., Wells D.L. & Hepper P.G. (2005). The influence of olfactory stimulation on the behaviour of dogs housed in a rescue shelter, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 91 (1-2) 143-153. DOI:

Wells D.L. (2006). Aromatherapy for travel-induced excitement in dogs, Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, 229 (6) 964-967. DOI:

MOTOMURA N., SAKURAI A. & YOTSUYA Y. (2001). REDUCTION OF MENTAL STRESS WITH LAVENDER ODORANT, Perceptual and Motor Skills, 93 (3) 713-718. DOI:

Do you believe in dog?
Academic Life | Behavioral Biology
Citation

May 08, 2013

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5:00 PM | Microbial Misadventures: Anthrax, Hippies & Drum Circles
Everyone has their own collecting quirk. I myself collect animal skulls, inconveniently large earrings and unusual stories of infectious disease cases and outbreaks. To each their own, yes? I’ve decided that, instead of stockpiling these stories away in some recess of my brain, I’ll be sharing them online in a new recurring series on Body [...]

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (2010). Gastrointestinal anthrax after an animal-hide drumming event - New Hampshire and Massachusetts, 2009., MMWR. Morbidity and mortality weekly report, 59 (28) 872-7. PMID:

Body Horrors
Social Science | Microbiology
Citation
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1:50 PM | Thanks Mom!
Like Mother, like baby! Photo from freedigitalphotos.net.Moms give us so much more than we ever give them credit for. Biologically speaking, we all have a mom and a dad (unless you’re a flatworm or some other species that can reproduce without sex) that provide us with one of each chromosome type (our chromosomes contain our genes, commonly thought of as our “biological blueprints”). So it makes sense that we tend to think of ourselves as being half-our-mom and half-our-dad. But not so! […]

BERNARDO, J. (1996). Maternal Effects in Animal Ecology, Integrative and Comparative Biology, 36 (2) 83-105. DOI:

Wolf, J. & Wade, M.J. (2009). What are maternal effects (and what are they not)?, Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B, 364 1107-1115.

The Scorpion and the Frog
Behavioral Biology | Neuroscience
Citation
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1:50 PM | Thanks Mom!
Like Mother, like baby! Photo from freedigitalphotos.net.Moms give us so much more than we ever give them credit for. Biologically speaking, we all have a mom and a dad (unless you’re a flatworm or some other species that can reproduce without sex) that provide us with one of each chromosome type (our chromosomes contain our genes, commonly thought of as our “biological blueprints”). So it makes sense that we tend to think of ourselves as being half-our-mom and half-our-dad. But not so! […]

BERNARDO, J. (1996). Maternal Effects in Animal Ecology, Integrative and Comparative Biology, 36 (2) 83-105. DOI:

Wolf, J. & Wade, M.J. (2009). What are maternal effects (and what are they not)?, Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B, 364 1107-1115.

The Scorpion and the Frog
Behavioral Biology | Neuroscience
Citation

May 07, 2013

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11:01 PM | In Your Face: soldiers' faces predict aggression, military rank and number of children | @GrrlScientist
New research demonstrates that male soldiers' faces may predict their military rank and how many children they ultimately fatherWhat role has aggression played in human evolution? Can scientists predict who might be more aggressive? And how might increased aggressiveness be linked to overall fitness? Previous research found that aggression in hockey players is correlated with their facial width to height ratio (fWHR), and a new study builds on this work by demonstrating that fWHR may also […]

Carré J.M. & McCormick C.M. (2008). In your face: facial metrics predict aggressive behaviour in the laboratory and in varsity and professional hockey players, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 275 (1651) 2651-2656. DOI:

Wong E.M., Ormiston M.E. & Haselhuhn M.P. (2011). A Face Only an Investor Could Love: CEOs' Facial Structure Predicts Their Firms' Financial Performance, Psychological Science, 22 (12) 1478-1483. DOI:

Tsujimura H. & Banissy M.J. (2013). Human face structure correlates with professional baseball performance: insights from professional Japanese baseball players, Biology Letters, 9 (3) 20130140-20130140. DOI:

Stirrat M., Stulp G. & Pollet T.V. (2012). Male facial width is associated with death by contact violence: narrow-faced males are more likely to die from contact violence, Evolution and Human Behavior, 33 (5) 551-556. DOI:

Stirrat M. & Perrett D.I. (2012). Face Structure Predicts Cooperation: Men With Wider Faces Are More Generous to Their In-Group When Out-Group Competition Is Salient, Psychological Science, 23 (7) 718-722. DOI:

GrrlScientist
Ecology | Evolution
1
Citation
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11:01 PM | In Your Face: soldiers' faces predict aggression, military rank and number of children | @GrrlScientist
New research demonstrates that male soldiers' faces may predict their military rank and how many children they ultimately fatherWhat role has aggression played in human evolution? Can scientists predict who might be more aggressive? And how might increased aggressiveness be linked to overall fitness? Previous research found that aggression in hockey players is correlated with their facial width to height ratio (fWHR), and a new study builds on this work by demonstrating that fWHR may also […]

Carré J.M. & McCormick C.M. (2008). In your face: facial metrics predict aggressive behaviour in the laboratory and in varsity and professional hockey players, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 275 (1651) 2651-2656. DOI:

Wong E.M., Ormiston M.E. & Haselhuhn M.P. (2011). A Face Only an Investor Could Love: CEOs' Facial Structure Predicts Their Firms' Financial Performance, Psychological Science, 22 (12) 1478-1483. DOI:

Tsujimura H. & Banissy M.J. (2013). Human face structure correlates with professional baseball performance: insights from professional Japanese baseball players, Biology Letters, 9 (3) 20130140-20130140. DOI:

Stirrat M., Stulp G. & Pollet T.V. (2012). Male facial width is associated with death by contact violence: narrow-faced males are more likely to die from contact violence, Evolution and Human Behavior, 33 (5) 551-556. DOI:

Stirrat M. & Perrett D.I. (2012). Face Structure Predicts Cooperation: Men With Wider Faces Are More Generous to Their In-Group When Out-Group Competition Is Salient, Psychological Science, 23 (7) 718-722. DOI:

GrrlScientist
Ecology | Evolution
1
Citation
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8:12 PM | A design for life
As the average age of the population goes up with people surviving many years more than their allegorical three score years and ten, the incidence of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of senile dementia will rise too. Many people can suffer symptoms for many years and yet live independent lives or at least with minimal [...]A design for life is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Glasgow A. (2013). The use of domestic appliances by cognitively impaired users, Int. J. Cognitive Performance Support, 1 (1) 40-53.

Sciencebase Science Blog
Chemistry | General Science
Citation

May 06, 2013

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1:44 PM | The young and the restless
It struck me recently that one of the key differences between economists and neuroscientists studying decision-making is their interest in dynamics.  Economists seem more interested in explaining how behavior operates (or should operate) on average whereas neuroscientists would like to explain trial-to-trial variability.  Decisions are rarely made just once in a lifetime, but are instead made repeatedly. [...]

Hampton, A., Bossaerts, P. & O'Doherty, J. (2008). Neural correlates of mentalizing-related computations during strategic interactions in humans, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 105 (18) 6741-6746. DOI:

Zhu, L., Walsh, D. & Hsu, M. (2012). Neuroeconomic Measures of Social Decision-Making Across the Lifespan, Frontiers in Neuroscience, 6 DOI:

neuroecology
Ecology | Neuroscience
Citation

May 05, 2013

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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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11:00 PM | Social learning dilemma
Last week, my father sent me a link to the 100 top-ranked specialties in the sciences and social sciences. The Web of Knowledge report considered 10 broad areas[1] of natural and social science, and for each one listed 10 research fronts that they consider as the key fields to watch in 2013 and are “hot [...]

Rendell L, Boyd R, Cownden D, Enquist M, Eriksson K, Feldman MW, Fogarty L, Ghirlanda S, Lillicrap T & Laland KN & (2010). Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament., Science, 328 (5975) 208-213. PMID:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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5:42 PM | How Does Political Ideology Influence Views On Accountability?
Accountability is all the rage these days, whether it’s with regard to schools, hospitals, government agencies, or the local Geico car insurance branch. But not all accountability is the same, and a thought-provoking new study led by Penn’s Philip Tetlock examines how political ideology and trust can influence support for various accountability systems. The study [...]

Tetlock, P., Vieider, F., Patil, S. & Grant, A. (2013). Accountability and ideology: When left looks right and right looks left, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 122 (1) 22-35. DOI:

Peer-reviewed by my neurons
Education | Psychology
Citation

May 04, 2013

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3:00 AM | Evolutionary economics and game theory
Like the agents they study, evolutionary economics is highly heterogeneous. Models are ad-hoc and serve as heuristic guides to specific problems. This is similar to theoretical biology, where evolutionary models are independent of each other. Even the general theory of inclusive fitness does not provide a non-controversial unifying framework. Although there is no single framework, [...]

Hodgson, G. & Huang, K. (2010). Evolutionary game theory and evolutionary economics: are they different species?, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 22 (2) 345-366. DOI:

Theory, Evolution, and Games Group
Biology | Mathematics
Citation
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