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Whipping up fear or creating a distraction is a common tactic in politics. Providing stark, seemingly life or death choices, us versus them, scapegoating, creating a false bogeyman to distract from real problems, using lies and disinformation … fear and distraction is used because it often works. The invoked fear is often based on racism and bias. It’s those “other people”–with a different skin color,…
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Background: “Studies suggest that relying on willpower is hopeless. Instead, we must find strategies that don’t require us to be strong. In the modern era, habits have become a significant area of scientific inquiry. Psychologists have explored the genesis of habitual behavior and its impact on health and happiness. William James, echoing Aristotle, wrote, ‘All our life, so far as it has definite form, is…
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How and when does an established viewpoint of a society change? What does it take for a society (a very large group of people) to alter its collective opinion? Is there a “tipping point” for public opinion? Background: A 2018 study using a naming game discovered that when a minority viewpoint became held by “at least 25% of the population,” that viewpoint “was likely to…
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Sunita Sah, Cornell University (from The Conversation) You’re in a meeting when your boss suggests changing a number to make the quarterly report look stronger. Heads nod. The slides move on. You feel a knot in your stomach: Do you speak up and risk being branded difficult, or stay silent and become complicit? Most people picture defiance as dramatic outbursts. In reality, it’s often these…
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Was Lord Acton right? “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Or, is it more as John Steinbeck described “Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts… perhaps the fear of a loss of power”? Is there a connection between having power (in politics, government, business, etc.) and becoming or being corrupt? There seem to be examples all around us and, yet, we also see…
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“With climate-fueled hurricanes, wildfires, and other climate-related disasters intensifying, climate migration is on the minds of communities and researchers. Around the globe, more than 216 million people could be forced to move due to climate change by 2050, according to a 2021 World Bank report. By 2100, 13 million U.S. residents could be displaced by sea level rise alone. The topic of climate migration leads to numerous questions, from “Where…
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Fear is corrosive whether caused by events outside our control or if purposefully used (for example, by politicians trying to gain or consolidate power). Fear impacts the decisions we make and the actions we take. We do things we would not do if the fear was not present. We believe things we normally would not. We act against our own best interests. Featured articles: *Anestis,…
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Naomi S. Baron, American University (from The Conversation) When the company OpenAI launched its new artificial intelligence program, ChatGPT, in late 2022, educators began to worry. ChatGPT could generate text that seemed like a human wrote it. How could teachers detect whether students were using language generated by an AI chatbot to cheat on a writing assignment? As a linguist who studies the effects of…
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What are the connections between the food we eat and how we behave? In particular, is there a connection between diet and aggressive behavior? Can this connection be used to help reduce the aggressive behavior that leads to criminal acts? Featured article: *Tcherni‐Buzzeo, Maria. (2023). Dietary interventions, the gut microbiome, and aggressive behavior: Review of research evidence and potential next steps. Aggressive Behavior, 49(1), 15-32….
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On an international scale, food waste is a big problem. “The largest contribution to food waste is from the consumption stage, where household food waste represents the largest share.” In a time of growing food insecurity even in so-called richer countries–due to war, the effects of climate change on agriculture, supply chain problems, and more–wasting a large percentage of the food that is produced magnifies…
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