Regret and Responsibility Resolved? Evaluating Ordóñez and Connolly's (2000) Conclusions

T. Connolly, L. D. Ordo;aan;atez, and R. Coughlan (1997, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 70, 73-85) argued, on the basis of 5 experiments, that regret need not be related to a sense of responsibility for the regretted outcome. We (M. Zeelenberg, W. W. van Dijk, & A. S. R. Manstead, 1998, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 74, 254-272) showed in 2 experiments that this conclusion was premature, because it was based on an indirect measure of regret (i.e., overall happiness with the decision outcome). When regret was directly measured, the predicted effects of responsibility were found. L. D. Ordo;aan;atez and T. Connolly (2000, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 81, 132-142) replicated our findings in 2 experiments. Based on their findings they arrived at 4 conclusions. In this rejoinder we first discuss Ordó?ez and Connolly's new studies and we then discuss the validity of their 4 conclusions. Copyright 2000 Academic Press.     

Multinational data show that conspiracy beliefs are associated with the perception (and reality) of poor national economic performance

While a great deal is known about the individual difference factors associated with conspiracy beliefs, much less is known about the country-level factors that shape people's willingness to believe conspiracy theories. In the current article we discuss the possibility that willingness to believe conspiracy theories might be shaped by the perception (and reality) of poor economic performance at the national level. To test this notion, we surveyed 6723 participants from 36 countries. In line with predictions, propensity to believe conspiracy theories was negatively associated with perceptions of current and future national economic vitality. Furthermore, countries with higher GDP per capita tended to have lower belief in conspiracy theories. The data suggest that conspiracy beliefs are not just caused by intrapsychic factors but are also shaped by difficult economic circumstances for which distrust might have a rational basis.     

Ubuntu and the law in South Africa: Exploring and understanding the substantive content of ubuntu

Supposing some legal solutions lay in exploring and understanding the substantive content of ubuntu, what then? Is there no ground for suspecting that some legal scholars and courts, in so far as they have been dogmatists, have failed to understand ubuntu? That the terrible, seriousness and clumsy importunity with which they have usually paid their addresses to ubuntu have been unskilled and unseemly methods of solving some legal problems? Certainly, some legal problems have not rendered themselves to proper solutions through such methods.     

Selective blockade of 5-HT2A receptors attenuates the increased temperature response in brown adipose tissue to restraint stress in rats

Previous studies have demonstrated that 5-HT2A receptors may be involved in the central control of thermoregulation and of the cardiovascular system. Our aim was to test whether these receptors mediate thermogenic and tachycardiac responses induced by acute psychological stress. Three groups of adult male Hooded Wistar rats were instrumented with: (i) a thermistor in the interscapular area (for recording brown adipose tissue temperature) and an ultrasound Doppler probe (to record tail blood flow); (ii) temperature dataloggers to record core body temperature; (iii) ECG electrodes. On the day of the experiment, rats were subjected to a 30-min restraint stress preceded by s.c. injection of either vehicle or SR-46349B (a serotonin 2A receptor antagonist) at doses of 0.01, 0.1 and 1.0 mg/kg. The restraint stress caused a rise in brown adipose tissue temperature (from, mean +/- s.e.m., 36.6 +/- 0.2 to 38.0 +/- 0.2 degrees C), transient cutaneous vasoconstriction (tail blood flow decreased from 12 +/- 2 to 5 +/- 1 cm/s), increase in heart rate (from 303 +/- 15 to 453 +/- 15 bpm at the peak, then reduced to 393 +/- 12 bpm at the steady state), and defaecation (6 +/- 1 pellets per restraint session). The core body temperature was not affected by the restraint. Blockade of 5-HT2A receptors attenuated the increase in brown adipose tissue temperature and transient cutaneous vasoconstriction, but not tachycardia and defaecation elicited by restraint stress. These results indicate that psychological stress causes activation of 5-HT2A receptors in neural pathways that control thermogenesis in the brown adipose tissue and facilitate cutaneous vasoconstriction.