Framing Political Risks: Individual Differences and Loss Aversion in Personal and Political Situations

People are motivated to avoid losses. In the context of politics, studies consistently show that the threat of losses increases support for risky public policies more than the promise of gains. Here, we predict that this loss aversion is calibrated by individual differences related to one’s ability to accommodate resource loss, and we investigate how these individual differences moderate reactions to the threat of losses and the promise of gains. Results from large-N experiments consistently demonstrate that this moderation effect crucially depends on whether the resource loss relates to oneself or one’s group—whether the setting is personal or political. Consistent with classic assumptions, individuals with inferior abilities to cope with resource loss are more loss averse in personal settings. In political settings where group resources are threatened, effects reverse: Individuals with superior resources and a more central position within the group consistently respond more to the prospect of loss. As discussed, these findings have important implications for our understanding of why and for whom the threat of loss motivates risky personal and political choices. By consequence, the findings also shed novel light on the psychological underpinnings of recent risky political events.      

Parent Roles and Facilitation Strategies as Influenced by a Mobile-Based Technology During a Family Nature Hike

Abstract

Families use mobile technologies in many educational spaces, such as museums or other informal learning venues to support their social learning experience. This trend encourages parents to take on new facilitation roles during their children’s technologically driven learning experiences. This study provides an in-depth look at how one type of mobile technology shaped parent roles, facilitation, and family learning in an outdoor setting. The qualitative case study uses sociocultural learning theory with a lens toward parent roles during a mobile-based family learning experience in the outdoors to analyze the 1-hour hike of one case study family. Findings from a thematic analysis of the video data resulted in 6 parental roles embodied by the parents during their hike with an e-Trailguide. A secondary analysis provided evidence that the e-Trailguide facilitated collaborative observations of the natural world for the parents and children. Recommendations for mobile-based designs that support family, outdoor learning are included.     

Exploring the relationship between umbilical blood cord donation and the impact of social distance on altruism and trust

Allogeneic umbilical cord blood (UCB) donation is a pro-social behaviour directed to strangers that has a certain cost for the donor. Although the promotion of such behaviour is an important goal for many countries' health systems, little is known about the reasons that would lead to it. With this study, we explored how the impact of social closeness on altruism and trust could be related to UCB donation in a sample of new-mothers (N = 167). Participants played hypothetical Dictator and Trust games with socially close (e.g., parents) or distant (e.g., strangers) others. They donated more money to parents and siblings compared to cousins, friends and strangers and they trusted more parents, siblings and friends than cousins and strangers. Interestingly, the lower the impact of social closeness on altruism (i.e., generosity towards socially distant others), the higher the intention and the actual probability of UCB donation. A mediation analysis has shown that the relationship between social closeness on altruism and UCB donation was mediated by objective intention to donate (i.e., having followed all the procedures needed). These findings show that other-oriented motivations towards distant others might have important practical implications in identifying the targets of interventions for the promotion of UCB donation.     

Should Versus Want: On the Relative Contribution of Injunctive Norms and Preferences on Trust Decisions

Despite much research on the determinants of trust among strangers, its mechanisms are understood only rudimentarily. Recently, it has been proposed that people trust strangers because they believe they should, thus complying with an injunctive norm even if it conflicts with their preferences. However, given the boldness of this claim and in light of independent arguments and earlier findings that suggest otherwise, the hypothesis requires critical scrutiny. Thus, we tested whether the decision to trust (in the trust game) is indeed more strongly driven by what people think they should entrust rather than what they want to entrust in two studies. We consistently found a stronger influence of “want” than of “should” on trust decisions even when controlling for the fairness aspect inherent in the trust game. Thus, our findings speak against a predominant role of injunctive norms for trust behavior and confirm that the latter is mostly driven by preferences. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Mobile technologies in use by those participating in Lutheran confirmation training in Finland

Abstract

This article focuses on the study of where mobile devices and social media tools are taken into consideration in the Finnish confirmation training entity as a new opportunity to work together. The research is based on the ethnographical method. The data was collected by observation in two confirmation training camp periods and interviewing confirmation training participants. The aim was to find out ways mobile devices were exploited in confirmation training pedagogy, how adolescents reacted to such mobile device use and how adolescents described their personal mobile device use. The research material is analysed by inductive content analysis. The findings are discussed in the theoretical context of the communities of practice (CoPs), originally formed by Lave and Wenger . According to the results, mobile device use, in the confirmation training programme did not seem to be that special for adolescents. At the same time, the youth considered it important to have the possibility to use mobile devices according to their own preferences. Using mobile devices in confirmation training challenged the traditional CoP setting, as adolescents used mobile technology more in their own way, being familiar with it in their earlier virtual communities of practice (VCoPs), instead of the plans of the workers of confirmation training.     

Technologies,Multitasking, and Driving: Attending to and Preparing for a Mobile Phone Conversation in a Car

This article investigates mobile phone calls initiated or received by drivers and passengers in cars and focuses on the participants' actions before the telephone conversation proper. Drawing on video‐recorded data of real driving situations, and building on conversation analysis and multimodal interaction analysis, this article discusses how participants temporally and sequentially coordinate situations that require multitasking, that is, use a phone while on the move. This article shows how participants draw on the current social‐interactional, material context to handle the call as relevant at that point and how they, through their vocal and bodily conduct, manage the prebeginning as a collaborative effort. The findings have relevance for research both on driving and on human–human and human–technology interaction.     

Trust in Nanotechnology? On Trust as Analytical Tool in Social Research on Emerging Technologies

Trust has become an important aspect of evaluating the relationship between lay public and technology implementation. Experiences have shown that a focus on trust provides a richer understanding of reasons for backlashes of technology in society than a mere focus of public understanding of risks and science communication. Therefore, trust is also widely used as a key concept for understanding and predicting trust or distrust in emerging technologies. But whereas trust broadens the scope for understanding established technologies with well-defined questions and controversies, it easily fails to do so with emerging technologies, where there are no shared questions, a lack of public familiarity with the technology in question, and a restricted understanding amongst social researchers as to where distrust is likely to arise and how and under which form the technology will actually be implemented. Rather contrary, ‘trust’ might sometimes even direct social research into fixed structures that makes it even more difficult for social research to provide socially robust knowledge. This article therefore suggests that if trust is to maintain its important role in evaluating emerging technologies, the approach has to be widened and initially focus not on people’s motivations for trust, but rather the object of trust it self, as to predicting how and where distrust might appear, how the object is established as an object of trust, and how it is established in relation with the public.     

Demandingness and Boundaries Between Persons

ABSTRACT

Demandingness objections to consequentialism often claim that consequentialism underestimates the moral significance of the stranger/special other distinction, mistakenly extending to strangers demands it is proper for special others to make on us, and concluding that strangers may properly demand anything of us if it increases aggregate goodness. This argument relies on false assumptions about our relations with special others. Boundaries between ourselves and special others are both a common and a good-making feature of our relations with them. Hence, demandingness objections that rely on the argument in question fail. But the same observations about our relations with special others show that there are many demands special others may not properly make, and since we cannot be more guilty of unjustified partiality in insisting on boundaries between ourselves and strangers than on boundaries between ourselves and special others, there are – as demandingness objections maintain – some demands strangers may not properly make on us.     

Digital Photography and Picture Sharing: Redefining the Public/Private Divide

Digital photography is contributing to the renegotiation of the public and private divide and to the transformation of privacy and intimacy, especially with the convergence of digital cameras, mobile phones, and web sites. This convergence contributes to the redefinition of public and private and to the transformation of their boundaries, which have always been subject to historical and geographical change. Taking pictures or filming videos of strangers in public places and showing them in webs like Flickr or YouTube, or making self-portraits available to strangers in instant messenger, social network sites, or photo blogs are becoming a current practice for a growing number of Internet users. Both are examples of the intertwining of online and offline practices, experiences, and meanings that challenge the traditional concepts of the public and the private. Uses of digital images play a role in the way people perform being a stranger and in the way they relate to strangers, online and offline. The mere claims about the privatization of the public space or the public disclosure of intimacy do not account for all these practices, situations, and attitudes, as they are not a simple translation of behaviors and codes from one realm to the other.     

The social psychological power of photography: can the image‐freezing machine make something of nothing?

Sontag ( 1990 ) proposed that taking a photograph imparts social significance to the moment being captured. Two experiments were conducted to examine how the experience of being photographed affects the social relations of those who are photographed. In Experiment 1 (N=92), unacquainted members of dyads who were photographed together and then saw the resulting image displayed greater social self‐categorization and greater affinity for each other than did dyads who were not photographed (p<0.05). In Experiment 2 (N=282), pairs of photographed strangers also displayed greater social self‐categorization and mutual affinity than pairs of nonphotographed strangers (p<0.05). This effect occurred whether pair members were explicitly framed together in photographs or not. This result was unaffected by whether the photographed strangers were shown or were not shown their photograph. Merely opening and closing the shutter of a camera was sufficient for the development of a photo‐bonding effect. Results are discussed in terms of how the experience of being photographed can affect interpersonal perception and relationship formation. The significance of being photographed (Milgram, 1977 ; Sontag, 1990 ) apparently is so strong that it promotes social self‐categorization (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987 ) both when people are photographed simultaneously and sequentially. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Empathic Blushing in Friends and Strangers

Three volunteers watched a previously recorded video of one of them singing, as cheek sensors monitored their blushing. When performers watched videotapes of their performance, they blushed significantly more than strangers, but not more than their own friends, watching with them. Friends and strangers did not differ significantly in blushing, however. Skin conductance arousal responses of performers and friends, but not performers and strangers, or friends of performers and strangers, were correlated. In a second experiment, strangers who sang before watching another person sing blushed more than strangers who did not sing first, or who sang and then watched a neutral video. This suggests that performing the embarrassing act may have predisposed people to blush, perhaps empathically, later. No gender differences were seen in blushing. Embarrassability questionnaire scores did not correlate with blushing. Empathic accuracy, and associative learning, are proposed to account for the results.     

The role of ordinary conversation and shared activity in the main effect between perceived support and affect

People with high perceived support have better mental health, but how this occurs is not well understood. We tested hypotheses from relational regulation theory that the main effect between perceived support and affect primarily reflects ordinary conversation and shared activity. In two studies (n = 193; n = 149), students rated three important network members and psychological reactions to each. In a third study (n = 72) strangers shared an activity in a round‐robin design. Affect was strongly determined by with who participants were interacting or thinking about. Perceived support, ordinary conversation, and shared activity were strongly linked, and each was related to high positive affect, low negative affect, perceived similarity, and few negative thoughts. Perceived support's link to affect emerged when strangers shared a brief activity. Thus, much of perceived support's main effect with affect could be explained as resulting from ordinary conversation and shared activity.     

Asymmetrical friendships? People are willing to risk COVID-19 infection from friends but are reluctant to pass it on to them

Although most protective behaviors related to the COVID-19 pandemic come with personal costs, they will produce the largest benefit if everybody cooperates. This study explores two interacting factors that drive cooperation in this tension between private and collective interests. A preregistered experiment (N = 299) examined (a) how the quality of the relation among interacting partners (social proximity), and (b) how focusing on the risk of self-infection versus onward transmission affected intentions to engage in protective behaviors. The results suggested that risk focus was an important moderator of the relation between social proximity and protection intentions. Specifically, participants were more willing to accept the risk of self-infection from close others than from strangers, resulting in less caution toward a friend than toward a distant other. However, when onward transmission was the primary concern, participants were more reluctant to effect transmission to close others, resulting in more caution toward friends than strangers. These findings inform the debate about effective nonclinical measures against the pandemic. Practical implications for risk communication are discussed.     

Surveillance,Self and Smartphones: Tracking Practices in the Nightlife

This paper is the result of the EMERGING ICT FOR CITIZEN VEILLANCE-workshop organized by the JRC, Ispra, Italy, March 2014. The aim of this paper is to explore how the subject participates in surveillance situations with a particular focus on how users experience everyday tracking technologies and practices. Its theoretical points of departure stem from Surveillance Studies in general and notions of participatory surveillance (Albrechtslund 2008) and empowering exhibitionism (Koskela in Surveill Soc 2(2/3):199–215, 2004) in particular. We apply these theoretical notions on smartphones and its users to investigate the combination of participation and surveillance. Empirically, the paper uses interviews held with urban nightlife visitors to uncover practices of smartphone use. This qualitative and explorative study contributes to the concept of participatory surveillance by discussing to what extent smartphone-users’ actions and motivations can be seen as forms of surveillance and how that influences these actors in a (nightly) public space. We finish by setting out directions for studying mobile technologies of the self.     

The subjective quality of episodic future thought and the experience of meaning in life

Two studies assessed whether mentally simulating specific future events to occur in familiar (vs. unfamiliar) settings indirectly increases meaning life via the subjective quality of the simulations. Participants in both studies (N = 344) were randomly assigned to visualize themselves doing something in familiar (e.g. home) or unfamiliar (e.g. fantasy world) settings in the future. They then rated the subjective quality of these visualizations and completed a measure of meaning in life. We replicated previous findings by showing that mental simulations involving familiar settings were of greater subjective quality than simulations involving unfamiliar settings. However, we also found that simulating future events in familiar (vs. unfamiliar) settings indirectly increased the perceived meaningfulness of life. These findings integrate research in cognitive psychology with research on the psychology of well-being and reveal how mental time travel contributes to the perception that one’s life has meaning.     

the media's portrayal of urban and rural school violence: a preliminary analysis

Although the juvenile arrest rate has declined in the last few years, public awareness of juvenile crime has not diminished (Snyder 1996; Schiraldi 1998). The recent rash of rural school shootings has, in fact, heightened public awareness of juvenile crime and delinquent behavior. This research examines acts of school violence that have been committed by juveniles in three rural school districts and analyzes how the newspaper media present these acts relative to similar acts committed by juveniles in urban school settings. Our content analysis of the Wall Street Journal, Louisville Courier Journal, New York Times, St. Louis Post Dispatch, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post reveals that these newspapers present school violence in these two settings very differently and that these differences are reflected in the way the political system reacts to such incidents.     

Ordinary Social Interaction and the Main Effect Between Perceived Support and Affect

Relational regulation theory hypothesizes that (a) the main effect between perceived support and mental health primarily reflects ordinary social interaction rather than conversations about stress and how to cope with it, and (b) the extent to which a provider regulates a recipient's mental health primarily reflects the recipient's personal taste (i.e., is relational), rather than the provider's objective supportiveness. In three round‐robin studies, participants rated each other on supportiveness and the quality of ordinary social interaction, as well as their own affect when interacting with each other. Samples included marines about to deploy to Afghanistan (N = 100; 150 dyads), students sharing apartments (N = 64; 96 dyads), and strangers (N = 48; 72 dyads). Perceived support and ordinary social interaction were primarily relational, and most of perceived support's main effect on positive affect was redundant with ordinary social interaction. The main effect between perceived support and affect emerged among strangers after brief text conversations, and these links were partially verified by independent observers. Findings for negative affect were less consistent with theory. Ordinary social interaction appears to be able to explain much of the main effect between perceived support and positive affect.     

Beyond ‘nothing to hide’: When identity is key to privacy threat under surveillance

Privacy is psychologically important, vital for democracy, and in the era of ubiquitous and mobile surveillance technology, facing increasingly complex threats and challenges. Yet surveillance is often justified under a trope that one has ‘nothing to hide’. We conducted focus groups (N = 42) on topics of surveillance and privacy and using discursive analysis, identify the ideological assumptions and the positions that people adopt to make sense of their participation in a surveillance society. We find a premise that surveillance is increasingly inescapable, but this was only objected to when people reported feeling misrepresented, or where they had an inability to withhold aspects of their identities. The (in)visibility of the surveillance technology also complicated how surveillance is constructed. Those interested in engaging the public in debates about surveillance may be better served by highlighting the identity consequences of surveillance, rather than constructing surveillance as a generalised privacy threat.     

The cultural salience of moral character and virtue declined in twentieth century America

In a large corpus of American books, we tracked how frequently words related to moral excellence and virtue appeared over the twentieth century. Considering the well-established cultural trend in the USA toward greater individualism and its implications for the moral domain, we predicted that terms related to morality and virtue would appear with diminishing frequency in American books. Two studies supported our predictions: Study 1 showed a decline in the use of general moral terms such as virtue, decency and conscience, throughout the twentieth century. In Study 2, we examined the appearance frequency of 50 virtue words (e.g. honesty, patience, compassion) and found a significant decline for 74% of them. Overall, our findings suggest that during the twentieth century, moral ideals and virtues have largely waned from the public conversation.     

Beyond the Boundaries of Current Human Nature: Some Theological and Ethical Reflections on Transhumanism

Following a brief overview of the emerging transhumanist vision, Childs turns to a theological and ethical assessment. He recommends that there take place a community‐wide conversation over the prospects of a post‐human future that includes both nerds and theologians along with all stakeholders in a healthy human future. Christians should be guided by the eschatological values that inform love's commitment to the common good. How does the common commitment to justice take concrete shape in public policies governing the mounting advances in science and technology? How does the commitment to life and healing speak to the ethical distinction between the uses of biomedical technology for therapy versus for enhancement?