Complicated grief following job loss: Risk factors for its development and maintenance

Increasing evidence shows that job loss can lead to symptoms of complicated grief (CG). However, little is known about which factors relate to the development and maintenance of CG symptoms following job loss. This study aimed to examine risk factors for the development and maintenance of job loss-related CG symptoms. For this study 485 Dutch workers who had lost their job were recruited (239 men and 246 women), with an average age of 50.2 years. A subsample of 128 participants also completed questionnaires at a six-month follow-up. We conducted correlational and multiple regression analyses (MRA) to examine the influence of the former work situation, coping strategies, and negative cognitions on job loss-related CG symptoms. MRA results showed that belief in an unjust world was related to job loss-related CG symptoms, cross-sectionally and longitudinally. Further, there was a significant relationship between CG symptoms following job loss and a preference for maladaptive coping over adaptive coping styles and a low level of self-esteem. This effect remained stable over time. These findings can inform the development of interventions for and early detection of job loss-related CG symptoms.     

Eating patterns and breakfast consumption in obese patients with binge eating disorder

This study examined eating patterns and breakfast consumption, and their relationships to weight and binge eating, in obese individuals with binge eating disorder (BED). One-hundred seventy-three consecutively evaluated men (n=46) and women (n=127) with BED were administered semi-structured interviews and self-report measures to assess the frequency of meals and snacks eaten, as well as binge eating and eating disorder features. Overall, those who consumed more frequent meals, particularly breakfast, and snacks, weighed less. Breakfast, which was eaten on a daily basis by less than half of participants (n=74; 43%), was the least frequently eaten meal of the day. Participants (n=56; 32%) who ate three meals per day weighed significantly less, and had significantly fewer binges, than participants (n=117; 68%) who did not regularly eat three meals per day. Thus, eating more frequently, having breakfast and consuming three meals every day, have potentially important clinical applications for the treatment of BED given that the effectiveness of specific interventions within treatments for BED are unknown, and that weight loss outcome for BED has been poor.     

Explaining neurocognitive aging: is one factor enough?

As an introduction to the special issue on neurocognitive factors underlying age effects, we discuss a number of recent developments in the literature on aging. The classic distinction between generalized and process-specific cognitive changes with old age has reappeared in the distinctions between the frontal lobe hypothesis and more differentiated views of neurocognitive aging. We argue that neurological decay in the frontal cortex has important implications for cognitive control, but that the frontal lobe hypothesis does not capture the plethora of changes that characterize aging and incorrectly suggests a unitary effect.     

Tolerance to the effects of cocaine on performance under behavior-correlated reinforcement magnitude

Four pigeons responded under a fixed-interval 8-min schedule of food delivery in which the amount of food delivered at the end of each interval depended on performance during the interval (i.e., a correlated schedule). Specifically, duration of access to grain was contingent upon the number of responses made during the first 4 min of the interval. This differential outcome did not affect response rates or patterning relative to performance under a simple fixed-interval 8-min schedule. Behavior under the correlated schedule was then investigated under doses of cocaine ranging from 0.3 to 10.0 mg/kg. A bitonic dose-response function was obtained for response rates and the time with head in the food hopper, whereas dose-dependent decreases were observed in the mathematical index of curvature (Fry, Kelleher, & Cook, 1960). The dose that produced the greatest increase in the head-in-hopper time was then administered prior to each session. Following repeated administration of cocaine, disruptions in response patterning were attenuated for all 4 pigeons; tolerance was also observed to the rate-increasing effects and increased head-in-hopper time for 2 pigeons after chronic cocaine administration. Tolerance therefore developed despite the fact that the initial effect of cocaine was to increase the amount of food obtained.     

Distinguishing indeterminate belief from “risk-averse” preferences

I focus my discussion on the well-known Ellsberg paradox. I find good normative reasons for incorporating non-precise belief, as represented by sets of probabilities, in an Ellsberg decision model. This amounts to forgoing the completeness axiom of expected utility theory. Provided that probability sets are interpreted as genuinely indeterminate belief (as opposed to “imprecise” belief), such a model can moreover make the “Ellsberg choices” rationally permissible. Without some further element to the story, however, the model does not explain how an agent may come to have unique preferences for each of the Ellsberg options. Levi (1986, Hard choices: Decision making under unresolved conflict. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press) holds that the extra element amounts to innocuous secondary “risk” or security considerations that are used to break ties when more than one option is rationally permissible. While I think a lexical choice rule of this kind is very plausible, I argue that it involves a greater break with xpected utility theory than mere violation of the ordering axiom.     

Testing alternative explanations of phantom decoy effects

Phantom decoys are alternatives that asymmetrically dominate a targeted alternative and yet lead to increased selection of the target when the decoy is declared to be unavailable. This effect is difficult to explain within most standard theoretical accounts of decoy effects. The current experiments tested between three explanations of this effect: (1) the relative advantage model based on loss aversion, (2) similarity substitution, and (3) range weighting. In Experiment 1, participants were presented trinary choice sets, with half of the sets containing a phantom decoy in one of five possible locations within the attribute space. Phantom decoy effects were robust across all decoy locations but one, and the pattern of effects most closely corresponded to predictions of the relative advantage model. Experiment 2 used a within‐subjects manipulation of the five phantom decoy locations. The overall pattern of effects most closely corresponded to predictions from the relative advantage model, as did the pattern for the group of participants who exhibited the strongest phantom decoy effects. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A randomized controlled trial on the long-term effects of a 1-month behavioral weight control program assisted by computer tailored advice

OBJECTIVES: To examine the long-term effects of a new behavioral weight control program (Kenkou-tatsujin, KT program). The program consisted of twice-interactive letter communications including computer-tailored personal advice on treatment needs and behavioral modification. DESIGN: A randomized controlled trial comparing Group KM: KT program with 6-month weight and targeted behavior's self-monitoring, Group K: KT program only, Group BM: an untailored self-help booklet with 7-month self-monitoring of weight and walking, and Group B: the self-help booklet only. PARTICIPANTS: Two hundreds and five overweight Japanese females were recruited via a local newspaper. MEASUREMENTS: Weight loss (body weight, BMI, reduction quotient, etc.) and behavioral changes (daily eating, exercise and sleeping habits). FINDINGS: A significant weight loss was observed in all groups. At 1 month, Groups KM and K were superior, but at 7 months, the mean weight loss was significantly more in Group KM than the other 3 groups. At 7 months, 8 dietary habits and 4 physical activities were improved in all subjects. Habitual improvement was related to the weight loss in Groups KM and K at 1 month.     

A systematic review of algorithm aversion in augmented decision making

Despite abundant literature theorizing societal implications of algorithmic decision making, relatively little is known about the conditions that lead to the acceptance or rejection of algorithmically generated insights by individual users of decision aids. More specifically, recent findings of algorithm aversion—the reluctance of human forecasters to use superior but imperfect algorithms—raise questions about whether joint human-algorithm decision making is feasible in practice. In this paper, we systematically review the topic of algorithm aversion as it appears in 61 peer-reviewed articles between 1950 and 2018 and follow its conceptual trail across disciplines. We categorize and report on the proposed causes and solutions of algorithm aversion in five themes: expectations and expertise, decision autonomy, incentivization, cognitive compatibility, and divergent rationalities. Although each of the presented themes addresses distinct features of an algorithmic decision aid, human users of the decision aid, and/or the decision making environment, apparent interdependencies are highlighted. We conclude that resolving algorithm aversion requires an updated research program with an emphasis on theory integration. We provide a number of empirical questions that can be immediately carried forth by the behavioral decision making community.     

The Unbearable Uncertainty Paradox

People can be risk seeking and risk averse, but people can also be uncertainty averse: in other words, if risk is at least the possibility of an unwanted affect, then it is not only the unwanted effect that they want to avoid, it can also be the uncertainty inherent in the possibility that they wish to avoid. This uncertainty aversion can even lead to a state where someone prefers a certain outcome at all costs, even when it is the worst case. This gives rise to the following paradox: the worst case seems to be more acceptable than the state where there is still a chance that it will not materialize. We can call this the Unbearable Uncertainty Paradox. This essay provides a first conceptual sketch of this phenomenon that seems to be widespread but nevertheless does not appear to have been identified before, either by philosophers or by psychologists.     

To change or not to change: A matter of decision maker’s role

The status quo effect derived from loss aversion is common in decision making. However, we propose that advisors (vs. personal decision makers) are less susceptible to such an effect because they are less loss-averse. The difference in loss aversion between personal decision makers and advisors is reflected in both the query order and content. Compared to advisors, personal decision makers produce more queries favoring the status quo, at an earlier time, than those favoring the new option. As hypothesized, the status quo effect was observed among personal decision makers, but not among advisors (Studies 1 and 2). Query order and content were found to mediate the impact of decision maker’s role on the status quo effect (Study 2). When personal decision makers and advisors made queries in the same order (Study 3) or of the same content (Studies 4a and 4b), the difference between self–other decision making disappeared.