the centre for neuroimaging sciences just announced the results of a study indicating that yes, ice cream makes our brains very happy. participants were strapped to an fMRI machine and given vanilla ice cream:

The results showed that eating the ice cream had an immediate effect on parts of the brain that previous research has shown are activated when someone is really enjoying themselves.

the “pleasure centers” this brief article mentions are in the dopaminergic centers involved in motivation and reward that are, interestingly enough, also activated by most controlled substances.

although we enjoy being high on ice cream (or IC, as it's known on the street), the health consequences of long-term abuse include obesity and high cholesterol, as well as greater risk of disorders such as type 2 diabetes. in addition, ice cream is expensive. a ben & jerry’s pint is around $4. consuming one or two of those puppies a day can really add up and siphon money away from more beneficial uses. when resources are tight and an IC craving strikes, things can get messy. case in point, me craving ice cream when i can't have it. witnesses can testify.

and in all seriousness, addiction is also a risk. overindulgence on any substance that overstimulates reward centers can induce the main feature of addiction, motivational toxicity*, when the effectiveness of rewards normally effective in governing behavior (namely, rewards promoting survival) are diminished. you could argue that ice cream counts as a normal reward, but that seems like stretching it to me.

interestingly enough the above seem to parallel justifications for the drug war.

physiologically, activation of reward centers is identical no matter the trigger substance. so, ice cream induces the same reaction in one’s brain in areas relevant to future behavior as that of controlled substances such as alcohol, nicotine, cocaine, or heroin. the only difference would be, i assume, the level of activity in the center which probably varies by drug type and potency. ice cream would, of course, be at the far bottom of the spectrum.

* motivational toxicity’s neurological substrates have not (yet) been identified. it’s commonly thought to be a decrease in dopaminergic function due to chronic use.

more about: different legal status, same physiology

Labels: neuroscience, well being

researchers have found – if simultaneous fMRI scans are to be believed – the “trust” center of the brain:

With the development of trusting feelings, increased blood flow occurred in the caudate nucleus, an area in the rear portion of the brain that is involved in processing rewards. Over time, this increased blood flow appeared earlier as an expectation of trustworthiness was established.

the study was pretty cool. two participants were wired for fMRI and began a trading game that's pretty standard in experimental economics. the “investor” could give her partner money, which would then triple. the partner could then give some of that money back, a method that would create trust in the investor to continue to send money.

with the recognition that social interactions are rarely single-shot, and that trust cannot develop without prior experience, 10 rounds were played. at first, the caudate nucleus lit up when participants knew how much the other was giving them. towards the end - after seven or eight rounds - its neurons began popping even before participants knew whether or not their partner was giving them money at all, indicating that participants are building a model of the investor's next move. that was indeed the case, an additional experiment revealed, when the partner was able to guess more and more accurately what the investor would do over time. this is, essentially, the neuroscience of reputation building.

the caudate nucleus, whose disorder is implicated in such disorders as ADHD, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, parkinson's, and huntington's disease, is part of the striatum, which is one of the basal ganglia, situated kind of in the middle of the brain between the two hemispheres. in this experiment researchers concluded that it handles information regarding the "fairness" of the investor's decision as well as the decision to repay that fairness with trust.

reference: getting to know you: reputation and trust in a two-person economic exchange
brooks king-casas, damon tomlin, cedric anen, colin f. camerer, steven r. quartz, and p. read montague science 1 april 2005; 308: 78-83 [DOI:10.1126/science.1108062]

Labels: decision making, neuroscience

i don’t know much about william f. buckley, but my impression has always been that he's a laissez faire kind of guy. his rant on high corporate salaries confuses this understanding:

That money was taken, directly, from company shareholders. But the loss, viewed on a larger scale, is a loss to the community of people who believe in the capitalist free-market system. Because extortions of that size tell us, really, that the market system is not working in respect of executive remuneration. What is going on is phony. It is shoddy, it is contemptible, and it is philosophically blasphemous.

buckley’s concerns are common, and understandably so for those unconvinced that market mechanisms shake out efficiently. admittedly, the situation is complicated and may involve government sneakery. however, in essence he’s probably right - not linking executive compensation to company performance seems like a bad idea. practices such as market-based management are likely much better. however, as with most theories, we can’t be certain.

on the assumption that there is actually one right way to structure executive compensation, it seems that evolution is the best way to give us an answer. if rewarding on a performance basis actually improved performance, companies with such a policy would outlast (or at least outperform) less wisely run enterprises.

buckley says that any losses due to the prevalent system are a “loss to the community of people who believe in the capitalist free-market system,” and goes on to say that clearly, here, the market system is not working. this is where he’s wrong. failure means the market is working. it's is a vital market signal that tells us what doesn’t work, something we can only know experientially via this evolutionary process. the information contained within failure will prevent others from making the same mistakes, improve business practice, and - i believe - ameliorate the problem he decries.

Labels: economics, ideology

constituents: what are you gonna do today, representative?
representative: whatever i feel like i wanna do. gosh!

did this really happen?

Idaho has a special place in its heart for the 2005 cult hit "Napoleon Dynamite" -- as evidenced in its lawmaking capital, where legislators have drawn up a bill to commend the film's creators and the city of Preston

check out the actual resolution for a laugh. highlights:

• WHEREAS, filmmaker Jared Hess is a native Idahoan who was educated in the Idaho public school system
• tater tots figure prominently in this film thus promoting Idaho's most famous export
• Uncle Rico's football skills are a testament to Idaho athletics
• Napoleon's bicycle and Kip's skateboard promote better air quality and carpooling as alternatives to fuel-dependent methods of transportation

continued:

WHEREAS, any members of the House of Representatives or the Senate of the Legislature of the State of Idaho who choose to vote "Nay" on this concurrent resolution are "FREAKIN' IDIOTS!" and run the risk of having the "Worst Day of Their Lives!"

no, seriously.

commentary is absolutely unnecessary.

anyone else feel like i'm beating a dead horse with this wealth/well-being crap? wait, don't answer that. i have one more thing to say about it and then i'll move on for a while.

folks are all excited that studies cannot prove a positive correlation between wealth and happiness, with some large exceptions. psychologists seem to feel this discredits the merits of wealth (and, generally, capitalism). they may be wrong on several counts, and they also forget that happiness is correlated to very few things anyway. in fact, studies show that even one's health is not even correlated to her happiness.

to psychologists, studies of wealth and well-being "prove" that wealth is not an ultimate goal of society as it is not relevant, generally, to happiness. if one applies that logic to health vs. happiness discovery, we'd have to conclude that good health is also not a worthy goal in and of itself because it does not directly promote happiness. significant funds should be diverted from medical research to things psychologist deem more likely to produce happiness, like cognitive therapy, perhaps.

of course, no one dares to seriously make this argument, but it does help to illustrate how silly the well-being-over-wealth argument is. that the link between health and well-being is tenuous does not mean we should ignore health. health has objective value, and the same goes for wealth. and wealth may not make us that much happier, but it serves a net good nonetheless by, among other things, providing us with safety and security during crisis and disability.

Labels: well being

a new study reveals circumstances when money does buy happiness. it turns out that although psychologists claim that wealth above a minimal threshold has no impact on well-being, it certainly does after one suffers tragedy, such as illness or disability:

The analysis showed that those whose financial assets had been above the median before they were disabled suffered a much smaller drop in self-reported well-being than those who had been below the median. A second analysis confirmed that there was a relationship between a person's net worth and the drop in their well-being after disability.

of course those with more cash reserves are better equipped to handle disaster. although these reserves themselves, during good times, do not improve well-being, they certainly will cushion the fall during crisis. earlier i wrote on money's tangential effects on well-being during natural disaster:

the market has the best record of meeting the most essential levels of maslow's hierarchy of needs, even during times of crisis. for market pessimists, we can think of it as an insurance system. although we may pay in a certain percentage of happiness for materialism due to markets (a debatable premise), we gain when disaster strikes. and the gain may make it worth it.

wealth, then, becomes much more significant than psychologists claim. as wealth promotes well-being during crisis, and this well-being in turn facilitates not only healing, but accumulation of more wealth, the balance in your bank account is no laughing matter.

Labels: economics, well being

fun! tim has passed along the "caesar's bath" meme... and i quote:

Behold, the Caesar’s Bath meme! List five things that people in your circle of friends or peer group are wild about, but you can’t really understand the fuss over. To use the words of Caesar (from History of the World Part I), “Nice. Nice. Not thrilling…but nice.”

here's an "eh" list:

1. working out. although some people claim to actually enjoy working out, i say bullshit. working out is always one of two things: agonizingly painful or mind-numbingly boring. every three seconds i catch myself checking the time. i just don't get it. there are much better ways to get exercise.
2. ben stiller. i really do have a sense of humor, but most of his movies are just okay, and some make me nervous and uncomfortable. dodgeball was okay i suppose, as was zoolander, but something about mary and meet the parents in particular are movies i still can't sit through.
3. concerts. the majority of shows i've been to fall in the "nice, not thrilling" category, especially the big-label ones. they are smoky and make both my feet and ears hurt. i could take it or leave it (that said, ok go did put on a fantastic show last weekend, so this isn't a sweeping statement).
4. those weird elf-like pointy-toed high heels. i don't "get" heels in general, but this variety in particular baffle me. perhaps it appeals to the s & m crowd, is all i can figure.
5. caffeine. people talk about caffeine like it's legal crack. a few months ago i actively tried to get myself into the whole coffee bit, and just couldn't do it.
6. U2. yea, don't see the appeal. just okay.

i added six because #4 technically doesn't count - those shoes are not nice at all. they are ugly, uncalled for, and perhaps even evil.

ditto to tim's point on alcohol, matt's on the royal tenenbaums (which i would extend to include all wes anderson films), and julian's on ernest hemingway.

and i pass it along to... john, john, and pj.

i highly recommend utilizing the memo line to vent frustration when writing checks.

to the internal revenue "service":

to the district court of maryland for a $140 speeding ticket:

who says paying the government can't be fun?!

Labels: personal

retail sales staff snub corpulent clientele, according to a new study reported by the new york times.

although you'd have to control for store quality (upscale stores likely hire a different variety of clerk), there would likely be significant behavioral differences between stores paying on an hourly rate and those paying on commission. giving staff a stake in their sales may curb their prejudiced behavior because ignoring obese customers on the assumption that they will not buy will result in fewer sales. clerks who ignored the stereotype would likely earn more (and possibly even stay in the job longer because of their higher earnings). clerks on hourly wage, however, have no reason to treat customers differently from their default behavior, as they have no direct stake in daily sales.

prejudiced behavior may still bleed through with commissions, but to a lesser degree.

and, if americans really are becoming more obese (which i am not convinced of), we'll probably see this stereotype effect fade away as people are confronted with the invalidity of this stereotype more often - one upside to the "epidemic," i suppose.

reference: the paper is not published. it's a graduate student paper by eden king, “remediation strategies and consequences of interpersonal discrimination toward obese customers.” eden tells me they did not compare commission vs. hourly pay schedules in this study.

Labels: social