i don't have happy hours, a myspace page, or a 10,000 hit-a-day readership, but what i do have is one kickass shirt:



thanks, guys!

make your own at neighborhoodies.com.

Labels: personal

the bonanno article from my last post has another interesting insight:

...there appear to be multiple and sometimes unexpected ways to be resilient, and sometimes resilience is achieved by means that are not fully adaptive under normal circumstances.

one such method is trait self-enhancement, the propensity to exhibit self-serving bias in both perception and attribution of desert and guilt. that is, it's a flawed, overly rosy picture of oneself. this research indicates that one who exhibits trait self-enhancement tends to be more resilient, healthy, and happy after traumatic events.

interestingly, in a previous post i noted that perhaps flawed self-assessment leads to an unrealistic assessment of one's ability to ride out a storm (or succeed at other risky endeavors) as well. combined with this research, it seems then that folks with a tendency for trait self-enhancement, although better at weathering disaster, may put themselves in more risky environs in the first place, creating a type of "overconfidence paradox. "

source: bonanno, george. resilience in the face of potential trauma. psychological science, june 2005

Labels: well being

during and after disasters such as september the 11th and hurricane katrina, national attention turns towards how the nation can help survivors. those in the mental health community, naturally, focus on how they can help as well. in the wake of last year's tsunami, media outlets also noted the need for more than simply monetary aide - victims needed counseling, as well. surprisingly, some victims resisted or ignored this kind of aid, pleading instead for more food and help rebuilding their cities. an article in june's psychological science confirms that this may actually be a better allocation of crisis resources.

we image that people confronted with disasters must have a disturbed pattern of functioning. it makes sense; people should have a difficult time moving on after extraordinarily traumatic events. however, george bonanno at columbia university claims:

...the most common reaction among adults exposed to such events is a relatively stable pattern of healthy functioning coupled with the enduring capacity for positive emotion and generative experiences.

given our pop psychological understanding of reaction to tragedy, this surprised me. why does it seem as if people should be less resilient than they are? two posibilities come to mind. first, traumatized victims are a better media story, increasing our perception of their actual incidence in a normal population. a cynic would also say it's in the mental health field's best interest to portray their services as necessary for everyone, but i'm not sure that's always the case, as most of them do seem honestly convinced of being essential.

this study is much needed as it highlights human's amazing coping mechanisms and the power of social networks. it shows our ability to eek out a happy - or at least satisfied - life following very unfortunate events. and that's not so bad.

for more on the good stuff in psychology, see positive psychology.

source: bonanno, george. resilience in the face of potential trauma. psychological science, june 2005

update: fixing typos, that's all.

Labels: social, well being

brooke at bantheban.org tells us that dc's smoking ban will probably pass next week. in a last-ditch effort, she urges district residents to write the dc council - chairman cropp, david catania, and jack evans specifically. here's how.

well, not much else to say but "boo [representative] democracy."

for those who don't believe in evolution, here's some good evidence of its mechanism:

Joe McGee stands in the pounding surf at the Southern Most Point in Key West, Fla. Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2005, as Hurricane Rita neared the lower Florida Keys. (AP)

this reminds me of people who rushed to mount saint helens last year when everyone thought it may blow its top. the motivations for rushing to the scene of a potential natural disaster are a bit different than what is going on here, though. here people are staying in their homes, and the disaster is coming to them. risk judgments are involved in both cases, but in the latter other factors such as previous hurricane experience and overestimation of home construction play a role. in some situations, one could see overconfidence and flawed self-assessment as adaptive traits, helping individuals perform better. however, flawed assessment of one's ability to weather a storm is fatally dangerous, as we've seen with katrina or any number of other decisions (e.g., overestimating your body and making the decision to continue smoking).

it's also interesting to note that when forced to make decisions based solely on experience and memory people typically make much riskier decisions than when presented with written materials. this is not particularly surprising. and hurricane folks certainly aren't basing their decisions off of hurricane evacuation manuals. life insurance companies would do well to mail those to their costal clientele.

aside: rita is a truly terrible name. homes in houston deserve better.

update: just fixing the picture

Labels: decision making, social

the other day i was on the metro reading murray rothbard's for a new liberty. the clean-cut gentleman seated next to me, who appeared to be about 45, was engaged in a phone conversation for half of our journey. shortly after snapping shut his cell phone, i noticed him peering over me and reading along. hoping to subtly proselytize, slowly moved my hand away so he could fully appreciate rothbard's acumens.

after a few minutes i looked up and he, embarrassed, apologized for reading over my shoulder. he noted that what i was reading seemed interesting, and i told him a little about rothbard (what little i know). he then told me a little about his family. his grandparents were coal miners in west virginia, who advocated unions and all sorts of government programs. he went on to explain that the carter era's fiascos, as well as union corruption, made his parents and grandparents skeptical that government intervention was the solution. we then had a long, interesting, and thoughtful discussion of unions, their viability, and their compatibility with a libertarian worldview.

funny, the people you meet on the metro - or anywhere, really. the media likes to portray america as a nation divided, with everyone falling into one of two boxes. i'm always pleasantly surprised when talking to the "average" person (outside the policy world) about how non-ideological they are. or maybe i'm just lucky.

Labels: personal

according to network for good, 89% of US households give to charity, and those households give, on average,$1,620, or 3.1% of their incomes. this is much more than i expected. even with so much money going to taxes and other major expenses, nearly all americans donate a substantial portion of their incomes.

i chose americares for katrina. any donation is good, i suppose, but it confounds me that with so much human suffering people donate instead to animal rescue efforts. in my opinion, i'd rather save all the people and worry about the animals later. i'd rather them be alive and missing fluffy than the reverse.

also check out missionfish's ebay auctions for various katrina-related charities.

Labels: social

this is a somewhat amusing quiz, especially if you know the artists they're referring to in the questions. my results (they're right about the trousers):

You scored as Piet Mondrian. You are a painstaking and disciplined worker with your eye on the prize. You appreciate silence and simplicity and you always change into fresh trousers when receiving guests. Piet Mondrian 95% Cecily Brown 65% Vincent Van Gogh 60% Bob Ross 50% Willem DeKooning 40% R. Crumb 25% Artemisia Gentilleschi 25% William Blake 15% What artist are you? created with QuizFarm.com

i'm happy with most of it, but a little disappointed i'm only at 50% on bob ross. bob ross is awesome.

Labels: personal

a brand-new study takes on two popular cultural archetypes, those of the forgetful senior and the “grumpy old man.” it indicates not only that seniors are more interested in positive than negative materials, more so than their younger counterparts, but that they have little to no deficiency in working memory when attending to positive emotional material.

the study, in part, tested working memory, the “scratch pad” of the brain. although it remained true that seniors preformed worse on many memory tasks, there was no significant deficit when processing positive emotional tasks.

perhaps the most interesting element of the study is that the results were inverted for younger participants, who were shown to have better working memories with negative emotional stimuli. younger adults have, in the past, been found to process negative information more thoroughly and weigh it more in decision-making. this makes sense evolutionarily, because neglecting negative information has greater risk to survival. of course, it’s difficult to separate between age and cohort effects in studies like these. it could just be that older generations were more optimistic than younger ones, so longitudinal studies would be necessary.

researchers propose socioemotional selectivity theory as the explanation for this phenomenon. in this theory, goals are ensconced in temporal contexts wherein youth focus on preparing for the future. individuals with restrictions on their time, such as older people and patients with terminal illness, focus on emotionally meaningful objects and events.

carstensen, l.l., and mikels, j.a. at the intersection of emotion and cognition. current directions in psychological science vol. 14 no. 3

Labels: well being

the half of my salary uncle sam allows me to keep will be taxed again when i spend it. a good example is my cell phone bill, with four separate government charges making up over 10% of my total payment. the "regulatory cost recovery charge" and "federal universal service charge" are my favorites.

some of it will also go towards more taxes, such as the virginia car tax. this weekend i got my “bill.” someday i'll regret writing passive-aggressive memos, but for now:

thinking of forced taxes (and the programs they fund) reminded me of one of my GRE words:

internecine: adj. mutually destructive; causing harm to both sides

[aside: quick! someone play scrabble with me before i forget all these words!]

Labels: personal

this weekend, i paid nearly seventy dollars to fill up my gas tank. when whining about gas prices, most folks cite the manifestly false complaint that everyone is forced to use gas, so it’s unfair that it’s expensive.

it seems to me that there are countless alternatives to gas, and even more options for gas consumption reduction. get an ethanol, diesel, electric or hybrid car. take the bus. take the subway. walk. ride a bike. buy a horse. carpool. move closer to work. don’t drive a hummer. don’t drive unless you have to. make your car more fuel efficient.

of course, some of the above are predicated on the assumption that one can switch situations immediately, but in reality some people may be unable or unwilling to compensate at all right away. however, it seems this will only slow, but not altogether prevent, the market adjustments that will occur. in the meantime, we’ll just have to wait it out and stop whining – or even concentrate on the positive benefits of the gas spike to the environment and technology making us less dependent on oil.

Labels: social