Thursday, November 11, 2021

Novel projects of scientific & tech innovation: We found causal evidence of a negativity bias, where evaluators lower their scores by more points after seeing scores more critical than their own rather than raise them after seeing more favorable scores

Conservatism Gets Funded? A Field Experiment on the Role of Negative Information in Novel Project Evaluation. Jacqueline N. Lane , Misha Teplitskiy , Gary Gray, Hardeep Ranu, Michael Menietti , Eva Guinan , Karim R. Lakhani. Management Science, Oct 28 2021. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2021.4107

Abstract: The evaluation and selection of novel projects lies at the heart of scientific and technological innovation, and yet there are persistent concerns about bias, such as conservatism. This paper investigates the role that the format of evaluation, specifically information sharing among expert evaluators, plays in generating conservative decisions. We executed two field experiments in two separate grant-funding opportunities at a leading research university, mobilizing 369 evaluators from seven universities to evaluate 97 projects, resulting in 761 proposal-evaluation pairs and more than $250,000 in awards. We exogenously varied the relative valence (positive and negative) of others’ scores and measured how exposures to higher and lower scores affect the focal evaluator’s propensity to change their initial score. We found causal evidence of a negativity bias, where evaluators lower their scores by more points after seeing scores more critical than their own rather than raise them after seeing more favorable scores. Qualitative coding of the evaluators’ justifications for score changes reveals that exposures to lower scores were associated with greater attention to uncovering weaknesses, whereas exposures to neutral or higher scores were associated with increased emphasis on nonevaluation criteria, such as confidence in one’s judgment. The greater power of negative information suggests that information sharing among expert evaluators can lead to more conservative allocation decisions that favor protecting against failure rather than maximizing success.


There is a general gender difference in paraphilic interests, such that men report more interest (and greater engagement) in a variety of paraphilic behaviors

Sex Drive as a Possible Mediator of the Gender Difference in the Prevalence of Paraphilic Interests in a Nonclinical Sample. Enya Levaque, Samantha J. Dawson, Cynthia Wan & Martin L. Lalumière . Archives of Sexual Behavior, Nov 8 2021. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-021-02074-w

Abstract: There is a general gender difference in paraphilic interests, such that men report more interest (and greater engagement) in a variety of paraphilic behaviors. Using a nonclinical sample, Dawson et al. (Sexual Abuse, 28(1):20–45, 2016, https://doi.org/10.1177/1079063214525645) found that the gender difference in paraphilic interests was eliminated when scores on measures of sex drive were used as mediators. However, their measures of sex drive were about more than just sex drive and included a measure of hypersexuality (i.e., distress, perceived lack of control, and problematic consequences of one’s sexuality). This study had two aims: to replicate Dawson et al.’s mediation results (using the same measures and scoring methods), and to discern the effect of sex drive itself (by replacing their measure of hypersexuality with a measure of sex drive). A nonclinical sample of 517 men and 615 women completed an online questionnaire. As expected, men reported less repulsion than women for most paraphilic themes. The gender difference in paraphilic interests was reduced (but not eliminated) both when reproducing Dawson et al.’s analysis and when examining a mediation model focused on sex drive specifically. The same results were obtained when examining the paraphilic interest with the largest gender difference (i.e., voyeurism). A full mediation effect was obtained in an unplanned supplementary analysis using a factor score (derived from eight measures) putatively assessing sex drive. While the main findings are consistent with Dawson et al.’s conclusions that sex drive is a possible mediator, they also suggest that other factors need to be considered to help explain the gender difference in the prevalence of paraphilic interests.


55 cultural groups from 33 nations: Those who saw themselves as more connected to others and those who emphasized commitment to others above self-interest were more likely to endorse the value of looking after the environment

Self-Construals and environmental values in 55 cultures. Hamish Duff et al. Journal of Environmental Psychology, November 7 2021, 101722. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2021.101722

Highlights

• Past research has noted similarities between self–other and self–nature relations.

• We report correlations among seven self-construal dimensions and environmental values.

• Cross-cultural findings confirmed reliable interdependence–environmentalism relations.

• Greater connection and commitment to others linked to environmental values.

• Consistency versus variability was the only independent pole with positive correlation.

• Self-reliance versus dependence on others was unrelated to environmental values.

• Other ways of being independent/interdependent showed inconsistent correlations.

Abstract: Environmentalism is influenced by views of the self. In past research, individuals who saw themselves as more interdependently connected to others expressed greater environmental concern than those who saw themselves as more independent from others. Yet, cross-cultural evidence is limited. In this pre-registered study, we tested how seven ways of being interdependent or independent correlated with environmental values among 7279 members of 55 cultural groups from 33 nations. Supporting our predictions, environmental values were strongly associated with several forms of interdependent self-construal, supporting parallels between self–other and self–nature relations. Specifically, two interdependent forms of self-construal showed consistent cross-cultural correlations: those who saw themselves as more connected to others and those who emphasized commitment to others above self-interest were more likely to endorse the value of looking after the environment. Extending previous conceptions, one way of being independent correlated consistently with environmental values: those who saw themselves as consistent across contexts were also more likely to endorse environmental values. Multilevel moderation analysis indicated that commitment to others had stronger correlations with environmental values in nations with greater environmental performance and national development. We conclude that improving social connectedness and cohesion, alongside the protection of natural ecosystems, may be imperative for tackling the global climate crisis.

Keywords: Self-construalEnvironmentalismEnvironmental valuesCross-cultural



Men more highly value same-sex friends who are physically formidable, possess high status, possess wealth, & afford access to potential mates; women more highly value friends who provide emotional support, intimacy, & useful social information

Sex differences in friendship preferences. Keelah E.G. Williams et al. Evolution and Human Behavior, November 10 2021. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2021.09.003

Abstract: Friendships can help us solve a number of challenges, increasing our welfare and fitness. Across evolutionary time, some of the many challenges that friendships helped to solve may have differed between men and women. By considering the specific and potentially distinct recurrent problems men's and women's friendships helped them solve, we can derive predictions about the qualities that would have made men's and women's same-sex friends ideal partners. This logic leads to several predictions about the specific friend preferences that may be differentially prized by men and women. Across three studies (N = 745) with U.S. participants—assessing ideal hypothetical friends, actual friends, and using a paradigm adapted from behavioral economics—we find that men, compared to women, more highly value same-sex friends who are physically formidable, possess high status, possess wealth, and afford access to potential mates. In contrast, women, compared to men, more highly value friends who provide emotional support, intimacy, and useful social information. Findings suggest that the specific friendship qualities men and women preferred differed by sex in ways consistent with a functional account of friendship.

Keywords: FriendshipSex differencesEvolutionary psychologyFriend preferences


Adaptation to incentives: Proposed Child Tax Credit Expansion would lead 1.5 million workers (2.6% of all working parents) to exit the labor force; child poverty would only fall by 22% (instead of estimated 34pct) & deep child poverty would not fall at all

Corinth, Kevin and Meyer, Bruce and Stadnicki, Matthew and Wu, Derek, The Anti-Poverty, Targeting, and Labor Supply Effects of the Proposed Child Tax Credit Expansion (October 7, 2021). University of Chicago, Becker Friedman Institute for Economics Working Paper No. 2021-115. SSRN: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3938983

Abstract: The proposed change under the American Families Plan (AFP) to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) Child Tax Credit (CTC) would increase maximum benefit amounts to $3,000 or $3,600 per child (up from $2,000 per child) and make the full credit available to all low and middle-income families regardless of earnings or income. We estimate the anti-poverty, targeting, and labor supply effects of the expansion by linking survey data with administrative tax and government program data which form part of the Comprehensive Income Dataset (CID). Initially ignoring any behavioral responses, we estimate that the expansion of the CTC would reduce child poverty by 34% and deep child poverty by 39%. The expansion of the CTC would have a larger anti-poverty effect on children than any existing government program, though at a higher cost per child raised above the poverty line than any other means-tested program. Relatedly, the CTC expansion would allocate a smaller share of its total dollars to families at the bottom of the income distribution—as well as families with the lowest levels of long-term income, education, or health—than any existing means-tested program with the exception of housing assistance. We then simulate anti-poverty effects accounting for labor supply responses. By replacing the TCJA CTC (which contained substantial work incentives akin to the EITC) with a universal basic income-type benefit, the CTC expansion reduces the return to working at all by at least $2,000 per child for most workers with children. Relying on elasticity estimates consistent with mainstream simulation models and the academic literature, we estimate that this change in policy would lead 1.5 million workers (constituting 2.6% of all working parents) to exit the labor force. The decline in employment and the consequent earnings loss would mean that child poverty would only fall by 22% and deep child poverty would not fall at all with the CTC expansion.


Caveats

A few caveats are in order. While our baseline estimate is that employment will decline by 1.5 million adults based on the midpoint of ranges used in past simulations and the central tendency of literature surveys, both lower and higher changes are predicted by other elasticities in the literature. Since we rely on elasticities from the literature rather than estimate a full structural model, we would need other information to allocate the average tendencies implied by elasticities to particular individuals. For example, we do not know whether a one percent decline in average hours implies a ten percent decline for one in ten people or a one percent decline for every worker.

Similarly, we would need a more sophisticated model than the one we employ to consider the separate incentives of both spouses in a couple. These complications are avoided in our modeling of the work/nonwork decisions for single worker families since average tendencies imply probabilistic choices that are easily modeled. As a result, we focus only on the work/nonwork decision, not incorporating the reduction in hours that would be expected for those who remain in the workforce due to the increase in marginal tax rates along the previous phase-in and over the new phase-out of the CTC. This understatement of the work response is likely offset to some extent by our simplified work decision of couples, taking them both to stop working or neither to stop working. In fact, the employment response for couples should be spread across a larger number of families, some of whom would have only one spouse leave the labor market. Since the loss of one out of two low-income earners from a family is likely to lead a family to be below the poverty line but not the deep poverty line, the implication of our simplification is that the child poverty reduction of the AFP CTC has likely been overstated, but the deep child poverty reduction understated. As the large majority of our response comes from single worker families, even assuming no response of dual-earner couples as an extreme would leave intact the large majority of the behavioral response we estimate. At least 83 percent of the families that experience a drop in earnings in our simulations have only one worker and are unaffected by this issue.39F 40


Long-Run Effects

Potential long-run effects of the CTC expansion are important to consider alongside shortrun effects. Increased support for low-income children could improve their long-run outcomes. Children’s access to food stamps in the 1960s and 1970s led to improved outcomes when they became adults, including higher earnings (though not increased employment), better health, less incarceration and less dependence on welfare programs (Hoynes, Schanzenbach, and Almond 2016; Bitler and Figinski 2019; Bailey et al. 2020). Much of this evidence comes from a period when other safety net programs were much less generous than current aid, so the marginal effects might be lower today. Larger EITC payments for children have increased their educational attainment and their employment and earnings as adults (Bastian and Michelmore 2018). In that case, the policy being examined is a combination of more income and higher employment. The incremental CTC could also affect behavior in less favorable ways, for example by changing rates of marriage or divorce. Some of the most methodologically sound research on this topic has found large effects of unconditional aid on single parenthood (Grogger and Bronars 2001). Consistent with this microdata evidence, the share of children with a single parent stabilized and then reversed after welfare reform, reversing a more than thirty-year trend.40F 41 Single parenthood has been found to lead, for example, to lower levels of educational attainment and higher incarceration rates of children in the long run (Hoffman and Maynard 2008).  

Resting heart rate as biological correlate of antisocial spectrum behavior: Effect sizes are largest for the most violent offenders & for psychopathy, while they are smaller for physical aggression, laboratory aggression, & antisocial personality disorder

Heart Rate and Skin Conductance Associations with Physical Aggression, Psychopathy, Antisocial Personality Disorder and Conduct Disorder: An Updated Meta-Analysis. Peter C. de Looff et al. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, November 10 2021. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2021.11.003

Highlights

• Resting heart rate remains the best replicated biological correlate of antisocial spectrum behavior.

• Physiological measures of heart rate and skin conductance might be used to differentiate between (and within) types of antisocial spectrum behavior based on the experimental task and analysis type (rest, task, and reactivity).

• Physiological measures of heart rate and skin conductance might be used to aid in diagnosing subtypes of mental health disorders as was evident from the differential effect sizes found for psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder for these are typically represented as similar constructs.

• Effect sizes are largest for the most violent offenders and for psychopathy, while they are smaller for physical aggression, laboratory aggression, and antisocial personality disorder.

Abstract: The associations between physiological measures (i.e., heart rate and skin conductance) of autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity and severe antisocial spectrum behavior (AB) were meta-analyzed. We used an exhaustive partitioning of variables relevant to the ANS–AB association and investigated four highly relevant questions (on declining effect sizes, psychopathy subscales, moderators, and ANS measures) that are thought to be transformative for future research on AB. We investigated a broad spectrum of physiological measures (e.g., heart rate (variability), pre-ejection period) in relation to AB. The search date for the current meta-analysis was on January 1st, 2020, includes 101 studies and 769 effect sizes. Results indicate that effect sizes are heterogeneous and bidirectional. The careful partitioning of variables sheds light on the complex associations that were obscured in previous meta-analyses. Effects are largest for the most violent offenders and for psychopathy and are dependent on the experimental tasks used, parameters calculated, and analyses run. Understanding the specificity of physiological reactions may be expedient for differentiating between (and within) types of AB.

Keywords: autonomic nervous systemantisocial behavioraggressive behaviorpsychopathymeta-analysisheart rateelectrodermal activity