Keep Telling Yourself It's Only a Movie: The Psychology of Horror Movie Enjoyment, Part 2

As I said in my last post, I love horror movies. I set out to explore some reasons why I (and many other people) might love movies that others might find disturbing. Little did I know, this search would turn up so much information, in addition to my personal notes on the subject, that 1) my first blog post was quite long and 2) I still had to cut it off and add the ever-annoying "To Be Continued". Who knew that something so trivial could bring up so much relevant information in the scientific community? Well, I did, but that was what we call a rhetorical question, dear reader.

So what is it that sets horror movie lovers apart from others? Last time, I wrote about the sensation-seeking personality, which includes love of horror movies in a long list of traits held by people who seek out thrills in all the wrong places and suffer from an insatiable case of neophilia (and if you thought, "Ew, they like dead people?!" dear reader, read that word again). As I said, though, I hesitate to accept something so clinical. As a social psychologist, I try to look for situational explanations as well. And as a recovering radical behaviorist (hi, my name is Sara, and I'm a Skinner-holic), I try to think of how learning and patterns of reinforcement & punishment might have shaped a behavior.

Love of horror movies, for instance, seems to be correlated with gender. Men are more likely to enjoy them than women. Of course, you could make the case that there are some innate, biological differences between men and women that make them respond differently to these images, but behavior shaping and reinforcement could also explain some of these differences. When children start growing up, they begin going through what is called gender socialization: they learn how to be little boys and little girls.

One way this happens is through selective reinforcement. We reinforce (through our verbal and behavioral responses) when little girls play with dolls and little boys play with trucks; we may not necessarily reinforce when little boys play with dolls and little girls play with trucks. We often reinforce when little boys play rough, but sometimes even punish little girls when they play rough.

Gender stereotypes can become so internalized, we even get the kids to do the dirty work for us:

Even parents who insist they don't want to reinforce gender stereotypes with their kids may inadvertently reinforce gendered behaviors; a parent may not "have a problem" with Jr. playing with dolls but they may not say anything or join him during that kind of play, but would respond positively and join when Jr. plays with a truck.

As a behaviorist (oops, I mean recovering behaviorist), I love observing these kinds of interactions; people often fail to realize what kinds of behaviors they're rewarding.

So you could argue gender socialization influences movie choice. When children pick out a movie to watch at the movie theater, at home, etc., parents always have to option of saying, "No, not that one. How about something else?" Do that often enough, and with certain movie selections, and over time, children learn what sorts of movies they should be watching (and what they should avoid – or at least, what movies they should be watching when the parents are around; people constantly test to see what they can “get away with”).

The problem with explaining a behavior with reinforcement and punishment is that the definition is circular, and it's difficult to get to the root cause. What is a reinforcer? Something that reinforces, that is, makes a behavior more likely to occur again. The thing is defined by the effect is has on behavior, and if it doesn't have that effect on behavior, it was never that thing to begin with (do you see why I say recovering behaviorist? - I love this subfield of psychology but it definitely gives me a headache). You are never able to get away from individual differences here, because something that may be reinforcing for one person may be neutral or punishing for another. Individual differences are fine, of course (I love including some of these variables in my studies), but where do they come from? Biology, perhaps? Very early experiences? Start thinking too much about this, and Watson's insistence that, "I can shape anyone to be anything I want, mwa ha ha" and Skinner's "Innate schminnate" attitude start to unravel, and the only way to repair it is to weave it with – gasp – cognitive psychology, evolutionary psychology, and psychodynamics. Oh, the horror.

Of course, timing is key when it comes to reinforcement and punishment. We know that for a reinforcer to be truly reinforcing, and a punisher to be truly punishing, it should happen quickly after the target behavior; this is one of the basic tenets of behaviorism. To take this one step farther, something may only work if it is delivered at a certain time. Perhaps one has to be in a certain state of mind for a horror movie to be enjoyable, and if you see a movie during that proper window, you’re more likely to seek it out again. Your mind shapes to enjoy these images (there is evidence that experiences actually change your brain physically, and that early stimulation may have long-term implications for brain development and, therefore, things like intelligence), and you become, over time, a horror movie fiend.

If you first view a movie during one of those off times, your response may be disgust, a response that strengthens over time. This is similar to something I’m exploring for another blog post (coming soon!) about cravings. This argument still depends very much on inner states, like mood, but considering that other research has established things like mood influence our decision-making and processing of information, it stands to reason that mood could influence whether something is reinforcing or not. And also considering we know that physiological states influence whether something is reinforcing or not (a cookie isn’t very rewarding if you’re not at all hungry), it doesn’t seem like a huge leap to weave these two lines of thinking together.

Hard to believe I once spouted Skinner constantly – Skinner, the man who said, “So far as I’m concerned, cognitive science is the creationism of psychology. It is an effort to reinstate that inner initiating or originating creative self or mind that, in a scientific analysis, simply does not exist.” Ah, Skinner, you were a brilliant man, but just because you can’t take something out and dissect it, or put it in an operant chamber and train it to press a bar, doesn’t mean it isn’t real or important. Not to mention, with advances in technology and scientific methods, something that was once unobservable, and therefore untestable, unfalsifiable, and unscientific, often becomes the subject of routine scientific study.

If we keep moving forward in the 20th century in the history of behaviorism, we come to Albert Bandura and his work on vicarious learning, imitation, and modeling. We learn a lot by watching others and chose role models to imitate (something Thorndike began studying almost a century prior to Bandura, but he found little to no evidence in his studies of animals and determined such learning did not exist). It’s possible, then, that love (or hatred) of horror movies develops in part from who we aspire to be and from observing the responses of others. This could even explain why behaviors not in line with gender stereotypes get shaped and reinforced; a little girl may learn to behave in “boyish” way by observing and imitating little boys (perhaps one reason that little girls with lots of brothers become “tomboys” themselves – I use the quotes because I personally hate these terms, but sometimes there is no better way to explain something).

 To use a personal analogy, I grew up with a brother and mostly male cousins, so perhaps my early models were mostly male. And though I did engage in some “girly” play behaviors, I would also play with action figures and train sets with my brother, and we would often watch TV together: lots of He-Man, Justice League, and even WWF. (I was traumatized when I learned pro wrestling was fake. Hulk Hogan, I still remember that sobbing letter I wrote to you after you “broke your back”. Hope you had a nice vac-ay, you liar!)

Once again, we come back to the original dilemma, and to play devil’s advocate, you may be asking, “Okay, but where did the behavior originally come from? If we’re imitating, where does the imitated behavior come from? What makes parents want to reinforce gendered behavior? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? And you really wrote a get-well letter to Hulk Hogan? Dork.” Yes, yes, I know. I suppose we can never truly get away from the cognitive, personality, and clinical arguments. But depending on them entirely seems as misguided as depending entirely on contingencies of reinforcement as the sole explanation for behavior (sorry Skinner). Taken together, I think we… well, I think we perhaps created more questions than we started with, but isn’t that what good science is all about? What do you think?

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

Keep Telling Yourself It's Only a Movie: The Psychology of Horror Movie Enjoyment, Part 1

The weather is turning colder and fall is just around the corner. There are many things to love about fall. As much as people love summer activities, the heat begins to wear on many of us; the cooler days of fall are usually a welcome change by summer's end. Fall clothes are also some of my favorites; say goodbye to shorts and flip-flops and hello to scarves, sweaters, jackets - there's just something cozy about the layers, the neutral colors. Speaking of colors, fall leaves... need I say more? Yes, fall is wonderful for many reasons, including one more: Halloween.

Why Halloween? For one: It's the one time of year that it is acceptable to watch horror movies (I watch them pretty much year-round, but this is the one time that it's totally acceptable to talk about these movies and invite people over to watch them with you). I love horror movies. Despite (or perhaps because of) being slightly traumatized watching a scene from Children of the Corn when I was 4 or so years old, a scene I remember quite vividly, I grew up to be a horror movie fiend. When my family made its visit to the local video store, I'd want to check out movies from A Nightmare on Elm Street series (I've seen them all, even, shudder, Freddie versus Jason; Part 3: Dream Warriors, is my favorite for blending scary with funny – generally on purpose). On rainy days when we couldn't play outside, I'd turn off all the lights, block out of the windows, and watch the Exorcist in the dark. Alone, because no one in my family wanted to join me. And it wasn't just movies: I was a voracious reader, and though I would read pretty much anything from the fiction or nonfiction sections of the library, Stephen King was (and still is) one of my favorite authors.

Many believe that people who love scary movies don't find them scary. I don't know about others, but I find them terrifying. I'll sometimes have trouble sleeping after a really good one, like the first time I saw Poltergeist, and, especially when I'm alone, I'll find myself imagining all kinds of creepy things and explanations for weird noises. I probably find them just as scary as people who refuse to watch them (and I know a lot of people who fall into this camp, including my family, especially my mom).

But still, I love them. I own many, one of the first things people notice when looking through my movie collection. I talk about them to anyone who will listen; yes, I'm that person who still goes on about that awesome scene in that one movie that came out the year I was born but didn't see until I was 10 (aka: The Thing). When someone talks about zombies, I feel we have to clarify, "Are these slow-moving Night of the Living Dead zombies? Or crazy fast 28 Days Later zombies? Or somewhere in the middle Walking Dead zombies", because it’s an important distinction. And yes, I’m also that obnoxious person who thrives on horror movie trivia: did you know that A Nightmare on Elm Street (movie 1) took place in Springwood, California, but suddenly in later movies, they reveal they’re in Springwood, Ohio? That’s movie magic for you; they moved an entire city across the country.

So what explains my love of movies that would leave my mom insisting she sleep with the lights on surrounded by crosses, garlic, and silver? I started doing some research on this, and it seems there are many psychologists and communication experts who have sought to explain this very thing. There's actually a lot here, and a lot of commentary that I think is necessary, so this is the first of two parts on this topic.

One explanation is the notion of "sensation-seeking". Some people, for instance, are high sensation seekers. According to Jonathan Roberti, clinical psychologist and expert in sensation-seeking (read a review of his here), these individuals thrive on experiences that leave them emotionally and physically high. Not only would high sensation seekers be more interested in seeking out thrills and other emotional highs through the media (they apparently enjoy horror movies), they also are at increased risk for other "thrilling" activities, like drug use, excessive gambling, and casual sex. (Hmm, this isn't really sounding like me, but let's continue exploring.) Furthermore, high sensation seekers thrive on novelty, always seeking out new experiences, and are willing - and perhaps, prefer - to take risks to achieve these thrills; they're likely to select careers that allow them to take risks and experience new things - forensic identification, aka profiling, is one career they tend to express an interest in - and are prone to boredom.

Some research suggests that people have different brain responses to stimuli, and that some people, called "high stimulation seekers" (sounds like high sensation seekers to me, but different terms for different folks) experience activation in areas of the brain associated with reinforcement and arousal when exposed to intense stimuli, whereas others experience activation in emotional areas of the brain. While the researchers did not measure these brain reactions in response to horror movies, it may be that my brain responses are what differentiate me from my mom. While these images are reinforcing and psychologically arousing to horror movie lovers, they're upsetting to others.

But I hesitate to leave it at that. It seems that this explanation is more clinical, referring to enjoyment of horror movies as part of an additional diagnosis or, at the very least, a personality type. I hesitate to accept this explanation alone, because it clinicalizes (if that is in fact a word - and if not, it should be) something that could be considered normal. Additionally, though this research suggests there is a correlation between enjoyment of horror movies and these other behaviors, the one thing that makes horror movie viewing different from these other things is the notion of risk. There are risks of bodily injury or death involved in these behaviors, even something as commonplace as riding a roller coaster (though the odds are very, very low). The only risk involved with watching horror movies is that you might get a little freaked out, which could be quite traumatizing for people who dislike horror movies but probably not people who seek them out (either way, remember the advice given to viewers of Last House on the Left: "to keep from fainting, keep telling yourself 'it’s only a movie'"). As Roberti points out, however, not all of their behaviors are related to risk; they also enjoy trying new things in general, in terms of art, music, and sports; they score high on the personality dimension, "Openness to Experience".

Still, there are many good reasons to avoid clinical explanations when other explanations are just as likely if not better. One early example of the dangers of over-clinicalizing is a study by Rosenthal, aptly titled "On Being Sane in Insane Places". In this study Rosenthal and 7 colleagues got themselves committed to different mental hospitals, by each meeting with psychiatrists and informing them they were hearing voices saying the words, "Empty", "Hollow", and "Thud". All but one were diagnosed with schizophrenia (the final patient was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, or “manic depression” as it was called then) and committed. After reporting to an inpatient psychiatric ward, these "pseudo patients" stopped faking any symptoms and began acting as they normally would to see how long it would take for facility staff to notice. Their stays ranged from 7 to 52 days, with an average of 19 days.

So, they had time to kill, and thought, "Let's have some fun". What's a social psychologist's idea of fun? Doing research. While they were inpatient, they had an interesting opportunity to observe the various happenings: patients' behaviors, providers' behaviors, and most importantly, providers' assessments of patients' behaviors. They found that once a patient had been labeled with a clinical diagnosis, his or her behavior was often interpreted in line with that diagnosis, even when situational explanations were perhaps better. For example, patients spent a lot of time hanging out in the cafeteria waiting for meal-time, which providers attributed to things like "oral fixation", but the researchers thought was more likely because there's not much to do in a mental hospital, but eating is one regular activity that breaks up the monotony. Even the researchers' note-taking behavior was attributed to their diagnoses. [Interesting side note: while the providers never caught on that the pseudo patients were not actually mentally ill, 35 of the 118 other patients caught on rather quickly, and would ask the researchers things like, "Why are you here? You're not crazy."]

As a social psychologist, I think we should at least consider situational explanations for these phenomena. That's for next time. To be continued...

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

Forgiveness and the 10-Year Anniversary of 9/11

Today, we remember the 10th anniversary of the attacks of September 11th. In church today, the message was one of forgiveness. There are many religious and spiritual arguments for the importance of forgiveness that I won't go into. Psychologists also have explored this concept, and have discovered how forgiveness (and its converse, unforgiveness) influences an individual's mental and physical health.

Forgiveness is defined in many ways, but all of these definitions add up to one thing: forgiveness is something a wronged person offers to the one (or ones) who perpetrated the wrongdoing. It is generally viewed as a process that the forgiver works toward through many emotions and behaviors. Forgiveness is also often viewed as a personality trait; some people are simply more forgiving than others.

A lot of evidence suggests that being in a state of unforgiveness is damaging to both your mental and physical health (read one of many reviews here). Conversely, forgiveness is associated with better mental and physical health. Forgiveness is something you do, in part for the other person, but also for yourself. Refusing to forgive and continuing to hold a grudge is, for lack of a better word, toxic to your well-being.

This is because, in refusing to forgive, we often dwell on the wrongdoing. Psychologists refer to this constant dwelling on the negative as "rumination", and refer to rumination about perceived wrongdoing as "vengeful rumination". Research on rumination in general finds negative effects. Rumination is negatively correlated with sleep quality (abstract), as well as alcohol misuse, disordered eating, and self-harm (full paper). It makes focusing attention and problem solving difficult, because ruminators tend to be less confident in their problem solving abilities (full paper), and also because rumination uses working memory that could be devoted to the problem (full paper). Ruminators generate more biased interpretations of negative events, are more pessimistic about the future, and are poorer at solving interpersonal problems, as well (full paper).

Rumination is also associated with poor physical health. High ruminators show physiological stress markers, such as increased salivary cortisol (full paper here and abstract here) and immune system activity (full paper). People who ruminate also take longer for their heart rate and blood pressure to return to normal after being made to feel angry, which can put them at risk for organ damage over time (full paper).

Forgiveness is not "letting someone off the hook". It is not the same as condoning or absolving someone of wrong-doing. The old adage of "forgive and forget" doesn't necessarily lead to better outcomes, mainly because of the forgetting part. It is good to forgive, but not necessarily good to forget. Forgetting means failing to learn a lesson - a lesson that may be very important for you later on. This leaves the "forgiver" in a rather difficult position; one in which he or she must remember the wrongdoing without holding a grudge.

How, then, do you forgive? And how do you think about the act in such a way, that you can find forgiveness without simply ruminating on the event? Rumination has one key component - it is dwelling on the negative without trying to find a solution for the negative. You're stuck in the mud and simply spinning your wheels without really getting anywhere. Reflection, on the other hand, involves thinking through an event and trying to find closure. Reflective thought leads to a change in the thinker.

The review I linked to above (linked again here) discussed some of the reflection “forgivers” engage in. One cognitive process is empathy, in which the forgiver puts him- or herself in the other’s shoes, and attempts to experience the same emotional state. Not only do “trait forgivers” experience more empathy, but people who are randomly assigned to engage in empathy are also able to experience forgiveness. This provides some evidence that anyone, even people who are not naturally empathetic, can use this experience to forgive.

Forgivers are more generous in their appraisals of the one(s) to be forgiven, seeing them as more likable or having more likable traits. They are also better at understanding another person’s explanation for the behavior. In essence, they try to see the situation from the other person’s point-of-view. You don’t have to accept another person’s explanation, but rather, try to understand where they’re coming from. At the very least, this understanding can aid in finding a solution or determining a path to reconciliation. People often have a very self-centered view of the world in that they have difficulty recognizing that other people do not see things in the same way or have the same knowledge (a good blog post for another day).

Of course, one thing that may make forgiveness such a difficult process in the case of 9/11 is the severity of the wrong as well as the fact that the group responsible has such different worldviews. In a previous blog entry, I talked about stereotypes and ingroup/outgroup, all of which is definitely relevant here. Our tendency to dehumanize the outgroup makes forgiveness complicated, because forgiveness is a between-human experience. Forgiveness in this case is not impossible, but would have to involve an even greater degree of understanding and attempts to characterize the other group’s point-of-view.

Forgiveness is a process. Even 10 years later, the emotions are still very raw, but we can still continue moving forward.

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

Too Pretty to Write this Blog Post: On Math Performance, Stereotypes, and Bad T-Shirt Choices

I know, I haven't posted in a while. Mea culpa, etc. etc. I'll try to be better about this from now on :)

Recently, two stories came across my desk (well, desktop, but whatever) that I've been meaning to blog about. It seemed like a perfect opportunity to talk about some of my early research interests. I've always been interested in the media: how it shapes our perceptions, and how it influences our behavior, performance on various tasks, and even our health (something I've done some research on and should definitely post about one of these days). One of my first studies I worked on - for my master's thesis - was about how the media influences women's math performance.

The most recent pop culture reference to women and academic ability was on a t-shirt marketed toward girls 7 to 16 at the major retailer, JC Penney. Though JC Penney eventually pulled the shirt, many argued that this t-shirt perpetuated negative stereotypes about girls and women. This is not the only instance of stereotypes about women popping up in the media. Abercrombie and Fitch prompted a "girlcott" in 2005 when they released a t-shirt with the phrase "Who needs brain when you have these?" printed across the bustline. T-shirts aren't the only outlets for these messages. Perhaps you remember the "Math is hard" Barbie? Teen Talk Barbie was the cause of controversy when one of the many phrases she uttered is "Math class is tough!" And advertising is constantly filled with gender stereotypes (both of men and women).

But wait a minute? Do these messages really affect women's math performance? Research (and not just my own) finds that they can. To avoid looking biased toward my own research, I won't even discuss my thesis.

But first, to give you some background information. Much of this research is influenced by the work of Claude Steele and his colleagues, and on Steele's concept called "stereotype threat". Essentially, stereotype threat occurs when the negative stereotype about a group's performance on a task makes a member of that group underperform on that task. To give a concrete example, Steele first explored this concept in a study on standardized test performance by African-American students. He and his colleague Aronson found that making African-American students conscious of racial stereotypes resulted in underperformance on a standardized test. Even asking them report their race on the test lowered performance. When racial stereotypes were made irrelevant through test instructions, African-American students performed at the same level as White students. (Read the original article here).

Stereotype threat became an important area of study because it provided evidence to counter claims of genetic inferiority that have been used to explain past race differences in standardized test scores. Steele and his colleagues went on to apply this phenomenon to a variety of groups, and used it to explain another group difference: women’s scores in math testing. In a conceptual replication of their study on African-American students' test performance, they found that when some women were told a math test had shown gender differences in the past, they performed worse than men; when they were told the math test they were taking had not shown gender differences, they performed at the same levels as men. (Full paper available here).

Prior to Steele and his colleagues' research, biological explanations were applied to gender differences in math and the sciences. Many people believed that women were just naturally bad at math. These opinions continue even today; early in 2005, Harvard University President, Lawrence H. Summers, presented a variety of explanations for women’s under-representation in math and science, including that the difference may be due to genetic inferiority (he resigned not long after, though this speech was just one of many marks against him).

Steele established three conditions that must be satisfied in order for stereotype threat to occur: 1) there must be awareness of the stereotype by society at large, that is, the stereotype that women are bad at math must be well-known; 2) the individual must be identified with the domain of interest, that is, a woman must be math-identified in order for stereotype threat to take place; and 3) the negative stereotype must be relevant to the individual during the domain-specific situation, that is, the stereotype that women are bad at math must be relevant to the individual when she encounters a math test. Though some people have called proposition 2 into question, and have even shown that stereotype threat can operate among women who don't really care about their math ability/performance, the other two propositions are necessary.

What these propositions mean, however, is that instructions from an experimenter aren't necessary for stereotype threat to occur. Simply having a high awareness of the stereotype (abstract here), being strongly woman-identified (full paper), or believing that gender stereotypes are correct (full papers here and here) can lead women to underperform in math even in the absence of any stereotype cues from the experimenter. It's not even necessary that the information made salient is related to math. Being the only woman in a group of men is one way (abstract, full paper). Receiving unwanted homework help from your parents is another (abstract here).

But it was work by Paul Davies and his colleagues that found stereotypical television commercials could lower math performance in women and impact their interest in math. In one study, some participants saw two stereotypical commercials: a teenage girl jumping for joy about a new acne medication and another of a woman drooling over a new brownie mix. Others saw counter-stereotypical ads: one in which a woman impressed a man with her knowledge of automotive engineering and another of a woman discussing health care concerns. Men and women who saw the counter-stereotypical ads did not differ on math performance. Men and women who saw the stereotypical ads did, with women receiving significantly lower scores. In a second study, women exposed to stereotypical ads avoided math questions in favor of verbal questions more frequently than women who saw neutral ads or men in either condition. A third study found that exposure to stereotypical television ads lowered women's interest in quantitative careers.

None of these television commercials said anything about women's math ability. Why then would these influence math performance? It has been argued that these messages create an "atmosphere of stereotype threat", where the messages are ubiquitous and inescapable. No special instructions are needed to make women question their math ability; messages present in their environment are enough. Some have argued that the controversy of JC Penney's t-shirt is misplaced; after all, it's just a t-shirt. But is it? Based on what we know about stereotype threat and how similar messages have influenced women's math performance, can we really shrug this off as "just a t-shirt"?

So what was the second story that came across my desktop? A cultural exploration of not math performance, but a related concept: spatial reasoning. In this really creative natural experiment, researchers examined two tribes in India, the Karbi and the Khasi. These two tribes are very similar in lifestyle, diet, even DNA (they likely share some common ancestors). The main difference is in gender roles. In the Karbi society, land is passed to male children when the parents die. Women rarely own land. In the Khasi society, women control the land and goods; men can't own land and their earnings are turned over to their nearest female relative. The researchers went to different members of these two tribes (in total, 1300 people) and found some striking results: in the Karbi society, men outperformed women, but in the Khasi society, no differences were found.

There are still people who argue that stereotype threat doesn't explain these differences, or if it does, is only one variable among many that explain these differences. There is definitely some validity to that argument. The effect sizes in these studies are small to moderate at best, meaning there is more pushing math scores around than stereotype threat. Furthermore, the original article that prompted this blog post is a t-shirt about "doing homework" in general - not just the math work. There aren't many stereotypes that women are bad in school - in fact, in some cases, the opposite stereotype exists - so would this t-shirt really have the effects I discuss above? What do you think?

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

Celebrities and Weight Management

I didn't think, when I started this blog, that I would even bother responding to celebrity quotes. True, I could probably blog forever and a day about the things celebrities utter in interviews, on their Twitter page, etc. - in fact, there are many successful blogs devoted to just that topic. In a recent interview, however, Mila Kunis talked about weight loss. Since weight management is one of my areas of research, I felt I needed to respond -- plus, I was looking for a good reason to talk about weight management research on here.

Essentially, Mila said that people who are “trying to lose weight” and are unsuccessful are simply not trying hard enough. What prompted her to reach this conclusion is the fact that she was able to lose 20 pounds for her role in Black Swan, a substantial amount, considering she normally is very thin. Of course, what Mila said is problematic for a few reasons.

Even when an individual is successful at losing weight through a program, weight gain in the time following the program is very common; most will gain back two-thirds of the weight within a year, and nearly all of it within 5 years. Why? Because sudden and drastic changes are difficult to maintain. That’s one reason you’ll find that, for many people, losing weight, especially with “fad diets”, is easy but maintaining weight loss is difficult. The approaches celebrities often take to lose weight for a role definitely work over the short-term, but are rarely sustainable. Look at celebrities who did not lose weight for a role, but who did so because their weight was unhealthy – for example, Oprah Winfrey (whose weight has often been the target of comedians) lost 67 pounds on the liquid diet, and unveiled her new look on her show while pulling a wagon of fat… only to regain much of that weight later. In fact, within a week of going off the diet, she had gained 10 pounds. Such low calorie diets cannot be maintained for very long, and there’s a good reason for that. In fact, even in cases where a doctor has prescribed a very low calorie diet (an approach taken only for patients who are very obese), the patient has to (or is supposed to) undergo intense medical supervision.

Whatever changes you make to lose weight, whether it is diet, exercise, or some combination of both, they have to be changes you’re willing to maintain over the long-term, or your chances of regaining the weight are high.

My predominant concern when I see celebrities losing large amounts of weight, and talking about how easy it is and “anyone can do this”, is that it creates unrealistic expectations. In fact, a lot of research shows that people entering weight loss programs come in with really unrealistic expectations.

Furthermore, telling people they’re going about weight loss in the “wrong way” and to “try harder” doesn’t instruct them on how to lose weight effectively and in a healthy way. This is probably one reason that media coverage of celebrity weight loss and the constant messages about what people are “supposed to look like” can lead to disordered eating and other maladaptive behaviors. Figuring out how to lose weight is pretty intuitive – cut down on calorie intake and/or increase physical activity – but the approaches one needs to take to lose weight healthily are definitely not intuitive. Even if someone decides to do some research into losing weight, there are many sources of information, some teaching really unhealthy approaches. A lot of people don’t even realize what disordered eating means, thinking that, as long as they aren’t starving themselves or forcing themselves to vomit after eating, their behaviors (like “fasting” after large meals or exercising to the point of exhaustion) are perfectly normal and even healthy.

I’m certainly not attacking celebrities. I know that Mila probably felt that by telling people “no, you can” was an attempt to boost people’s confidence in themselves and their ability to reach their goals (a concept psychologists call “self-efficacy”). It’s definitely a noble goal, because research suggests that people starting weight management programs often have low self-efficacy.

Even so, boosting confidence may lead people to try something to lose their weight, but not necessary the right thing, so increasing self-efficacy needs to be done in concert with teaching healthy weight management approaches. This is one of the many reasons that people trying to lose weight on their own are not very effective.

Just once, rather than hearing a celebrity go on and on about how much he loves to eat fast food or how she is able to keep thin simply by “playing with her kids”, I would love to hear a celebrity say, “You know what, keeping thin is hard work! Here are all the things I do…” Okay, not as a great a sound-bite, I know (and arguably not the celebrity's responsibility), but it might help to balance out some of the other celebrity sound-bites that I fear do more harm than good.

Of course, celebrities are not the only ones sending the wrong, or at least, incomplete messages. Proposed policy to outlaw Happy Meals or add additional taxes to “junk food” is just as bad as simply saying, “What you’re doing is wrong” – it doesn’t teach what people should be doing instead. Rather than punishing people for making the “wrong” choices, we need to incentivize them to make the “right” choices.

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

Citizen Journalists and Credibility

Five years ago this month, CNN started an initiative called iReport, where regular people could generate news content. Though visitors to CNN.com can access these iReports via the iReport page, CNN will also occasionally place iReport stories on their main homepage as well. In a recent story covering what the iReport news team consider to be the five stories that defined their "year one", many commenters attacked the initiative, saying iReport stories were "non news-worthy", and "lack the credibility and the training to hold such an important place on the website". Others posted support for iReports, saying that these "iReporters" put more efforts into fact-checking and proofreading than regular CNN reporters. This notion of citizen-journalists is definitely very interesting, and could be the starting point for many interesting debates. For another day, I suppose. What I'd really like to delve into today is this idea about credibility: what determines whether someone is viewed as credible and what biases may influence that judgment?

Human beings are regularly called upon to process large amounts of information from the world around us. This information is perceived by our five senses, and the information has to be interpreted by our brain in order for us to make decisions and navigate our environment. We're very good at processing this information. We're so good in fact that people are always looking for supernatural explanations for why we're so good at it - I know a lot of people who believe in ESP, but honestly, I think that people are just very good at picking up on cues in the environment (and some people are better and faster) and that because of their skill and speed, it appears they reacted before whatever they were reacting to even happened. Once again, another post, another day.

That's not to say that biases can't be introduced into our processing. We often see what we want to see and hear what we want to hear. It's true that our current experiences are often colored by our past experiences, which I think is just another example of how awesome our brain is; not only do we process what's directly in front of us, we are processing past experiences in tandem and drawing connections between the two. This means, however, that we can make mistakes.

Want to learn more about some of these "mistakes"? Check out this list of cognitive biases.

Of course, just because we're capable of systematic processing doesn't mean we will always be raring to think things through at that level all the time. On the contrary, thinking through everything at this level would lead us to become quickly overwhelmed. Therefore, we've created mental shortcuts that help us to navigate our environment while saving our cognitive resources for the things that really matter; Susan Fiske and Shelly Taylor referred to this tendency, calling us "cognitive misers". It is important to note, however, that some people really enjoy thinking and engage in it much more than the average person; we would say they have a "high need for cognition". Even these people will occasionally engage in mental shortcuts, they just do so less frequently than the average person.

One mental shortcut is called a heuristic. Heuristics are quick rules or devices, which allow someone to draw a conclusion or solve a problem quickly and without a great deal of thought. Heuristics are not always wrong. For example, if you see someone standing on a busy street carrying a map, you can probably safely assume they are a tourist. True, you could cycle through all the possible reasons a person would be carrying a map, but the cognitive miser in you will probably just think, "Tourist", and move on (or if you're feeling altruistic, offer to help said tourist find his or her next destination). The problem is when we use these shortcuts in situations where more systematic thought is necessary.

For example, imagine you've been called for jury duty. You're presented with lots of competing evidence, and you have to use that information to determine whether the defendant is guilty or not guilty. Now would probably be a bad time to use a heuristic, but some research evidences suggest that people do use heuristics in these situations, especially when the evidence is confusing or points equally to guilt or innocence. One heuristic is referred to as "what is beautiful is good"; it is a belief that, if a defendant is physically attractive, he or she must be innocent.

Another well-known heuristic is called the "availability heuristic". When we believe something is true - such as, "Women are bad at telling jokes" - we can easily think of many examples that support our conclusion, but often have difficulty remembering examples that refute the conclusions - such as times when women showed excellent comedic skills or times when men showed poor skills. Based on having many available examples that support our conclusion, we develop even stronger beliefs that our initial conclusion is correct.

The heuristic that is probably operating here deals with source credibility. When someone is presenting information, and especially, trying to convince you of something, you could 1) listen to her arguments and systematically think through them to determine if her conclusions are valid, or 2) decide whether you agree with her based on her education and/or title. Research shows that arguments presented by someone with, for example, a PhD are judged to be more sound than the same arguments presented by, say, a high school student. True, when studies manipulate how good the arguments really are, people are generally able to differentiate good arguments from bad arguments, but even then, the PhD often still has an advantage over Joe H.S. Student.

I don't often read the iReport stories, so I don't really have any conclusions about whether there is any truth to claims of inaccuracy. It stands to reason, however, that some of these commenters are reacting to job title rather than content. An iReporter could be anybody. CNN does provide information on their vetting process - how they determine whether an iReport is accurate and worthy of being called news - but someone who is applying a heuristic to determine whether to believe this particular story may not be very motivated to read about the vetting process and determine whether that raises their estimation of an iReporter's credibility.

That’s not to say that job title is the only marker of credibility people use. For instance, Elizabeth Smart, whose kidnapping case received widespread media attention, is now a contributor to ABC News on stories involving kidnappings. ABC News clearly feels this experience qualified her to talk about kidnapping in general (and many viewers likely do, as well). Of course, her hiring did prompt the Daily Beast to ask, “Other than fame – as the victim of a horrifying crime – what exactly are her qualifications?” True, the qualifications they would like see, such as a degree in psychology or years of experience in studying kidnapping victims, could be considered a metric of knowledge – we assume someone which such training to have a lot of knowledge on the topic, but this is not always the case; once again, this is just a heuristic at work.

Heuristics are not likely to go away. Despite their flaws, these shortcuts are necessary. Imagine if every decision you made (paper or plastic, boxers or briefs, soup or salad) involved the same careful thought you currently reserve for the important decisions (city or suburbs, car or SUV, Cubs or White Sox). So what is the best way to deal with this dilemma of credibility? Other than what CNN currently does – provide a document detailing the vetting process – what could they do to set your mind at ease?

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara

PC versus Mac, the Debate of Our Age

It's been a while since I last updated - sorry about that!  In addition to a trip out of the country and starting a new job (hooray for both!), I recently bought a new laptop - a shiny new MacBook Air.  I love how thin and lightweight this baby is (two of my most important characteristics in choosing a laptop), not to mention fast!  Startup takes about 10 seconds.  In my free time, I've been playing around with it, getting the hang of MacOS.  As a longtime Windows user, and occasional Linux user, there are still some things I have to learn.  I've definitely made some silly, "Windows-user" style mistakes.

Before I bought the MacBook Air, I posed a question to my friends on Facebook about what my next laptop should be.  When I mentioned that I was leaning toward a MacBook, this discussion turned into a debate among my friends about which is better, Windows or Mac.  This debate has gone on for a while, perpetuated by the "I'm a PC.  I'm a Mac." advertising, where operating system is more than a simple preference; it is an identity.  Still, though other ad campaigns involve these forced choice paradigms (Coke or Pepsi, for example), few create such strong allegiances and even denigration of people who prefer the other option.  Why might this be the case?

Identity is very important.  This probably goes without saying - so why am I saying it?  Because identity is not only very important, it is an essential part of our lives.  Erik Erikson, a developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst famous for his stages of psychosocial development, argued that the formation of a consistent, integrated identity is a necessary step in becoming an adult.  It's no coincidence that the "coming of age" story, the tale of the journey of self discovery, is so popular in literature, film, and a variety of other media.  It's a journey we all take, and struggle with on the way, so it's a story with which we can all identify.  Additionally, according to identity researcher Seth J. Schwartz, failing to develop a clear identity is associated with depression, anxiety, and aggression, and even risky behavior, like drug use.  Our identity is like our guide; so many of our decisions are influenced by "who we are".  There are few experiences more excruciating than identity confusion.

Our social identity - who we are in relation to others and our group membership - is also important, in terms of "who we are" and our self-esteem.  Many identify with a particular race or ethnicity, culture, gender, even baseball team (to my fellow Chicagoans, Cubs or Sox?).  The best known researcher and theorist on these effects is Henri Tajfel.  His research shows us that it doesn't take much for us to begin dividing people into groups, and that we hold a lot of beliefs, many completely irrational, about the group to which we belong, our "ingroup", and the other group, the "outgroup".  We ascribe certain characteristics to ourselves, based on our identified groups, and ascribe certain characteristics (often called stereotypes) to the other groups as well.  Discovering that another person is similar to us in some way can lead us to give that person preferential treatment, called "ingroup favoritism".  Furthermore, we can create "ingroups" and "outgroups" based on seemingly unimportant details, like preference for a particular painting.  Studies in social identity often use what is called the "minimal group paradigm" - these studies examine how much (or rather, how little) information about others is needed for us to begin categorizing them as like us, our "ingroup", or different, our "outgroup".  We show these tendencies even when we've been randomly assigned to a group (and even if we KNOW we've been assigned completely at random).

For a comedic take on this dilemma, see this XKCD comic.

Why, then, don't we see angry interactions between Coke drinkers and Pepsi drinkers?  What is so different about computer preference?  Arguably, computers are more integrated into our daily lives than our choice of beverage.  I'm not sure about you, but I spend most of my day seated in front of a computer, writing, conducting literature searches for manuscripts and grant applications, designing online surveys, and analyzing data.  Even my leisure time activity is spent in front of a computer or similar device (like a personal music player or ebook reader - notice my avoidance of brand/product names :D).  Furthermore, computer advertisements, which focus on this issue of identity, are a reflection of the design of the product itself.  The "Mac" from the commercial spends a lot of time on "creating things" - photos, videos, music - and many of the products that come standard on a Mac are also focused on "creating things".  Additionally, the "Mac"-guy is technically saavy in the sense that he is comfortable with using technology, but more in the "I don't care HOW it works, just THAT it works" way.  That is, he wants technology that is intuitive and completely user friendly. 

The "PC"-guy is portrayed as more professional, with a business and productivity orientation.  It's true that Windows machines really shine in this application.  I've worked in many large organizations, all of them using networks of Windows computers.  Could you have a large organization with all Mac users?  Probably.  But I've yet to see it myself.  While recent Windows advertising has focused on the "creative" side of Windows, this operating system and its accompanying software is still designed with this application in mind.

Of course, the landscape is changing.  In the past, having a Mac meant limits in compatible software, and this was the case for many of the programs I use as part of my job until very recently.  Now that software companies are increasing availability of their popular titles for both Windows and Mac, people will no longer have to feel married to a particular operating system.  Does that mean this identity division will go away?  I think not.  If anything, this might make advertising more likely to highlight the different identities.  If two products are very similar, how can you get people to commit to one over the other?  One way is by appealing to their sense of self.

So which am I?  In my opinion, each has its own benefits and drawbacks.  I have no issue with continuing to use my Windows machine at work.  I have to admit, though, every time I start up my work computer, and wait... and wait... and wait for the login screen before I wait... and wait... and wait for the desktop to load, I think of my MacBook Air and how much work I could have accomplished in that time.

Thoughtfully yours,
Sara