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| Source: Mind Hacks |
Tuesday, November 17, 2015
Monday, November 9, 2015
Facial Composites and the Power of Averages
I've previously blogged about facial asymmetry and attractiveness. Research in this area often works with facial composites - photos that combine facial elements of multiple faces - and found that composites are often viewed as more attractive. This is because composites average across various (often asymmetrical) features.
I saw this post on Facebook today and thought it made a nice follow-up to my post: composite faces using celebrities. Enjoy!
Still asymmetrically yours,
~Sara
I saw this post on Facebook today and thought it made a nice follow-up to my post: composite faces using celebrities. Enjoy!
Still asymmetrically yours,
~Sara
Sunday, November 8, 2015
The Importance of Scientific Literacy
The next presidential election is a little less than a year away, but we're already hearing from many presidential hopefuls, including a few we wish would go away. One who springs to mind is Ben Carson.
I've been accused of disliking Ben Carson because of his desire to do away with the Department of Veterans Affairs. (Check out a response from some of the major Veteran Service Organization here.)
But my bigger issue is that he has demonstrated a poor understanding of science multiple times. Such as when he said vaccines are important (and thankfully shooting down the autism and vaccines claim) but should be administered in smaller doses, and the ones that don't prevent death or disability should be discontinued (as Forbes asks, which ones are those? Because preventing death or disability is kind of what they're meant to do).
Or when he said the theory of evolution was "encouraged" by Satan.
Or that the pyramids are grain silos.
These are all issues that countless scientists, with years of formal education, have spent their careers studying. I'm certainly not saying we should trust them simply because they have years of formal education. That would be a little like believing anything Ben Carson says because he has an MD.
But, even though I'm not a virologist, or biologist, or archaeologist, I can examine what these experts have to say and come to my own conclusions about whether I think they're accurate based on the methods used in the research.
That's because of an important concept called scientific literacy:
Or how about this figure shown during a Congressional hearing about funding for Planned Parenthood, which highlights a related concept of numerical literacy (or numeracy)?
A figure that, based on the numbers associated with the two trend lines, should look more like this:
Or even a recent analysis of Southwestern Airlines's claim of having the lowest fares - read more at my friend David's blog here.
The big thing we can do is encourage a healthy level of skepticism. Obviously, continuing to provide strong science and math education is incredibly important when preparing children to become voting citizens. But simply getting people to think twice about any "scientific" claim they hear would be a step in the right direction.
~Scientifically yours,
Sara
I've been accused of disliking Ben Carson because of his desire to do away with the Department of Veterans Affairs. (Check out a response from some of the major Veteran Service Organization here.)
But my bigger issue is that he has demonstrated a poor understanding of science multiple times. Such as when he said vaccines are important (and thankfully shooting down the autism and vaccines claim) but should be administered in smaller doses, and the ones that don't prevent death or disability should be discontinued (as Forbes asks, which ones are those? Because preventing death or disability is kind of what they're meant to do).
Or when he said the theory of evolution was "encouraged" by Satan.
Or that the pyramids are grain silos.
These are all issues that countless scientists, with years of formal education, have spent their careers studying. I'm certainly not saying we should trust them simply because they have years of formal education. That would be a little like believing anything Ben Carson says because he has an MD.
But, even though I'm not a virologist, or biologist, or archaeologist, I can examine what these experts have to say and come to my own conclusions about whether I think they're accurate based on the methods used in the research.
That's because of an important concept called scientific literacy:
Scientific literacy is the knowledge and understanding of scientific concepts and processes required for personal decision making, participation in civic and cultural affairs, and economic productivity. It also includes specific types of abilities...
Scientific literacy means that a person can ask, find, or determine answers to questions derived from curiosity about everyday experiences. It means that a person has the ability to describe, explain, and predict natural phenomena. Scientific literacy entails being able to read with understanding articles about science in the popular press and to engage in social conversation about the validity of the conclusions. Scientific literacy implies that a person can identify scientific issues underlying national and local decisions and express positions that are scientifically and technologically informed. A literate citizen should be able to evaluate the quality of scientific information on the basis of its source and the methods used to generate it. Scientific literacy also implies the capacity to pose and evaluate arguments based on evidence and to apply conclusions from such arguments appropriately. (from the National Science Education Standards)As the quote above says, you're constantly bombarded with claims in the popular media. Such as the recent story about how eating bacon increases your risk of colon cancer by 18%. But an examination of this research shows two things: 1) they found this increased risk among people who eat about 2 strips of bacon every day, and 2) the absolute risk of colon cancer without eating bacon at that level is about 5%, and with that level of consumption is about 6% (more here). In fact, this story had a great outcome. People heard the claim, were skeptical, and looked into it.
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| More here |
The big thing we can do is encourage a healthy level of skepticism. Obviously, continuing to provide strong science and math education is incredibly important when preparing children to become voting citizens. But simply getting people to think twice about any "scientific" claim they hear would be a step in the right direction.
~Scientifically yours,
Sara
Monday, October 19, 2015
The Importance of Context, Confirmation Biases, and the Fundamental Attribution Error
Recently, a photo of a group of young women taking selfies at a ball game went viral. Not only did this become an online joke, it was used by some as more evidence of the younger generation as self-absorbed and vain.
However, a recent post on medium.com provided some important context for this picture. I won't repeat everything from the post here - you should definitely check it out at the link above - but in short, the girls, and everyone else in the audience, were asked to take selfies. They were just participating. After the public shaming of these young women, they were offered free tickets as an apology, which they instead asked to be donated to an organization that supports victims of domestic violence.
So that picture above? That's what classy ladies who also know how to have fun look like.
Why were people so quick to believe that these young women were acting out of vanity, not participation? One potential reason is because it confirms a stereotype we have about young people. This phenomenon is aptly called "confirmation bias" - we look for, and remember, evidence that confirms our expectations, and ignore or forget information that disconfirms our expectations. This is one reason that anecdotes are not useful evidence if you're trying to get at the truth of a phenomenon. You might be able to remember, for example, 20 times you observed women drive poorly, but fail to remember the 20 times you observed men drive poorly. (And as I've blogged before, memory can be very biased.)
Another reason, which could occur in concert with confirmation bias, is the fundamental attribution error (or FAE, because damn, is that a really long name). FAE is based on in-group-out-group theories; our in-group is made up of people like ourselves and our out-group is made up of everyone else. How we define that group at a given moment depends on context - it could be gender, race, age group, education level - and research suggests that we begin grouping people as "like us" and "unlike us" based on some pretty arbitrary information: what team you were randomly assigned to, whether someone picked the same painting from two options, etc.
For those who love learning psychological terms toimpress your friends expand your knowledge, we call this latter concept the "minimal group paradigm."
FAE basically states that we look for evidence to confirm that people in our in-group are good, and unlike people in our out-group. If we observe someone in our in-group doing something positive, we attribute that to their personality - they're just good people. If we observe someone in our in-group doing something negative, we attribute that to the situation - something made them do that.
And we do the opposite with people in our out-group. When they do something positive, we attribute it to the situation, and when we observe them do something negative, we attribute it to their personality.
When we saw these young women taking selfies at the ball game, many of us attributed it to their personalities - they're vain. No one stopped to consider that maybe there was a situational explanation. Then medium.com came along and demonstrated that there was a situational explanation. And we allfelt like assholes said, "if I'd known that information when I saw the picture, I wouldn't have been so quick to judge." Because we're good people. It was the situation. (See how pervasive the FAE is? Hey, I have a PhD in social psychology and I did the same thing.)
Contextually yours,
~Sara
However, a recent post on medium.com provided some important context for this picture. I won't repeat everything from the post here - you should definitely check it out at the link above - but in short, the girls, and everyone else in the audience, were asked to take selfies. They were just participating. After the public shaming of these young women, they were offered free tickets as an apology, which they instead asked to be donated to an organization that supports victims of domestic violence.
So that picture above? That's what classy ladies who also know how to have fun look like.
Why were people so quick to believe that these young women were acting out of vanity, not participation? One potential reason is because it confirms a stereotype we have about young people. This phenomenon is aptly called "confirmation bias" - we look for, and remember, evidence that confirms our expectations, and ignore or forget information that disconfirms our expectations. This is one reason that anecdotes are not useful evidence if you're trying to get at the truth of a phenomenon. You might be able to remember, for example, 20 times you observed women drive poorly, but fail to remember the 20 times you observed men drive poorly. (And as I've blogged before, memory can be very biased.)
Another reason, which could occur in concert with confirmation bias, is the fundamental attribution error (or FAE, because damn, is that a really long name). FAE is based on in-group-out-group theories; our in-group is made up of people like ourselves and our out-group is made up of everyone else. How we define that group at a given moment depends on context - it could be gender, race, age group, education level - and research suggests that we begin grouping people as "like us" and "unlike us" based on some pretty arbitrary information: what team you were randomly assigned to, whether someone picked the same painting from two options, etc.
For those who love learning psychological terms to
FAE basically states that we look for evidence to confirm that people in our in-group are good, and unlike people in our out-group. If we observe someone in our in-group doing something positive, we attribute that to their personality - they're just good people. If we observe someone in our in-group doing something negative, we attribute that to the situation - something made them do that.
And we do the opposite with people in our out-group. When they do something positive, we attribute it to the situation, and when we observe them do something negative, we attribute it to their personality.
When we saw these young women taking selfies at the ball game, many of us attributed it to their personalities - they're vain. No one stopped to consider that maybe there was a situational explanation. Then medium.com came along and demonstrated that there was a situational explanation. And we all
Contextually yours,
~Sara
Wednesday, October 7, 2015
Totally Superfluous Movie Review: The Craft
Because it’s October, and because I was talking about this movie with friends recently, I decided to watch The Craft again tonight.
I’ve seen this movie many times – it spawned a generation of young women fascinated with the occult, and has a great soundtrack, including a great cover of “Dangerous Type” by one of my favorite bands, Letters to Cleo.
The thing that struck me about this movie upon watching it again tonight is the underlying theme of belonging. On its surface, the theme seems to be about control – fascination with magic and other supernatural forces stems, at least in part, from a desire to feel in control of the world around us. With magic, we can punish the people who hurt us, make our crush love us, and change our situation, all things that happen in the movie.
But the deeper issue is the need to belong, something we all experience, but is often the focus of our lives as children and teenagers. Sarah (Robin Tunney) first befriends Nancy (Fairuza Balk), Bonnie (Neve Campbell), and Rochelle (Rachel True) because she is a new student and has no friends in a new town. She also meets Chris and falls for him, but is devastated when he rejects her and spreads nasty rumors about her. Her focus then becomes getting Chris to accept (love) her.
Bonnie wants to get rid of her scars, so she can feel normal. Rochelle is stifled socially and on her swim team because of a hateful bully (played by the ever-awesome Christine Taylor, who can pull off everything from plucky love interest to racist bully), and wants to make the bullying stop. Finally, Nancy wishes to escape poverty and an abusive stepfather, because even though she claims she doesn’t care what others think of her, she does (including Chris).
Of course, in trying to belong and feel accepted, they become the monsters they fought so hard against. This is a common theme in horror movies (look for a blog post on that later!). Sarah realizes first that they’ve taken things way too far, unfortunately a little too late to help Chris. When she tries to stop Nancy, Bonnie, and Rochelle from hurting people, they lash out at her. Only through being accepted by (and accepting) Lirio is Sarah able to make things right - or perhaps more symbolically, only through Sarah accepting herself is she able to find the strength to make things right.
If you’re looking for education on Pagan religions, obviously this is not the place to look. Probably one of the most common misconceptions of these religions is that the purpose is to do magic. But the Pagans were farmers, and their religion and ceremonies were built around the harvest and nature. Magic was considered one of many natural forces they sought to understand and, when possible, control.
But if you’re looking for an allegory of adolescence, and the price of belonging (at least in certain ways), check out The Craft!
Craftily yours,
~Sara
I’ve seen this movie many times – it spawned a generation of young women fascinated with the occult, and has a great soundtrack, including a great cover of “Dangerous Type” by one of my favorite bands, Letters to Cleo.
The thing that struck me about this movie upon watching it again tonight is the underlying theme of belonging. On its surface, the theme seems to be about control – fascination with magic and other supernatural forces stems, at least in part, from a desire to feel in control of the world around us. With magic, we can punish the people who hurt us, make our crush love us, and change our situation, all things that happen in the movie.
But the deeper issue is the need to belong, something we all experience, but is often the focus of our lives as children and teenagers. Sarah (Robin Tunney) first befriends Nancy (Fairuza Balk), Bonnie (Neve Campbell), and Rochelle (Rachel True) because she is a new student and has no friends in a new town. She also meets Chris and falls for him, but is devastated when he rejects her and spreads nasty rumors about her. Her focus then becomes getting Chris to accept (love) her.
Bonnie wants to get rid of her scars, so she can feel normal. Rochelle is stifled socially and on her swim team because of a hateful bully (played by the ever-awesome Christine Taylor, who can pull off everything from plucky love interest to racist bully), and wants to make the bullying stop. Finally, Nancy wishes to escape poverty and an abusive stepfather, because even though she claims she doesn’t care what others think of her, she does (including Chris).
Of course, in trying to belong and feel accepted, they become the monsters they fought so hard against. This is a common theme in horror movies (look for a blog post on that later!). Sarah realizes first that they’ve taken things way too far, unfortunately a little too late to help Chris. When she tries to stop Nancy, Bonnie, and Rochelle from hurting people, they lash out at her. Only through being accepted by (and accepting) Lirio is Sarah able to make things right - or perhaps more symbolically, only through Sarah accepting herself is she able to find the strength to make things right.
If you’re looking for education on Pagan religions, obviously this is not the place to look. Probably one of the most common misconceptions of these religions is that the purpose is to do magic. But the Pagans were farmers, and their religion and ceremonies were built around the harvest and nature. Magic was considered one of many natural forces they sought to understand and, when possible, control.
But if you’re looking for an allegory of adolescence, and the price of belonging (at least in certain ways), check out The Craft!
Craftily yours,
~Sara
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
Totally Superfluous Movie Review: The Taking of Deborah Logan
Last year, during my horror movie binge, I watched a newish movie on Netflix, "The Taking of Deborah Logan." The movie had an interesting premise: a elderly woman with Alzheimer's becomes the subject of a young student's film project, but there is reason to believe that she is experiencing something far worse.
In fact, the poster immediately sets the stage that something very bad is going to happen... or has already happened.
The movie tries to make itself look like a documentary, similar to the Blair Witch Project. The group of filmmakers film themselves and behind the scenes because, well, they're filmmakers. They like cameras. Of course, it's obvious early on that the movie is fictional:
One, because of a recognizable actress in the role of Deborah's daughter.
Two, because the poster highlights the producers' other, fictional movies.
And three, because just like in Blair Witch, you reach a point where you begin to wonder why the characters continue to film or hold the camera, rather than drop and run, or at least put it down to argue with each other. The level of commitment to recording every moment is not completely believable, no matter how devoted the filmmakers are to their craft.
The movie packs lots of creepy scenes and a few legitimate scares. The movie is well-paced, well-acted, and at times, truly terrifying. That's why it pains me to say I really didn't like it.
Or rather, the psychologist in me, with an awareness of the history of treatment of mental and neurological illness, didn't like it. I'm probably not giving away a huge spoiler when I say that Deborah is possessed by something evil. In fact, this becomes a suspicion very early on with some strong evidence to support it. The evidence simply gets stronger and scarier as the movie goes on.
For centuries, people with mental and neurological illnesses were accused of being possessed. They were exorcised, treated cruelly, and had holes drilled in their heads to "let the evil spirits out." Some with an awareness of what was happening to them may even have come to believe they were possessed. Though modern medicine has certainly moved past this point to recognize legitimate illness, there are still somenutjobs people who believe that illness is demonic possession. And even among people with more modern understanding of illness, many conditions are still treated as unimportant or something to be ashamed of.
This is why it really bothered me that this movie seemed to dismiss that history for cheap scares. I'm sure the filmmakers did not intend to suggest mental and neurological illnesses aren't "real." But there are many people who fail to learn from history - some are doomed to repeat it, some are doomed to make thoughtless mistakes that appear malicious. An extreme, recent example:
Overall, I'm afraid I can't give The Taking of Deborah Logan high marks, or a recommendation to my fellow horror movie lovers. There are many things to like about the movie. But the psychologist in me just can't get past this issue.
Thoughtfully yours,
~Sara
In fact, the poster immediately sets the stage that something very bad is going to happen... or has already happened.
The movie tries to make itself look like a documentary, similar to the Blair Witch Project. The group of filmmakers film themselves and behind the scenes because, well, they're filmmakers. They like cameras. Of course, it's obvious early on that the movie is fictional:
One, because of a recognizable actress in the role of Deborah's daughter.
Two, because the poster highlights the producers' other, fictional movies.
And three, because just like in Blair Witch, you reach a point where you begin to wonder why the characters continue to film or hold the camera, rather than drop and run, or at least put it down to argue with each other. The level of commitment to recording every moment is not completely believable, no matter how devoted the filmmakers are to their craft.
The movie packs lots of creepy scenes and a few legitimate scares. The movie is well-paced, well-acted, and at times, truly terrifying. That's why it pains me to say I really didn't like it.
Or rather, the psychologist in me, with an awareness of the history of treatment of mental and neurological illness, didn't like it. I'm probably not giving away a huge spoiler when I say that Deborah is possessed by something evil. In fact, this becomes a suspicion very early on with some strong evidence to support it. The evidence simply gets stronger and scarier as the movie goes on.
For centuries, people with mental and neurological illnesses were accused of being possessed. They were exorcised, treated cruelly, and had holes drilled in their heads to "let the evil spirits out." Some with an awareness of what was happening to them may even have come to believe they were possessed. Though modern medicine has certainly moved past this point to recognize legitimate illness, there are still some
This is why it really bothered me that this movie seemed to dismiss that history for cheap scares. I'm sure the filmmakers did not intend to suggest mental and neurological illnesses aren't "real." But there are many people who fail to learn from history - some are doomed to repeat it, some are doomed to make thoughtless mistakes that appear malicious. An extreme, recent example:
Overall, I'm afraid I can't give The Taking of Deborah Logan high marks, or a recommendation to my fellow horror movie lovers. There are many things to like about the movie. But the psychologist in me just can't get past this issue.
Thoughtfully yours,
~Sara
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
The Comfort of Home, The Thrill of the Unknown
I've gotten out of the habit of blogging regularly once again. I recently went out of town for work, and came back to have a lot of catching up to do on various work tasks. Though I loved the trip and had a great time, by the end, I was thrilled to be back home.
I started thinking about this interesting juxtaposition - how people can love traveling and seeing new places but also love the comfort of the familiar. And what I think it comes down to, at least in part, is cognitive resources.
Social psychologists Susan Fiske and Shelley Taylor postulated that people are cognitive misers; they are thrifty with their cognitive resources, and avoid using them if they can coast through a situation on mental autopilot.
I started thinking about this interesting juxtaposition - how people can love traveling and seeing new places but also love the comfort of the familiar. And what I think it comes down to, at least in part, is cognitive resources.
Social psychologists Susan Fiske and Shelley Taylor postulated that people are cognitive misers; they are thrifty with their cognitive resources, and avoid using them if they can coast through a situation on mental autopilot.
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This is certainly true, but I think there's a little more to it. We're cognitive neophiliacs; new things get our attention and encourage us to use some of our cognitive resources, to a point. But when new situations become overwhelming or threaten to use more resources than we have or are willing to give, we tune out. Things that are familiar take little to no mental energy, which is why they could be comforting at some times and stifling at others.
In fact, exerting mental energy depends on two things: ability, a trait, and motivation, a state. Some people begin with higher ability than others, but if motivation is low, it might be difficult to tell the difference. Further, some people have a high motivation to use mental resources - we refer to them as being high in "need for cognition." They tend to also have high ability, and are the true cognitive neophiliacs. They love thinking through situations and ideas, and thrive on learning new things. But even people with low need for cognition are willing and able to use mental resources at some point in time.
When you travel somewhere new, you're bombarded with new sights and sounds, maybe even a different language than you're used to hearing. You have to learn new paths to take to get where you're going, because your cognitive maps aren't very useful in a new location. And I'm not just talking about navigating to attractions, since many people use GPS or maps to get there, but even the simple act of waking up in the morning and getting ready requires a mental map that differs from your usual routine. If you're able and motivated, you will likely thrive in this new situation.
But mental resources are limited, and we all reach a point where we have no more left to give. It just takes some people longer to get there than others. It's at this point that we are attracted to the familiar, where we can once again rely on our mental autopilot (good old Otto).
I've been home for almost a week, and honestly, I'm starting to get the travel bug again. But it's nice to return to familiar sights, sounds, and people. So instead, I'm thinking of directing my replenished cognitive resources toward learning something new and improving in my daily activities. Hopefully there will be another trip in my near future, though.
Cognitively yours,
~Sara
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