��Ī - behaviour

��Ī Festival Speaker Spotlight: Professor Paul Bays

zs332 — Tue, 11 Mar 2025 13:24:10 +0000

Paul Bays is a Professor of Computation and Cognition in the Department of Psychology at the ��Ī. He investigates the nature of the internal representations our brains construct and sustain to interact with the world and the computations performed on them to achieve behavioural goals.

One term of empathy training measurably improved classroom behaviour

tdk25 — Wed, 28 Aug 2024 07:33:11 +0000

An analysis of a short programme teaching empathy in schools has found it had a positive impact on students’ behaviour and increased their emotional literacy within 10 weeks.

The findings come from an evaluation of the 'Empathy Programme': a term-long course developed by the UK-based Empathy Studios. The research was conducted with support from academics at the Faculty of Education, ��Ī.

Empathy Studios develops school-based, video-led programmes which aim to increase empathy in students aged 5 to 18. Students are shown thought-provoking films, then engage in approximately 30 minutes of activities and discussions about the issues raised. An annual flagship festival of films, resources and events, 'Empathy Week', is made available for free and has to date reached 1.3 million students worldwide.

Survey and interview data from 900 students and teachers at 10 participating schools in 6 countries, including the UK, revealed measurable, positive changes in students’ conduct, emotional awareness and curiosity about different cultures and the wider world.

Teachers rated students’ empathy, behaviour and other characteristics on a scale of one to 10 before the programme began, and 5 and 10 weeks later. The average empathy score rose from 5.55 to 7, while average behaviour scores increased from 6.52 to 7.89.

In follow-up interviews, one primary school teacher reflected: “I’ve definitely been able to resolve more issues within the classroom and not have parents called in.” A student told the interviewers: “I think that everyone in the class has become kinder.”

Empathy Studios defines empathy as: “the skill to understand others and the ability to create space for someone to reveal their authentic self while reserving judgement.” The company was founded 4 years ago by Ed Kirwan, a former science teacher from North London.

“The programme’s success lies in teaching students to celebrate difference, which changes their wellbeing and behaviour,” he said. “There’s never an excuse for poor behaviour, but often a reason, which greater mutual understanding can potentially address.”

“I think the social unrest we have seen in Britain this summer shows how urgently we need more empathy across society. It won’t solve everything, but it is the foundation for solutions, and it starts with education. If the new government is serious about curriculum reforms that prepare young people for life and work, we must ensure that school equips them to understand, be curious about, and listen to each other, even in moments of disagreement.”

The evaluation was supported by Dr Helen Demetriou, a specialist in empathy education at the ��Ī, who helped to design the research, and to collect, quality assure and interpret the data.

“The findings show that a fairly simple, film-based programme can raise pupils’ empathy levels, enhancing their understanding of themselves, others, and global issues,” she said. “That supports a more complete learning experience, developing social and emotional skills that we know contribute to improved behaviour and more engaged learning.”

Although it is often considered innate, evidence suggests that empathy can be taught. A 2021 study co-authored by Demetriou successfully trialled teaching empathy during design and technology lessons. More recently, researchers at the University of Virginia found that empathy between parents and children is 'paid forward' by the children to friends and, later, when they become parents themselves.

Empathy has been linked to better leadership and inclusion in workplaces; while a 2023 World Economic Forum White Paper highlighted the importance of socio-emotional skills to the future of work and argued for more education that emphasises interpersonal skills, including empathy.

Empathy Studios offers schools assembly and lesson plans built around films about the real-life stories of diverse people in other parts of the world. Its 2024/5 programme, for example, profiles 5 individuals from Mexico, including a Paralympian, a dancer, and a women’s rights activist.

Their framework focuses on 3 core concepts: 'Empathy for Myself', which develops students’ emotional literacy; 'Empathy for Others', which covers mutual understanding and interpersonal relations, and 'Empathy in Action', during which the students develop their own social action projects.

The new research builds on a 2022 pilot study with the ��Ī, which suggested that the programme makes students more responsive to each others’ feelings and improves self-esteem. The new evaluation involved over 900 students and 30 teachers, and took place during 2023.

The teacher surveys indicated that behaviour had improved by up to 10% in some schools, especially those new to empathy lessons. The average improvement in behaviour recorded by UK teachers corresponded to the overall trend, rising from 6.3/10 pre-programme to 7.7/10 post-programme. Empathy and behaviour also appeared to be closely linked: all schools reporting an overall improvement in student empathy also saw improvements in behaviour after 5 weeks, which was sustained in 80% of cases after 10.

The evaluation recorded small improvements in students’ overall emotional literacy and their 'affective empathy'; or their ability to share the feelings of others. A change that emerged strongly from interviews with teachers was that the Empathy Programme appeared to increase students’ interest in other cultures. In one primary school, for example, the proportion of students responding positively to the statement “I want to find out more about the world” rose from 86% to 96% after 10 weeks. This echoes Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) evidence linking empathy to civic engagement.

Many students said they had learned valuable lessons from the programme. Their reflections included: “Everyone struggles… I’m not the only one who finds it hard”, and “Although we are all different, we all have so much in common”.

“Empathy is the number one human skill we need to develop for the future,” Kirwan said. “It should not just be an add-on; it should be considered foundational.”

Further information is available from: www.empathystudios.com.

A study involving 900 students in 6 countries found that a short programme of empathy lessons led to measurable, positive changes in their conduct, emotional awareness and curiosity about different cultures.

Empathy Studios

Empathy lessons at Kingsmead School, Enfield, UK

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Yes

Limited resources leave school leaders with few options to manage poor behaviour

tdk25 — Wed, 07 Jun 2023 15:22:36 +0000

The findings are from a qualitative study which investigated why more school leaders are not exploring alternative approaches to behaviour management. It argues that resource limitations and other concerns have left teachers feeling trapped within the prevailing system of mounting punishments. Under this, more than a thousand students are excluded, and almost 150,000 suspended, every year.

Educators interviewed for the study often acknowledged the potential benefits of alternative methods, but believed they had little choice but to follow the established orthodoxy. The most common reasons included cost, resource constraints, parental perception, and lack of time.

Most schools in England follow a 'behaviourist' approach to student discipline, reinforcing positive behaviour and implementing escalating sanctions for repeated misconduct. Initially, students may receive a verbal warning for poor behaviour, followed by mid-level punishments like detention. Those who persist eventually face suspension and ultimately may be excluded from mainstream education.

The approach seems effective with many students, but there are concerns that it is still failing a significant minority. Government data have, for many years, consistently shown that persistent, disruptive behaviour is the main reason for suspensions or exclusions from school. The latest available figures suggest that about 1,500 students are excluded, and 148,000 suspended, each year for this reason.

The study was conducted by Dr Laura Oxley, now at the Faculty of Education, ��Ī, drawing on research she undertook while at the University of York. The newly-published element documents very in-depth interviews with a small group of 14 school leaders in England using a method called Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. This was just part of the full study, which also surveyed 84 behaviour referral units in England and involved interviews with teachers in other education systems with different approaches to discipline.

Given the scale of the research, the findings should be interpreted cautiously. They do, however, highlight a possible cycle shaping behaviour management policy in England. Specifically, political and resource constraints limit schools’ capacity to experiment with alternative approaches, resulting in scarce evidence for their efficacy. This reinforces the view that the existing model is the only option.

Prior to her academic career Oxley worked with children who were at risk of exclusion from school, their families, and senior school leaders to support schools to provide appropriate educational provision for children who exhibited persistent misconduct. She held roles as an Exclusions and Reintegration Officer in East Yorkshire, and as an Education Inclusion Officer in ��Īshire.

“This is not a call to scrap the existing system, but to consider ways to enhance it,” she said. “For significant numbers of children, the current approach isn’t working.”

“Fundamentally, if a child persists with the same behaviour despite multiple punishments, it’s unlikely that they don’t comprehend the consequences. In those situations, instead of escalating the punishment, we should be asking why we aren’t trying something else? Unfortunately, even if school leaders have the motivation to try a different approach, they often feel that they have little choice. This means the same, standardised approach often prevails, even though it doesn’t suit every child.”

Widely-cited alternative behaviour management techniques include ‘restorative practice’ (RP) and ‘collaborative and proactive solutions’ (CPS). RP focuses on rebuilding positive relationships between students, or students and teachers, after breakdowns occur. CPS involves identifying the triggers behind persistent misbehaviour and addressing them collaboratively.

While neither method suits every situation, trials have yielded encouraging results. A 2019 study, for example, found that RP improved behaviour and reduced bullying. Although these approaches are already used by some schools in England, neither is currently used widely.

In Oxley’s study, school leaders identified cost, time and resource constraints as barriers to these alternatives, as they tend to be labour-intensive and require a thorough culture change. Most feared that they would place an intolerable extra burden on already overstretched staff. Issuing sanctions was seen as more efficient. Even providing space for private discussions with challenging students was sometimes considered unfeasible. One teacher explained: “We don’t have the staffing or capabilities for that”.

Some school leaders were concerned that teachers might perceive restorative approaches as a challenge to their authority in the classroom. There is evidence that training can change teachers' perspectives on handling challenging students, fostering a deeper understanding of the psychological context. Again, however, limited time and resources pose barriers to this, the study suggests.

Participants also expressed unease about parental reactions to alternative approaches. One school leader told Oxley: “A lot of pupils would tell you that it’s harder to do a restorative meeting than it is to miss your break time. It’s more difficult to get the message across to parents.” Some cited cases where heads had been “held to ransom” by parents demanding the exclusion of so-called “problem” pupils.

Oxley suggests these pressures have fostered a culture of risk aversion in schools, impeding potential reforms. “We need to give teachers and parents opportunities to understand the alternatives available,” she said. “The fact that researchers know methods like RP could work in situations where the current approach is not promoting behaviour change is irrelevant if teachers don’t share that confidence.”

The study highlights insufficient promotion of alternative methods in current Government guidance, which prioritises the sanctions-based approach. It emphasises, however, that providing adequate funding and time to enhance teachers’ and parents’ understanding of collaborative and restorative behaviour management techniques is essential to cultivating a “desire for change”.

“At the moment, alternative approaches are often dismissed as unrealistic,” Oxley said. “This stems from a lack of large-scale evidence due to limited opportunities to explore them in schools. Education researchers must address that by studying real experiences in schools, moving beyond limited trials. This will empower more school leaders to see restorative practice and other methods as valuable and viable, generating momentum for change.”

The findings are reported in the Psychology of Education Review.

School leaders in England feel compelled to continue using a system of escalating punitive measures to manage student behaviour, even though they recognise it fails some pupils, new research suggests.

This is not a call to scrap the existing system, but to consider ways to enhance it

Laura Oxley

Getty images

Boy in school corridor

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Yes

Rewarding accuracy instead of partisan pandering reduces political divisions over the truth

fpjl2 — Mon, 06 Mar 2023 16:17:56 +0000

Offering a tiny cash reward for accuracy, or even briefly appealing to personal integrity, can increase people’s ability to tell the difference between misinformation and the truth, according to a new study.

The findings suggest that fake news thrives on social media not only because people are tricked into believing it, but also due to a motivational imbalance: users have more incentive to get clicks and likes than to spread accurate content.

Social psychologists from the ��Ī and New York University argue that their study, published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, highlights the “perverse incentives” driving shares on social media – particularly in “divisive political climates” such as the United States.

They say the psychological pull of pandering to one’s own “in-group” by attacking the other side of a social and political divide is a significant – and often neglected – factor for why so many believe and choose to spread misinformation, or disbelieve accurate news.

The study involved four experiments with a total of over 3,300 people from the United States, with equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans. The researchers offered half of participants up to one US dollar if they correctly pointed out true or false headlines, and compared the results to those offered no incentive.

This tiny sum was enough to make people 31% better at discerning true from fake news. The best results came when participants were asked to identify accurate news that benefited the opposing political party.

In fact, the financial incentive reduced partisan division between Republican and Democrat over the truthfulness of news by around 30%. The majority of this shift occurred on the Republican side.

For example, the offer of up to a dollar made Republicans 49% more likely to report that the accurate Associated Press headline ‘Facebook removes Trump ads with symbols once used by Nazis’ was indeed true. A dollar made Democrats 20% more likely to report the Reuters headline 'Plant a trillion trees: U.S. Republicans offer fossil-fuel friendly climate fix' as accurate.

However, in another experiment, researchers inverted the set-up to “mirror the social media environment” by paying participants to identify the headlines likely to get the best reception from members of the same political party. The ability to spot misinformation reduced by 16%.

“This is not just about ignorance of facts among the public. It is about a social media business model that rewards the spread of divisive content regardless of accuracy,” said lead author Dr Steve Rathje, who conducted the work while he was a Gates ��Ī Scholar.

“By motivating people to be accurate instead of appealing to those in the same political group, we found greater levels of agreement between Republicans and Democrats about what is actually true.”

Previous research by the same team has shown that attacking political rivals is one of the most effective ways to go viral on Twitter and Facebook.

“Shifting the motivations to post on social media could help rebuild some of the shared reality lost to political polarisation in many nations, including the United States,” said senior author Prof Sander van der Linden, director of the ��Ī’s Social Decision-Making Lab.

In one of the study’s experiments, half the participants were simply exposed to a short piece of text reminding them that people value truth, and falsehoods can hurt reputations. They were also told they would receive feedback on accuracy rates.

While this did not have the same effect as a small pay out, it still increased the perceived accuracy of true but politically inconvenient news by 25% compared to a control group.

“A short piece of text nudging users to consider the social value of truth could be deployed at scale by social media corporations,” said van der Linden.

Jay Van Bavel, Professor of Psychology at New York University and co-author of the study, said: “It is not possible to pay everyone on the internet to share more accurate information. However, we can change aspects of social media platform design to help motivate people to share content they know to be accurate.”

Providing incentives improved the accuracy of news judgements across the political spectrum, but had a much stronger effect on Republican voters.

The team point to previous research showing that Republicans tend to believe in and share more misinformation than Democrats. In the latest study, payment incentives brought Republicans far closer to the accuracy levels of Democrats – shrinking the political divide.

“Recent lawsuits have revealed that Fox News hosts shared false claims about ‘stolen’ elections to retain viewers, despite privately disavowing these conspiracy theories. Republican media ecosystems have proved more willing to harness misinformation for profit in recent years,” said Van der Linden, author of the new book Foolproof: why we fall for misinformation and how to build immunity.

Researchers argue that the findings hold lessons for social media companies and the “perverse incentives” driving political polarisation online.

Shifting the motivations to post on social media could help rebuild some of the shared reality lost to political polarisation

Sander van der Linden

The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©��Ī and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – as here, on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Study reveals ‘drastic changes’ to daily routines during UK lockdowns

fpjl2 — Wed, 03 Nov 2021 17:51:02 +0000

This is according to a new study of “time-use diaries” kept by 766 UK citizens from across the social spectrum during three points in time: the last month of normality, the first lockdown, and the last lockdown in March of this year.

Economists from the ��Ī and Queen Mary University of London collected data that charted time spent on activities during both typical work and nonwork days to map changes to the rhythm of life for millions.

The study, published today in the journal PLOS ONE, found marked differences between genders, particularly parents of young children, and that increases in odd working hours and downtime spent alone were detrimental to wellbeing.

“The lockdowns resulted in drastic changes to patterns of time use, disrupting routines and blurring the distinction between work and family life,” said co-author Dr Ines Lee from ��Ī’s Faculty of Economics.

“We have hopefully seen the end of lockdowns, but our study holds lessons for hybrid working, as splitting time between home and office becomes more common.”

“Employers should promote better work-life balance in the post-pandemic world. This could include limits on emails outside working hours, home-working schedules that suit parents, and options for younger workers left isolated by reduced in-person networking,” said Lee.

The researchers looked at amounts of time each individual spent on activities in four broad categories: employment (excluding commutes); “housework” (from shopping to childcare); leisure (e.g. hobbies or home entertainment); subsistence (meals, sleeping, personal care).

While previous studies have focused on the initial lockdown, this is one of the first to examine the effects of repeated COVID-19 containment measures on our lives and routines.

Before Covid arrived, 86% of the sample was employed, but this fell to 63% in the first lockdown and 74% in the third. Mothers of young children were significantly less likely to be employed than fathers by the third lockdown.

For those employed before and during lockdowns, people with at least one young child spent an average of 43 fewer minutes a day on their paid job in the first lockdown, and 32 fewer minutes in the third, compared to pre-pandemic.

For those without young children it was an average decrease of 28 minutes and 22 minutes a day on paid work respectively.

Women with young children spent around an hour less on paid work a day than men and women without young children. This was mainly a reduction in time spent on actual work tasks rather than, for example, meetings.

During the first lockdown, the average time women spent on housework increased by 28 minutes a day, while for men the average time spent on subsistence activities (e.g. sleeping and eating) increased by 30 minutes. By 2021 these changes had evened out.

Life with small children during this year’s lockdown meant an extra hour of housework a day over pre-pandemic levels. Mothers of young kids did 67 more minutes of housework a day than fathers. Only women saw an increase in cooking and cleaning (time spent on caring duties was spread across genders).

The study suggests that parents often forfeited leisure time. Living with young kids was associated with a drop in leisure activities of almost an hour a day in both lockdowns – and income levels made no difference to this loss of downtime.

For those without young kids, leisure time increased – but much of it was spent alone. By the third lockdown, people with no small children had around an extra hour of solitary leisure time a day over pre-pandemic levels.

However, in terms of quality – the self-reported “enjoyment” of given activities – this solo leisure time felt less pleasurable during the last lockdown than it had prior to the pandemic.

The third lockdown also saw around 20% of individuals spend more time working unusual hours (outside 0830-1730) compared to the pre-pandemic period, which reduced the reported enjoyment of their day overall.

Those earning £5k a month or more, worked almost two extra hours a day than people earning less than £1k a month by the last lockdown. High earners also spent less time on subsistence activities during both lockdowns.

Overall, the third lockdown felt a bit more miserable than the first, according to the research.

While there was little change in the enjoyment of various activities in the early days of Covid, with men even reporting slightly higher “quality” of time during lockdown one, by March of this year enjoyment of activities was around 5% lower than pre-pandemic levels across the board.

Dr Eileen Tipoe, co-author from Queen Mary University of London, said: “It is no surprise that having to do more work outside of typical working hours meant that people were substantially unhappier during the third lockdown.

“And it was concerning to find that women, and especially those with young children, were disproportionately affected by lockdown – for example being less likely to be employed and the fact that only women spent more time cooking and cleaning.”

Some spent an extra hour a day on chores and childcare during lockdowns, while others got an added daily hour of solo leisure time – and most of us reduced time spent on paid work by around half an hour a day.

The lockdowns resulted in drastic changes to patterns of time use, disrupting routines and blurring the distinction between work and family life

Ines Lee

Charles Deluvio via Unsplash

Child and mother during lockdown

Yes

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Attribution

Fake news ‘vaccine’: online game may ‘inoculate’ by simulating propaganda tactics

fpjl2 — Tue, 20 Feb 2018 00:06:35 +0000

A new online game puts players in the shoes of an aspiring propagandist to give the public a taste of the techniques and motivations behind the spread of disinformation – potentially “inoculating” them against the influence of so-called fake news in the process.

Researchers at the ��Ī have already shown that briefly exposing people to tactics used by fake news producers can act as a “psychological vaccine” against bogus anti-science campaigns.

While the previous study focused on disinformation about climate science, the new online game is an experiment in providing “general immunity” against the wide range of fake news that has infected public debate.

The game encourages players to stoke anger, mistrust and fear in the public by manipulating digital news and social media within the simulation.

Players build audiences for their fake news sites by publishing polarising falsehoods, deploying twitter bots, photo-shopping evidence, and inciting conspiracy theories in the wake of public tragedy – all while maintaining a “credibility score” to remain as persuasive as possible.

A pilot study conducted with teenagers in a Dutch high school used an early paper-and-pen trial of the game, and showed the perceived “reliability” of fake news to be diminished in those that played compared to a control group.

The research and education project, a collaboration between ��Ī researchers and Dutch media collective DROG, is launching an English version of the game online today at www.fakenewsgame.org.

The psychological theory behind the research is called “inoculation”:

“A biological vaccine administers a small dose of the disease to build immunity. Similarly, inoculation theory suggests that exposure to a weak or demystified version of an argument makes it easier to refute when confronted with more persuasive claims,” says Dr Sander van der Linden, Director of ��Ī University’s Social Decision-Making Lab.

“If you know what it is like to walk in the shoes of someone who is actively trying to deceive you, it should increase your ability to spot and resist the techniques of deceit. We want to help grow ‘mental antibodies’ that can provide some immunity against the rapid spread of misinformation.”

Based in part on existing studies of online propaganda, and taking cues from actual conspiracy theories about organisations such as the United Nations, the game is set to be translated for countries such as Ukraine, where disinformation casts a heavy shadow.

There are also plans to adapt the framework of the game for anti-radicalisation purposes, as many of the same manipulation techniques – using false information to provoke intense emotions, for example – are commonly deployed by recruiters for religious extremist groups.

“You don’t have to be a master spin doctor to create effective disinformation. Anyone can start a site and artificially amplify it through twitter bots, for example. But recognising and resisting fake news doesn’t require a PhD in media studies either,” says Jon Roozenbeek, a researcher from ��Ī’s Department of Slavonic Studies and one of the game’s designers.

“We aren’t trying to drastically change behavior, but instead trigger a simple thought process to help foster critical and informed news consumption.”

Roozenbeek points out that some efforts to combat fake news are seen as ideologically charged. “The framework of our game allows players to lean towards the left or right of the political spectrum. It’s the experience of misleading through news that counts,” he says.

The pilot study in the Netherlands using a paper version of the game involved 95 students with an average age of 16, randomly divided into treatment and control.

This version of the game focused on the refugee crisis, and all participants were randomly presented with fabricated news articles on the topic at the end of the experiment.

The treatment group were assigned roles – alarmist, denier, conspiracy theorist or clickbait monger – and tasked with distorting a government fact sheet on asylum seekers using a set of cards outlining common propaganda tactics consistent with their role.

They found fake news to be significantly less reliable than the control group, who had not produced their own fake article. Researchers describe the results of this small study as limited but promising. The study has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Risk Research.

The team are aiming to take their “fake news vaccine” trials to the next level with today’s launch of the online game.

With content written mostly by the ��Ī researchers along with Ruurd Oosterwoud, founder of DROG, the game only takes a few minutes to complete. The hope is that players will then share it to help create a large anonymous dataset of journeys through the game.

The researchers can then use this data to refine techniques for increasing media literacy and fake news resilience in a ‘post-truth’ world. “We try to let players experience what it is like to create a filter bubble so they are more likely to realise they may be living in one,” adds van der Linden.

A new experiment, launching today online, aims to help ‘inoculate’ against disinformation by providing a small dose of perspective from a “fake news tycoon”. A pilot study has shown some early success in building resistance to fake news among teenagers.

We try to let players experience what it is like to create a filter bubble so they are more likely to realise they may be living in one

Sander van der Linden

DROG

A screen shot of the Fake News Game on a smart phone.

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Yes

Conservationists’ eco-footprints suggest education alone won’t change behaviour

fpjl2 — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 10:12:28 +0000

Conservationists work to save the planet, and few are as knowledgeable when it comes to the environmental pressures of the Anthropocene.

However, the first wide-ranging study to compare the environmental footprint of conservationists to those of others – medics and economists, in this case – has found that, while conservationists behave in a marginally ‘greener’ manner, the differences are surprisingly modest.

Researchers say their findings add to increasing evidence that education and knowledge has little impact on individual behavior when it comes to major issues such as the environment and personal health.

Conservation scientists from the universities of ��Ī, UK, and Vermont, US, gathered data on a range of lifestyle choices – from bottled water use to air travel, meat consumption and family size – for 734 participants across the three groupings.

They found that fellow conservationists recycled more and ate less meat than either economists or medics, were similar to the other groups in how they travelled to work, but owned more cats and dogs.

The combined footprint score of the conservationists was roughly 16% less than that of economists, and 7% lower than the medics.

Nevertheless the average conservationist in the study’s sample took nine flights a year (half for work; half personal), ate meat or fish five times a week, and purchased very few offsets to their personal carbon emissions.

In fact, researchers found little correlation between the extent of environmental knowledge and environmentally-friendly behavior.

Moreover, greener action in one aspect of a person’s life did not predict it in any others – regardless of occupation. So a positive and relatively simple habit such as recycling did not appear to act as a “gateway” to more committed behaviour change.

The team suggest that overall improvements might be most effectively achieved through tailored interventions: targeting higher-impact behaviors such as meat consumption and flying through government regulation and by incentivising alternatives.

“While it may be hard to accept, we have to start acknowledging that increased education alone is perhaps not the panacea we would hope,” said lead author Andrew Balmford, Professor of Conservation Science at the ��Ī.

“Structural changes are key. For example, providing more affordable public transport, or removing subsidies for beef and lamb production. Just look at the effect of improved collection schemes on the uptake of recycling.

“The idea of ‘nudging’ – encouraging particular choices through changes in how cafes are laid out or travel tickets are sold, for instance – might have untapped potential to help us lower our footprint,” Balmford said.

“As conservationists we must do a great deal more to lead by example. Obvious starting points include changing the ways we interact, so that attending frequent international meetings is no longer regarded as essential to making scientific progress. For many of us flying is probably the largest contributor to our personal emissions.”

The study’s four authors offer their own mea culpa: pointing out that, between them, they have seven children, took 31 flights in 2016, and ate an average of two meat meals in the week before submitting their study – now published – to the journal Biological Conservation.

“I don’t think conservationists are hypocrites, I think that we are human – meaning that some decisions are rational, and others, we rationalise,” said study co-author Brendan Fisher from the University of Vermont’s Gund Institute for Environment and Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources.

“Our results show that conservationists pick and choose from a buffet of pro-environmental behaviours the same as everyone else. We might eat less meat and compost more, but we fly more – and many of us still commute significant distances in gas cars.”

For the study, researchers distributed surveys on environmental behavior through conservation, economics and biomedical organisations to targeted newsletters, mailing lists and social media groups.

Of the self-selecting respondents, there were 300 conservationists, 207 economists and 227 medics from across the UK and US.

The participants were also asked a series of factual questions on environmental issues – from atmospheric change to species extinction – and ways to most effectively lower carbon footprints.

“Interestingly, conservationists scored no better than economists on environmental knowledge and awareness of pro-environmental actions,” said Balmford.

Overall footprint scores were higher for males, US nationals, economists, and people with higher degrees and larger incomes, but were unrelated to environmental knowledge.

Fisher says the study supports the idea that ‘values’ are a key driver of behaviour. Across the professions, attaching a high value to the environment was consistently associated with a lower footprint: fewer personal flights and less food waste, for example.

“It doesn’t matter if you are a medic, economist, or conservationist, our study shows that one of the most significant drivers of your behaviour is how much you value the environment,” Fisher said.

“Economists who care about the environment behave as well as conservationists.”

A new study shows that even those presumably best informed on the environment find it hard to consistently “walk the walk”, prompting scientists to question whether relying solely on information campaigns will ever be enough.

While it may be hard to accept, we have to start acknowledging that increased education alone is perhaps not the panacea we would hope

Andrew Balmford

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Yes

Winner takes all: Success enhances taste for luxury goods, study suggests

sc604 — Tue, 19 Sep 2017 14:52:15 +0000

While we may sometimes make expensive purchases because of the high quality of a product, these items often represent status symbols, a phenomenon termed ‘conspicuous consumption’. Evolutionary psychologists claim that conspicuous consumption may be comparable to ostentatious behaviours or elaborate physical characteristics seen in the animal kingdom. A peacock’s tail may be energetically costly to build, but may serve as an indicator of genetic quality; similarly, conspicuous consumption may represent a costly display of wealth that serves to increase an individual’s social status.

Previous studies have suggested that testosterone plays a key role in human social status seeking, with elevated levels of the hormone being associated with more dominant and aggressive behaviour in men. It has also been suggested that testosterone levels increase in response to an individual winning a competition, and fall in response to losing.

In a study published today in the journal Scientific Reports, Yin Wu, at the time a PhD student at the ��Ī, in collaboration with researchers from London Business School, University of Oxford, and University of Vienna, led an investigation into the effects of social status and testosterone levels on conspicuous consumption. Dr Wu tested the effects of winning or losing a competitive version of the game Tetris on the behaviour and testosterone levels of 166 male volunteers – although in fact, while the participants thought they were competing against each other in two-player games, they were randomly assigned as winners or losers.

After playing the Tetris game, the researchers asked the participants how much they would be willing to pay for luxury items such as expensive cars, from 10% of its retail price up to 120%. They found that winners tended to be willing to pay more for these items than losers. This effect was confirmed with some status products made in the laboratory, such that winners were more willing than losers to pay for a Harvard University T-shirt.

Next, participants were asked to attribute positive and negative words to the items. This task helps assess the implicit value that participants assigned to the objects – in experiments, this is used to measure attitudes that people are unwilling to reveal publicly, and in the field of consumer psychology, these measures can predict brand preferences, usage, and recognition. The current study supported the finding that winners attach greater value than losers to luxury items.

Finally, the researchers measured the participants’ testosterone levels. Contrary to expectations, winning and losing had no observable effect on testosterone levels. This suggests that testosterone does not play a role in conspicuous consumption.

“Winning a competition, which we know is associated with feeling a sense of a higher social status, seems to drive individuals towards conspicuous consumption, making them more willing to pay for luxury items,” says Dr Wu, now based at Shenzhen University in China. “However, we were surprised that testosterone levels did not change with winning or losing, and so testosterone does not seem to be driving the effects on conspicuous consumption.”

The researchers argue that one way in which winning leads to conspicuous consumption is through an enhanced sense of entitlement among winners, the feeling that as winners they are more deserving of preferential treatment than others: the Tetris ‘winners’ may have felt more deserving of the high-status products and also of fair treatment in the ultimatum game. This would be consistent with findings that feelings of superiority over others arising from hard work and success enhance the desire to purchase luxury brands, as individuals see the luxury goods as a reward.

“We are not only interested in examining what people are willing to do to win, but also in understanding the consequences of winning on people’s everyday behaviour,” says Dr Amos Schurr, a behavioural economist at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel, who was not part of this study.

“Social competition is pervasive in our daily life – whether it is in terms of fighting for the top job, competing for friends and popularity or even growing up in a wealthy, successful family,” says Dr Wu. “Our study demonstrates that winning a competition leads people to prefer high-status products, possibly through an increased feeling of entitlement or deservingness.”

Concerning the null findings on the testosterone levels, the researchers suggested that competition-induced testosterone fluctuations may be hard to detect, and so they are carrying out further work to test the effects of testosterone on conspicuous consumption in their on-going project.

This study was conducted at the ��Ī’s Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, funded by Medical Research Council and Wellcome Trust.

Reference
Wu, Y et al. The role of social status and testosterone in human conspicuous consumption. Scientific Reports; 18 September 2017; DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-12260-3

Footballers in flashy cars, City workers in Armani suits, reality TV celebrities sipping expensive champagne while sitting in hot tubs: what drives people to purchase luxury goods? New research suggests that it may be a sense of being a ‘winner’ – but that contrary to expectations, it is not driven by testosterone.

Social competition is pervasive in our daily life – whether it is in terms of fighting for the top job, competing for friends and popularity or even growing up in a wealthy, successful family.

Yin Wu

David Villarreal Fernández

McLaren P1

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