Posts Tagged: Psychology

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4
May 10

WORDSUM and IQ, and their Correlation

Often I’ve seen people use WORDSUM scores as a proxy for IQ. You may have seen it yourself, but wondered why people believe there is a correlation between the two. Razib Khan wrote up a nice post that explains it.

Every time I use the WORDSUM variable from the GSS people will complain that a score on a 10-question vocabulary test is not a good measure of intelligence. The reality is that “good” is too imprecise a term. The correlation between adult IQ and WORDSUM = 0.71. The source for this number is a 1980 paper, The Enduring Effects of Education on Verbal Skills.

Jason Malloy further makes the comment that…

I’ve linked this paper before as well. The WORDSUM is an IQ test, and not simply a “proxy” for IQ, as many have called it. This is determined by its construct validity.

It’s clearly tapping a cognitive dimension; vocabulary strongly correlates (.83) with the general intelligence factor: content validity. The WORDSUM correlation with the AGCT is within the range that IQ tests correlate with each other: concurrent validity. It is a reliable independent predictor and predicts external outcomes in a similar manner as other IQ tests: criterion validity.

I wouldn’t recommend it for clinical or admissions purposes, but the GSS is an adequate cognitive test for the purposes of the GSS.

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4
May 10

Coordinated Punishment and Cooperation

An interesting paper is out called "Coordinated Punishment of Defectors Sustains Cooperation and Can Proliferate When Rare", by Robert Boyd, Herbert Gintis and Samuel Bowles.

From a public release about it…

Previous models of cooperation assumed that punishment of free-riders was uncoordinated and unconditional. One problem with these models was that the costs associated with punishment were often higher than the gains of cooperation. Thus, the cost of one group member’s punishing a free-rider would be substantial and would not overweigh the gains achieved through increased cooperation.

Costs may be defined as loss of friendship or loss of relational closeness with other members of the group.

To address the problem, Boyd and his colleagues changed the assumptions built into previous cooperation/punishment models. First, they allowed for punishment to be coordinated among group members. In their model, group members could signal their willingness to punish someone who was not participating in the group, but punishment would only occur if it was coordinated. This meant the cost of punishing a free-rider would be distributed across members and would not be higher than the cost of gains achieved through increased cooperation.

Second, the researchers allowed for the cost of punishing a free-rider to decline as the number of punishers increased. Boyd explained that this new model was “catching up with common sense” because these two assumptions exist in reality.

Their model had three stages in which a large group of unrelated individuals interacted repeatedly. The first stage was a signaling stage where group members could signal their intent to punish. In the second stage, group members could choose to cooperate or not. The final stage was a punishment stage when group members could punish other group members.

The results of their model look a lot like what is seen in most human societies, where individuals meet and decide whether and how to punish group members who are not cooperating. This is coordinated punishment where group members signal their intent to punish, only punish when a threshold has been met and share the costs of punishing.

Boyd argues that even in societies without formal institutions for establishing rules and methods of punishment, group punishment appears to be effective at maintaining cooperation.

Of course, the usual caveat that the existence of or creation of a model is not proof, but a hypothesis.

Dienekes Pontikos makes the interesting comment about it that….

Here is an example of what the authors are talking about. Imagine you are living in the Old West and a gang has just robbed your neighbor’s store. Clearly, if you went out to punish the perpetrators you would pay a high cost (they would be likely to kill you) and it wouldn’t be successful. So, it doesn’t make sense to punish individually. But, the sheriff could assemble a posse to go after the criminals. This would immediately reduce your risk (since you would be one target among many) and it would also increase your chance of success (as more punishers are more likely to achieve their goal).

And from the actual paper…

Coordinated Punishment of Defectors Sustains Cooperation and Can Proliferate When Rare

Robert Boyd, Herbert Gintis, Samuel Bowles

Because mutually beneficial cooperation may unravel unless most members of a group contribute, people often gang up on free-riders, punishing them when this is cost-effective in sustaining cooperation. In contrast, current models of the evolution of cooperation assume that punishment is uncoordinated and unconditional. These models have difficulty explaining the evolutionary emergence of punishment because rare unconditional punishers bear substantial costs and hence are eliminated. Moreover, in human behavioral experiments in which punishment is uncoordinated, the sum of costs to punishers and their targets often exceeds the benefits of the increased cooperation that results from the punishment of free-riders. As a result, cooperation sustained by punishment may actually reduce the average payoffs of group members in comparison with groups in which punishment of free-riders is not an option. Here, we present a model of coordinated punishment that is calibrated for ancestral human conditions and captures a further aspect of reality missing from both models and experiments: The total cost of punishing a free-rider declines as the number of punishers increases. We show that punishment can proliferate when rare, and when it does, it enhances group-average payoffs.

(Link)

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2
May 10

Why Athletes Are Geniuses

An interesting article by Carl Zimmer on Why Athletes Are Geniuses. Here’s an excerpt….

Neuroscientists have found several ways in which the brains of top-notch athletes seem to function better than those of regular folks.

The qualities that set a great athlete apart from the rest of us lie not just in the muscles and the lungs but also between the ears. That’s because athletes need to make complicated decisions in a flash. [...]

In recent years neuroscientists have begun to catalog some fascinating differences between average brains and the brains of great athletes. By understanding what goes on in athletic heads, researchers hope to understand more about the workings of all brains—those of sports legends and couch potatoes alike.

[A]n athlete’s actions are much more than a set of automatic responses; they are part of a dynamic strategy to deal with an ever-changing mix of intricate challenges.
[...]
Good genes may account for some of the differences in ability, but even the most genetically well-endowed prodigy clearly needs practice—lots of it—to develop the brain of an athlete.

Some (but not all) of the research involved, for those interested…

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1
May 10

Dating By Blood Type?

People in most parts of the world do not think about their blood group much, unless they have an operation or an accident and need a transfusion.

But in Japan, whether someone is A, B, O or AB is a topic of everyday conversation.

There is a widespread belief that blood type determines personality, with implications for life, work and love.
[...]
Interest in blood type is widespread in Japan, particularly which combinations are best for romance.

Women’s magazines run scores of articles on the subject, which has also inspired best-selling self-help books.

The received wisdom is that As are dependable and self sacrificing, but reserved and prone to worry.

Decisive and confident – that is people with type O.

ABs are well balanced, clear-sighted and logical, but also high-maintenance and distant.

The black sheep though seem to be blood group B – flamboyant free-thinkers, but selfish.
[...]
The preoccupation with blood ultimately dates back to theories of eugenics during the inter-war years.

One study compared the blood of people in Taiwan, who had rebelled against Japanese colonial rule, with the Ainu from Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido, thought to be more peaceable.

Stripped of its racial overtones, the idea emerged again in the 1970s.

(Link)

The article suggests that this blood type theory doesn’t have any evidence it support it.

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1
May 10

Big brains not always better

There’s an interesting paper out titled, "Evolutionary Divergence in Brain Size between Migratory and Resident Birds". It’s interesting in that it is an example of a case where, big brains are not always better. Here’s what ScienceDaily has to say about it….

Scientists have known for some time that migratory birds have smaller brains than their resident relatives. Now a new study looks into the reasons and concludes that the act of migrating leads to a reduced brain size. Authors point to the fact that the causes could be due to a need to reduce energetic, metabolic and cognitive costs.
[...]
“For birds that travel a lot, exploring their surroundings produces more costs than benefits since the information which is useful in one place is not necessarily so in another. It also exposes them to more dangers. For these reasons we believe that for these species, their innate behaviour can be more useful than learned behaviour.”

I don’t find it a surprising result though. What is “better” depends on what your goals are. And I don’t see why more intelligence would necessarily be the “better” for reaching every possible goal, no matter what that goal is.

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1
May 10

Lairs Have Different Brain Wiring

While previous research has shown that there is heightened activity in the prefrontal cortex – the area of the brain that enables most people to feel remorse or learn moral behavior – when normal people lie, this is the first study to provide evidence of structural differences in that area among pathological liars.

The research – led by Yaling Yang and Adrian Raine, both of the USC College of Letters, Arts and Sciences – is published in the October issue of the British Journal of Psychiatry.
[...]
[T]he researchers used Magnetic Resonance Imaging to explore structural brain differences between the groups. The liars had significantly more “white matter” and slightly less “gray matter” than those they were measured against, Raine said.

Specifically, liars had a 25.7 percent increase in prefrontal white matter compared to the antisocial controls and a 22 percent increase compared to the normal controls. Liars had a 14.2 percent decrease in prefrontal gray matter compared to normal controls.

More white matter – the wiring in the brain – may provide liars with the tools necessary to master the complex art of deceit, Raine said.

“Lying takes a lot of effort,” he said.

“It’s almost mind reading. You have to be able to understand the mindset of the other person. You also have to suppress your emotions or regulate them because you don’t want to appear nervous. There’s quite a lot to do there. You’ve got to suppress the truth.

“Our argument is that the more networking there is in the prefrontal cortex, the more the person has an upper hand in lying. Their verbal skills are higher. They’ve almost got a natural advantage.”

But in normal people, it’s the gray matter – or the brain cells connected by the white matter – that helps keep the impulse to lie in check.

Pathological liars have a surplus of white matter, the study found, and a deficit of gray matter. That means they have more tools to lie coupled with fewer moral restraints than normal people, Raine said.

“They’ve got the equipment to lie, and they don’t have the disinhibition that the rest of us have in telling the big whoppers,” he said.

“When people make moral decisions, they are relying on the prefrontal cortex. When people ask normal people to make moral decisions, we see activation in the front of the brain,” he explained. “If these liars have a 14 percent reduction in gray matter, that means that they are less likely to care about moral issues or are less likely to be able to process moral issues. Having more gray matter would keep a check on these activities.”

The researchers stopped short of asserting that these structural differences account for all lying.

(Link)

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30
Apr 10

Jesse Bering and Neil Sinhababu talk about Sex, Pleasure, and God

Jesse Bering and Neil Sinhababu (who also blogs on The Ethical Werewolf) have a discussion about morality.

(Link)

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25
Apr 10

Another Question for Moral Foundation Theory: Unions, Striking, and Scabs

For a while now, I’ve been fascinated by Jonathan Haidt et al’s Moral Foundation Theory. But the more I look at the questionnaire, the more I wonder why there aren’t question on certain topics. I’ll write up posts for other questions I’d put on the YourMorals.org questionnaire(s) if I were contributing to them, but for now I’ll simply just suggest a set of questions regarding unions, striking, scabs….

  1. One of the worst things a person could do is to be a scab while a union is on strike.
  2. People should be loyal to their union brothers and sisters, even if when they have done something wrong.
  3. If I were a union member and disagreed with the reasons the union was striking, I would strike anyways because it is my duty.
  4. Respect for union seniority is important.
  5. To dole out work in a way that violates union seniority would be wrong.
  6. It is wrong to hire a scab.
  7. It would be acceptable for someone to harm a scab for crossing a picket line.
  8. It can never be right to cross a picket line.
  9. It is the duty of all union members to support the strike action of members of other unions.

I think the imagery of the “dirty” scab you commonly find among union culture, would be enough to attract the interest of those interested in moral psychology.

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4
Mar 10

Did We Just Have Sex, Or Not?

Seems what different people consider “sex” seems to different.

When people say they “had sex,” what transpired is anyone’s guess. A new study from the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University found that no uniform consensus existed when a representative sample of 18- to 96-year-olds was asked what the term meant to them.

Is oral sex considered sex? It wasn’t to around 30 percent of the study participants. How about anal sex? For around 20 percent of the participants, no. A surprising number of older men did not consider penile-vaginal intercourse to be sex. More than idle gossip, the answers to questions about sex can inform — or misinform — research, medical advice and health education efforts.
[...]
Here are some of the results:

  • Responses did not differ significantly overall for men and women. The study involved 204 men and 282 women.
  • 95 percent of respondents would consider penile-vaginal intercourse (PVI) having had sex, but this rate drops to 89 percent if there is no ejaculation.
  • 81 percent considered penile-anal intercourse having had sex, with the rate dropping to 77 percent for men in the youngest age group (18-29), 50 percent for men in the oldest age group (65 and up) and 67 percent for women in the oldest age group.
  • 71 percent and 73 percent considered oral contact with a partner’s genitals (OG), either performing or receiving, as having had sex.
  • Men in the youngest and oldest age groups were less likely to answer “yes” compared with the middle two age groups for when they performed OG.
  • Significantly fewer men in the oldest age group answered “yes” for PVI (77 percent).

(Link)

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23
Feb 10

General Intelligence Located In The Brain

There’s an interesting paper called "Distributed neural system for general intelligence revealed by lesion mapping". (It’s open access, so anyone can read it online.)

The paper claims to have found the regions of the brain associated with general intelligence.

Here’s an excepts from ScienceDaily….

A collaborative team of neuroscientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), the University of Iowa, the University of Southern California (USC), and the Autonomous University of Madrid have mapped the brain structures that affect general intelligence.

The study, to be published the week of February 22 [2010] in the early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, adds new insight to a highly controversial question: What is intelligence, and how can we measure it?

[The Scientists] examine[d] a uniquely large data set of 241 brain-lesion patients who all had taken IQ tests. The researchers mapped the location of each patient’s lesion in their brains, and correlated that with each patient’s IQ score to produce a map of the brain regions that influence intelligence.
[...]
The researchers found that, rather than residing in a single structure, general intelligence is determined by a network of regions across both sides of the brain.

“One of the main findings that really struck us was that there was a distributed system here. Several brain regions, and the connections between them, were what was most important to general intelligence,” explains Gläscher.

“It might have turned out that general intelligence doesn’t depend on specific brain areas at all, and just has to do with how the whole brain functions,” adds Adolphs. “But that’s not what we found. In fact, the particular regions and connections we found are quite in line with an existing theory about intelligence called the ‘parieto-frontal integration theory.’ It says that general intelligence depends on the brain’s ability to integrate — to pull together — several different kinds of processing, such as working memory.”

(Emphasis mine.)

Or in the words of the authors of the paper….

Distributed neural system for general intelligence revealed by lesion mapping

J. Gläschera, D. Rudraufc, R. Colome, L. K. Paula, D. Tranelc, H. Damasiof, and R. Adolphsa

Abstract

General intelligence (g) captures the performance variance shared across cognitive tasks and correlates with real-world success. Yet it remains debated whether g reflects the combined performance of brain systems involved in these tasks or draws on specialized systems mediating their interactions. Here we investigated the neural substrates of g in 241 patients with focal brain damage using voxel-based lesion–symptom mapping. A hierarchical factor analysis across multiple cognitive tasks was used to derive a robust measure of g. Statistically significant associations were found between g and damage to a remarkably circumscribed albeit distributed network in frontal and parietal cortex, critically including white matter association tracts and frontopolar cortex. We suggest that general intelligence draws on connections between regions that integrate verbal, visuospatial, working memory, and executive processes.

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