Country music encourages faster drinking

One wonders just how the research was conducted in the following study; as reported by Associated Press and published in the Edmonton Sun, December 26, 1988:

Phoenix, Arizona--"Wailing, lonesome, self-pitying music" in country western bars makes drinkers there consume alcohol faster, James Schaefer of the University of Minnesota told a recent gathering in Arizona.

The findings came from a 10-year study by Schaefer and a team of other anthropologists of a bar in Missoula, Montana, a lumber and paper-milling town. The survey was supplemented by study of about 2,000 groups in 65 similar saloons in the Minneapolis area over three years.

Schaefer even wrote a country western song on the subject, beginning, "Joe, don't play that country music.
"I drink more, and think sore, and sing right along..."

"No doubt about it," he said, "country and western can be a prescription for trouble among people with little self-control." One reason, he said, is the lyrics' sad songs of lost love, personal freedom, truck driving and the solace of drinking.

The songs and lyrics of Hank Williams, Jimmy Rodgers, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Jerry Jeff Walker, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings were particularly powerful drinking inducements, Schaefer found.

Their songs celebrate heavy drinking by making heroes out of drunkards. In contrast, he said, rock 'n' roll singers don't glorify anything or anyone."

But in the country western bars, slower music went with faster drinking. "Hard drinkers prefer listening to slower-paced, wailing, lonesome, self-pitying music during slow times in the bar," said Shaefer. "They seemed to prefer bold, macho, strong-beat-based music when the action in the bar picks up."

And they use the music as a "mood selection device"--picking out three or four songs on a jukebox, he said. "The music maintains the normative flow of emotions and the rhythm of activity--like the sound track in a movie."

"As the mood and tempo of the songs filtered through the bar, key actors could be seen changing the level and intensity of their drinking activity."

Bereavement often leads men to turn to drink

As reported by Emily Braeger of the London Daily Express, April 28, 2022:

Men often turn to drink and recreational drugs to numb the heartbreak of bereavement, research has revealed.

They admitted they reached for alcohol 13 times a month on average, according to the Sue Ryder charity.

And nearly a quarter said they used drugs every day after the death of a loved one.

Women were more likely to use prescription drugs to combat depression and anxiety, the poll said.

Sue Ryder, which has launched a Grief Kind campaign to encourage more openness, said support from friends and family would have prevented many from using drugs or drinking.

The charity's Bianca Neumann said: "This suggests men are turning to short-lasting and numbing coping mechanisms. Encourage them to visit their GP!"

People who have trouble falling asleep have the most anxiety--or is it the other way around?

Is it the anxiety that's making it difficult for people to fall asleep, or is it the inability to sleep that's causing the anxiety? Only the scientists know for sure, as reported by Mari Rian Hanger and Nancy Bazilchuk in ScienceNorway, October 9, 2019 (bold, link in original):

Sleeplessness, or insomnia, takes different forms. Some patients have trouble falling asleep at night. Others wake up very early in the morning, without being able to fall back asleep again. A third group struggles with constantly waking during the night.

Now, sleep researchers who have looked at these three types of insomnia have found differences in anxiety levels in people with the different types.

"Patients who have trouble falling asleep have significantly higher levels of anxiety than those who struggle with waking during the night or waking early in the morning," said the lead researcher behind the new study, Daniela Bragantini, a biologist at the Department of Mental Health at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).

The study was recently published in the journal Sleep Health.

Population-level study

The researchers had access to information from one of the largest health studies ever performed, called HUNT, the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study. This study of residents of the former county of Nord-Trøndelag includes a database with information on nearly 120,000 individuals. In this case, the researchers relied on data collected from 4317 people between 2006-2008 who had reported at least one symptom of insomnia to the HUNT researchers.

A total of 3616 controls, or people who did not have insomnia, were also included in the sleep study.

Participants had completed a questionnaire in which they answered questions about insomnia and also questions about anxiety.

“We compared their responses and saw that people with insomnia generally had a higher level of anxiety than those who slept well at night,” Bragantini says.

People with insomnia are known to suffer from more anxiety and depression than average. But few researchers have studied the differences between different types of sleep problems.

Trouble falling asleep associated with anxiety

People who had trouble falling asleep, whether combined with other types of sleep problems or alone, had the highest anxiety score.

Those who suffered from waking early in the morning, or waking multiple times at night, had lower levels of anxiety.

“It's interesting that having problems falling asleep is more closely related to anxiety than other insomnia symptoms,” says Bragantini.

She said that the anxiety levels in question were not very high and that not everyone needs professional help. But the differences between people with different symptoms were significant.

It seems that people who have trouble falling asleep struggle to turn off their brains.

“Their brains continue to think, even if it really supposed to be time to sleep. It is difficult to say which comes first, anxiety or insomnia — often the two disorders can sustain each other, so that it becomes a circle of stress. Sometimes it may also be that the anxiety comes first, but that the sleep problems become an independent disorder, which does not necessarily disappear even if the anxiety is treated,” she says.

Other research has shown that a patient’s mental disorders often get better when they are treated for insomnia.

Sleep anxiety can cause insomnia

Concerns over how important sleep is can also cause people to feel anxious, Bragantini said.

“It can be easy to think that it is bad for your health if you don’t get your eight hours of sleep. This type of information can be taken out of context and can feel daunting. It can cause people to develop even more anxiety about their lack of sleep, which makes it even more difficult to sleep at night,” she said.

Bragantini and her co-researchers believe a diagnosis of insomnia actually consists of several different subtypes, based on the symptoms the patients have.

“There may be different reasons for different types of insomnia. I am looking into the different biological causes behind these different types of insomnia,” she says.

Consequently, she thinks different types of insomnia may also require different treatment.

“A person who struggles with falling asleep may need treatment for anxiety, while those who wake up very early in the morning may benefit from other types of treatment. We want to continue this line of inquiry,” says Bragantini.

Most often, anxiety comes first

Ståle Pallesen, who is a professor at the Department of Psychosocial Science at the University of Bergen, says it’s not surprising that people who struggle to fall asleep have the most anxiety.

“If you have a lot of worries, and struggle with anxiety, it is not surprising that it can be difficult to turn off your cognitive activity in the evening when you are trying to sleep. Anxiety patients can also have physical symptoms that make it hard for them to fall asleep,” says Pallesen.

He believes that in some cases, having trouble falling asleep can also lead to anxiety.

“Not being able to sleep at night gives you more time to lie there and worry,” he says.

Still, he believes that in most cases, anxiety comes first, and leads to sleep problems in these patients.

Reference:

Daniela Bragantini et al.: Differences in anxiety levels among symptoms of insomnia. The HUNT study. Sleep Health, August 2019

Addictions expert says that legalization of marijuana could lead to greater use

As reported by Kieran Leavitt of StarMetro Edmonton, June 3, 2018:

EDMONTON—With cannabis legalization on the horizon, Alberta Health Services is trying to grapple with how and where people can use the substance — but also how they can help people quit if they want to stop using it.

“It does worry me,” said AHS executive director for addiction and mental health, Mark Snaterse.

“When we look at some parts of the world that have done this (legalization), they have found that in many instances, recreational users of marijuana will often become daily or regular users of marijuana.”

He’s a veteran in the world of addictions, having been involved for 26 years and in his current role as director for nine. He has reason to be concerned, while most people who come to use his department’s services are addicted to myriad substances, many are addicted to marijuana.

“When we look at everybody coming into our services for all different kinds of substance use, the top two are alcohol and marijuana,” he said.

According to data Snaterse provided from all of Alberta in 2016-2017, only one per cent of people who accessed addiction services came solely using marijuana.

However, of people taking multiple substances, 52 per cent of them included marijuana in their list of substances they were taking. Of those people, 25 per cent identified that marijuana was a problem they wanted to be treated for.

Therefore, of the approximately 13,500 people that accessed addiction services and listed marijuana as a substance they used in 2016 and 2017, around 3,300 acknowledged marijuana was a problem for them.

Snaterse also said mental illness is commonly exacerbated by marijuana use.

“A lot of the people we care for have a persistent and chronic mental illness,” he said. “There certainly is a strong link between people’s ability to remain well and their use of substances such as marijuana.”

His department offers addictions counselling and one-on-one support for people dealing with dependency to marijuana. The treatment style is very individualistic, Snaterse said.

Some will be in residential treatment, where they spend a certain amount of time. Some just need to have conversations with counsellors and others might have to be outpatients dealing with things more independently.

Snaterse said they deal with marijuana withdrawal as well, saying people can experience high anxiety or other emotional symptoms.

No substitute exists for people wanting to ween themselves off cannabis, he said.

May 31 marks World No Tobacco Day and folks all over the globe gathered in protest to tobacco products.

In Edmonton, Chris Sikora, medical officer for health with Alberta Health Services, spoke to the cessation of smoking but also said they’re also grappling with legalization of cannabis and what it means for them.

At the Kaye Edmonton Clinic Thursday, AHS promoted their resources for quitting smoking available to those struggling, but have updated their policy to include quitting the use of cannabis.

People dealing with substance abuse can access addiction counselling, outpatient support, residential support or peer support through AHS. Typically people will go for a consultation to see what the best course of treatment is. This applies to tobacco, e-cigarette and cannabis use as well.

AHS also updated their policies to ban cannabis use on all of their properties, with Sikora saying although cannabis will be legal to consume, it shouldn’t mean creating an unsafe environment where people are cared for.

“What isn’t right… is exposing others to those substances in an unnecessary manner that increases risk the risk of harm to other individuals,” said Sikora.

AHS has a free help line people can call if they want assistance in dealing with addiction, available by dialling 1-866-332-2322.

Laughter is contagious

A neuroscientist confirms it, in an interview with Andrew Anthony in the British newspaper The Guardian, December 24, 2017 (bold, links in original):

Sophie Scott is a senior fellow at University College London. She is an expert in cognitive neuroscience, particularly in relation to communications. This year, she is giving the Royal Institution Christmas lectures looking at how evolution has shaped our bodies to communicate with each other. She also does standup comedy...

...Many animals laugh, including, apparently, rats. What have rats got to laugh about?
They laugh for the same reasons as other animals: it’s a social behaviour. We tend to associate laughing with jokes and humour in adult humans, but actually laughter is always something that happens primarily around members of your own species. Particularly the ones you know, particularly the ones you like. Rats laugh when they’re tickled and when they’re playing. That’s true of apes and humans too.

What are the advantages of laughter over a wry smile?
They are twofold. Laughter is a very strong cue to others to join in. So it works as a behaviourally contagious phenomenon. It also feels good to laugh. You get a kick from laughter. It’s having an effect at multiple levels. There’s some very good research from Robert Levenson on positive affect. If both members of a couple laugh or smile, they can deal with stressful situations. But only if they both do it.

We’re 30 times more likely to laugh with someone than on our own. Is laughing alone an activity that should be of concern?
All laughter’s good. Don’t worry about laughing on your own. It’s a statistical phenomenon – you’re much more likely to do it around other people. I realised the other day the same is true of speaking. You’re much more likely to talk around other people.

"Real" men don't like to go to the doctor...

...which is why we die younger than women, as reported by Agence France-Presse/Relaxnews, March 24, 2016:

A newly published American psychological study has set out to investigate whether male life expectancy -- which is shorter than female life expectancy by an average of five years -- could be affected by social and psychological factors like choice of doctor and honesty.

"Why do men die earlier than women?" That's the question Diana Sanchez, associate professor of psychology at Rutgers University in the USA and doctoral student Mary Himmelstein, set out to answer in a recent study published in the Preventive Medicine journal and the Journal of Health Psychology.

They found that men who had traditional beliefs about masculinity -- such as showing bravery, courage and emotional restraint -- were more likely to ignore their health problems or delay acting on them.

The pair studied a group of 250 men, who were given a questionnaire designed to gauge their ideas about manhood and their preferences when choosing a doctor.

The results showed that participants with the highest scores on the masculinity scale were more likely to choose a male doctor, assuming them to be more competent that their female counterparts.

The scientists then recruited 250 university students and gave them a similar questionnaire. Each participant was also interviewed about their health by male and female medical or nursing students.

Paradoxically, the higher they scored on the masculinity scale, the less likely they were to talk openly about their symptoms and current health problems with male doctors. "That's because they don't want to show weakness or dependence to another man, including a male doctor," explains Diana Sanchez.

Ironically, this same group of volunteers was found to be more honest about their medical symptoms with female doctors, the authors found.

The pair published similar findings in 2014 in the Journal of Health Psychology. The study showed that men with strong, traditional ideas about masculinity were less likely to seek medical help, and were more likely to downplay their symptoms and suffer worse health outcomes than women or men who did not share those values.

"Men can expect to die five years earlier than women, and physiological differences don't explain that difference," said Diana Sanchez.

Click on the links to see the abstracts of the original journal articles by Mary Himmelstein and Diana Sanchez:

Masculinity impediments: Internalized masculinity contributes to healthcare avoidance in men and women, Journal of Health Psychology, October 7, 2014

Masculinity in the doctor's office: Masculinity, gendered doctor preference and doctor–patient communication, Preventive Medicine, Volume 84, March 2016, Pages 34–40

Girls are different from boys in their texting habits...

...with resulting differences in school performance. Once again, psychologists treat every example of obvious differences between males and females as if they've made a profound discovery.

As reported in a press release from the American Psychological Association, October 5, 2015:

WASHINGTON - Teenage girls who compulsively text are more likely than their male counterparts to do worse academically, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.

"It appears that it is the compulsive nature of texting, rather than sheer frequency, that is problematic," said lead researcher Kelly M. Lister-Landman, PhD, of Delaware County Community College. "Compulsive texting is more complex than frequency of texting. It involves trying and failing to cut back on texting, becoming defensive when challenged about the behavior, and feeling frustrated when one can't do it..."

...Girls do not text more frequently than do boys, but they appear to text for different purposes, Lister-Landman said. "Borrowing from what we know about Internet communication, prior research (e.g., Baron, 2004) has shown that boys use the Internet to convey information while girls use it for social interaction and to nurture relationships," she said. "Girls in this developmental stage also are more likely than boys to ruminate with others, or engage in obsessive, preoccupied thinking, across contexts. Therefore, it may be that the nature of the texts girls send and receive is more distracting, thus interfering with their academic adjustment."

Go here for full text of the original article.

Behavioural scientists don't seem to know much about human nature

I've never had a high opinion of behavioural scientists; they treat their discoveries of the most obvious human behaviours and characteristics as profound revelations. However, maybe I should treat behavioural scientists with more respect; they have fun conferences, and they come up with surprising discoveries such as those mentioned below.

Submitted for your approval is an excerpt from a report by Mike Pottenger, Sessional Lecturer, Department of Economics at University of Melbourne. Click on the link to see the full article, Why Can’t We Just Behave? Free Drinks and Behavioral Science, from The Conversation, June 4, 2014 (bold in original):

Something for Nothing and Making the Most of It

Last night there was a function where free drinks were served. Behavioural science has found that when something is free, people are likely to flock to it more than they otherwise might. So there’s reason to suspect that at least some attendees may have overindulged.

But that assumes the drinks really were free: attendees’ behaviour may have been driven by the assumption that they were effectively paying for the drinks (at least in part) through their registration fees.

In this case, behavioural science suggests that instead of regarding that past expense as a sunk cost and choosing their preferred number of drinks based on how many they actually feel like having, people may actually consume more drinks in an effort to get their money’s worth.

What About Self-Restraint? Or Self-Awareness?

Wouldn’t people’s knowledge that they needed to turn up bright and early this morning have meant they restrained themselves last night? As it turns out, behavioural science finds that a present bias means people are likely to have placed a higher value on having a good time last night than on being alert and attentive this morning.

Research also tells us that our capacity for self-restraint might be limited. So after spending a whole day paying attention to cognitively taxing talks and doing our best to avoid the chocolate cake at morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea, we might be less able to resist a tempting beverage (an effect known as ego-depletion).

You might think a group of people at a conference about behavioural science would know at least something about these behavioural phenomena and so could adjust their behaviour accordingly. But the research suggests it’s not easy to change your own behaviour even when you’re aware of your own biases (as is the case with gender bias). Many of the experts noted that yes, even they were subject to this dilemma. To make matters worse, self-serving bias means people are likely to routinely overestimate their ability to do so.

HT: The Epoch Times

Narcissists are attracted to positions of power--or is it the other way around?

I'm always struck by the number of politicians and people who run for political office--people who presume to be qualified to govern others--who can't govern themselves and have the nerve to run for office despite having huge skeletons in their closets (or sometimes in plain view). The recent examples of Newt Gingrich, John Edwards, Eliot Spitzer, and Anthony Weiner come to mind. Then, of course, there are those who run for and hold office to meet the demands of their own egos (examples too numerous to mention). News with Views commentator Dave Daubenmire puts it succinctly: "America is governed by sociopaths." The situation is no better in Canada (which is one of the reasons I've largely given up voting), but of course, we can't figure this out ourselves--we need a psychology professor to tell us. As reported by Andrea Hill of Postmedia News, August 16, 2013:

OTTAWA — As Sen. Pamela Wallin‘s damning expense audit becomes public knowledge, many Canadians have taken to social media and the op-ed pages of their local papers to express disgust at what they call the senator’s “sense of entitlement.”

Wallin — who is accused of improperly claiming more than $120,000 in travel expenses — has staunchly denied she feels any such thing.

“I do not have some sense of entitlement,” she told the CBC in June. “I didn’t deliberately set out to abuse this system in any way.”

She insists Senate rules about what can be claimed are unclear and that the audit process was “fundamentally flawed and unfair.”

But behaviour experts say it’s not unusual for people in positions of power to feel entitled.

“People in the Senate, in the Canadian Senate, are there because they’re being rewarded for a lifetime of service to Canada,” said Del Paulhus, a psychology professor at University of British Columbia who studies narcissism. “It seems that’s why they’re there: because they deserve to be there and they deserve to get all the perks.”

Paulhus said Wallin “absolutely” displayed a sense of entitlement by charging taxpayers for travel not directly related to Senate duties and that her behaviour is not surprising. After all, he said, Canada’s upper house — which is filled with successful people who are often told how important they are — breeds a culture of entitlement.

But Paulhus said some people are more likely than others to believe they deserve to use public funds for their own purposes.

Feelings of entitlement often come hand-in-hand with big egos, Paulhus said, and people who make their careers as television broadcasters — as Wallin did — could be more likely to fit that description.

And just as broadcast work draws people with a distorted sense of what they are owed, so too does the Senate, said Christian Jordan, a psychology professor and narcissism expert at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont.

While he said there’s no reason to think the Senate as a whole has an inflated sense of entitlement, “there’s certainly evidence that narcissists are more likely to seek high-profile positions, be they celebrity positions or in politics, more than other people do.”

“And being in those positions leads people to feel a greater sense of entitlement and power as well,” he said.

Jordan said people with this attitude believe they deserve more than others and don’t feel bad about claiming what they believe to be rightfully theirs.

“It’s a route to get really what they are entitled to or what they deserve to have, and so they don’t really think about the repercussions of what that means for other people or for the public generally,” he said...

...But saying these politicians felt a sense of entitlement when they helped themselves to the public coffers doesn’t tell the whole story, said Frank Farley, a psychology professor at Temple University in Philadelphia and past-president of the American Psychological Association.

“It may be an ingredient in the recipe, but the driving force in the recipe is this deeply rooted risk tolerance quality that is demanded in the political life,” Farley said.

He said people who end up in politics are hardwired to take risks. After all, “if you’re a shrinking violet, to use that old phrase, you’re not going to make it to the top.”

Farley said a politician’s job involves speaking in public, engaging in public debate and suffering “the slings and arrows of criticism.” You need to be a risk taker to survive the day-to-day responsibilities of the job, Farley said, but there’s a “destructive side” to that behaviour, which can lead to actions like inappropriately claiming expenses...

As Thomas Sowell says, politicians who talk about being in "public service" are likely to end up thinking that the voters owe them something.

Close friendships are good for you

The psychologists who conducted this study apparently have no close friends themselves, or they'd already know this. As reported by Anne Sutherland in the Montreal Gazette, January 29, 2012:

MONTREAL - ..."We've long studied the effects of friendship on the behaviour and emotional well-being of children and we wanted to see if the HPA axis (hypothalamic, pituitary and adrenal systems) varied (under stress) when a friend is with you," said William Bukowski of his study published in the journal Developmental Psychology.

If a child is alone when he or she gets into trouble, there is a measurable increase in levels of a coping hormone and a decrease in feelings of self-worth, Bukowski said.

A group of schoolchildren, in Grades 5 and 6, were given journals to record their feelings and had their saliva tested four times a day for four consecutive days.

For privacy reasons, Bukowski would not reveal which school the children attended, but said they came from all walks of life.

They were tested and questioned before school, right after recess, after lunch and after school, the classic schoolyard periods outside of class time when bullying or hassling are most prevalent.

When the body is stressed, the adrenal glands produce cortisol, a hormone that metabolizes sugar to provide energy for the flight or fight reaction.

Bukowski and his team looked for levels of cortisol in the children as an indicator of stress levels.

Bukowski's participants who were with their best friends showed lower levels of the hormone during stressful situations.

"We knew what the experiences the kids were having through their journals, so we could monitor the cortisol levels of both positive and negative experiences," he said.

The researchers found no discernible gender difference between boys and girls and their best friends.

"We chose kids in Grades 5 and 6 because friendships are very important at this age and the child is developing the emotional patterns that will continue through adolescence," Bukowski said.

Besides handling stress, having a best friend is very good training for all that life has to offer, teaching children to take into account the needs of others and not to be selfish, Bukowski said...

Exposure to dumbed-down content in the media can dumb you down

As reported by Misty Harris of Postmedia News on June 15, 2011:

A new study suggests that when people don't think critically about their media consumption, they're in danger of assimilating some of the mental characteristics on display. Specifically, researchers found that if the main character in a screenplay was a total imbecile, and people weren't expressly asked to identify differences between themselves and that protagonist, the participants' own cognitive skills were compromised.

In other words, stupidity appears to be contagious - if only temporarily.

"It's not like a disease, where once you have it, you have it for a long time; we're not saying you'll be impaired the day after reading a stupid story or watching TV," says study author Markus Appel, an associate professor at Johannes Kepler University of Linz in Austria. "But we do show that performance in knowledge tests is susceptible to fictional characters."

Just as video games put players at the centre of the action, Appel says storytelling implicitly asks people to identify with the characters on some level. And just as video games have been (controversially) linked to behaviour, stories can have a transformative effect on people's thinking.

"People are scared of being influenced by aggressive content but there are many other things to consider," says Appel. "There's much more to narratives than just entertainment."

In experiments with 81 people, Appel had different groups read a screenplay that featured either a protagonist whose intellectually abilities were undetermined or one in which the star was an alcoholic, aggressive and intellectually feeble soccer hooligan (think Europe's answer to the cast of Jersey Shore).

Half of those given the latter story were directed to think about ways in which they differed from the protagonist, while the others were given no such instruction before reading the tale.

Afterward, all participants took a general knowledge test, and those who read the story about the idiotic thug did significantly worse, on average, than those who read the story in which the main character's intellect wasn't addressed. The exception was the group that was asked to actively think about the imbecilic character's traits - a process Appel says kept the contagion effect from occurring, and ultimately underscored the value of critical thinking.

Go here to see the abstract of Dr. Appel's article A Story About a Stupid Person Can Make You Act Stupid (or Smart): Behavioral Assimilation (and Contrast) as Narrative Impact in Media Psychology, Volume 14, Issue 2, 2011, pp. 144-167.

Snipers face less stress than other soldiers

The Canadian Armed Forces have made the shocking discovery that snipers are less stressed than other soldiers, and enjoy their work more. Gee, I wonder if that may be because snipers aren’t directly in the line of fire. I have the suspicion that the study’s finidings regarding Canadian snipers are probably true for snipers in armies the world over. As reported by Andrew Mayeda of Postmedia News on January 5, 2011:

OTTAWA — Canadian snipers who have served in Afghanistan report being less traumatized by the war than the average soldier, according to a study that offers a rare glimpse into the minds of Canada's battle-hardened troops.

Rather than expressing regret over their deadly line of work, snipers say they feel justified in killing enemies who pose a threat to Canadian troops and Afghan civilians. Moreover, most show high levels of career satisfaction, and say their job has been a positive influence in their lives.

Yet snipers report being more troubled than other soldiers when asked about specific combat experiences, such as knowing that someone has been seriously injured or killed in action, or seeing members of their unit become a casualty.

The findings are part of an ongoing three-year study commissioned by Defence R&D Canada, the research arm of the Department of National Defence. They paint a complex, at times contradictory, portrait of the carefully screened, elite soldiers who are paid to take out the enemy from afar.

A House of Commons committee has estimated that 1,120 of the 27,000 Canadian soldiers who served in Afghanistan between 2002 and 2008 showed symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. Yet a number of soldiers who have returned from the war have complained that the military does not provide adequate care to those afflicted with the disorder.

After reports of snipers being traumatized, the former commander of Canada's land forces, Lieut.-General Andrew Leslie, called for an examination of their psychological well-being. Previously, little was known about the unique makeup of snipers.

"Unlike other soldiers who can deflect their responsibility for killing by rationalizing that they were led into battle by their officers, or had to kill in order to stay alive, snipers have more autonomy than conventional combat soldiers and often have discretion as to who they kill and who they don't," writes study author J. Peter Bradley, a retired lieutenant-colonel in the Canadian Forces who now works as a professor at Royal Military College in Kingston, Ont.

In his initial exploratory study, Bradley interviewed 19 snipers who had served in Afghanistan and been back to Canada for at least six months. Most had killed someone in combat. Because of the small sample size, Bradley cautions that more research needs to be done before any firm conclusions can be drawn about the sniper community.

Compared with a general benchmark, the snipers exhibited escalated levels of psychological stress after taking a test known as the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale. However, their stress levels were actually lower than the average scores of Canadian soldiers who served in Afghanistan.

Bradley notes the Canadian Forces have been developing a system of tests to filter out candidates who don't fit the right psychological profile. According to this research, snipers tend to score low on "neuroticism," high on conscientiousness and low on "tender mindedness."

According to conventional theory, soldiers typically feel an initial sense of euphoria after killing someone in combat. Most later express remorse, and in the third stage, they try to rationalize their actions — a process that can haunt soldiers for the rest of their lives, Bradley notes.

But the snipers he interviewed showed little remorse, with one third stating that they had no feelings about killing, since they were just doing their job.

Bradley says it's possible snipers truly have no regrets and are coping well. "First, killing in combat may not be as traumatic as one might think. Humans have been killing one another in combat for millennia. Second, even if we assume that killing in combat is traumatic, not everyone suffers after experiencing trauma."

However, he also suggests the snipers could have been concealing their feelings to reconcile conflicting emotions about killing, or to "protect their place within the sniper community."

"Snipers are top soldiers and weakness is not consistent with the sniper image," Bradley writes.

Pet owners trust pets more than people

Anyone who's had a pet will wonder why this is reported as a news item:

Canadian pet owners would rather deal with their furry friends than other people, according to a recent study by Harris/Decima.

The study revealed 53 per cent of Canadians who own pets find them more reliable than people. Ninety per cent of Canadians talk to their pets and one-third have confided their deepest, darkest secrets to Fido or Milo or Hero.

There are several obvious reasons for this, such as: pets don't lie to you; they aren't mean to you; they're glad to see you; and best of all, they don't talk back.

Science confirms what Jackie Gleason knew more than 50 years ago

Musical choices affect chances with women: study
Agence France-Presse June 19, 2010

French researchers have provided scientific backing to would-be seducers who instinctively know they have to swap rap or heavy metal for Marvin Gaye to improve their odds...

...At the end of their conversation, the young male used a standard pickup line. What swayed his chances of success was the music that had been played in the waiting room, the researchers found. When a "neutral" song was played, only 28 per cent of women responded positively.

But when the romantic ballad was played, his success rate nearly doubled, to 52 per cent.

Jackie Gleason was more than 50 years ahead of science when he released an album of instrumental music titled Music to Change Her Mind. Any of The Great One's albums will do just as well; or you can try The Many Moods of Murry Wilson (1967), which is now available on CD.
For those who like romantic singing to help accomplish their purposes, I recommend Nat King Cole, Roy Hamilton, and Frank Sinatra. If you're really adventurous, you might want to try the album You're My Girl (1958), with Jack Webb talking his way through a dozen romantic ballads. For those of us without anyone, there's Roy Orbison (and Mr. Sinatra when he's in a melancholy mood).

Sex researcher discovers that attitude influences behaviour

I suspect that sex researchers are too busy studying others' sex lives to have any of their own.

Virginity Perceptions Affect Relationship Choices: Trent Professor
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Findings Have Important Implications for Sexual Education Programs

According to Trent University psychology professor Dr. Terry Humphreys, virginity is a powerful cognitive schema that has different meanings for people and can affect their relationships choices and other life decisions.

People who act like snobs are probably rich

Rich Man, Poor Man: Body Language Can Indicate Socioeconomic Status, Study Shows

The results, reported in Psychological Science, reveal that nonverbal cues can give away a person's SES. Volunteers whose parents were from upper SES backgrounds displayed more disengagement-related behaviors compared to participants from lower SES backgrounds. In addition, when a separate group of observers were shown 60 second clips of the videos, they were able to correctly guess the participants' SES background, based on their body language.

The researchers note that this is the first study to show a relation between SES and social engagement behavior. They surmise that people from upper SES backgrounds who are wealthy and have access to prestigious institutions tend to be less dependent on others. "This lack of dependence among upper SES people is displayed in their nonverbal behaviors during social interactions," the psychologists conclude.

Bullies enjoy seeing people in pain

Bullies may get kick out of seeing others in pain
By Julie Steenhuysen – Fri Nov 7, 8:15 am ET

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Brain scans of teens with a history of aggressive bullying behavior suggest that they may actually get pleasure out of seeing someone else in pain, U.S. researchers said on Friday.
While this may come as little surprise to those who have been victimized by bullies, it is not what the researchers expected, Benjamin Lahey of the University of Chicago, who worked on the study, said in a telephone interview.

In order to discover what drives voter preferences...

...advanced brain research isn't necessary. The same information can be obtained just by asking women why they vote the way they do--which is why women should never have been allowed to vote.

Voters make decisions more on emotion than reason, author finds
Honest pitch will persuade quicker than facts, figures, even among sophisticated
David Zussman, Freelance
Published: Tuesday, March 04

...A recently published book authored by Drew Westen, titled The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation, provides a new lens through which to analyze and speculate on voter behaviour...

In essence, Westen challenges the popular notion that voters are rational and cool headed in their assessment of political parties and individual candidates. Westen argues that when strategists "assume voters dispassionately make decisions based on the issues, they lose."

In other words, based on their MRI research, when voters are asked to choose between reason and emotion, they always choose the candidate or party that evokes the emotional response...

That's why they're called "bystanders"

As reported by Jamie Hall, in the Edmonton Journal, January 18, 2008:

EDMONTON - Bystanders are less likely to step in and help someone whose life is in danger if they're part of a crowd, according to a University of Alberta professor asked to comment about the recent actions of two Good Samaritans.

One man, an off-duty restaurant employee at Joey Tomatoes, was shot in the leg when he and a manager intervened in a fight; another, 46-year-old Randy Lintner, was killed when he tried to stop a fight outside a bar.

The men acted in separate incidents over the past few days, but in both cases several people were present.

"The likelihood that someone will intervene in dangerous situations diminishes as the number of bystanders increases; psychologists call it the bystander effect, " said Mitchell McInnes.

He...wrote his doctoral dissertation on Good Samaritans while at Cambridge University several years ago.

The bigger the crowd, the easier it is for people to diffuse responsibility, and shift or avoid blame. "People kind of freeze in those situations; they're inhibited by uncertainty, and by the fear of acting inappropriately," McInnes said.

Fawn Hagen thinks the recent spate of violence will deter others from taking similar actions. The restaurant employee who was shot is her sister's boyfriend. She identified him only as "Justin."

"He chose to help a man who was being beaten. His reward? A gunshot to the leg," Hagen wrote in a letter to the Journal.

"If this isn't a deterrent for the Good Samaritans on our city, I don't know what is."

Fear of personal harm, or legal liability, are among the factors that make them hesitate or stop altogether, McInnes said.

The latter has prompted a number of provinces--Alberta was among the first, in 1969--to enact legislation to protect Good Samaritans.

Essentially, the legislation protects Good Samaritans from legal liability in the event of damages or injury "unless they're grossly negligent or do something wildly wrong," McInnes said.