People Sacrifice Research Articles

People constrain their semantic associations when talking to both friends and strangers.

During conversations, people face a trade-off between establishing understanding and making interesting and unique contributions. How do people balance this when deciding which concepts to reference, and does it matter how well they know their conversation partner? In the present work, participants made stream-of-consciousness word associations either with a partner or alone-simplified versions of dialogue and monologue. Participants made semantically narrower and more predictable word associations with a stranger than alone (Study 1), suggesting that they constrain their associations to establish mutual understanding. Increasing closeness (Study 2) or having a prior relationship (Study 3) did not moderate this effect. Thus, even during a task that does not depend on establishing mutual understanding, people sacrifice being interesting for the sake of being understood. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Communicating emotions, but not expressing them privately, reduces moral punishment in a Prisoner’s Dilemma game

The existence of moral punishment, that is, the fact that cooperative people sacrifice resources to punish defecting partners requires an explanation. Potential explanations are that people punish defecting partners to privately express or to communicate their negative emotions in response to the experienced unfairness. If so, then providing participants with alternative ways to privately express or to communicate their emotions should reduce moral punishment. In two experiments, participants interacted with cooperating and defecting partners in a Prisoner’s Dilemma game. After each round, participants communicated their emotions to their partners (Experiments 1 and 2) or only expressed them privately (Experiment 2). Each trial concluded with a costly punishment option. Compared to a no-expression control group, moral punishment was reduced when emotions were communicated to the defecting partner but not when emotions were privately expressed. Moral punishment may thus serve to communicate emotions to defecting partners. However, moral punishment was only reduced but far from being eliminated, suggesting that the communication of emotions does not come close to replacing moral punishment. Furthermore, prompting participants to focus on their emotions had undesirable side-effects: Privately expressing emotions diminished cooperation, enhanced hypocritical punishment (i.e., punishment of defecting partners by defecting participants), and induced an unspecific bias to punish the partners irrespective of their actions.

Friendly Fire and Terrorism Acts!

From time to time and almost every day we hear terror and criminal acts in all around the world that many people sacrifice from those acts as soul, wounded, building, general and private properties in particular to foreign communities without classifying the acts as terrorism. It is clear to societies that terror is state of intense fear without despite of nationality, religion, passport, which country the terror actors belong to, but it seems the definition of terror is elastic and can be classified as a friendly fire which is by own side. This issue goes up from just several cases to phenomenon situations which goes out of control in one hand as well confuses whole society regarding what the exact terror is. It is dangerous precedent and put the terrorism act law under questions due to discriminations and conflict in almost the same cases in different locations and countries, but the procedures, responsibilities and the charges are different which in some cases counted as a high degree of terror and in some counted as friendly fire just to put the act out of terrorism act and count it just as a simple criminal case. It is not just an obvious discrimination among cases in different places and countries, but pushes radicals and even others not to think properly over another nationality, races and gender which leads to sadness end in a humanitarian disasters. Instead of covering the terrorism acts and disguise it, better to confess the truth and put points on the letter which means to solve it and find out which ways the government can take to end it or at least lessen it. Nowadays the world lives in nervous, the merciful from a nation to another is not as before due to statements addressed by some political leaders and racism officials which spreads the hatred among various religions, nationalities and other minorities, as it is the one of the main reason of the case and during the article several experimental cases have been studied in different places with the causes behind each case.

Hidden Markov Models of Evidence Accumulation in Speeded Decision Tasks

Speeded decision tasks are usually modeled within the evidence accumulation framework, enabling inferences on latent cognitive parameters, and capturing dependencies between the observed response times and accuracy. An example is the speed-accuracy trade-off, where people sacrifice speed for accuracy (or vice versa). Different views on this phenomenon lead to the idea that participants may not be able to control this trade-off on a continuum, but rather switch between distinct states (Dutilh et al., Cognitive Science 35(2):211–250, 2010). Hidden Markov models are used to account for switching between distinct states. However, combining evidence accumulation models with a hidden Markov structure is a challenging problem, as evidence accumulation models typically come with identification and computational issues that make them challenging on their own. Thus, an integration of hidden Markov models with evidence accumulation models has still remained elusive, even though such models would allow researchers to capture potential dependencies between response times and accuracy within the states, while concomitantly capturing different behavioral modes during cognitive processing. This article presents a model that uses an evidence accumulation model as part of a hidden Markov structure. This model is considered as a proof of principle that evidence accumulation models can be combined with Markov switching models. As such, the article considers a very simple case of a simplified Linear Ballistic Accumulation. An extensive simulation study was conducted to validate the model’s implementation according to principles of robust Bayesian workflow. Example reanalysis of data from Dutilh et al. (Cognitive Science 35(2):211–250, 2010) demonstrates the application of the new model. The article concludes with limitations and future extensions or alternatives to the model and its application.

Augmenting LGBTQ+ and Minority Identities within Medical School and Residency Training

Medical training is a lengthy process that requires mental, physical, and emotional prowess. It is a costly journey, but an ultimately rewarding one for those who want to become a physician. Many people sacrifice several aspects of their life to receive their DO or MD, thus complicating the journey is something most hope to avoid. However, personal identity is increasingly becoming a sacrifice that minorities have to make to pursue a medical degree. While society has seen a substantial increase in awareness and acceptance of minority groups over the last few years, the medical community can do their part in augmenting this growth by helping these populations feel comfortable embarking on the journey to become a physician. While medical institutions may have foundational policies regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), there still seems to exist a disparity among the physician workforce. By identifying barriers within the medical profession for minority groups and modeling recruitment, applications, and interviews after programs that are paving the way for a more inclusive profession, medicine will become a safer, more equitable field.

Altruism and Spite in Politics: How the Mind Makes Welfare Tradeoffs About Political Parties

How much will people sacrifice to support or oppose political parties? Extending previous work on the psychology of interpersonal cooperation, we propose that people’s minds compute a distinct cost–benefit ratio—a welfare tradeoff ratio—that regulates their choices to help or hurt political parties. In two experiments, participants decide whether to financially help and hurt the inparty and outparty. The results show that participants were extremely consistent (> 90%) while making dozens of decisions in a randomized order, providing evidence for tradeoff ratios toward parties. Moreover, participants’ ratios correlated in the expected directions with partisanship, political ideology, and feelings of enthusiasm and anger toward each party, corroborating that these ratios are politically meaningful. Generally, most participants were willing to sacrifice at least some money to help their inparty and hurt the outparty. At the same time, a sizable minority hurt their inparty and helped their outparty. Welfare tradeoff ratios push our understanding of partisanship beyond the classic debate about whether voters are rational or irrational. Underneath the turbulent surface of partisan passions hide precise calculations that proportion our altruism and spite toward parties.

Prevalence of Sleep Disorders among Staff Workers at a Tertiary Health Care Center

Background: Due to a demanding modern work style, many people sacrifice sleep by intentionally or unintentionally decreasing the number of sleeping hours or by overlooking their sleep disorders. This study aimed to screen university hospital workers in Saudi Arabia for sleep disorders and estimate their prevalence using a cross-sectional study conducted in 2016.
 Methods: This study used the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, International Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group diagnostic criteria, Epworth Sleepiness Scale, Berlin Questionnaire, and SLEEP-50 Questionnaire. 116 participants were interviewed (56% males; mean age, 30.9 years (SD: 8.5; range: 21 to 58); mean body mass index, 25.79 (SD: 6.10); 40.5% classified as overweight or obese).
 Results: Only 6.9% reported good sleep quality. Insomnia was the most common sleep disorder (72%); sleepwalking was the least common disorder (5%). Women had a higher risk of insomnia, nightmares and circadian rhythm disorders (P = 0.024, 0.015, and 0.009, respectively). A strong relationship between smoking and insomnia was found (P = 0.04).
 Conclusion: The population had much lower sleep quality than other populations. The bidirectional relationship between insomnia and smoking presents an opportunity and emphasizes the need for insomnia management to decrease health and economic burdens.

Consumer priorities: what would people sacrifice in order to fly on holidays?

ABSTRACT Holidaying is an important leisure pursuit and, for a growing minority, air travel is the default mode for holiday mobility. However, the current trend of increasing demand for air travel runs contrary to climate-related sustainability goals. Efforts to motivate reductions in consumption of holiday air travel must contend with the embeddedness of flying as a social practice and should be informed by an understanding of how people prioritize air travel for holidays relative to other forms of consumption. Using data drawn from a survey of 2066 British adults, this exploratory study uses a novel method to assess the willingness of individuals to sacrifice holiday air travel relative to their willingness to make changes to their daily consumption patterns. We find a greater readiness to undertake additional expense (of time, effort, or money) than to retrench incumbent consumption patterns in order to fly for holidays. Reluctance to sacrifice for the sake of flying was greatest with regards to those items that are most associated with the basic infrastructure of modern life (e.g. mobile phones). Examining product-specific pro-environmental sacrifice in relative terms, our findings suggest that voluntary reductions in flying are more plausible than other modes of pro-environmental sacrifice.

Cumulative advantage in collective action groups: How competition for group members alters the provision of public goods

Research on collective action problems and the provision of public goods has yielded an array of important insights into why people sacrifice for their groups, but ignores the processes that bring people into those groups in the first place. The literature is also silent on the fact that groups providing similar public goods often compete with one another to attract new members. We extend the reach of theories of collective action problems to bring them to bear on these interrelated issues. Results from four experiments support our predictions about when group members compete to attract new adherents by sacrificing more for group goals. Further, we find that prospective members join more productive groups at much higher rates and then contribute to them at high levels. These processes give way to cumulative advantage, whereby initially productive groups continually attract new members. Thus competition for members can yield large inequalities in the size and success of collective action groups.

Control yourself: on user control of privacy settings using personalization and privacy panel on smartphones

Abstract: The paper assesses the gap between actual and perceived privacy features of smartphones, exploring privacy as one decision-making factor in information protection, and the balance between privacy control and the required user interaction with the settings. We conducted a fine-grained evaluation partly based on the Privacy Panel, a protection solution on Firefox OS including features of Find my Device, Backup, Location Blurring, and Guest Mode. Results showed that safety as one decision-making factor impacted information protection in different use cases at different levels. Although people sacrifice more privacy as the price of a handset grows, they still see privacy as a factor of various significance with respect to context of finding back smartphone and selecting storage places. People were satisfied to use improved privacy settings but still did not well adapt to complex personalized interfaces. Sorting methods, recommendations and establishing profiles have shown to be feasible ways to assist users to balance between full control and the additional interaction burden when adjusting privacy settings in a complex app ecosystem.

Harm to others outweighs harm to self in moral decision making

Concern for the suffering of others is central to moral decision making. How humans evaluate others' suffering, relative to their own suffering, is unknown. We investigated this question by inviting subjects to trade off profits for themselves against pain experienced either by themselves or an anonymous other person. Subjects made choices between different amounts of money and different numbers of painful electric shocks. We independently varied the recipient of the shocks (self vs. other) and whether the choice involved paying to decrease pain or profiting by increasing pain. We built computational models to quantify the relative values subjects ascribed to pain for themselves and others in this setting. In two studies we show that most people valued others' pain more than their own pain. This was evident in a willingness to pay more to reduce others' pain than their own and a requirement for more compensation to increase others' pain relative to their own. This "hyperaltruistic" valuation of others' pain was linked to slower responding when making decisions that affected others, consistent with an engagement of deliberative processes in moral decision making. Subclinical psychopathic traits correlated negatively with aversion to pain for both self and others, in line with reports of aversive processing deficits in psychopathy. Our results provide evidence for a circumstance in which people care more for others than themselves. Determining the precise boundaries of this surprisingly prosocial disposition has implications for understanding human moral decision making and its disturbance in antisocial behavior.

"I'd only let you down": Guilt proneness and the avoidance of harmful interdependence.

Five studies demonstrated that highly guilt-prone people may avoid forming interdependent partnerships with others whom they perceive to be more competent than themselves, as benefitting a partner less than the partner benefits one's self could trigger feelings of guilt. Highly guilt-prone people who lacked expertise in a domain were less willing than were those low in guilt proneness who lacked expertise in that domain to create outcome-interdependent relationships with people who possessed domain-specific expertise. These highly guilt-prone people were more likely than others both to opt to be paid on their performance alone (Studies 1, 3, 4, and 5) and to opt to be paid on the basis of the average of their performance and that of others whose competence was more similar to their own (Studies 2 and 5). Guilt proneness did not predict people's willingness to form outcome-interdependent relationships with potential partners who lacked domain-specific expertise (Studies 4 and 5). It also did not predict people's willingness to form relationships when poor individual performance would not negatively affect partner outcomes (Study 4). Guilt proneness therefore predicts whether, and with whom, people develop interdependent relationships. The findings also demonstrate that highly guilt-prone people sacrifice financial gain out of concern about how their actions would influence others' welfare. As such, the findings demonstrate a novel way in which guilt proneness limits free-riding and therefore reduces the incidence of potentially unethical behavior. Lastly, the findings demonstrate that people who lack competence may not always seek out competence in others when choosing partners.

“I’d Only Let You Down”: Guilt Proneness and the Avoidance of Harmful Interdependence

Three studies demonstrated that highly guilt-prone people may avoid forming interdependent partnerships with others whom they perceive to be more competent than themselves, as benefitting a partner less than the partner benefits one’s self could trigger feelings of guilt. Highly guilt-prone people who lacked expertise in a domain were less willing than were those low in guilt proneness who lacked expertise in that domain to create outcome-interdependent relationships with people who possessed domain-specific expertise. These highly guilt-prone people were more likely than others both to opt to be paid on their performance alone) and to opt to be paid based on the average of their performance and that of others whose competence was more similar to their own. Guilt proneness did not predict people’s willingness to form outcome-interdependent relationships with potential partners who lacked domain-specific expertise. It also did not predict people’s willingness to form relationships when poor individual performance would not negatively affect partner outcomes. Guilt proneness therefore predicts whether, and with whom, people develop interdependent relationships. The findings also demonstrate that highly-guilt prone people sacrifice financial gain out of concern about how their actions would influence others’ welfare. As such, the findings demonstrate a novel way in which guilt proneness limits free-riding and therefore reduces the incidence of unethical behavior. Lastly, the findings demonstrate that people who lack competence may not always seek out competence in others when choosing partners.

Social Exclusion Causes People to Spend and Consume Strategically in the Service of Affiliation

When people's deeply ingrained need for social connection is thwarted by social exclusion, profound psychological consequences ensue. Despite the fact that social connections and consumption are central facets of daily life, little empirical attention has been devoted to understanding how belongingness threats affect consumer behavior. In four experiments, we tested the hypothesis that social exclusion causes people to spend and consume strategically in the service of affiliation. Relative to controls, excluded participants were more likely to buy a product symbolic of group membership (but not practical or self-gift items), tailor their spending preferences to the preferences of an interaction partner, spend money on an unappealing food item favored by a peer, and report being willing to try an illegal drug, but only when doing so boosted their chances of commencing social connections. Overall, results suggest that socially excluded people sacrifice personal and financial well-being for the sake of social well-being.

Why do people sacrifice to approach rewards versus to avoid costs? Insights from attachment theory

This research provides the first empirical investigation of how attachment orientations contribute to approach and avoidance goals for engaging in sacrifice. Study 1 is a cross-sectional study of individuals in dating relationships, and Study 2 is a 14-day daily experience study of dating couples. Results showed that attachment anxiety was associated with a greater frequency of sacrifice and more willingness to sacrifice for approach goals (particularly self-focused goals) and avoidance goals. Attachment avoidance was associated with a lower frequency of sacrifice, less willingness to sacrifice for approach goals (particularly partner-focused goals), and more willingness to sacrifice for avoidance goals (both self- and partner-focused). Daily sacrifice goals were also associated with the partner’s attachment orientation. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. It’s Saturday night, and you and your partner can’t agree on where to go for dinner. You want to try the trendy new sushi restaurant across town, but your partner is in the mood for a burger and fries. You had a long day at work and just want to curl up with a good book and go to bed, but your partner wants to go out for a night on the town. Situations in which partners have conflicting interests and desires are inevitable in close relationships. As the above examples reflect, these situations are oftentimes as mundane as

Quantifying individuals’ trade-offs between privacy, liberty and security: The case of rail travel in UK

Public transport systems have been targets in several terrorist attacks, notably in recent years, resulting in tight security measures worldwide. However, individuals’ privacy and liberty often conflict with efforts towards safety and security, making it difficult to assess the implications of security measures balanced against the costs (e.g., citizens may be stopped, searched and asked to provide personal identification data to authorities without any particular reason). Henceforth, our research question asks, “to what extent would people sacrifice their right to privacy and liberty in exchange for potentially safer and more secure travel?” This paper uses a stated choice experiment to quantify individuals’ trade-offs between privacy and security within a real-life context, namely rail travel in the UK. Using a nationwide sample, the empirical analysis yields the importance of improvements in the security infrastructure and identifies areas of concern with regard to privacy and liberty controlling for travel related factors. Further, trade-offs across different security measures for rail travel are quantified in terms of individuals’ willingness-to-pay extra on top of the average ticket price.

The price you pay: cost-dependent reputation effects of altruistic punishment

Two studies were conducted to test reputation-based accounts of altruism which predict that the more people sacrifice to help others, the greater their ensuing benefits. We tested this prediction by varying the cost invested in altruistic behavior, here modeled as costly sanctioning of unfair behavior. Confirming this prediction, it was found that only altruists who invested most in the punishment of unfairness were preferred as partners and were transferred more money in a subsequent trust game. This implies that the benefits of behaving altruistically depend upon how much one is willing to pay. It is discussed that these results fit both an indirect reciprocity and a costly signaling framework.

Vladimir's Choice and the Distribution of Social Resources

`Vladimir's choice' refers to the tendency for people to favor the ingroup relative to the outgroup—even when doing so requires that people sacrifice ingroup profits in absolute terms. We investigated correlates of this tendency by asking a sample of White undergraduates to complete an allocation task using a resource allocation matrix. While there was a slight tendency for Vladimir's choice to increase with increasing levels of ethnic identification, this tendency disappeared when other factors were considered. Consistent with realistic group conflict theory and social dominance theory, the tendency to make Vladimir's choice increased with increasing levels of perceived intergroup competition and social dominance orientation.

Advice from the Pros Time to Talk Salary, But When?

While some recruiters post salary ranges for client companies' jobs, that unfortunately is not the industry norm in the biomedical field. This can leave job seekers adrift, unsure of how to handle this delicate yet critical question. Conventional wisdom would have the prospective employee tread lightly—avoiding the discussion until a job offer is extended.However, experts in the field—hiring managers and recruiters—agree that the answer is not whether to ask, but when. When it comes to negotiating pay and benefits, should a potential employee inquire at the beginning of a job search when answering ads that list no salary information or near the end of the process, after a job offer has been made? Asking too early, some experts warn, may not pay off.“Certainly if a job applicant comes in and that's their first question, that's going to turn you off,” says Virgil Smoot, director of biomedical services at The Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk, VA. He has been hiring biomeds for 30 years and currently is responsible for 6 BMETs and 7,000 pieces of equipment at 30 locations. Smoot says premature talk of money can send an employer the wrong signal about a candidate's priorities. “You'd want to hope they want to work for your institution because of who you are, that they just want to be a part of the team.”Smoot raises the salary issue with candidates, typically during the first interview. “I'd rather know that up front,” he explains, “rather than spend a lot of time with them and find out they want $10,000 more than I can pay them.” In cases where the interviewer does not raise the question, Smoot recommends asking about compensation either toward the end of the first interview or at the second.Charla Triplett is national director of Biomedical Engineering Alliance for Industrial Internships, a nonprofit in Chandler, AZ, that works with the biomedical industry and university biomed programs. She says that broaching the salary issue too soon can result in a lower salary, especially for younger job seekers. “Sometimes students don't know what the job salary is,” she says. “That's why I tell them to wait to have the employer offer, because then there's room to negotiate. If you tell them a salary range that you're looking for, honestly, the salary that they are offering could be higher, and you could end up basically gypping yourself out of salary by doing that.”So how does one find out salary information when none is given? That's where doing your homework can be helpful. Call the Human Resources department and ask for the salary range for the job you are seeking, advises James Powell, author of Mastering the Art of Salary Negotiation, in an online column, “Salary Negotiation: the Art of the Deal.”Triplett recommends reviewing recent salary surveys. [For example, see “AAMI's Salary Survey … How Does Your Salary Measure Up?” BI&T, Volume 39, Issue 6 (November 2005)]. Talk to others working in your field or contact trade or professional associations to learn what others are paid for the same work, says Dawn Rosenberg McKay in an about.com article, “Do's and Don'ts of Salary Negotiation.”Matthew Kenney, a 27-year-old biomedical engineer at Jellico Community Hospital in Tennessee, agrees with that advice: “Look into the company you're possibly going to be working for; get some feedback on them.” Kenney, however, hasn't always heeded the advice of the experts. He hasn't been shy about asking potential employers about compensation. Before landing his current job in May 2006 he had telephone interviews with several companies. He says he always asked about salary and benefits up front.“They're going to ask to see if I qualify before asking me to come in for an interview,” he reasons, “so why shouldn't I, as a candidate, see if they qualify?”Other advice for a successful salary negotiation:Finally, experts agree that no matter when the salary issue is raised, think long term. Barring a dramatic financial windfall, what you earn for years to come will be based on the starting salary you negotiate going in, says Dave Jensen, who writes “Tooling Up,” a career advice column, for the American Association for the Advancement of Science's website, sciencecareers.org. “Negotiating makes people uncomfortable,” he says in a recent online column, “Salary Negotiation, Part 1.” “Many people sacrifice long-term financial security because of a slight, temporary feeling of discomfort.“If a 15-minute conversation can have such a large and lasting impact, why not pursue it?”

DISPERSING THE “PUBLIC” AND THE “PRIVATE”

In examining the practice of power in the Birth Planning Policy of China, the author argues that the theorizing of the public-private frame and public patriarchy based on the welfare state in the West fails to capture the specific gender and state relations in the Chinese socialist context. With the convergence of the traditional familial order and the development of a modern nation-state, the “public” sphere of the Chinese socialist state is a disrupted space where the “state” still calls for its people's sacrifice for the collective good and yet at the same time, a terrian where citizens can claim their rights. It is also a domain where Chinese women's reproduction is collectivized for the cause of socialist modernization and yet a realm where they claim their voices. In the conclusion, the author addresses the question of Chinese women's agency in maneuvering through the patriarchal system and using the policy as a springboard to effecting changes in it.