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anonymous

Conspiracy Theorists Are More Likely To Doubt Climate Science - 0 views

www.motherjones.com/...sts-also-doubt-climate-science

shared by anonymous on 06 Jun 13 - Cached
  • It's called "motivated reasoning"—and was described at length in Mother Jones (by me) back in 2011. Here's the gist: People's emotional investments in their ideas, identities and world views bias their initial reading of evidence, and do so on a level prior to conscious thought. Then, the mind organizes arguments in favor of one's beliefs—or, against attacks on one's beliefs—based on the same emotional connections. And so you proceed to argue your case—but really you're rationalizing, not reasoning objectively.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 06 Jun 13
       
      *clears throat* - "Duh."
  • Conspiracy theorizing. Psychologist Stephan Lewandowsky, who studies conspiracy theorists. So what's the relationship between the two?
  • motivated reasoning and conspiracy mongering are at least in part separable, and worth keeping apart in your mind. To show as much, let's use the issue global warming as an example.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • In a recent study of climate blog readers, Lewandowksy and his colleagues found that the strongest predictor of being a climate change denier is having a libertarian, free market world view. Or as Lewandowsky put it in our interview, "the overwhelming factor that determined whether or not people rejected climate science is their worldview or their ideology."
  • This naturally lends support to the "motivated reasoning" theory
  • a conservative view about the efficiency of markets impels rejection of climate science because if climate science were true, markets would very clearly have failed in an very important instance.
  • But separately, the same study also found a second factor that was a weaker, but still real, predictor of climate change denial—and also of the denial of other scientific findings such as the proven link between HIV and AIDS. And that factor was conspiracy theorizing.
  • "If a person believes in one conspiracy theory, they're likely to believe in others as well," explained Lewandowsky on the podcast. "There's a statistical association. So people who think that MI5 killed Princess Diana, they probably also think that Lee Harvey Oswald didn't act by himself when he killed JFK."
  • This makes conspiracy theorizing a kind of "cognitive style," one clearly associated with science denial—but not as clearly moored to ideology.
  • anonymous on 06 Jun 13
     
    "Here's the gist: People's emotional investments in their ideas, identities and world views bias their initial reading of evidence, and do so on a level prior to conscious thought. Then, the mind organizes arguments in favor of one's beliefs-or, against attacks on one's beliefs-based on the same emotional connections. And so you proceed to argue your case-but really you're rationalizing, not reasoning objectively."
anonymous

Middle school is when the right friends may matter most - 1 views

www.labspaces.net/..._right_friends_may_matter_most

shared by anonymous on 13 Jan 11 - Cached
  • Having pro-social friends and staying away from deviant peers proved more effective for academic payoffs than simply being friends with high-achieving peers.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      Duh? Certainly with regard to academics, there are no surprises here, but it's interesting that improvement is correlated with avoidance-of problem kids not hanging-with high achievers.
  • This new study -- conducted by Marie-Helene Veronneau and Thomas J. Dishion of the UO Child and Family Center -- focused solely on the role played by friendship on academic achievement.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      And, like every damned study, take this with a giant grain of salt. Maybe, snowball sized.
  • A surprise discovery was that girls who already were struggling academically in sixth grade actually suffered later when their chosen friends were already those making the highest grades, Veronneau said. "We don't know the mechanisms on why it is this way for girls, but we can speculate that girls compare themselves to their friends and then decide they are not doing very well. Perhaps this affects their self-efficacy and belief in their own abilities."
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  • For girls already doing well in sixth grade, however, there was an opposite influence. "It could be for these girls, having friends who also are getting good grades, school is challenging and stimulating, and they end up doing better than expected," she said.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      These two examples strike me as a kind of slope. Whichever side of the slope you find yourself on sort of reinforces itself.
  • "Puberty is taking place. The brain is changing rapidly. Kids' brains are almost wired to be reading the social world to see how they fit in, and the school is the arena for it."
  • In a previous longitudinal study, he said, he and colleagues looked at the impacts of peer relationships of young people at ages 13, 15 and 17 to look for predictive indicators of life adjustments at age 24. Those influences at age 13 -- going back to middle school -- were the most influential, he noted. While instruction is school is vitally important, he said, it may be that more eyes should be looking at shifting peer relationships.
  • "Parents should pay attention to what their kids are doing and with whom they hang out," Veronneau said. "If parents notice that there is a shift in a child's friendship network, they should try to get to know those kids, talk with teachers and communicate naturally with their own child about where they are going and when they will be coming home."
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      This is a classic difference of broad generational differences in how children are raised. It's helicopter-ish, but I sure get it.
  • anonymous on 13 Jan 11
     
    "As adolescents move from elementary school into their middle or junior-high years, changes in friendships may signal potential academic success or troubles down the road, say University of Oregon researchers."
anonymous

Wanting Foreign Governments to Have Different Preferences is Not a Strategy - 0 views

fpwatch.blogspot.com/...reign-governments-to-have.html

geopolitics duh

shared by anonymous on 15 Jun 11 - Cached
  • In the case of Israel, it's been obvious for decades that unconditional American support for Tel Aviv complicates U.S. policy in the rest of the Middle East, and that some kind of deal on Palestinian statehood is a practical means of dulling the contradiction inherent in America's approach to the situation.
  • It's clear that Israeli and American preferences just don't align, and hoping for that to suddenly change is not a coherent policy.
  • Likewise with Pakistan. America would like Pakistan to stop caring about the threat posed by India, be less concerned with gaining "strategic depth" in Afghanistan, abandon its quixotic fits over the status of Kashmir, and thus be less inclined to openly and tacitly support Islamic militant groups that complicate American policy.
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  • But, obviously, those in Pakistan's government have different preferences and priorities. And hoping for that to change isn't a strategy.
  • anonymous on 15 Jun 11
     
    "For those who missed them, check out Andrew Sullivan's piece this morning on the bind into which the eventual UN vote on a Palestinian state has put U.S. foreign policy, as well as Josh Foust's post on the inanity of accepting further Friedman unit extensions to the war in Afghanistan. Stepping back a bit from the specifics of each situation, it's notable just how much crucial American policymaking seems to be based on asking/hoping/praying that foreign governments realign their policy preferences to better sync with U.S. interests. Not their policies, their preferences."
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