Human-agent collectives

We live in a world where a host of computer systems, distributed throughout our physical and information environments, are increasingly implicated in our everyday actions. Computer technologies impact all aspects of our lives and our relationship with the digital has fundamentally altered as computers have moved out of the workplace and away from the desktop. Networked computers, tablets, phones and personal devices are now commonplace, as are an increasingly diverse set of digital devices built into the world around us. Data and information is generated at unprecedented speeds and volumes from an increasingly diverse range of sources. It is then combined in unforeseen ways, limited only by human imagination. People’s activities and collaborations are becoming ever more dependent upon and intertwined with this ubiquitous information substrate. As these trends continue apace, it is becoming apparent that many endeavours involve the symbiotic interleaving of humans and computers. Moreover, the emergence of these close-knit partnerships is inducing profound change. Rather than issuing instructions to passive machines that wait until they are asked before doing anything, we will work in tandem with highly inter-connected computational components that act autonomously and intelligently (aka agents). As a consequence, greater attention needs to be given to the balance of control between people and machines. In many situations, humans will be in charge and agents will predominantly act in a supporting role. In other cases, however, the agents will be in control and humans will play the supporting role. We term this emerging class of systems human-agent collectives (HACs) to reflect the close partnership and the flexible social interactions between the humans and the computers. As well as exhibiting increased autonomy, such systems will be inherently open and social. This means the participants will need to continually and flexibly establish and manage a range of social relationships. Thus, depending on the task at hand, different constellations of people, resources, and information will need to come together, operate in a coordinated fashion, and then disband. The openness and presence of many distinct stakeholders means participation will be motivated by a broad range of incentives rather than diktat. This article outlines the key research challenges involved in developing a comprehensive understanding of HACs. To illuminate this agenda, a nascent application in the domain of disaster response is presented

Animal Spirits: Affective and Deliberative Processes in Economic Behavior

The economic conception of human behavior assumes that a person has a single set of well-defined goals, and that the person's behavior is chosen to best achieve those goals. We develop a model in which a person's behavior is the outcome of an interaction between two systems: a deliberative system that assesses options with a broad, goal-based perspective, and an affective system that encompasses emotions and motivational drives. Our model provides a framework for understanding many departures from full rationality discussed in the behavioral-economics literature, and captures the familiar feeling of being "of two minds." And by focusing on factors that moderate the relative influence of the two systems, our model also generates a variety of novel testable predictions.

Organ Entrepreneurs

The supply of human organs for transplantation might seem an unlikely place to begin thinking about entrepreneurship. After all, there is no production market for human organs and, with the surprising exception of Iran, legal rules around the world make the sale of human organs for transplantation a criminal offense. Yet entrepreneurs have been present throughout the history of organ transplantation — a history of the active exploration, innovation, and management of a potentially very controversial exchange at the seemingly clear boundaries that separate giving from selling, life from death, and right from wrong. This article explores the role of entrepreneurial activity in the organ transplantation industry, with the goal of showing how the specific case helps us understand the more general phenomenon of innovation in the shadow of the law, and the role of reciprocity and gift exchange in that process. We begin with a more general point about the connection between structures of exchange and their social legitimacy, illustrating it with a familiar current case from the (conventionally entrepreneurial) world of the “sharing economy”. We then describe three innovations in the world of organ transplantation, discussing the legitimation problems faced by innovators in each case, and the strategies they have drawn on. First, Kidney Paired Donation (KPD), one of the first entrepreneurial attempts to bridge the gap between kidney supply and demand, allows patients with willing, but biologically incompatible donors, to “swap” with a similarly situated pair. Second, Non-simultaneous, Extended Altruistic Donor chains (or “NEAD” chains), removed the simultaneity constraint imposed by KPD, allowing more flexibility and a greater number of transplants, but also inserting the possibility of strategic behavior by donor-recipient pairs. Finally, we consider the most recent innovation, Advanced Donation, in which a donor donates a kidney before her paired recipient has been matched to a specific donor or scheduled for surgery, creating new challenges and risks

Belief in a Just World and Children's Test Scores

Parental beliefs, recognised by child psychologists as a causal influence on early development, are incorporated into a two-period model of human capital accumulation. In the first period parents transfer their beliefs, distinct from genes, to their child by signalling their "belief in a just world" or the perceived return to effort. The child responds by choosing effort, irrespective of the real world returns, which combines early with their genes to create their ability. This ability determines the rate of return to second period investment and final attainment. This is an ontological model, in the sense that children's beliefs influence the attainment they achieve. The identifying assumption is that parent beliefs are slow-moving and they are not conditioned on the child. If parents are credit constrained, then both beliefs and income determine attainment. Empirical analysis using the NCDS shows that beliefs are a strong predictor of early attainment and reduces the importance of parental income or wealth. This justifies effective mentoring programmes for children with problem parents.

The right temporoparietal junction during a cooperation dilemma: An rTMS study

Cooperation enhances interpersonal communication and nurtures society. However, efforts to socially cooperate may often evoke conflict. Individuals may selfishly pursue a greater reward or success by exploiting the efforts of other individuals or taking unnecessary risk to oneself. Such a cooperation dilemma is highly prevalent in real life; thus, it has been studied in various disciplines. Although published functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have shown the involvement of the right temporoparietal junction (TPJ) in resolving a dilemma through cooperation, a causal relationship between the two has rarely been explored. Hence, we investigated this issue by combining repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation with a priority game task (modified snowdrift game). In this game task, participants and opponent players jointly faced a problem whereby their collaboration was anticipated to defuse the situation. This conflicted with a choice in the participant's self-interest that was more rewarding but risky. We further included conditions with and without explicit social cues using figures describing elderly/pregnant passengers in the game opponent's car, and measured participants' prosocial traits to examine any cue-induced effect as well as the personality-cooperation relationship, respectively. The cooperation ratio was not statistically different in both the no-cue and with-cue conditions between the sham stimulation and inhibitory continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS). However, after cTBS, in the no-cue condition, the strength of the association between cooperation ratio and empathy traits decreased significantly. These results add to our knowledge about the right TPJ's role in social cognition, which may be extraordinarily complex. This topic is deserving of further examination

Suicide prevention: The contribution of psychoanalysis

The contemporary relevance of psychoanalysis is being increasingly questioned; Off the Couch challenges this view, demonstrating that psychoanalytic thinking and its applications are both innovative and relevant, in particular to the management and treatment of more disturbed and difficult to engage patient groups. Chapters address: Clinical applications in diverse settings across the age range. The relevance of psychoanalytic thinking to the practice of CBT, psychosomatics and general psychiatry The contribution of psychoanalytic thinking to mental health policy and the politics of conflict and mediation. This book suggests that psychoanalysis has a vital position within the public health sector and discusses how it can be better utilised in the treatment of a range of mental health problems. It also highlights the role of empirical research in providing a robust evidence base. Off the Couch will be essential reading for those practicing in the field of mental health and will also be useful for anyone involved in the development of mental health and public policies. It will ensure that practitioners and supervisors have a clear insight into how psychoanalysis can be applied in general healthcare

Hospitableness: the new service metaphor? Developing an instrument for measuring hosting

Over the last couple of decades the word hospitality has emerged from the shadow of being used to describe a cluster of commercial activities providing accommodation, food and drink experiences to guests for a fee. Hospitality describes a ubiquitous aspect of human behaviour. The need to protect and honour visitors has a tradition as long as human society and is practiced around the globe. The study of hospitality reveals that societies do have changing levels of obligation to be hospitable, and that many of the more advanced contemporary societies no longer practice the requirement to be hospitable with the same intensity that perhaps they once did. That said, philosophers and others suggest that in any given social context, there are differences amongst individuals in the commitment to being hospitable for the pleasure it gives them personally. They are not motivated by ulterior motives, personal gain, or the threat of punishment. Guests are unconditionally welcomed by hosts driven by altruistic motives. Whilst it has been possible to describe the behaviour of hospitable individuals, there has not been until now an instrument to measure the strength of genuine hospitality in individuals. This paper describes the development of a suite of questions designed to measure these qualities in individuals. This paper describes the development of the instrument and argues for the application of the instrument in wider array of tourist and other contexts than are described here.Keywords: host, guest, hosting, researching hospitablenes

ACEs Wild: Making Meaning out of Trauma Through Altruism Born of Suffering

Childhood exposure to early adverse experiences is prevalent—affecting almost one-half of children from birth to 17 years old—and brings with it the potential for the long-lasting detrimental effects of traumatization. At the same time, a growing body of compelling evidence also suggests that many survivors of trauma exhibit more resilience and prosocial behaviors than individuals who have never experienced a traumatic event. This phenomenon has been coined altruism born of suffering (ABS); it is a relatively new concept in trauma research that seeks to better understand the possible positive outcomes of trauma. Building further beyond the concepts of resilience and post-traumatic growth, ABS showcases the potential for an individual to not only resist the risk of psychopathology or experience a constructive intrapersonal transformation after a trauma, but also to become more altruistic and prosocial than one who has never experienced a traumatic event. Research has illuminated several factors that can promote ABS, such as victim affinity, adaptive meaning making, and a supportive social sphere. Nevertheless, little qualitative research has examined the specific nature of how one’s definition of their self and their trauma experience can foster altruism. In this dissertation, I examined the specific meaning making processes of ABS using a mixed methods study. I assessed quantitative correlation data between trauma and altruism in an adult volunteer population, then conducted qualitative interviews with four volunteers who had high levels of both trauma and altruism. I utilized Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to explore common themes that arose across the interviews. Six thematic clusters emerged: Insight and Inspiration, Accountability for Others’ Suffering, Personal Growth, Trait Enhancement, Interpersonal Relationships, and Negative Effects of Trauma. Notable themes within these clusters included Filling in Gaps, Preventing Pain, Self-Efficacy and Control, and Helping Me by Helping You. The findings were highly congruent with prior research on ABS, and provided further evidence that there is a noteworthy connection between trauma and altruism. The data showed that experiencing trauma led to greater levels of empathy, awareness, victim affinity, self-efficacy, and motivation to help, influencing the survivors to heal themselves and others through altruistic acts. I discussed the clinical treatment implications of such data, highlighted limitations of the study, and noted areas for future researc