Intuitive Biases in Choice Versus Estimation: Implications for the Wisdom of Crowds

Although researchers have documented many instances of crowd wisdom, it is important to know whether some kinds of judgments may lead the crowd astray, whether crowds’ judgments improve with feedback over time, and whether crowds’ judgments can be improved by changing the way judgments are elicited. We investigated these questions in a sports gambling context (predictions against point spreads) believed to elicit crowd wisdom. In a season-long experiment, fans wagered over $20,000 on NFL football predictions. Contrary to the wisdom-of-crowds hypothesis, faulty intuitions led the crowd to predict “favorites” more than “underdogs” against point spreads that disadvantaged favorites, even when bettors knew that the spreads disadvantaged favorites. Moreover, the bias increased over time, a result consistent with attributions for success and failure that rewarded intuitive choosing. However, when the crowd predicted game outcomes by estimating point differentials rather than by predicting against point spreads, its predictions were unbiased and wiser

The life and piano works of Alexander Tikhonovich Gretchaninoff (1864-1956)

Master of MusicSchool of Music, Theater, and DanceVirginia HouserAlexander Tikhonovich Gretchaninoff (1864-1956) was a prolific composer from Russia’s Romantic age who explored the art of musical writing within an extensive number of genres and forms and showed an unusually strong interest in the creation of solo piano pieces for and about children. It is important that musicians in general and pianists in particular investigate his compositions and gain an understanding of their nature and potential usefulness as teaching pieces and as works worthy of public performance. My research consisted of an examination of Gretchaninoff’s autobiography, the study of numerous secondary accounts of his life and personal analysis of piano scores written by the master. My investigation uncovered the almost hidden existence of a large number of attractive musical works which Gretchaninoff wrote for solo piano as well as insightful details concerning the circumstances and motives that inspired the master to compose within the parameters of this genre. The following pieces are performed as part of this presentation: (from Children’s Album, Op. 98) A Tale, In the Camp of the Lead Soldiers, Lead Soldiers on the March, Hobby-Horse, Nurse Is Sick, Lullaby, Little Dance, Dreadful Event, After the Ball, On a Travel Tour, The Little Would-be Hero; (from 12 Little Sketches for Children, Op. 182) Sunrise, With the Fishing Rod, On the Swing, A Country Lad; (from A Child’s Day, Op. 109) Morning Prayer, The Broken Toy, The Happy Return Home; (from The Grandfather’s Book, Op. 119) My Dear Mommy, Swallow Dance, Pussy Is Ill, On the Swing; (from Glass Beads, Op. 123) Morning Promenade, On a Bicycle, Difficult Work; (from Andrusha’s Album, Op. 133) The Dance of the Gold Fishes, My Little Dog Joujou; (from Album Leaves, Op. 139) After Walking; (from Nina’s Album, Op. 141) After Mass, Dreaming, At the Wheel; (from Arabesques, opus number in dispute) Russian Folksong, A Sad Little Story; Sonatina in F major, Op. 110, #2 – 1. Allegro giocoso, 2. Menuet (Moderato grazioso) and Trio, 3. Finale – Allegro

The Association Between Student Wellness and Student Engagement in School

School engagement has been identified as an important construct associated with student achievement, school completion, and more recently, student well-being. The present study included data from 200 ninth grade students of diverse ethnic groups (African American, Hispanic, & White) to explore dimensions of student wellness and their association with student engagement in school. Adolescents completed the Child and Adolescent Wellness Scale (CAWS) and the Student Engagement in School Questionnaire (SEQ). Results revealed that students viewed themselves positively on both measures, the two measures demonstrated adequate internal consistency, and all 10 dimensions of the CAWS were significantly related to student engagement in school. The current study provides support for dimensions of wellness contributing to measured student engagement in school, and discusses the potential of wellness concepts contributing to school mental health

Collateral projections innervate the mammillary bodies and retrosplenial cortex: A new category of hippocampal cells

To understand the hippocampus it is necessary to understand the subiculum. Unlike other hippocampal subfields, the subiculum projects to almost all distal hippocampal targets, highlighting its critical importance for external networks. The present studies, in male rats and mice, reveal a new category of dorsal subiculum neurons that innervate both the mammillary bodies and the retrosplenial cortex. These bifurcating neurons comprise almost half of the hippocampal cells that project to retrosplenial cortex. The termination of these numerous collateral projections was visualized within the medial mammillary nucleus and the granular retrosplenial cortex (area 29). These collateral projections included subiculum efferents that cross to the contralateral mammillary bodies. Within the granular retrosplenial cortex, the collateral projections form a particularly dense plexus in deep layer II and layer III. This retrosplenial termination site co-localized with markers for VGluT2 and neurotensin. While efferents from the hippocampal CA fields standardly collateralize, subiculum projections often have only one target site. Consequently, the many collateral projections involving the retrosplenial cortex and the mammillary bodies present a relatively unusual pattern for the subiculum, which presumably relates to how both targets have complementary roles in spatial processing. Furthermore, along with the anterior thalamic nuclei, the mammillary bodies and retrosplenial cortex are key members of a memory circuit, which is usually described as both starting and finishing in the hippocampus. The present findings reveal how the hippocampus simultaneously engages different parts of this circuit, so forcing an important revision of this networ

The Acute Effects of Ischemic Preconditioning on Short-Duration Cycling: A Randomized Crossover Study

International Journal of Exercise Science 16(6): 148-158, 2023. There is recent interest from coaches and athletes regarding IPC as an effective way to generate better competitive outcomes. Regarding cycling specifically, the impact of IPC remains unclear. This study aimed to assess the effectiveness of IPC treatment for improving athletic performance during short-duration cycling. After the exclusion and inclusion criteria, there were 11 volunteers for the 3-minute cycling TT and 13 volunteers for the 6-minute cycling TT. All volunteers were competitive athletes of aerobic sports. The IPC treatment consisted of three alternating cycles of 5 minutes of 100% occlusion followed by 5 minutes of reperfusion to each leg. The sham treatment consisted of three alternating cycles of 1 minute of 100% occlusion followed by 1 minute of reperfusion to each leg. The main finding was that IPC significantly improved (p\u3c0.05) power output during 3-minute (4.22%) and 6-minute (2.29%) cycling TT relative to a sham. Additionally, about one-third of our participants required a tourniquet pressure higher than 220 mmHg to achieve 100% occlusion. These findings indicate ischemic preconditioning, administered bilaterally as three rounds of 5 minutes of total occlusion and ensuing reperfusion 20 minutes before a cycling TT, significantly enhanced average power output

Associations of essential worker status, sex, lifestyle behaviors, and moods: Findings from a sample of working adults in the United States during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic

COVID-19 profoundly impacted the world by causing disruptions in the global job markets due to business closures to support physical distancing in the earliest stages of the pandemic. To maintain basic societal function in the early stages of the pandemic, workers were classified based on the nature of their employment responsibilities as essential (i.e., continued working outside the home) and non-essential (i.e., required to work from home). Using a cross-sectional design, this study identified the lifestyle behaviors (sleep, diet, physical activity) and mood among US workers. An internet-based survey was used to collect data from US adults from April 13 to May 4, 2020. Survey questions focused on sleep, diet, physical activity, mood, grit, mental workload, and hours worked. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to describe differences in outcomes of interest across a 4-category variable combining sex and essential worker status (i.e., male essential, male non-essential, female essential, and female non-essential). The sample of 631 US adults (mean age = 35.99±12.17) was primarily female (72%), employed full-time (80.5%), and had at least a bachelor’s degree (85.8%). Statistically significant differences were observed between groups based on sleep, diet, physical activity, and mood. While sex-based differences were identified between lifestyle factors and moods, both male and female essential workers slept better, were more physically active, and reported better moods than their non-essential counterparts. Findings suggest that sex and work status may have impacted physical and mental health during the earliest stages of COVID-19. The associated long-term consequences of work responsibilities during the earliest stages of the pandemic remain unknown and require further study

Evidence for Ring Caustics in the Milky Way

The late infall of cold dark matter onto our galaxy produces discrete flows and caustics in its halo. The recently discovered ring of stars near galactocentric distance 20 kpc and a series of sharp rises in the Milky Way rotation curve are interpreted as due to the presence of caustic rings of dark matter in the galactic plane. Their locations are consistent at the 3% level with the predictions of the self-similar infall model for the caustic ring radii. Also, a triangular feature in the IRAS map of the galactic plane is consistent with the imprint of a caustic ring of dark matter upon the baryonic matter. These observations imply that the dark matter in our neighborhood is dominated by a single flow whose density and velocity vector are estimated.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures. Version to be published in Phys. Lett. B. The paper has been revised in response to comments by referees and to include fresh evidenc

Grit Had a Positive Impact on Moderate-to-high Intensity Physical Activity During the COVID-19 Health Crisis

Recently, moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA) has attracted additional scientific interest (e.g., ACSM recommendations) not only thanks to a) the physical and psychological benefits that can be experienced by the general population following just a single bout, but also b) since high levels of MVPA seem to mitigate the mortality risk associated with high levels of sedentary behavior, such as sitting. Non-pharmaceutical interventions against the COVID-19 (e.g., stay-at-home orders) have altered people’s lifestyles (e.g., physical activity, sitting time). Grit, a higher-order personality trait based on two lower-order components (i.e., perseverance and consistency), is highly predictive of both success and performance. PURPOSE: To examine whether grit influenced MVPA during the first 16 weeks of the COVID health crisis on a general-population sample. METHODS: In total, 191 participants (mage = 37.2, SD = 15.8; 78% female) agreed to participate. Grit (via the 8-item Grit Scale; max. score is 5: extremely gritty; lowest score is 1: not at all gritty) and MVPA (mins/week) data were collected at baseline. Then, MVPA data were collected weekly 16 more times. Monthly MVPAs (i.e., weeks 1-4, 5-8, 9-12, and 13-16) were used as variables in a growth model within a multilevel modeling framework. Grit was used as a predictor of the intercept of MVPA at baseline. Differences based on sex and age were also investigated. RESULTS: On average, male and female respondents differed only trivially on grit and the correlation estimate between grit and age was .03. Using a multilevel growth model, grit and MVPA were related at baseline and MVPA was fairly stable across time. The expected amount of MVPA at baseline was 221.7 minutes/week if grit were equal to zero; however, for each one-unit increase in grit, the expected increase in MVPA was 99.4 minutes/week. Holding grit level constant, the reported MVPA decreased by only about 7 minutes per week across the four months of physical activity data. CONCLUSION: MVPA tended to decrease slightly over time; however, grit had a positive impact on MVPA. That is, people with higher grit scores (regardless of age/sex) tended to have higher MVPA at baseline and, consequently, over time. Findings infer the value of grit during this unique period in this predominately female, highly active, late-thirties sample