Avoiding The Ask: A Field Experiment on Altruism, Empathy, and Charitable Giving

What triggers giving? We explore this in a randomized natural field experiment during the Salvation Army's annual campaign. Solicitors were at one or both of two main entrances to a supermarket, making the solicitation either easy or difficult to avoid. Additionally, solicitors were either silent, or asked "please give" to passersby. We observed over 17,000 passings over four days, and found dramatic avoidance of the solicitors, but only during a direct ask. Furthermore, asking increased donations 75%. Across all conditions, seeking the solicitor was exceedingly rare. The results do not support static views of altruism, such as inequity aversion, and instead highlight the importance of social cues and psychological features of the giver-receiver interaction. We argue that avoidance could evidence a lack of altruism or self-control strategy to deal with empathic reflexes to give.

Congenital Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma in a Suckling Piglet

A 3-week-old suckling piglet spontaneously died after septicemic colibacillosis. At postmortem examination, bulging and ulcerated lesions were seen, affecting the oral mucosa on the inner surface of the lower lip. After histopathological investigation, the diagnosis of congenital oral squamous cell carcinoma was made. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first case of congenital oral squamous cell carcinoma ever described. A relationship has been shown or suggested between papillomavirus infection and oral squamous cell carcinoma in humans and animals. However, next-generation sequencing study did not demonstrate any papillomavirus sequences in the case reported herein

Avoiding the ask: a field experiment on altruism, empathy, and charitable giving’, mimeo

Abstract What triggers giving? We explore this in a randomized natural field experiment during the Salvation Army's annual campaign. Solicitors were at one or both of two main entrances to a supermarket, making the solicitation either easy or difficult to avoid. Additionally, solicitors were either silent, or asked "please give" to passersby. We observed over 17,000 passings over four days, and found dramatic avoidance of the solicitors, but only during a direct ask. Furthermore, asking increased donations 75%. Across all conditions, seeking the solicitor was exceedingly rare. The results do not support static views of altruism, such as inequity aversion, and instead highlight the importance of social cues and psychological features of the giver-receiver interaction. We argue that avoidance could evidence a lack of altruism or self-control strategy to deal with empathic impulses to give

Avoiding the ask: a field experiment on altruism, empathy, and charitable giving’, mimeo

Abstract What triggers giving? We explore this in a randomized natural field experiment during the Salvation Army's annual campaign. Solicitors were at one or both of two main entrances to a supermarket, making the solicitation either easy or difficult to avoid. Additionally, solicitors were either silent, or asked "please give" to passersby. We observed over 17,000 passings over four days, and found dramatic avoidance of the solicitors, but only during a direct ask. Furthermore, asking increased donations 75%. Across all conditions, seeking the solicitor was exceedingly rare. The results do not support static views of altruism, such as inequity aversion, and instead highlight the importance of social cues and psychological features of the giver-receiver interaction. We argue that avoidance could evidence a lack of altruism or self-control strategy to deal with empathic impulses to give. * A version of this paper constituted Trachtman's senior thesis at Harvard College, for which it was awarded the best thesis prize and summa cum laude honors. We would like to note that Trachtman took the lead responsibility in coordinating and executing the experiment. Erzo Luttmer provided exceptionally helpful advice along the way. We would also like to thank Ned Augenblick, Stefano DellaVigna, Randall Lewis, David Reiley and Michael Schwarz for helpful comments and the NSF and Harvard College for financial support. We especially thank the Salvation Army for cooperation in running the experiment

The Effect of a Gluten-Free Diet in Children With Difficult-to-Manage Nephrotic Syndrome

Case reports have linked childhood nephrotic syndrome to food sensitivity, including gluten. We report our experience with 8 children (6 boys, 2 girls; age at implementation of special diet 2–14 years) with difficult-to-manage nephrotic syndrome who were placed on a gluten-free diet for 3.4 ± 4.3 years (range, 0.6–14 years) and who had clinical improvement enabling reduction or discontinuation in steroid dosage

Training convolutional neural networks to score pneumonia in slaughtered pigs

The slaughterhouse can act as a valid checkpoint to estimate the prevalence and the economic impact of diseases in farm animals. At present, scoring lesions is a challenging and time‐consuming activity, which is carried out by veterinarians serving the slaughter chain. Over recent years, artificial intelligence(AI) has gained traction in many fields of research, including livestock production. In particular, AI‐based methods appear able to solve highly repetitive tasks and to consistently analyze large amounts of data, such as those collected by veterinarians during postmortem inspection in high‐throughput slaughterhouses. The present study aims to develop an AI‐based method capable of recognizing and quantifying enzootic pneumonia‐like lesions on digital images captured from slaughtered pigs under routine abattoir conditions. Overall, the data indicate that the AI‐based method proposed herein could properly identify and score enzootic pneumonia‐like lesions without interfering with the slaughter chain routine. According to European legislation, the application of such a method avoids the handling of carcasses and organs, decreasing the risk of microbial contamination, and could provide further alternatives in the field of food hygiene

Urinary Epidermal Growth Factor as a Marker of Disease Progression in Children With Nephrotic Syndrome

© 2019 International Society of Nephrology Introduction: Childhood-onset nephrotic syndrome has a variable clinical course. Improved predictive markers of long-term outcomes in children with nephrotic syndrome are needed. This study tests the association between baseline urinary epidermal growth factor (uEGF) excretion and longitudinal kidney function in children with nephrotic syndrome. Methods: The study evaluated 191 participants younger than 18 years enrolled in the Nephrotic Syndrome Study Network, including 118 with their first clinically indicated kidney biopsy (68 minimal change disease; 50 focal seNorthwell Healthntal glomerulosclerosis) and 73 with incident nephrotic syndrome without a biopsy. uEGF was measured at baseline for all participants and normalized by the urine creatinine (Cr) concentration. Renal epidermal growth factor (EGF) mRNA was measured in the tubular compartment microdissected from kidney biopsy cores from a subset of patients. Linear mixed models were used to test if baseline uEGF/Cr and EGF mRNA expression were associated with change in estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) over time. Results: Higher uEGF/Cr at baseline was associated with slower eGFR decline during follow-up (median follow-up = 30 months). Halving of uEGF/Cr was associated with a decrease in eGFR slope of 2.0 ml/min per 1.73 m2 per year (P \u3c 0.001) adjusted for age, race, diagnosis, baseline eGFR and proteinuria, and APOL1 genotype. In the biopsied subgroup, uEGF/Cr was correlated with EGF mRNA expression (r = 0.74; P \u3c 0.001), but uEGF/Cr was retained over mRNA expression as the stronger predictor of eGFR slope after multivariable adjustment (decrease in eGFR slope of 1.7 ml/min per 1.73 m2 per year per log2 decrease in uEGF/Cr; P \u3c 0.001). Conclusion: uEGF/Cr may be a useful noninvasive biomarker that can assist in predicting the long-term course of kidney function in children with incident nephrotic syndrome

Diagnostic yield of renal biopsies: a retrospective single center review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Previous studies have examined the spectrum of diseases identified with a kidney biopsy and the complications of the procedure. However, few studies have examined the utility of the test to clarify the diagnosis and guide treatment of pediatric patients. This retrospective, single-center chart review was performed to test the hypothesis that at least 80% of native kidney biopsies provide clinically valuable information that rationally guides diagnosis and patient management.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>200 biopsies performed between January 1, 2000 and June 30, 2008 were reviewed. A scheme composed of six categories was devised to classify the utility of each kidney biopsy.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>196 complete case files were available for review. Twenty-four (12.2%) biopsies did not shed light on the diagnosis and were unhelpful in patient management – 21 biopsies (10.7%) were non-diagnostic and 3 (1.5%) failed to yield enough tissue for examination. The number of unhelpful biopsies did not cluster in any specific disease entity.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our findings provide guidance to nephrologists about the total risk of a kidney biopsy, including uninformative results, when seeking informed consent for the procedure. The results suggest an appropriate balance has been reached which maximizes the use of kidney biopsies while minimizing the risk of this invasive procedure (word count: 202).</p

Plasma zonulin levels in childhood nephrotic syndrome

© 2019 Trachtman, Gipson, Lemley, Troost, Faul, Morrison, Vento, Ahn and Goldberg. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. Objective: We conducted this study to test the hypothesis that plasma zonulin levels are elevated in pediatric patients with nephrotic syndrome compared to healthy controls. Study Design: Plasma zonulin levels were measured by ELISA in 114 children enrolled in the NEPTUNE study. Clinical and laboratory data were retrieved from the NEPTUNE database. Results: The median age of the patients was 10 (IQR = 5 to 14) years, 59 were male, 64 had minimal change disease, 47 focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, median eGFR was 96 (IQR = 80 to 114) ml/min/1.73 m2, and median urine protein:creatinine ratio was 0.5 (IQR = 0.1 to 3.4) (g:g). The plasma zonulin level was 14.2 ± 5.0 vs. 10.2 ± 2.5 ng/ml in healthy adults in a report using the same assay kit, P = 0.0025. These findings were confirmed in an independent cohort of children with nephrotic syndrome compared to healthy age-matched controls, P = 0.01. Zonulin concentrations did not differ in children with minimal change disease vs. focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, frequently relapsing vs. steroid-dependent vs. steroid-resistant clinical course, and were not influenced by the immunosuppressive treatment regimen. There was no relationship between plasma zonulin levels and the absolute or percentage change in proteinuria from enrollment until the time of the zonulin assay. Conclusion: Plasma zonulin levels are elevated in childhood nephrotic syndrome regardless of level of proteinuria or specific treatment. The cause of the high plasma zonulin levels and whether zonulin contributes to glomerular injury requires further study