Minimal Social Cues in the Dictator Game

This paper reports results of an incentivized laboratory experiment manipulating an extremely weak social cue in the Dictator Game. Prior to making their decision, we present dictators with a simple visual stimlulus: either three dots in a “watching-eyes” configuration, or three dots in a neutral configuration. The watching-eyes configuration is suggestive of a schematic face—a stimuli that is known to weakly activate the fusiform face area of the brain (Tong, et al., 2000; Bednar and Miikkulainen, 2003; Johnson and Morton, 1991). Given the experimental evidence for automatic priming of watching eyes of others, it is thus reasonable to hypothesize that even though the social cue is very weak, this activation might be sufficient to produce a significant change in social behavior. Our results demonstrate that such a weak social cue does increase giving behavior—even under conditions of complete anonymity—and this difference in behavior across subjects is entirely explained by differences in the choice behavior of males. In fact, males in our treatment condition, who typically act more selfishly than do females in conditions of complete anonymity, give twice as much to anonymous recipients than females give.dictator game, social preferences, laboratory experiment, social distance

Prevention focus and prior investment failure in financial decision making

This research demonstrates, across four experiments, that investors behave differently when a prior investment is perceived as a failure rather than as a loss. The research shows that individuals consistently prefer a conservative investment option in the condition of failure rather than a loss even though the risky option offers a chance to break even (Study 1 & 2). The same result was obtained even when the risky option offers a higher expected return (i.e. should be selected if the decision makers are rational) than the conservative option (Study 3). The tendency to be more risk-averse in the failure condition is due to the activation of situational prevention focus (Study 4). The research findings highlight the importance of understanding investors’ perceptions of their prior negative investment decision outcomes since risk-seeking behavior and buying behavior could be different when a prior investment is perceived as a failure or as a loss. © 2020 Elsevier B.V

Cultural grounding of regret: regret in self and interpersonal contexts.

The purpose of this study was to explore cultural similarities and differences in regret, focusing on distinctions between interpersonal and self-situations, and between action and inaction regrets. Japanese and American undergraduates were asked to describe regrets experienced in interpersonal and self-situations. We found that both situational and cultural contexts influenced the likelihood of regretting inactions over actions. Participants were more likely to recall inaction regrets in self-situations than in interpersonal situations, and that the likelihood of recalling inaction regrets was more pronounced for Americans than for Japanese. Furthermore, we examined the intensity of the regret. Whereas American students experienced regret as intense as that of Japanese students in self-situations, Japanese students experienced regret more strongly than American students in interpersonal situations. Detailed content analysis also showed that individuals experienced regret in ways consistent with cultural values. The situational and cultural grounding of regret is discussed

Neuron-Glia Interaction as a Possible Glue to Translate the Mind-Brain Gap: A Novel Multi-Dimensional Approach Toward Psychology and Psychiatry (R1)

Neurons and synapses have long been the dominant focus of neuroscience, thus the pathophysiology of psychiatric disorders has come to be understood within the neuronal doctrine. However, the majority of cells in the brain are not neurons but glial cells including astrocytes, oligodendrocytes and microglia. Traditionally, neuroscientists regarded glial functions as simply providing physical support and maintenance for neurons. Thus, in this limited role glia had been long ignored. Recently, glial functions have been gradually investigated, and increasing evidence has suggested that glial cells perform important roles in various brain functions. Digging up the glial functions and further understanding of these crucial cells, and the interaction between neurons and glia may shed new light on clarifying many unknown aspects including the mind-brain gap, and conscious-unconscious relationships. We briefly review the current situation of glial research in the field, and propose a novel translational research with a multi-dimensional model, combining various experimental approaches such as animal studies, in vitro & in vivo neuron-glia studies, a variety of human brain imaging investigations, and psychometric assessments

Solving the type-order free rider problem in a public goods game:an experiment using a leader support system

Punishment of non-cooperators—free riders—can lead to high cooperation in public goods games (PGG). However, second-order free riders, who do not pay punishment costs, reduce the effectiveness of punishment. Here we introduce a “leader support system,” in which one group leader can freely punish group followers using capital pooled through the support of group followers. In our experiment, participants engage in three stages repeatedly: a PGG stage in which followers decide to cooperate for their group; a support stage in which followers decide whether to support the leader; and a punishment stage in which the leader can punish any follower. We compare a support-present condition with a no-support condition, in which there is an external source for the leader’s punishment. The results show that punishment occurs more frequently in the support-present condition than the no-support condition. Within the former, both higher cooperation and higher support for a leader are achieved under linkage-type leaders—who punish both non-cooperators and non-supporters. In addition, linkage-type leaders themselves earn higher profits than other leader types because they withdraw more support. This means that leaders who effectively punish followers could increase their own benefits and the second-order free rider problem would be solved

Trust, Cohesion, and Cooperation After Early Versus Late Trust Violations in Two-Person Exchange

We examine how the timing of trust violations affects cooperation and solidarity, including trust and relational cohesion. Past studies that used repeated Prisoner’s Dilemmas suggest that trust violations are more harmful when they occur in early rather than later interactions. We argue that this effect of early trust violations depends on cultural and individual differences in generalized trust. A laboratory study from high- and low-trust cultures (the United States vs. Japan) supported our claim. First, early trust violations were more harmful than late trust violations, but only for Americans; the pattern reversed for Japanese. Second, these patterns were mediated by individual differences in generalized trust. Finally, generalized trust also moderated the effect of trust violations in the United States but not Japan. By demonstrating that generalized trust is not only lower but also less important in low-trust cultures, our research advances our understanding of how culture affects the development of solidarity in exchange relations