Monthly Archives: January 2020

Human Behavior

Think twice before shouting your virtues online moral grandstanding is toxic – The Conversation US

In an era of bitter partisanship, political infighting and ostracization of those with unpopular views, Americans actually agree on one thing: 85% say political discourse has gotten worse over the last several years, according to Pew Research.

The polarization plays out everywhere in society, from private holiday gatherings to very public conversations on social media, where debate is particularly toxic and aggressive.

For psychologists like myself, who study human behavior, this widespread nastiness is both a social problem and a research opportunity. My colleagues and I have zeroed in on one specific aspect that might help explain Americas dysfunctional discourse: moral grandstanding.

The term may be unfamiliar, but most people have experienced moral grandstanding.

Examples of moral grandstanding include when a friend makes grand and extreme proclamations on Twitter about their deepest held values regarding climate change, for instance, and when a campaigning politician makes bold but clearly untrue ideological claims about immigration.

Philosophers coined the phrase to describe the abuse of so-called moral talk an umbrella term encompassing all conversations humans have about our politics, beliefs, values and morals.

Usually, people engage in moral talk to learn from, connect with or persuade someone else. They might say of their decision not to eat any animal products, for example, I am vegan for environmental and animal rights reasons.

Moral grandstanding occurs when people use moral talk, instead, to promote themselves or seek status. So a moral grandstander might say, I am vegan because it is the only moral decision. If you care about the planet, you cant eat animal products.

For moral grandstanders, conversation is a means to an end not a free exchange of ideas.

A desire for respect from our peers is normal in humans, as are the desires for safety, love and belonging. Social scientists have traced the evolutionary origins of status seeking to prehistoric times.

Moral grandstanding, however, is a special kind of status seeking. It implies that someone is using conversations about important or controversial topics solely to get attention or impress others.

Just because someone touts their virtues whether on Twitter or in conversation does not mean they are morally superior to everyone else.

In a recently published study conducted with a team of other psychologists and philosophers, we asked 6,000 Americans a series of questions about who and why they share their deepest moral and political beliefs with. People who reported sharing beliefs to gain respect, admiration or status were identified as grandstanders.

Almost everyone indicated they had some history of grandstanding, but only a few 2% to 5% indicated they primarily used their moral talk to promote themselves.

We found that moral grandstanders were more likely to experience discord in their personal lives. People who reported grandstanding more often also reported more experiences arguing with loved ones and severing ties with friends or family members over political or moral disagreements.

People who indicated using their deepest held beliefs to boost their own status in real life also reported more toxic social media behaviors, picking fights over politics on Facebook, for example, and berating strangers on Twitter for having the wrong opinions.

Philosophical accounts of grandstanding strongly suggest that moral grandstanders behave less morally than other people in other ways, too. They are more likely to rudely call others out for not being virtuous enough, systematically disparage entire groups of people and hijack important conversations to serve their own purposes.

When the natural human desire for respect leads people to seek status in situations when they would be better served by listening, it seems, this behavior can drive friends, family and communities apart.

The rise of moral grandstanding isnt the only reason discourse in the United States has taken a turn for the worse.

Politics have grown extraordinarily polarized, which is both a cause and effect of social polarization. Politically active people feel more animosity and less trust toward the other side than they have in generations.

Social media itself seems to accelerate conflict, creating echo chambers of likeminded people that are galvanized against others and driving cycles of outrage that quickly escalate and stifle public participation in important conversations.

So ending moral grandstanding wont magically fix the public debate in the United States. But tamping it down would lead the country in a more productive direction.

Consider assessing your own conversation style, reflecting about what you say to others and why. When you enter into contentious territory with someone who differs in opinion, ask whether youre doing so because youre genuinely interested in communicating and connecting with your fellow human or are you just trying to score points?

Thinking honestly about your engagement on social media ground zero for moral grandstanding is particularly important.

Do you post controversial material just for likes and retweets? Do you share social media posts of people you disagree with just to publicly mock them? Do you find yourself trying to one-up the good deeds of someone else to make yourself look good to people whose respect you crave?

If so, then you may be a moral grandstander.

If not, you can still fight moral grandstanding by recognizing and dissuading these behaviors in others. Given that moral grandstanders crave status, respect and esteem from others, depriving them of the attention they seek is probably the best deterrent.

[ Youre smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversations authors and editors. You can get our highlights each weekend. ]

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Think twice before shouting your virtues online moral grandstanding is toxic - The Conversation US

Human Behavior

Research of SIUE’s Jeremy Jewell published on state government site – AdVantageNEWS.com

Madison County court programming is serving as an effective framework to be emulated statewide and nationally thanks to a long-standing partnership with Southern Illinois University Edwardsville's Jeremy Jewell and his published research now appearing onIllinoisCourts.gov.

For nearly two decades,Jewell, a professor of psychology in the SIUE School of Education, Health and Human Behavior, has shared his expertise in cognitive behavioral therapy, clinical child psychology, juvenile delinquency, risk assessment, and program evaluation with the Madison County Probation and Court Services Department.

Through this active partnership, Jewell has offered research-driven service to Madison County by creating and implementing programs aimed at helping probation clients improve their ability to manage anger and increase compassion for others. Other endeavors have included the measurement of program effectiveness in the Adult Drug Court and Veterans Court.

Jewells published analyses and outcomes from this work have been shared online by the Administrative Office of Illinois Courts as academically sound resources for individuals and courts nationwide.

Dr. Jewell has been instrumental in the implementation of evidence-based practices throughout the Madison County Probation and Court Services Department, Department Director Jackie Wiesehan said. Our goal is to provide effective programming to our clients that will change criminal behavior and reduce recidivism. Dr. Jewell has been able to evaluate what we do to ensure our actions are effective. The department has been awarded numerous federal and state grants with Dr. Jewells assistance. Because of the research he provides, we have been able to expand both our Drug Court and Veterans Court to better serve those in need of drug treatment in our community.

My collaborative role has expanded over time, Jewell explained. For the last 10 years, we have expanded the implementation of our Compassion Approach to Learning Meditation program for detained youth to five days a week. Ive also helped assess and improve the effectiveness of the Adult Drug Court and am now working with the Veterans Court.

Our programs aim to improve anger management and increase compassion, so that clients will be less likely to commit crimes in the future, he added. The court-involved population, especially juveniles as well as substance-abusing adults, is interesting to me because although they have all committed crimes, they also usually have been victims of abuse and trauma themselves.

So, while they may have broken the law, theyve also been victims and deserve good treatment. Programs that help these individuals also benefit others by decreasing future crime in our community.

According to Madison County Juvenile Detention Center Program Coordinator Scott Elliff, Jewells programs have provided rewarding, enriching and educational experiences for area youth, center staff and the SIUE undergraduate students who he mentors and involves in program implementation.

We cant thank Dr. Jewell enough for providing our facility with such an array of beneficial programs, including individual client counseling, outcome measures, psychological assessments and staff trainings, Elliff said. He freely offers his time and resources to improve the quality and therapeutic effectiveness of the services we provide.

The CALM program, in particular, continues to afford our youth effective methods to manage stress, anxiety and anger while detained, as well as coping skills to take with them wherever they may go, he added. Regarding individual counseling, it is encouraging to see how his graduate students easily develop rapport and express concern for their respective clients in the Juvenile Detention Center. Center youth look forward to and benefit from these sessions.

The sharing of published research on the Illinois Courts website is highly valuable for users.

We are trying to understand which trends that occur in national research studies might also occur locally, Jewell explained. For example, we know that drug court is an effective program nationally, but we have also confirmed its effectiveness in Madison County. In addition, we are trying to understand if there is anything happening locally that may be different than national trends. For example, our research on Madison County drug court clients found that those who are older and have more serious charges are more likely to graduate from drug court, which is different than other studies from across the U.S.

To view Jewells research and other court-involved publications, visitprobation.illinoiscourts.gov/data/illinois-publications.

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Research of SIUE's Jeremy Jewell published on state government site - AdVantageNEWS.com

Human Behavior

The Pitfalls and Possibilities of the Measurement Revolution for National Security – War on the Rocks

It was impossible to create good metrics. We tried using troop numbers trained, violence levels, control of territory and none of it painted an accurate picture, said one former NSC official. Said another: There was no head turning movement or measurement on how things are going to be improving.

Petabytes of data were collected throughout the war in Afghanistan, yet as the recently published Afghanistan Papers highlight, they rarely informed strategy. Instead, conflicting priorities and changing benchmarks of success ruled the day. And even when leaders did settle on metrics, such as the number of Taliban attacks, their interpretation was often tailored to match a desired high-level message, rather than being based on clear-eyed, consistent arguments about what different trends meant about the underlying political process. Realizing the measurement revolutions potential to enable better security policy does not require a military led by statisticians. It requires a military led by thinkers.

Because the trifecta of big data, the Internet of Things, and machine learning creates tremendous potential for quantifying human behavior. From tracking the spread of diseases to measuring refugee integration, data that were impossible to gather even a decade ago can now be used to inform policy decisions with great precision. The paralyzing issue for todays policy leaders is how to figure out which data-driven claims are credible and which are not. Nowhere is this more true than in national security policy, where hard-to-interpret data abound and the stakes couldnt be higher.

To see the measurement revolutions promise, consider some hard security policy questions.

Do countering violent extremism programs work, and if so, where should they be targeted? Recent work leveraging social media and high-resolution data on program administration can help answer both questions. New research by Tamar Mitts geolocates roughly 35,000 Twitter users in the United States who followed one or more Islamic State propaganda accounts and parses their tweets from 2014 to 2016 to identify which tweets explicitly express pro-ISIL sentiment. She finds that those living in areas where the Department of Homeland Security held community engagement events posted less content sympathetic to ISIL and followed fewer propaganda accounts in the period after the event compared to the period before. No similar change happened in places where Homeland Security did not hold events. Of course, wed like to target effective countering violent extremism programming at communities that in fact have a significant pro-ISIL presence. Here Mitts again provides helpful evidence. A new paper uses geolocated Twitter data to show that pro-ISIL sentiment increases following anti-Muslim protests in Europe and does so more strongly in regions with more far-right voters.

How about whether decision-makers should target aid in conflict zones at microenterprises or larger firms? This is not merely a development question; getting economies growing again is widely viewed as important for long-term stability. A recent study uses three years worth of cellphone data to assess how the war affected firm-level economic activity in Afghanistan. Not surprisingly, the authors find that companies avoid conflict-prone areas. One major violent event in a district is associated with a 6 percent reduction in the number of firms operating in that district in the next month, and the effect persists for six months. But only firms with more than 12 employees are able to adjust in this way; there is no statistical relationship between violence in one month and the level of activity among smaller firms in the next month. In Afghanistan, at least, this evidence suggests policies to reduce the impact of conflict on the economy should target larger enterprises.

Training Thinkers?

Is the American defense community building the capacity to spot such learning opportunities and ask the right questions?

The United States spends billions of dollars every year to ensure that its forces have great equipment. And there are entire training bases, such as the Joint Readiness Training Center, devoted to preparing the force to make tactical and operational decisions under pressure in sensitive circumstances. Army infantry train in the most realistic settings money can buy, practicing interacting with local civilians, coordinating supporting fires, and helping wounded comrades under fire. Air Force, Marine, and Navy fighter pilots spend hundreds of hours learning to operate highly technical systems under tremendous physical stress, including exercises such as Red Flag, which can involve hundreds of aircraft and more than 10,000 airmen, sailors, and soldiers. These kinds of exercises train structured responses, everything from the kind of immediate, nearly automatic reactions needed to handle battlefield problems to the complex managerial challenges staffs face in coordinating the actions of dozens of subordinate units based on information from hundreds of sensors and intelligence platforms, all in the face of complex logistical considerations.

Despite that prodigious investment in training to solve immediate and near-term problems, military education systems do very little to systematically train defense leaders on how to use evidence to inform longer-term decisions. The Army War College curriculum, for example, teaches necessary subjects such as Strategic Leadership and Theory of War and Strategy, but does not provide instruction on which kinds of data should inform which decisions. The professional military education system has no equivalent to the University of Washingtons Calling Bullshit: Data Reasoning in a Digital World, which systematically takes students through common mistakes such as assuming correlation implies causation, failing to consider base rates, and scaling data graphics in deceptive ways. Without education on how to use data to inform the big picture, modern technology has produced what Peter Singer calls tactical generals, leaders pulled by technology to micromanage at the tactical level, leaving few thinking about how the profusion of information could be used to learn and plan at the operational or strategic level.

This is an unfortunate state of affairs, as botching a few key principles can cause even the most astute leader to arrive at the wrong conclusion.

How Evidence Goes Wrong

Consider a few concrete questions. What drives suicide bombings? Will small-scale aid packages help establish stability in counter-insurgency campaigns? Will additional funding to airport security reduce the incidence of terrorism? In each case, an intuitive and superficially sensible evidence-based approach to the question leads to the wrong conclusion.

If you want to understand what motivates suicide terrorism, at first blush it seems sensible to look for commonalities among groups that use suicide bombings. That is, after all, the kind of thing people tend to do when they think about lessons learned. One prominent study did this and concluded that suicide terrorism tends to occur in conflicts involving foreign occupation by a democracy. But just focusing on the suicide terrorists was a mistake. To figure out what distinguishes groups that turn to suicide terrorism from groups that do not, you have to compare those two types of groups to one another. And studies that do so find no association between foreign occupation and suicide terrorism.

How individuals make inferences matters because those inferences drive strategy. In the suicide bombing case, different conclusions could be drawn from different datasets. For example, from 1970 to 1982 the only terrorist group using suicide bombings was the Tamil Tigers, so one might have concluded that suicide bombings were used by groups that combined socialist ideology with Tamil nationalism. But by 1989, both Hezbollah and Amal had used the tactic in the Lebanese civil war, so one might reasonably have concluded the common factors were socialist ideology plus Tamil nationalism or Lebanese Shiite Muslim groups fighting occupation. As suicide terrorism spread, by 2003 at least seven more groups were using the tactic, including Hamas, the Kurdistan Workers Party, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Jemaah Islamiyah, al-Qaida, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, and several Kashmiri rebel groups. One might then have concluded that the common factor was groups fighting directly or indirectly against occupation by a U.S.-allied country. Finally, by 2016, one would have been forced to add the Pakistani Taliban, various Chechen groups, al-Qaida in Iraq, the Islamic State of Iraq, ISIL, Jabhat al-Nusra, the Free Syrian Army, and al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula to the list. The common conditions would then have to encompass fighting a U.S.-, Saudi-, or Iranian-supported regime, as well as engaging in factional competition against other Sunni Islamist groups.

This is an example of a more general mistake. If you want to know whether two features of the world (say, occupation and suicide terrorism) are correlated (i.e., tend to occur together), you cant just look at cases where one of those features occurs. You have to compare the frequency of occupations in conflicts with and without suicide terrorism.

And failure to appreciate this point doesnt just affect academic studies; it can also undermine the efficacy of American defense institutions. For instance, think about the practice of performing a postmortem following some operational failure. It is natural to ask what rules were not followed or what warning signs were ignored during the failed mission. But if those postmortem procedures dont compel leaders to ask whether those same rules were broken or warning signs brushed aside during previous successful missions, then they allow them to make the mistake of not comparing and lead leaders to jump to the wrong conclusions.

Even when individuals do compare, things can go wrong. Think about trying to assess the efficacy of small-scale aid spending in insecure environments, a topic one of us has studied extensively. We can compare across Iraqs 104 districts and ask whether places where the United States devoted more money to small-scale aid experienced less insurgency. The answer turns out to be no. Districts with more small-scale aid projects experienced more insurgent violence, not less. But does that mean small-scale aid is counterproductive? As anyone who directed those projects will tell you, smart military leaders directed money to places where they faced bigger problems for instance, to districts where the people were more firmly opposed to the new Shiite-led government. So, the positive correlation between aid and insurgent violence doesnt necessarily reflect the counterproductive effects of aid spending. Instead, aid spending chased insurgency. A more clear-minded comparison can help untangle this question. We can account for the underlying level of insurgent support in a district by comparing changes in aid spending and changes in insurgent violence within districts, from one period to the next, instead of comparing levels across districts. Consistent with the concern that the positive correlation between spending and violence didnt reflect the true causal relationship, when you compare changes, you discover that increases in aid spending from month to month are actually associated with decreases, not increases, in violence.

Accuracy in tactical assessments only really matters, though, if those assessments are linked to the broader mission you are trying to achieve. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, a rash of airline hijackings led the United States to require metal detectors at all major airports. This was the first step down the road to owning toiletries that fit only in a quart-size bag. The number of hijackings of airplanes dropped quickly, from an average of almost 20 per quarter before metal detectors were installed to fewer than 10 per quarter after. Big counter-terrorism success, right? Well, maybe.

Lets stop and think about whether weve measured the counter-terrorism mission properly. If the counter-terrorism mission is to stop hijackings, then this seems like evidence of a clear win. But what if the mission is broader not just stopping hijackings, but terrorist attacks more broadly? Then, by looking only at the effect of the policy on hijackings, we havent quite measured the mission. And, indeed, it turns out that the reduction in hijackings was almost perfectly offset by an increase in other kinds of hostage takings by terrorists, who likely decided that if the United States was going to protect airplanes, they would attack other targets instead.

We can see a similar example in the war on drugs. Successful U.S. efforts to shut down drug transshipment through the Caribbean led drug traffickers to move their operations to Central America and Mexico, with no long-term reduction in drugs flowing to the United States, but with devastating consequences for those countries.

Questions to Avoid Common Mistakes

A firmer understanding of a few key evidence-based principles would add tremendous value to the defense educational framework. Leaders, especially at the senior level, can begin by asking their team, and themselves, four questions when trying to use evidence to make better decisions:

Our ability to collect data has vastly improved in recent years. But to reap the national security benefits of this data revolution, our ability to think clearly about how to use evidence to make better decisions has to keep up. The good news is that, in our experience creating and teaching an executive education course on leading evidence-based decisions, leaders can acquire the key conceptual tools needed to navigate todays information-rich environment without devoting years to becoming technical data analysts.

Like all important skills, however, evidence-based decision-making doesnt come naturally. It takes careful training and practice. The United States should reform its defense education system to prepare leaders to understand common conceptual errors, ask the critical questions, and retain the healthy level of skepticism necessary to use evidence effectively to make better decisions. This means bringing short courses on leveraging evidence into the curriculum at many levels, from the service academies through the National Defense University. Applying some basic principles can help leaders to filter through the noise and think clearly in a data-driven age. We are at a pivotal point in history. It is vital that our leaders education keeps pace with innovation.

Ethan Bueno de Mesquita is the Sydney Stein Professor and Deputy Dean at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. He is co-creator ofLeading Evidence-Based Decisionsand the author ofPolitical Economy for Public Policy.

Liam Collins is the Executive Director of the Madison Policy Forum and the Viola Foundation. He is retired Special Forces Colonel and former Director of the Combating Terrorism Center and Modern War Institute at West Point. He is co-creator ofLeading Evidence-Based Decisions.

Kristen G. DeCaires is Program Manager for the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project (ESOC) at Princeton University. Prior to ESOC, she served in various public health initiatives and research administration programs. DeCaires conducted field research and program evaluations in the U.S. and Myanmar for refugee populations, emergency response, and maternal child health projects.

Jacob N. Shapiro is Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University, where hedirectsthe Empirical Studies of Conflict Project.He is co-creator ofLeading Evidence Based-Decisions, author ofTheTerrorists Dilemma: Managing Violent Covert Organizations,and co-author ofSmall Wars, Big Data: The InformationRevolution inModern Conflict.

Image: U.S. Army National Guard (Photo by Sgt. Jennifer Amo)

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The Pitfalls and Possibilities of the Measurement Revolution for National Security - War on the Rocks

Human Behavior

Call of the Wild: How Playing as Animals Can Tell Us More About Ourselves – EGMNOW

When we think of animals in games, we usually think of anthropomorphized cartoon beasts like Sonic or Donkey Kong. While these characters may outwardly resemble animals, they have little in common with actual wildlife. Look past the fur, and youll see that their behaviors, their expressions, and the goals they aim to achieve are all relatably human.

Animals, real animals, rarely take center stage. When theyre friendly, games mostly employ them as background detailsif were lucky we can pet the dogor reduce them to buddies or modes of transport for humans. Iconic series such as The Legend of Zelda, Fallout, The Witcher, and Metal Gear Solid all know the value of a trusty steed or a faithful canine companion. Even more commonly, animals appear as enemies to kill or resources to gather. In countless action games or open-world RPGs, including some of those just mentioned, we do battle against instantly hostile creatures like bats and bears, or our need for armor upgrades takes priority over the lives of the deer and bunnies populating the countryside.

Opportunities to play as a more grounded animal lead do exist, but theyre scattered lightly throughout gaming history. Its a short enough list that a developer looking to design an animal character today might not find many past examples to draw on.

Such was the case for Infuse Studios when it built the 2019 fox-based adventure Spirit of the North. We actually havent played very many games with animal protagonists that ran on all fours, said Infuse co-founder Jacob Sutton. Clover Studios kami, as Sutton noted, is one example, but there really arent many games which focus on a quadrupedal mammal.

Its perhaps surprising that animal-led games arent more common, especially since theyre so well suited to creating novel experiences and offering different, interesting perspectives on the world. Even the earliest and most basic examples hint at the potential of such an approach. Take 1981s Frogger, in which players must guide a series of frogs across a busy freeway and back to the safety of their lily pads. Though simple, the objectives and mechanics established a precedent of forcing us to see and relate to the world differently. In some small way, we adopt the animals perspective, which then reflects back on our own human viewpoint.

We can see how these concepts evolve in 1992s Ecco the Dolphin. Theres nothing much realistic about Eccos plot, which revolves around time machines, ancient beings, and aliens. But from the name of the title character to the storyline about the oceans being drained of life, its not hard to spot underlying links to environmentalism. Beyond that, this is a game that accentuates a sense of embodying a non-human through its controls. The way Ecco cuts through the water, leaping and diving in smooth arcs, is tricky to master but creates a unique and liberating feel.

Alternatively, when games put animal characters in direct contact with humans, they can use the unusual perspective and attributes of their characters to highlight how the needs or desires of different species can clash. This is true even when the portrayals of animals are less realistic, such as in the PS2 titles Dogs Life and Mister Mosquito. Or in kami, where we actually play as a God in wolf form and have mystical powers. Here, the character works as a symbol of nature and its relationship to people, as we strive to paint the world back to a state of flourishing beauty.

There have also been games that dip into the more brutal reality of nature. The Shelter series and Tokyo Jungle are two examples in which animals hunt and kill each other to survive. But even these premises provide elements of humanity to reflect on. Tokyo Jungle, for instance, becomes a metaphor about civilization thanks to its post-apocalyptic city setting, which represents the alternately individualistic and group mentalities that govern modern urban life. Its ending, which casts you in the role of a robotic guard dog, has something to say about the incompatibility between animals and human technology.

One contemporary animal game, the forthcoming Away: The Survival Series, takes some cues from these latter games in particular. Andr-Paul Johnson, head of growth at Canadian developer Breaking Walls, told me that Away drew some inspiration from a few classic animal-based games, such as Deadly Creatures combat systems, Tokyo Jungles survival mechanics, and Shelter 2s family dynamics. These games all have vastly different gameplay and mechanics, but they each bring an interesting perspective on what its like to play as animals.

But Away is not merely a survival sim. As with many previous animal games, it uses its setting to say something about humanity and the realities of environmental crisis. Along with Spirit of the North, its part of a recent spate of animal games that continue and develop the thematic strands running through those earlier titles. They bring to light different modes of self-expression that force us to think differently about what were trying to accomplish. Not only is the experience refreshing, but its also a means to evaluate humanity from the outside.

In some recent examples, such as Ape Out, Untitled Goose Game, and the impending shark RPG Maneater, animals confront people directly. These games highlight an uneasiness or outright hostility between man and beast, whether that means disturbing peoples self-important routines or embarking on a bloody killing spree. In simple terms, they work as power fantasies, in some way fulfilling repressed desires to strike back and disrupt the status quo that we cant realize in reality.

Conversely, games such as Spirit of the North and Away, as well as another recent release, Lost Ember, take a more abstract and contemplative approach to humanitys relationship with nature, using animal characters to place people at a distance, so that we can better examine ourselves through their eyes. This latter group of titles, in particular, share a perspective that explores civilization from the vantage of nature to better survey the contradictions of human behavior and our impact on the world.

Here, even the choice of the central animal implies certain ideas and feelings. In deciding to make Lost Embers main character a wolf, for example, Mooneye Studios CEO and founder Tobias Graff cited two motivations. The first reason is pretty simple and I think we can all agree: Wolves are awesome! he said. But the selection is also intended to link the animal and human worlds, he told me, in a story about reincarnation. Wolves or wolf-like animals like jackals are common figures in a lot of religions and myths and as such have naturally mystical features. We figured that would be a perfect fit for a story in which you have to figure out who you were and if the choices you made were the right ones, Graff said.

For Spirit of the North, Sutton said, We knew we wanted to make a game with very little to no dialogue and have a unique character. Again, the choice of a fox helped connect the natural world to civilization via the animals symbolic meaning. The mythology that Spirit of the North is based on is the Finnish legend of Tulikettu. According to the legend when the Fire Fox runs in the snowy hills its fur and tail brushes up against things would create sparks that fly into the skies and turn into the Northern Lights. Using animals with a significant cultural presence helps bring in wider themes.

Aways sugar glidera small marsupial resembling a flying squirrelmay seem like a less obvious choice for a leading character, but it was a pick well suited to the sensations the games developer wants to convey. Johnson said the team wanted to craft an immersive experience where you truly feel like youre part of nature. In this sense, as an animal that can walk on land, climb trees, and even glide through the air, the sugar glider lets you explore your environments in any way you choose. As with something like Ecco, theres a promise here of fluidity and agility that should create a sense of natural freedom in contrast with human behavioral norms.

The animals in all three of these games thus establish the base from which their perspectives on humanity can develop. For Lost Ember and Spirit of the North, concepts of mysticism and spirit worlds frame the reciprocal bond between people and animals. Both games use this spiritual side similarly, showing us fragments of a past civilization that now lies in ruins. With a kind of future perfect tense to their narratives, they project into an imagined world to come where only nature survives, and then have us look back to decipher what happened. Its a method that points to the fragility and temporality of our position in the worldand offers a warning to be heeded.

For Sutton, the perspective in Spirit of the North, helps tell the story of mankinds dependence on things that they take for granted, things that could easily disappear or be unsustainable. It also helps sell the point of there really not being anyone left of the civilization as well. Plus its a useful way of creating ambiguity, or an invitation to consider what can go wrong without being fed conclusive information. Due to the way the story is presented to the player and not exactly told outright they get to come up with their own ideas of what happened in the past that made things how they are, Sutton said.

With Lost Ember, the key theme is transformation, as the wolf shape-shifts into various animal bodies to navigate different scenery and conditions. On this journey you uncover memories of the human soul trapped within the wolf, learning about how she lived and her role in the now-ruined civilization. Its a story told from outside the events themselves, which shows us varied interpretations of the same actions so that we continually reevaluate what weve seen.

The transformation mechanic is key to that idea. To question your own actions or even your view of the world and try and see it from a different angle was an important message for us to get across, Graff said. The gameplay supports this message by allowing you to see the world around you from high above as a parrot or from the ground level as a wombat and in between as lots of other animals. In that way the soul wandering abilityas we call itis less of a gameplay or puzzle mechanic and more a way to underline what the game is really about.

Away seems to offer a similar approach to its subject matter, despite adopting a more scientifically grounded scenario, especially in its representation of climate change. Whether its through ancient relics and artefacts scattered around the world or through the games environments and climate itself, Away brings players to reflect on the consequences of global warming on nature, humans, and the animal kingdom, Johnson said. Again, animal perspectives are used to judge humanity through its effects on the planet in a way that creates space for reflection.

What comes across in these responses is how well-suited animals are to representing themes of uncertainty, change, and potential disaster that mirror our view of civilizations future. For Graff, having a story thats not clearly communicated by a human protagonist that just tells you whats going on made it possible for players to create their own interpretations of different story elements and connect even deeper with its world. Animals are naturally silent protagonists that experience human culture as alien, making them ideal for a story that asks as many questions as it answers.

The flipside of all this is that the same openness and mystery, along with the unfamiliar physique and stature of animal protagonists, does throw up significant difficulties in terms of narrative and game design. Most obviously, it can be problematic that naturalistic animal characters cant clearly express themselves in ways we understand. This isnt only a matter of spoken or written language, as Sutton told me. Realistically animals cant shrug, sigh, roll their eyes, or easily show emotions the way humans can with just body movements which definitely presents its own set of challenges in the storytelling department, he said.

Lost Ember and Away try to avoid these pitfalls by finding ways to introduce language around their heroes. Your human soul in Lost Ember enables you to comprehend speech, and a buddy character in the form of a floating spirit narrates situations, although he doesnt know any more than you about past events. While he is trying to make sense of what the both of you see in the memories and the world, the player is basically left with their own thoughts, Graff said. This makes it difficult to explain some of the more complex details and was one of our main concerns in writing the story. Its a tricky balance to strike between confusing vagueness and didactic exposition.

Aways alternative solution is to frame its events as a nature documentary. Adding commentary to its action, for Johnson, allowed the team to explore the sugar gliders story and follow its adventures while maintaining the games immersion and realism. How exactly this works in relation to the players inputs, and whether the documentary voice is part of the narrative remains to be seen. But it sounds like an interesting device to explain what unfolds without intervening in the animal world itself.

One added complication is building worlds suited to the size of their characters. With Spirit of the Norths fox, for example, Sutton said the team had trouble with keeping the scale of things correct or just the general idea that you arent going to be seeing things from 10 feet in the air like the third-person camera of a human. Johnson expressed a similar challenge: Given the sugar gliders small size, youre much closer to the ground than you would be in most games, making the environments surrounding you seem much larger and more detailed. We therefore had to be extremely meticulous when designing Aways environments to make sure every plant, leaf, and blade of grass was accounted for.

Lost Embers added challenge was in having all kinds of playable animal characters, from soaring birds to burrowing armadillos. As Graff told me, this opens up a lot of possibilities to traverse the world. Especially with flying animals like parrots, but also just small animals that can fit into every nook and cranny, its difficult to guide the player in the right direction. As much as the game wants to make you feel unfettered by running, flying, and swimming as different creatures, it has to ensure you cant really break free.

Perhaps, then, we can chalk up the scarcity of animal-led games, at least in part, to the additional design challenges they present. Even this new breed seems restricted to tightly designed, high-concept indie experiences. But its heartening to see these attempts to place animals at the core of games because of the unique perspectives and experiences they offer. These are works that not only represent animals in a different light to most other games, but consider the connotations of being an animal in a world defined by human technology and hubris. By transporting us into the natural world, in other words, they prompt us to tell different kinds of stories about ourselves.

Header image credit: Lost Ember, Mooneye Studios

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Call of the Wild: How Playing as Animals Can Tell Us More About Ourselves - EGMNOW

Human Behavior

CES2020: The Rise of AI and Personalized Wellness – IoT For All

CES, the largest tech event of the year, is no stranger to the extremely cool, strange, repetitive or revolutionary when it comes to technology. Although the show boasts thousands of different types of technologies and products, certain themes and trends are pervasive throughout the week.

After putting in about 18.5 miles in less than 3 days, I reflected on the few days of sensory overload and everything I had experienced. Many of the conversations I had during the conference revolved around personalized health, connected vehicle ecosystems, smart cities and artificial intelligence (AI). While there were more than a few companies exhibiting at the show attempting to be the next Peloton or claiming their ear pods rival Apples Air Pods, I was grateful to not have to endure too many of those conversations.

With 5G rolling out and the IoT industry maturing, smart cities are the inevitable next move to take advantage of all IoT has to offer. At CES, there was no shortage of smart city concepts to experience. From miniature models that included autonomous cars and helicopters to vehicles that deliver groceries, companies have invested a lot of time and money into building the next generation of automation for our every day lives. The one concept that CES really drove home was that the future of tech is all connected. Smart cities dont exist without AI or without connected things and autonomous vehicles.

As our infrastructure ages, it becomes all too important for tech companies and their partners to understand how to build, secure and launch a connected future. Smart cities will rely on IoT sensors to understand water and energy consumption, traffic patterns and more. How we understand, control and initiate change based on the data collected in these smart cities will have a direct reflection on whether or not smart cities can be both a sustainable and practical way of life.

Toyota brought to life their proposed prototype Woven City at the conference this year. The concept Toyota used for their booth was inspiring. With a circular fabric set up to display live-action examples of how the city of the future will work, Toyota immersed visitors in their Woven City through sound, video and a 360-degree experience.

The city will be built as a fully connected ecosystem powered by hydrogen fuel cells at the base of Mt. Fuji in Japan by 2021. This smart city is being hailed as a living laboratory where residents and researchers will utilize the from-scratch infrastructure to test and develop numerous technologies including robotics, smart homes and autonomy. Toyota is only one of several companies taking a techno-utopian approach to their plans for the city of the future.

According to the Danish architect behind the city, Bjarke Ingels, connected, autonomous, emission-free and shared mobility solutions are bound to unleash a world of opportunities for new forms of urban life. With the breadth of technologies and industries that we have been able to access and collaborate with from the Toyota ecosystem of companies, we believe we have a unique opportunity to explore new forms of urbanity with the Woven City that could pave new paths for other cities to explore.

As Toyota takes a step into the future, so too do other tech companies. Sprint, for example, will be utilizing their True Mobile 5G and Curiosity IoT in areas across the United States, including Greeneville, SC and Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ.

The combination of Sprint Curiosity IoT with advanced network deployment has set the stage for building a truly smart city. Sprint and their partners are developing and deploying connected vehicles, autonomous services/machines and other smart technologies in conditions that reflect what future smart cities will look like. This allows researchers and developers to operate, navigate and react in real-time with real-world scenarios preparing us for the city of the future.

One of, if not the biggest, draw of CES is the automotive section. Everything from flying taxis to augmented reality cars and the latest models are on display at the event. I had the great pleasure of speaking with several experts in the autonomous industry including Blackberry and RTI.

During CES, Blackberry announced two partnerships including the advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and an autonomous vehicle platform that will integrate BlackBerry QNXs real-time operating system with Renovos intelligent automotive data platform. Renovo and QNX are jointly developing safety-critical data management tools for connected and autonomous vehicles with the plan to scale safety systems in new cars. Currently, Blackberrys QNX is already in 150 million cars on the road today.

I spoke with Kaivan Karimi, Senior Vice President and Co-Head of BlackBerry Technology Solutions about the importance of native and secure technology and data collection in our connected and autonomous vehicles. With technology now embedded in cars before they hit the lots, Karimi expressed how vehicles are becoming a vital component of the infrastructure of smart cities.

As we put the groundwork in now for how cities will look in the future, he also noted the importance of building infrastructure based on the data that these vehicles are collecting from Renovos data management system and AI pipeline. Blackberrys focus on safe and secure technology combined with Renovos data capabilities is only one example of how partnerships between private companies, the government, public entities and citizens of the world are necessary for being able to manage connected car data in a safe, secure and private way.

In addition to Blackberry, Real-Time Innovations (RTI), an IIoT connectivity company, is working on the future of autonomous driving.

Bob Leigh, Senior Market Development Director, Autonomous Systems at RTI shared with me that RTI believes that the advancement of autonomous driving will be transformative to industry and society. Right now, automotive and tech companies are grappling with the complexity of the new technology, how to bring it to market, and what business models will ultimately be successful. At CES this year, we saw [that the industry] is much more specific in how they are tackling the challenge; differentiating their technology between advanced ADAS, Level 2+ and Level 4 Autonomy levels. We think this is a sign of the maturing market and the industry as a whole becoming more confident in how they will deliver their first commercial products. At CES 2020 it was clear the exact future of autonomous cars may still be unclear, but there was much more confidence in the path to making this technology real.

Human behavior is a peculiar thing. Whether its a daily skincare routine, morning yoga or meditation, we are creatures of habit. Technology is advancing the way we personalize our health in those habits. Any marketer will tell you that human connection is the number one way to convince users to buy. If you can find a way to meet consumers where they are and solve their pain points, buyers will be more likely to choose your product. A companys ethos as well as how it approaches customer satisfaction is of utmost importance as we saturate the market with new solutions, cool tech and products.

Neutrogena relaunched its NEUTROGENA Skin360 app this year to democratize skin health information. I spoke with the team, including Global Communications Lead of Beauty and Baby at Johnson & Johnson, Michelle Dionne, who explained and walked me through the app. Skin360 utilizes advanced skin imaging, behavior coaching and artificial intelligence to empower consumers with actionable, personalized steps to help achieve their skin health goals.

The original app that launched in 2018 required a skin scanning tool. So why did they relaunch in 2019? The team at Neutrogena put their customers first. They took into consideration valuable insight from consumers who sought personalized recommendations, science-backed information, expert opinions, skincare product tracking and how routine care affects our facial skin health over time.

The team also added the Neutrogena AI Assistant (NAIA). NAIA is a personal skincare coach that builds a relationship with each user through in-app and text messaging. NAIA uses AI and behavior change techniques to determine each individuals skincare personality, what their current approach to care is and their current routine. Once youve added your information to the app and complete a 180-degree selfie analysis, the app will give you a score for wrinkles, fine lines, dark under-eye circles, dark spots and smoothness.

NAIA then helps users identify and build a personal 8-week skincare goal and routine based on the skin scores and a self-assessment of sleep, exercise, stress levels, external factors, etc. that is monitored and supported through coaching. This allows users to personalize their routine and place importance on various skin attributes such as moisture and tone.

In addition to continuing to accept user feedback and iterate on their app and AI technology,Neutrogena is combining their 360 app with MaskiD, a micro 3D printed facemask that is custom to face shape and structure, formulated with concern-specific ingredients on different areas of your face. Although they wont be available until later this year, be on the lookout for these masks as they will be both personalized and affordable. Side note: Ive used the app several times already since being introduced to it last week.

This year at CES, Panasonic also took into consideration how consumers are placing increased attention on their physical and mental health states with the launch of their Human Insight Technology.

With Panasonics human insight technology, users are provided with data to make recommendations to improve an individuals experience in the home.

Human insight technology uses non-invasive sensors and imaging to capture and interpret data based on human habits and behaviors. Panasonic demonstrated this technology through an interactive yoga studio. Through analysis of physical stress data, Pansonic was able to design products and environments optimized for typical human movements and physiology. At CES, participants can see human insight technology in action through an interactive yoga studio using the Yoga Synchro Visualizer.

Your face and body are scanned, and the technology prompts you to follow commands. The cameras and sensors recognize human motion and provide users with multiple scores including a pose, fatigue, stability, flow and stress. The best part? Youre able to see the physical representation of the changes taking place in your body while performing your yoga routine.

Among the flooded convention center floors and wave of beautiful displays, youre more likely than not to have run into companies that are incorporating AI assistants and technology into their products in some way. The smart home industry, in particular, is embedding AI into their ecosystems.

For example, Sharp has a vision of People-Oriented IoT according to Executive Vice President and Head of AIoT Business Strategy Office, Bob Ishida. With over 150 products in 10 categories, Sharp is rolling out products that meet lifestyle and culture needs. Sharp is only one of many companies that showcased AIoT and 8K solutions that will explore new possibilities for computers to offer innovative experiences to both business users and individual consumers around the world.

LG is another example of a company using AI to improve the home ecosystem. Revealed in 2019, LGThinQ artificial intelligence was on full display. LGs slogan for AI: anywhere is home. From kitchen appliances to washing machines and personal wardrobes, all of LGs appliances are using AI as a consumer experience. Washers are learning how users like certain types of clothing washed and air conditioners are adjusting automatically to your comfortability settings.

As I walked the convention floor with little spare time, I was curious about the prevalence of IoT at CES. Although I had to explain more than a handful of times what IoT is and how it works (simple explanation of IoT), even those that didnt know it by name were utilizing some element or elements tied deeply to the IoT industry.

From sensors to AI, 5G and the future of mobility, CES 2020 made a few things clear: partnerships are necessary for how we will build a connected future; personalized wellness is becoming a need to have instead of a nice to have and AI is becoming less of a buzzword and more of an actuality.

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CES2020: The Rise of AI and Personalized Wellness - IoT For All

Human Behavior

First was the genome. Now, its time for the screenome – ZME Science

All of us have a human genome, which is basically a composite of our genes. But we also have a screenome, a composite of our digital lives, according to a group of researchers from the United States. Their goal is to make sense of how the screens in our lives are affecting us.

A decade ago, the Human Genome Project worked to identify and map all of the genes of the human genome. In a nod to their research, academics Byron Reeves, Thomas Robinson and Nilam Ram created the concept of the screenome to describe the entity formed by all the digital activity individuals subject themselves to.

The three argued that everything we know about the effects of media use on individuals and societies could be incomplete, irrelevant or wrong. We are all doing more online and as this expanding form of behavior is digitalized, it is open to all forms of manipulation, they said.

In a comment article in the latest edition of the journal Nature, the authors argued that a large-scale analysis of detailed recordings of digital life could provide far greater insights than simply measuring screen time. Americans now spend over half of their day interacting with digital media.

The academics said most of the thousands of studies investigating the effects of media over the past decade used peoples estimates of the amount of time they spend engaging with technologies or broadly categorized platforms such as smartphone, social media or entertainment media.

Nevertheless, the range of content has become too broad, patterns of consumption too fragmented, information diets too idiosyncratic, experiences too interactive, and devices too mobile, for such simplistic characterization. Technologies now available can allow researchers to record digital life in exquisite detail, they said.

Digital life is life these days. As we spend more of our life on our devices, so more of our life is expressed through these screens. This gives us a tremendous opportunity to learn about all aspects of human behaviour, said Robinson to the Australian Financial Review.

Tracking our digital life has become much easier. Instead of using a range of devices for different things, applications have been consolidated into smartphones and other mobile devices. At the same time, there are now tools available to see what people are doing on their screens.

The researchers are using so-called screenomics technologies to observe and understand our digital lives, minute by minute. The result of their initial work is a call for the Human Screenome Project, a collection of large-scale data that will inform knowledge of and solutions to a wide variety of social issues.

Screenomics emerges from the development of systems for capturing and recording the details of individuals digital experiences, said Ram to Penn News. The system includes software that collects screenshots every five seconds on smartphones and laptop computers, extracts text and images, and allows analysis of the timing, content, function and context of digital life.

In their article in Nature, the researchers outlined the possibilities of the technology. Over 600 participants have so far consented to use screenomics software on laptops and Android smartphones that were linked to the researchers secure computational infrastructure.

Participants then went about their daily lives while the system unobtrusively recorded their device use. In their initial analyses of these data, the researchers found that participants quickly changed tasks, approximately every 19 seconds on a laptop, and every 10 seconds on a smartphone.

All the information collected includes indicators of health and well-being and can be shared with larger interdisciplinary projects. Reeves, Robinson and Ram suggested that researchers wishing to study digital life could even create a repository that everyone can contribute to and use.

That type of large interdisciplinary project they call for would have far-reaching benefits for all areas of life touched by digital technology. In the future, it might be possible for various apps to interact with an individuals screenome and to deliver interventions that alter how people think, learn, feel and behave, said Ram.

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First was the genome. Now, its time for the screenome - ZME Science

Human Behavior

Study Reveals Mens Favorite Size And Shape Of Womens Breast – BroBible

Womens breasts are kind of like pizza, even when its bad, its still great. But is there one type of female breast that is more appealing to men everywhere? According to a scientific study, men have a favorite size and shape of boobs.

A team of European researchers embarked on the scientific voyage to find out what kinds of boobies men lust after the most. Not all heroes wear capes. Scientists from Pragues Charles University released a scientific study titled Mens preferences for womens breast size and shape in four cultures that was published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior.

The study involved 267 men from four different countries: Brazil, Cameroon, the Czech Republic, and Namibia. The men were asked about their preferences in womens breasts with photos of different funbags. Do you ever get asked about your boob preferences? No. You get calls asking you if you want an extended warranty on your air fryer.

There are beautiful breasts of all different sizes and shapes, from saggy to perky to tiny ta-tas to plump jugs. According to the results from the story, bigger is not always better, and the reason is because of our biological intuition to find the best partner to reproduce with.

A 2004 study found that men found women with large breasts and narrow waists the most attractive because those characteristics indicate high reproductive potential in women. Males supposedly pay attention to these features because they serve as cues to fecundity and health, according to the study.

According to the researchers, males are hypothesized to prefer breast morphology that indicates both high potential and residual fertility. Scientists cited studies that women with larger breasts tend to have higher estrogen levels.

In contrast, we found systematic directional preferences for firm breasts across all four samples. Scientists hypothesized that firmness of perky breasts could also indicate fertility as breasts become saggier with age when women also become less fertile.

Individual preferences for breast size were variable, but the majority of raters preferred medium-sized, followed by large-sized breasts, the study stated. In contrast, we found systematic directional preferences for firm breasts across all four samples.

Of the men who were surveyed, they preferred medium-sized breasts that were perkier. Larger breasts were the second-favorite breasticles, and smaller breasts were the least desired.

So there you have it, having a huge rack like Salma Hayek or Katy Perry, isnt the favorite breast type of men (According to the study).

[TheSun]

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Study Reveals Mens Favorite Size And Shape Of Womens Breast - BroBible

Human Behavior

App uses voice-based AI to track wellbeing of mental health patients – E&T Magazine

Researchers in the US have found that an interactive voice application, which uses artificial intelligence, is an effective way to monitor the wellbeing of patients being treated for serious mental illness.

A University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) study followed 47 patients for up to 14 months using an application called MyCoachConnect. All of the patients taking part in the study were being treated by physicians for some serious mental health illnesses, including bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and major depressive disorder.

For the study, participants called a toll-free number one or two times a week and answered three open-ended questions when prompted by a computer-generated voice. These included: "How have you been over the past few days?", "Whats been troubling or challenging you over the past few days?", and "Whats been particularly good or positive?".

The MyCoachConnect app was designed to collect personalised patient responses, explained Dr Armen Arevian, director of the Innovation Lab at UCLA's Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. More specifically, the AI was trained to use an individuals own words to provide them with a personalised analysis.

The application focused primarily on the choice of words the patients used in their responses and how their responses change over time, with less emphasis placed on audible factors such as tone of voice.

The analysis of the data, conducted in collaboration with researchers from the Signal Analysis & Interpretation Laboratory (SAIL) at the University of Southern California (USC), found that the applications analysis was as accurate at monitoring patients mental states as their treating physicians.

The way people answer questions and the way they change their answers over time is unique to each patient, Arevian said. We were looking at a person as a person and not as a diagnosis.

For the study, the patients made calls from a mobile phone, landline, or payphone and were asked to speak for two to three minutes for each question.

Technology doesnt have to be complicated, Arevian added. In this study, patients didnt need a smartphone or even a phone at all. It could be simple and low tech on the patient end and high tech on the backend.

The team hope that AI that can analyse data collected from apps such as MyCoachConnect will enable more proactive and personalised care. For example, the app may help improve treatment by intervening early when someone is experiencing more symptoms.

Artificial intelligence allowed us to illuminate the various clinically meaningful dimensions of language use and vocal patterns of the patients over time and personalised at each individual level, said Dr Shri Narayanan, the director of SAIL at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering.

Arevian added that some of the participants interviewed after the study ended, and said they found the system easy and enjoyable to use.

They said speaking to a computer-generated voice allowed them to speak more freely, he said. It also helped them feel less lonely because they knew that someone would be listening to it, and to them, that meant that someone cared.

MyCoachConnect was developed and hosted on the Chorus platform, which was developed by Arevian at UCLA and allows people to visually create mobile and other computer applications without computer programming in as little as a few minutes.

Last November, a team of US researchers suggested that machine learning systems could assist doctors in monitoring the mental health of patients through speech-based tests.

Also, back in July 2019, computer scientists at the University of Alberta developed AI algorithms that can detect and identify depression through vocal cues.

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Human Behavior

Eight Management Ideas to Embrace in the 2020s – MIT Sloan

Our experts reveal where leaders should focus their efforts in 2020 and beyond.

At the beginning of a new year (and a new decade), its natural to wonder whats ahead. As technology and society continue to rapidly transform, it can also be overwhelming for managers and organizations to think about what to tackle next.

With that in mind, we turned to recent authors at MIT Sloan Management Review and asked them: As we enter the 2020s, what is one critical area where leaders and organizations should focus their efforts? The research and diverse expertise of our surveyed experts provides useful insights into the specific skills, investments, and processes that will help companies compete, thrive, and provide value for stakeholders in the years to come.

Create more agile cultures that enable speed, efficiency, and high employee engagement in work. This will require very different conceptions of culture away from broad characterizations to recognizing that culture is experienced locally in networks, is variable throughout organizations in ways that can be both positive and negative, and is not effectively shaped by traditional top-down communication or cascading change processes today.

We are finding in my consortium that far more effective approaches to cultural change can be enacted through networks by targeting different kinds of opinion leaders, cocreating desired future states, and more active targeting of points where misalignment in values or priorities exists.

Rob Cross, coauthor of A Noble Purpose Alone Wont Transform Your Company

The issue that will dominate the 2020s is climate change. All leaders will need to develop strategies for aggressively managing their carbon footprints; working with their value chains to slash energy, emissions, and waste; supporting pro-climate policies at global, state, and local levels; and communicating their progress and approach to employees, customers, investors, and many more. Well need innovation across many sectors to shift our economy to clean technologies quickly.

Andrew Winston, MIT SMR columnist and author of Should Businesses Stop Flying to Fight Climate Change?

By ignoring our feelings at work, we overlook important data and risk preventable mistakes. We send emails that cause unnecessary anxiety, we fail to make work meaningful, and we are more likely to burn out.

Embracing emotions at work means learning how to give more useful, less hurtful feedback (make it specific and actionable), help remote workers feel a sense of belonging (set up virtual social time), and better communicate important decisions (explain your reasoning and host a Q&A).

And for those skeptical about the ROI on doing all this? At Humu, a company that uses behavioral science to make work better (where I lead content), we find that employees who are nudged on themes related to meaning, trust, and empowerment become much happier and almost 10% more productive. Its time we learn how to bring emotion into the workplace without letting it run wild.

Liz Fosslien, coauthor of How to Create Belonging for Remote Workers

Managers at all levels need to have a good understanding of how AI will augment and enhance the work they are doing. AI has the potential to make virtually all jobs more efficient and more satisfying by automating tedious tasks, processing large amounts of data, predicting human behavior, and producing work that a human can review and approve. Once managers understand this potential, they can encourage their team members to experiment with new ways of doing things.

For example, today in customer service you will see human agents handling complex conversations with consumers while AI assists them seamlessly in the background. Over time, the AI becomes smarter and suggests responses to customers questions. Agents train the AI, and AI-powered bots support agents by automating tedious tasks. This improves agent productivity and satisfaction while dramatically improving the customer experience.

P.V. Kannan, coauthor of The Future of Customer Service Is AI-Human Collaboration

The single most important thing leaders and organizations must do going forward is investing to make their customers more valuable. If you take customer lifetime seriously, the strategic challenge isnt how best or how frequently to shear the sheep; its how we invest in our customers and clients so that they become measurably more valuable in their own eyes and ours.

Michael Schrage, author of Dont Let Metrics Critics Undermine Your Business

In the U.S., our understanding of demographic differences especially as they relate to race and gender has become at once more salient and difficult to talk about. People generally approach discussions of such differences with caution at best, brazen ignorance at worst, but most often, silence. This tactic in 2020, however, will likely prove unsuitable due to the changing nature of our workplaces.

To move past our collective notion that race and gender are third-rail topics that should be sidestepped or avoided, a new approach is needed. This approach should be centered on acknowledging differences and notably, acknowledging that each of us has more to learn about what specific differences mean across our work contexts, life roles, and social structures.

One place to start is the new terminology developed to reflect the reality many live. Consider, for instance, they as a singular pronoun, or the term cisgender, and the distinction between sexual orientation and gender identity. A second place is to explore your and others experiences of marginalization, harassment, and privilege. By adopting a learning approach to understanding individual and group differences, each of us can gain valuable insight into myriad, distinct facets of social life.

Morela Hernandez, MIT SMR columnist and coauthor of How Algorithms Can Diversify the Startup Pool

In todays fast-paced, technology-facilitated world with increasing emphasis on AI, its important to prevent a potential slide toward the devaluation of the human interface. This is a pitfall that might be particularly relevant for businesses that integrate advanced technologies with enthusiasm at the expense of investment in the human capital but recent research suggests they do so at their peril.

Business leaders who invest in their employees while keeping pace with technological adoption will see their businesses thrive. Activities and tasks performed by employees continue to evolve toward higher value added and skill levels. In a technology-driven world, human capital will become more rather than less critical in driving superior business performance.

Sharmila C. Chatterjee, coauthor of How AI Is Helping Companies Break Silos

A recent MIT SMR-BCG survey of thousands of companies globally shows that AI investments and applications are now widespread, but only 30% currently generate value. To succeed, leaders will need to focus on the larger strategic goal of building algorithmically powered organizations that can compete on the rate of learning in a rapidly shifting business environment.

In order to achieve these goals, companies will need to reconceive as synergistic combinations of algorithms and people and effectively partition tasks between those where humans, machines, or combinations of the two are the most advantageous. They also need to take measures to create rapid, autonomous learning loops for technology-driven tasks and think critically about algorithmic governance and ethics to ensure both effectiveness and social acceptability. The companies that win the 2020s will be hybrid extended learning organizations (HELOs), and 2020 will be the year where pioneers begin to establish the blueprint for these in earnest.

Martin Reeves, coauthor of Fighting the Gravity of Average Performance

Ally MacDonald (@allymacdonald) is senior associate editor at MIT Sloan Management Review.

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Eight Management Ideas to Embrace in the 2020s - MIT Sloan

Human Behavior

Joe Budden Defends Kevin Hart Cheating Comments Against ‘The Real’ – The Source

A lot of conversation has been surrounding Kevin Harts Netflix documentary, Dont F This Up, since its release on December 26th. The docu-series gives fans a closer look at what happened during the comedians cheating scandal and the controversy surrounding his choice to not host the Oscars.

Recently, the ladies of The Real sat down to talk about comments made by Joe Budden after sharing that he understands the choices of Kevin Hart behind the cheating scandal. On an episode of The Joe Budden Podcast, Joe says, Sometimes your not home but 10 seconds in the day, for however many days, and I as a man can understand how that can be difficult. Whelp, that wasnt a good enough reason for the ladies of The Real because they wasted no time in sharing their opinions on the Pump It Up rappers thoughts.

I think its hysterical, just the part of him saying You know how hard he works? Does the working affect his integrity, his moral standing, his moral compass? I dont think it does, says a laughing Adrienne Bailon-Houghton after being asked how she felt about Buddens comments regarding the situation.

In the latest episode of The Joe Budden Podcast, Joe responds to the comments that the ladies made on the show and chose to clarify his words by saying The art of understanding is not the same as condoning or agreeing, Joe began. I get that some people in the world dont know what words mean. But by the context of the English language, we dont need a big debate about this. Understanding something is not co-signing it, condoning something, or agreeing with something. Thats not something Joe made up.

To end his comments on the matter, Joe concludes, So no, it is not okay to cheat. It is not okay for Kevin Hart to cheat. Ladies ofThe Real, that was never said here, and I hate when were just presented a certain way when were in this new age of just clip floatin so we only go by the clip. I said a whole lot more than what was displayed here. We do not condone cheating, however, Im not part of the society that is looking to kill actually understanding human behavior and psychology.

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Joe Budden Defends Kevin Hart Cheating Comments Against 'The Real' - The Source