Category Archives: Human Behavior

Human Behavior

Leading with the Unknowns in COVID-19 Models – Scientific American

As the U.S. tops the chart on COVID-19 cases and growth rate, the theme of regret is ubiquitous in the media. Lost time that could have been spent enacting more stringent distancing measures weighs on the minds of many leaders and citizens. As a researcher in uncertainty visualization, I fear a different sort of regret from our response to COVID-19.

Many visualizations, including variations on the widely distributed Flatten the Curve graph represent estimates produced by models. These models simulate the number of people who would be infected, require hospitalization, or die under different conditions. Flatten the Curve adapts a visualization first presented by the CDC in 2007 to compare such estimates under different levels and durations of social distancing. The author added a dotted line to represent his estimate of the number of available hospital beds in the country.

It is easy to perceive the predictions of cases and deaths from simulations as complete depictions of what we can expect based on what we know. For one thing, these models take in multiple streams of available data: on COVID-19 cases, deaths, and rates of hospitalization; on how quickly COVID-19 spread under different conditions elsewhere in the world; and on how related viruses have spread in the past, to name a few.

Model results are powerful, because from them we can calculate risks. For example, How much more likely is it that our death rate reaches 10 percent of cases, as it has in Italy, under distancing measures? How likely is it that the virus will peak in two to three weeks? By quantifying unknowns, estimates of risks make clear that what will happen is not completely certain, but can nonetheless empower us to make decisions and weigh trade-offs.

What worries me as an expert in reasoning under uncertainty is a more difficult type of uncertainty: the uncertainty that arises from the many unknowns underlying COVID-19 data and models. We cant easily quantify this uncertainty, and it is easy to overlook, since it is not conveyed by model estimates alone.

One form of unquantifiable uncertainty stems from our limited ability to estimate how accurate the data that is input to these models is. Available data on COVID-19 case counts are likely to be unreliable as a result of large differences in the scale of testing in different locations, combined with inconsistencies in how testing is applied in a single location. This leads to case number comparisons of apples to oranges. A larger number of cases in one place, or even a higher rate of cases per capita, does not necessarily equate to a higher risk. More likely, it means health providers are testing more broadly in that location. Until we implement more comprehensive, nonselective testing, we cant quantify exactly how at risk of bias these data are.

Data on deaths from COVID-19 are likely to be more reliable, but may still be far from perfect. For example, it may be difficult to trace whether COVID-19 or another preexisting condition caused death in the elderly. Community decision-makers may also be incentivized to underreport deaths to avoid spreading panic or crippling a local economy.

A second form of unquantifiable uncertainty stems from the fact that models are often gross simplifications of real world situations. Many of the models being used to forecast our future under COVID-19 make strong assumptions that seem contradicted by what we expect in reality. Models vary in the assumptions they make about the mechanism behind disease transmission. Some approaches focus on fitting curves to available data rather than assuming mechanisms that account for realities like incubation periods and immunity after infection.

Others account for these dynamics, but make strong assumptions about the predictability of human behavior in the face of a crisis. Sometimes called ambiguity, non-numerical uncertainty like the unquantifiable inexactness of a model as a stand-in for reality means that our predictions could be off, by a little or by a lot depending on how flawed the model assumptions were. All models are wrong, but some are useful, said George Box, a statistician, reminding us of the tension between understanding models as tools for thinking versus expecting models to be oracles. Unfortunately, a careful critique of model assumptions, like other forthright presentations of uncertainty,, rarely makes it into the public-facing articles or visualizations used to present the results.

It is especially easy to overlook the strength of the assumptions models make because their predictions can seem comprehensive. Rather than producing a single number like a count, a model typically produces a set of predicted outcomes. Flatten the Curve, for example, shows two areas representing case counts over time: if we enact protective measures, and if we dont. A predicted number of infections is shown for each day after the first confirmed case.

Even when quantifiable uncertainty associated with the model predictions is not shownin this case, we do not see other values that the predicted case counts by day could take under the model assumptions--visualizations like Flatten the Curve can imply completeness through the series of predictions they produce. For many, seeing a graphical depiction of distributions of possibilities over time or space may seem like the epitome of scientific carefulness. Behind the seemingly precise visuals, however, are a number of approximations.

Does the presence of uncertainty make the extreme social distancing measures being enacted in many states an overreaction? Not necessarily. In the absence of good estimates of risk, it is rational to guard against worst case outcomes. Its the best we can do, until we get better data.

What is dangerous is if we fail to recognize the difference between model predictions made now based on limited information and strong assumptions, and more reliable data that will emerge over time as the virus plays out. If early model predictions turn out to overestimate COVID-19 deaths or the risk to our health system, or underestimate it by a significant amount, many may blame the scientists for being wrong. They may trust data-driven estimates less in the future.

Clear presentation of uncertainty can make model estimates seem less reassuring, but can prevent people from blaming the forecaster or the scientific enterprise itself, when, as we should expect, the model is wrong. Trading public trust in science in the future is not worth feeling more assured in the short term, no matter how much we seek to eliminate uncertainty.

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Leading with the Unknowns in COVID-19 Models - Scientific American

Human Behavior

Introducing New Levels of Transparency with AI – Thought Leaders – Unite.AI

By Balakrishna D R, Senior Vice President, Service Offering Head Energy, Communications, Services, and AI and Automation services, at Infosys.

On January 9, 2020, the World Health Organization notified the public ofthe Coronavirus outbreak in China. Three days prior, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had gotten the word out. But it was a Canadian health monitoring platform that had beaten them both to the punch, sending word of the outbreak to its customers as early as on December 31, 2019! The platform, BlueDot uses artificial intelligence-driven algorithms that scours foreign-language news reports, animal and plant disease networks, and official proclamations to give its clients advance warning to avoid danger zones like Wuhan.

Over the past few years, artificial intelligence has become the key source of transformation, disruption and competitive advantage in todays fast changing economy. From epidemic tracking to defense to healthcare to autonomous vehicles and everything in between, AI is gaining widespread adoption. PwC predicts that AI could contribute up to $15.7 trillion to the global economy in 2030, at its current growth rate.

Yet, for all the hope that AI brings, it still poses unanswered questions around transparency and trustworthiness. The need to understand, predict and trust the decision-making ability of AI systems is important particularly in areas that are critical to life, death, and personal wellness.

Into the unknown

When automated reasoning systems were first introduced to support decision-making, they relied on hand-crafted rules. While this made it easy to interpret as well as modify their behavior, they were not scalable. Machine learning based models arrived to address the latter need; they did not require human intervention and could train from data the more the better. While deep learning models are unsurpassed in their modelling capacity and scope of applicability, the fact that these models are black boxes for the most part, raises disturbing questions regarding their veracity, trustworthiness and biases in the context of their wide usage.

There is currently no direct mechanism to trace the reasoning implicitly used by deep learning models. With machine learning models that have a black-box nature, the primary kind of explainability is known as post-hoc explainability, implying that the explanations are derived from the nature and properties of the outputs generated by the model. Early attempts to extract rules from neural networks (as deep learning was earlier known) are not currently pursued since the networks have become too large and diverse for tractable rule extraction. There is, therefore, an urgent need to introduce interpretability and transparency into the very fabric of AI modelling.

Exit night, enter light

This concern has created a need for transparency in machine learning, which has led to the growth of explainable AI, or XAI.It seeks to address the major issues that hinder our ability to fully trust AI decision-making including bias and transparency. This new field of AI brings accountability to ensure that AI benefits society with better outcomes for all involved.

XAI will be critical in helping with the bias inherent to AI systems and algorithms, which are programmed by people whose backgrounds and experiences unintentionally lead to the development of AI systems that exhibit bias. Unwanted biases such as discrimination against a particular nationality or ethnicity may creep in because the system adds a value to it based on real data. To illustrate, it may be found that typical loan defaulters come from a particular ethnic background, however, implementing any restrictive policy based on this may be against fair practices. Erroneous data is another cause of bias. Example, if a particular face recognition scanner is inaccurate 5% of the time because of the complexion of the person or the light falling on the face, it could bring in bias. Lastly, if your sample data isnt a true representation of the whole population, bias is inevitable.

XAI aims to address how black box decisions of AI systems are arrived at. It inspects and tries to understand the steps and models involved in making decisions. It answers crucial questions such as: Why did the AI system make a specific prediction or decision? Why didnt the AI system do something else? When did the AI system succeed or fail? When do AI systems give enough confidence in the decision that you can trust it, and how can the AI system correct errors?

Explainable, predictable and traceable AI

One way to gain explainability in AI systemsis to use machine learning algorithms that are inherently explainable. For example, simpler forms of machine learning such as decision trees, Bayesian classifiers, and other algorithms that have certain amounts of traceability and transparency in their decision making. They can provide the visibility needed for critical AI systems without sacrificing too much performance or accuracy.

Noticing the need to provide explainability for deep learning and other more complex algorithmic approaches, the US Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) is pursuing efforts to produce explainable AI solutions through a number of funded research initiatives. DARPA describes AI explainability in three parts which include: prediction accuracy, which means models will explain how conclusions are reached to improve future decision making; decision understanding and trust from human users and operators, as well as inspection and traceability of actions undertaken by the AI systems.

Traceability will empower humans to get into AI decision loops and have the ability to stop, or, control its tasks, whenever need arises. An AI system is not only expected to perform a certain task or impose decisions, but also provide a transparent report of why it took specific decisions with the supporting rationale.

Standardization of algorithms or even XAI approaches isnt currently possible, but it might certainly be possible to standardize levels of transparency / levels of explainability. Standards organizations are trying to arrive at common, standard understandings of these levels of transparency to facilitate communication between end users and technology vendors.

As governments, institutions, enterprises and the general public come to depend on AI-based systems, winning their trust through clearer transparency of the decision-making process is going to be fundamental. The launch of the first global conference exclusively dedicated to XAI, the International Joint Conference on artificial intelligence: Workshop on Explainable Artificial Intelligence, is further proof that the age of XAI has come.

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Introducing New Levels of Transparency with AI - Thought Leaders - Unite.AI

Human Behavior

Slowing the Spread: Social distancing is working even as coronavirus case counts continue increasing – Milwaukee Independent

The last few weeks have brought previously unimaginable changes to the lives of people throughout the United States. Americans everywhere are waking up to a new reality in which they cannot go to work or school outside the home and they have to stay six feet away from others. More than 80% of Americans are under such stay-at-home orders.

People are also seeing charts in the news showing rapidly increasing case counts. This is likely to continue to occur. The United States surpassed Italy and China to have the most confirmed cases of any country. Americans might begin to wonder if these social distancing measures are working if the case numbers keep climbing. The problem is that the number of reported cases is not the same as the number of people who are infected.

It takes time for people to develop symptoms, seek treatment and get tested and for the results to come back. So the effects of social distancing might not be obvious from the numbers for a while. As an epidemiologist at the University of Michigan, I can assure you that staying at home is one of the most effective ways to slow the spread of COVID-19.

A key reason for the delay between people severely restricting their movements and a drop in the number of new cases is that COVID-19 can have a long incubation period, the time between getting infected and becoming sick. The average incubation period is around 5 days, but it can be as long as 14 days or more. This means that a person infected before a stay-at-home order might not get diagnosed until days later.

Testing for COVID-19

Testing is another factor in the delay between the start of social distancing and seeing the results. Many Americans do not even know if they have been infected with the new coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Though the United States is finally ramping up production of test kits in federal, state and private laboratories, there are stringent criteria on who can get tested. Testing is mostly limited to people with symptoms, frontline health care workers and first responders, and older people. However, scientists have found asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic transmission of COVID-19.

Asymptomatic spread has probably contributed to the explosive growth of COVID-19 in the United States. Overall, as restrictions on testing ease, case counts are going to rise because more people, including those with mild or no illness, will be able to get tested.

Finally, it is important to note that current COVID-19 tests take 24 to 72 hours to generate a result. Even in China, where testing is widely available, the average time from the onset of symptoms to a diagnosis of COVID-19 is five days. It takes one to three days to get test results because the tests discover whether the viruss genetic material is present inside a patients body. This requires replicating the viruss genome using specialized laboratory equipment. Scientists are developing tests that look for telltale signs of the patients immune system response to virus, and these blood tests should provide quicker results.

Believing can help make it so

Unfortunately, people will, for the next few weeks, see increasing case counts even as they might be rigorously complying with government directives to avoid contact with other people. The lag time in reporting cases could make people feel that the actions theyre taking staying at home and limiting in-person social interactions arent working.

When people think that what they do works, they are more likely to do it, a concept known as self-efficacy. It turns out to be an important predictor of human behavior. For example, people who expect to be able to quit smoking are more likely to quit. As self-efficacy diminishes, people could become less motivated and relax their adherence to stay-at-home orders.

Experience from previous pandemics in the 21st century shows that peoples behaviors and attitudes change over the course of the outbreak. As the 2009 H1N1 pandemic progressed, people became less likely to want a vaccine and to perceive themselves at risk. Researchers who conducted monthly interviews with Hong Kong residents over the course of the SARS outbreak found that peoples perceptions of the effectiveness of staying at home and avoiding going to work decreased as the outbreak wore on.

If Americans see increases in case counts and believe that their own actions are ineffective, they might be less inclined to follow through on social distancing. This could lead to increased contact among people, which could make it more difficult to bring the pandemic under control. Hopefully widespread testing and faster test results will lead to a more accurate understanding of who is and is not infected with the disease, not unlike what South Korea has accomplished so far. In the meantime, Americans should not take an increase in COVID-19 cases to mean that their sacrifices are not worth sustaining.

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Slowing the Spread: Social distancing is working even as coronavirus case counts continue increasing - Milwaukee Independent

Human Behavior

The Declaration of the Human Solidarity Initiative Against the Coronavirus Pandemic – Inter Press Service

Health

AMMAN, Apr 10 2020 - We find this to be a difficult time in the history of humanity. COVID-19 has brought about ever-increasing tragedies of death and deprivation all the while inflaming our social and economic problems. The time has come to form a humanitarian consensus strong and active to face the challenges and dangers that threaten humankind and its future onour small planet.

As a group of Muslim scholars and thinkers that share in the ethical commitment and humanitarian obligation towards others, we call on all individuals wherever they may be to take part in the blessed efforts of international, regional and national organisations and carry out their human, ethical and religious duty to overcome a deadly pandemic that has affected humankind, our ways of being, world economies and indeed a majority of life systems, and afflicted the impoverished with the additional suffering of a livelihood constricted and constrained.

With a view to reviving the ethical and humanitarian responsibility towards others as the governing and organizing principle of human behavior and activity, and out of the belief that the concept and practice of Zakat, or the giving of alms, entails good formankind and with respect to the conference that the Arab Thought Forum planned to hold on the subject of the Universalism of Zakat Dimensions and Institutional Manifestations in Ramadan of 1441H, we issue a call of support to the initiative made by Prince El Hassan bin Talal under the heading Solidarity and the Awakening of the Human Conscience and a call to action for the establishment of an international institution for Zakat and human solidarity, an undertaking that His Royal Highness called for many a year ago.

In all its reverberations and consequences, the present calls for reform from within. We must find inner peace and security, seek the soundness of our hearts andresuscitate acollective consciousness that leads us tothereinforcement of values that elevatethe dignity of Man above polychromatic nationality,religion, color and gender.

Reason and human existence today face monumental challenges in awe of a miniscule organism, intelligence has stood befuddled.An egalitarian pathogen perseveres in its mightand obliges us to underline the potential of human sufferingto bring people together further than the vocabulary of interests andgains. In truth, each of us harbors the feeling that the threat to humanity is one. And, that truth ought to marshalour capabilities and give rise to thoughtful reflection on the meaning of our collective humanity in all its strengths and weaknesses whilst it uncovers for us novel spaces of convergence and joint action.

The good of an individual lies in hishumanityand his humanitya cornerstone of human solidarity around which all of our shared values revolve. An imperative that beckons us to recognize our shared responsibility towards future generations, the injunction to give serious thought to the challenges facing humanity is a corollary of the belief in the dignity and the rights of Man.

These arduous times are a test ofthe humanityof Man and his humilityjust as they are a test ofthe truth, rituals and fruits of faith: Will we fail or will we succeed? WeMuslimscarry the flag of a mercifuland compassionate religion. An international institution for Zakat and human solidarity should be preceded by interpretive jurisprudential activity on the issues of our time such as Zakat and social solidarity. Zakat could be a starting point from which mercy which God Almighty rendered as the principal purpose behind the sending of His Messengers is realised. The revival of our human and ethical duty towards others is in effect a revival of the common sense that God has endowed us with. A revival as such would be a faithful representation of the true religion of God in all its doctrines and fundamental parameters.

We thus refer to a fatwa byMuslim scholars that permits nay applauds accelerating the payment of the Zakat owed over the course of one or two years to the impoverished and even favors the rapid payment of Zakat over waiting for thestart of the holy month of Ramadan to give alms.The value of that Zakat in the Muslim world this year alone is estimated in excess of four hundred billion dollarsa tremendous sum which if collected in the current circumstances,where curfews and shutdowns have meantinterruptions to the livelihoods of many, may salvage the faith, lives and dignity of the needy.

The ability of the mind to innovate, invent and face challenges is resounding. The problems that arise from a knowledge alien to the idea of a balance with nature can be addressed through the integration of the natural and social sciences. An opportunity to exhibit the extent of our involvement in the deft management of a crisis and showcase our collaborative efforts to realise the common good and blunt the effects of poverty, destitution and illness on people, the present brings to the fore the role of networking and coordination, the obligation to learn from others and the importance of working together to rebuild the trust that remains lostand that which has weakened between the young and the old and the rich and the poor.

We find it vital to emphasise the role played by faith in strengthening our capacity for hardship and our ability to persevere in the face of that hardship as well as the role played by faith in encouraging supportfor and the alleviation of the suffering and pain of others. We shall certainly test you with fear of hunger, and loss of property, lives and crops. But [Prophet], give good news to those who are steadfast the Quran (The Cow 2:155).

We view Man as a part of nature rather than asa creature outside of Gods natural creation. Man is thus entrusted with the care of the Earth and the creatures that inhabit the Earth: We offered the Trust [of reason and moral responsibility] to the heavens, the earth, and the mountains; yet they refused to undertake it and were afraid of it; but mankind [undertook to] bear it the Quran (The Joint Forces 33:72).

We call for a reconciliation betweenhumankind and nature. Mankind must develop a sense of responsibility towards the environment and begin to protect the environment. A balance between the requirements of modern civilization and the preservation of life must be found: pollution of all stripesand encroachments of all kinds must be curtailed, natural resources must be carefully managed, and troves of buried ore must be maintained and preserved. Institutional responsibility thus lies in the increase of funds made available for the purposes of scientific research in our contemporary societies

The here and now is a truly encouraging moment for the humanitarian side of religion to come to the fore and a moment conducive for the development of a civilizational discourse anchored in the shared values of humanity. In its entirety, humanitymustunite and bring repertoires of knowledge together and synchronize the endeavor to find a way out of the global catastrophe that we all face regardless of race, colorand belief.

We are all children of a civilization united by common bonds of a far greater kind than the differences cultural, racial or other that divide us: People, be mindful of your Lord, who created you from a single soul, and from it created its mate, and from the pair of them spread countless men and women far and wide The Quran (Women 2:1). We must come to sense the moral responsibility that we hold for the disasters caused by Man, or those natural disasters that come as a consequence of the actions and conduct of Man, as the Holy Quran says,Corruption has appeared throughout the land and sea by [reason of] what the hands of the people have earned so He may let them taste part of [the consequence of] what they have done so that they may return [to righteousness] The Quran (The Byzantines 30:41)

In the sake of Allah/God

Signatories:

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The Declaration of the Human Solidarity Initiative Against the Coronavirus Pandemic - Inter Press Service

Human Behavior

Akron’s shutdown may have come at least painful time – Crain’s Cleveland Business

There's never a good time for a pandemic, but as far as Akron's concerned, now is probably the best time in terms of its impact on the city's redevelopment plans.

As long as things return to normal as planned and attitudes toward urban living survive this historic episode, that is. If so, it may even present the city some opportunities.

The COVID-19 crisis has downtown Akron, like a lot of city centers, virtually shuttered. But at least the shutdown is occurring when the core of the city was already hobbled by a massive construction project on Main Street, said the builder spearheading downtown's $42 million Bowery Project, which now sits behind orange barrels on Main Street.

"Now would be the time to do it, because there wasn't a lot happening on Main Street anyway," said Don Taylor, CEO of Fairlawn-based Welty Building Co., of the current shutdown.

Taylor's company is building out the six formerly decrepit office and industrial buildings to transform them into a mixed-use development slated to open this summer. His company also is leasing out the 92 apartments that Taylor said make up the project's residential component, as well as its roughly 40,000 square feet of retail space.

Welty has been leasing apartments throughout the current crisis, Taylor said, speaking over the sound of jackhammers from the site as work continued on the street outside.

"We are now at over 35 leases signed for the residential, out of 92 units. So, our residential leasing has done really well, even with coronavirus," Taylor said, noting that all of the apartments in the project are now complete.

Many people may not have expected that prospective tenants would be signing leases. After all, the economy is in tatters, especially in downtown areas that rely heavily on now-shuttered bars, restaurants and retail establishments. Those are the amenities places like the Bowery typically use to market themselves, as well as sources of income for some potential tenants.

Leases at the Bowery are not cheap by Akron standards, either. Apartments at the new complex lease for between $1,000 and $3,100 a month fairly pricey for Akron, where various apartment-tracking sites list average rents between $600 and $825 a month.

But even as the city and the nation are gripped by what most economists say is likely the beginning of a significant recession, Taylor said interest in leasing at the Bowery has been keen.

He likely can thank Akron's diverse economy and, in particular, its strong health care component for picking up the slack.

"We have a real cross-section (of new tenants), from young professionals to those newly moved to the area," Taylor said. "And probably the most concentration is with doctors and those that serve health care, mainly because we are a block from Akron Children's Hospital and four blocks from Cleveland Clinic Akron General (Hospital)."

On the retail side, though, pretty much everything is on hold, he noted, with prospective new bars, restaurants and other establishments taking a wait-and-see approach before committing to space.

Taylor said that's not necessarily due to the COVID-19 crisis, but to the construction on Main Street, which is taking longer than anticipated.

"Every single commercial space had at least one person looking at it. And when I say they were looking at it, I mean we were in serious conversations about leasing," Taylor said. "But because of the delay in construction on Main Street, as it became apparent it would not be finished (in 2019), our interest in those spaces really dried up. They said, 'When Main Street is done, call us back. We can't put time into planning something when we don't know when we can open the front door.' "

That means the establishments likely won't have their space built out and be ready to open when Main Street is completed, Taylor said.

Taylor had planned to have a grand opening for the Bowery in April or May but said he will now push that back to June or July. However, he's not overly concerned as long as Main Street construction wraps up in July as the city is currently promising.

"Now, the city's telling us that Main Street will be done in July. Most of the retail community said, 'Prove it. When it's done, we'll talk again.' Now, we have the coronavirus and we're in a serious pause," Taylor said, stressing the importance of the city completing Main Street by the new deadline.

That's on track to happen, said Jason Segedy, Akron director of planning and urban development.

"We're really full steam ahead on all the city's construction projects. One of the things COVID has done is eliminate a lot of traffic, which has made it easier to work. I think we're in good shape in terms of opening a new Main Street on July 1," Segedy said.

If that happens, and things do return to some semblance of normalcy, Segedy and Taylor both think Akron could even benefit from the effects of the crisis.

For one thing, as big cities such as New York seem to be having the worst time during the pandemic, it may spur folks to seek out smaller cities in which to live, where the pandemic so far appears easier to manage. Or maybe the work-from-home trend forced on society will stick around, meaning locals who take jobs with companies elsewhere could work from Akron.

"I do wonder if this doesn't hurt really large cities like New York. But for midsize cities like Akron, I think in the long run we may even benefit from people giving us a second look now," said Segedy, a staunch urbanist who studies issues that impact cities.

Taylor said the dramatic impact of the crisis on restaurants and bars in the area could benefit downtown, too. He said he thinks that when the shutdown ends, many restaurant operators might see a newly rebuilt downtown as a more desirable place to reopen and relocate their businesses, especially if the Bowery and other projects successfully fill the neighborhood with new residents.

"The predictions that 50% to 60% of restaurants will go out of business, that also means good operators will be looking for new places to run their businesses," Taylor said.

He added the Bowery will seek to work with four or five such operators and will offer particularly generous terms in the form of tenant improvement allowances to help make their visions a reality in the Bowery's new "white-box" spaces. It will cost Welty more up front, but it should also help ensure the project's ultimate success, Taylor reasoned.

"We're willing to take some financial bets on some good operators that are out there," he said.

Of course, all of the city's plans and Taylor's bets depend on the crisis passing and on people continuing to seek out cities in which to live and play.

If the past is a gauge, the signs are good, according to economists and historians familiar with past pandemics.

People sometimes fled cities during the outbreaks themselves, but the lure of urban environments didn't go away. Human behavior changed in many ways spitting on the sidewalk became taboo, for instance but people always came back to cities for their social and economic benefits.

"What cities saw during cholera outbreaks and the 1918 flu pandemic is that people just left for the short term. They left while the pandemic was going on, but then they just returned," said Amanda Weinstein, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Akron.

Matthew Crawford, an associate professor of history at Kent State University who specializes in the history of science and medicine, agreed.

"It's hard to imagine there would be a big demographic shift back to the countryside or even the suburbs," Crawford said. "I can't think of a case where there was a massive shift of people moving to the countryside and giving up on living in the cities. Cities exist for a reason."

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Akron's shutdown may have come at least painful time - Crain's Cleveland Business

Human Behavior

Psychology: An introduction to the science of human behavior

by Chris Woodford. Last updated: January 13, 2020.

Why do we do the things we do? Why do some people like hot chocolate while others prefer coffee? Why do some live to surf while others would rather stay home and read a book? How can some of us puta name to every single person we've ever met while others struggleeven to remember our own telephone number? Why do some peoplealways seem happy and successful while others see no choice but toend their painful lives in suicide? These are the sorts of questionswe can try to answer through psychology: the science of humanbehavior. In this short article, we'll briefly explore the differentbranches of psychology and get a quick overview of the kinds ofthings psychologists do.

Photo: Everything you do, think, and feel involves your brain, shownhere as a 3D-printed model. Understanding how the brain works, how it gives rise to the mind, and why it makes us do the things we do is the prime goal of psychology. Photo courtesy of Nevit Dilmen, NIH 3D Print Exchange, National Institutes of Health, published on Flickr under a Creative Commons Licence.

We can divide psychology into two big areas called experimental psychology and social psychology.

Of course, we can study social psychology in a lab using rigorousexperiments, just as we can carry out meticulous experiments in the real world; the division I've drawn between experimental and socialpsychology is arbitrary and artificial, but it reflects the waypsychology is often taught in schools and colleges, and how it'swritten up in textbooks and scientific papers. The reason for that islargely historical: in the late 19th-century, when psychology wasstill a very new field, psychologists were keen to be taken seriouslyas scientists, so they tried to adopt scientific methods to cloak thethings they studied in respectability. To this day, there's a certainstigma attached to social psychology and sociology (the study of howindividuals and groups behave in society); whether fairly or not,some people see them as soft sciences lacking academic rigor. AtCambridge University in England, for example, the psychologydepartment still calls itself the "Department of ExperimentalPsychology" and its curriculum includes relatively little socialpsychology.

Humans are the most complex of all the animals, which explains whypsychology is such a vast subject. Within the psychology departmentof a typical university, you'll find people working in a huge rangeof different areas. There are people who study perception (such ashow our eyes and ears work), learning (how we develop as children andhow we make sense of the world as adults), memory (why we rememberand how we forget), language, thinking, and reasoning. While somepsychologists study "normal" human behavior, others specialize in"abnormal" psychology, which includes how people behave whentheir brains are damaged or degenerate over time and what causespsychiatric disorders. Social psychologists study everything from thebest way to design a computer mouse to whether we can really trustthe evidence we get from people who witness crimes. Let's look at thevarious branches of psychology in turn, in a bit more detail.

You can think of people as living machines who receive information fromthe world, process it in various ways, and then act on it. In themid-20 century, it was fashionable to talk about animals (includingpeople) receiving a stimulus through their senses (maybe seeing achocolate-chip cookie appearing in front of you), which then led tosome kind of response (salivating and reaching out); according to aschool of thought known as behaviorism, human behavior was allabout the way a certain stimulus produced an appropriate response(and exactly what went on inside the brain to make the connectionwasn't thought to be especially important: behaviorism was literally"mindless"). Since the 1960s and 1970s, psychologists have tendedto view the human brain as a kind of computer, taking in informationas "input," processing and storing it in various ways, and thenproducing "output" (some kind of visible behavior); this approachis known as cognitive psychology and we'll consider it again alittle later. However you react to the world, your behavior usuallystarts with sensory perception: the way your five main senses(vision, hearing, smell, touch, and taste), plus other, lesser-knownsensory abilities such as proprioception (your sense of where yourlimbs are and how your body is moving), feed information into yourbrain.

Photo: A huge part of your brain is devoted to processing information gathered by your eyes.

For most people, vision is easily the most important sense, closelyfollowed by hearing; that also explains why perceptual psychologistshave traditionally devoted most effort to studying vision, closelyfollowed by hearing (comparatively speaking, the other senses havebarely been explored at all). Most of us assume that we see with oureyes, but it's far more accurate to say that we see with our eyes andour brains. While we can't see without our eyes, it's also true thatour brains carry out a huge amount of processing on the sensoryimpressions they receiveand in all kinds of interesting ways. Onevery obvious example is that we see things in three dimensions usingseparate, two-dimensional images that our brain fuses together fromour two eyes. But we also see things based on what we expect to see,which is what causes most of the things we call optical illusions;for example, we see faces in clouds because our brains try to makesense of the world very quickly based on the things we've seen in thepast (an awful lot of faces), the things we expect to see in thefuture (an awful lot more faces), and the things that matter most tous (the faces of people we love, work with, and have to interactwith). We can get some idea of just how complex the human visualsystem is by considering how little progress computer scientists androbot engineers have made designing machines that can "see" inanything like the same way. Why are our own brains so good at seeing?It's estimated that something like 30 percent of the cortex (the outer and,in evolutionary terms, "newest" part of the human brain) is devoted to vision. That's a veryimpressive illustration of the sheer complexity of making sense ofthe world entirely by studying light rays that enter two big holes inyour head.

One of the things that marks out humans from "lesser" creatures is ourability to make sense of our environment and learn from it. It'sobviously untrue to suggest that humans are the only creatures thatlearn things: you can teach a chimpanzee to use a symbolic language,you can train a dog not to defecate on your carpet, a rat willquickly learn to run through a maze to reach a food reward, and evena simple sea-slug can learna couple of basic tricks.

Learning goes hand-in-hand with survival, but it's a surprisingly large andcomplex subject. At one end of the spectrum, psychologists study theprocess of conditioning, which is how animals come toassociate a particular stimulus with a certain response. One ofthe first people to look into this was Russian scientistIvan Pavlov(18491936), who famously rang a bell when he delivered food to his dogs; eventually,he found the dogs would salivate simply when he rang the bell, evenwhen there was no food around, because they'd been conditionedto associate salivating with the sound of the bell. When behaviorismwas fashionable, some psychologists thought all kinds of complexhuman behavior might be broken down into patterns of stimulusand response. That's why, for example, you often see attempts toblame violence on TV and in the movies for wider violence in society.Now we know complex human behavior is much more than a simpleknee-jerk reflex from stimulus to response.

One of the great things about psychology, which differentiates it from oldersciences such as physics and chemistry, is that its relevance toeveryday life is often more immediate and apparent. One branch of thepsychology of learning is called developmental psychology andit concerns how babies develop into children and adults: for example,how they learn language, how they turn specific, concrete examples ofthings they see around them into much more general, abstractprinciples (the rules by which we have to live to survive), and therelative importance of "nature" (genetic factorsthings we'reborn with) and "nurture" (environmental factorsthings we'retaught and learn). Developmental psychology has played a huge role inpedagogy and the scientific, theoretical approach to education; it's also afascinating subject to study if you're a parent.

Photo: Mirror neurons? Sometimes we mimic one another's behavioral unconsciously, such as when two friends stand next to one another and, quite unawares, adopt exactly the same posture. Psychologists think our brains contain "mirror neurons," which are activated both when we do things and when we see other people doing those things. That encourages us to copy other people's behavior, and possibly explains how we feel empathy with others. Photo by Kasey Close courtesy of US Navy.

Thousands of years ago, before humans started to create fixed settlements anddeveloped agriculture, we lived much like other animals andday-to-day survival was our only preoccupation. How different thingsare now. Although the world's poorest people still experience life asa horrible daily battle to survive, most of us, thankfully, get tolead lives that alternate between (reasonably tolerable) work and(extremely tolerable) pleasure. Both of these things involve usingour brains as much as or more than our bodies; both see us functioningas living computers"human information processors"that take ininformation, process or store it in our brains, and then outputresults. The way we process and store information is what cognitivepsychologists study. How do we understand a simple sentence whisperedinto our ears? How can we remember everything from how to ride abicycle to the names, in order, of all the American presidents? And isthere any fundamental difference between these two types of memory(knowing how to do something, which is called procedural memory, andknowing facts about the world, which is declarative memory)?

Where behaviorists liked to pretend that "internal mental processes"didn't matter, didn't exist, or probably both, cognitive psychologists spendtheir time teasing out the precise nature of those processes,typically coming up with flowchart models that break such things asmemory and language processing (a field of its known, often known aspsycholinguistics) into sequences of discrete components.Applying this to the study of memory, for example, has given usmodels of mind that suggest memory breaks into separate long-term andshort-term stores, with the short-term or "working" memory itselfdivided into distinct areas that process visual impressions, snippetsof spoken language, and so on.

Artwork: Ulric Neisser's famous caricature of cognitive psychology from his 1976 book Cognition andReality.

Cognitive psychology is not limited to how we process the structure ofinformation, but also what information means. The word cognition is asynonym for thinking and reasoning, two areas that cognitivepsychologists have also studied using computational models. How do wemake informed judgements about things, such as whether one car is abetter buy than another? Why do we live in absolute fear of thingslike terrorist attacks but happily cross roads, drive cars, ridebicycles, drink alcohol, or smoke cigarettes (all of which pose fargreater risk to our safety and health)? Why do we play lotteries whenthe chances of winning are so much less than the odds of being struckby lightning? These are the sorts of questions cognitivepsychologists consider under the broad umbrella of thinking and reasoning.

Photo: The psychology of typography: Thanks to things you've read and seen previously, you read words printed in different fonts (typefaces) with a slightly different meaning and emotion: elegant, relaxed, friendly, imperative, hostile, or whatever it might be. You can emphasize a message you want to get across by choosing the most appropriate font. That's one of the key principles of graphic designand it happens in your mind, not on the page.

Though related to cognition, intelligence, which we might define as ageneral ability to solve problems, is a separate area of study, andit's much less fashionable than it used to be several decades ago.There are several reasons for this. FromSir Cyril Burt (a prominentBritish psychologist who allegedly faked research data about hisstudies of intelligence) toWilliam Shockley (the co-inventor of thetransistor who, predictably, became embroiled in controversy when hedared to suggest that there was a link betweenrace and intelligencethat made white people intellectually superior to blacks), the studyof intelligence has often proved intensely controversial. Thecontroversies, though important, distract from a much more fundamentaldifficulty: how should we define intelligence and is it even a meaningfulconcept? Some cynics have defined intelligence as the mere ability topass intelligence tests, but although psychometric testing isas popular as ever in recruitment for jobs, intelligence tests arenot, and never have been, a predictor of people's ability to livehappy, worthwhile, successful lives.

When you study psychology, it's remarkably easy to forget that most of thecool and fascinating things you discover happen inside the brainanapparently unremarkable organ often compared to "two fistfuls ofporridge." Neuropsychology is all about figuring out how the brainis structured and how different parts of it have different functions.One extreme, early example of neuropsychology, known as phrenology,famously involved quack doctors claiming they could tell interestingthings about someone's personality by feeling their skull for bumps.Although the idea seems risible today, the central idea ofphrenologythat the brain is modular, with discrete regions havingspecialized functionsis now known to be essentially correct.However, it's an unhelpful oversimplification to suggest, forexample, that the right half of the brain is dreamily creative whilethe left half is clinically rational; for most of the things we do,many different parts of the brain are involved, either working inparallel or in complex serial circuits.

Photo: Brain scanners have revolutionized psychology. By showing up the activity inside ourbrains when we think certain thoughts or do certain things, they can help to reveal which areas of the brain do what. Photo by courtesy ofWarren Grant Magnuson Clinical Center (CC) and USNational Institutes of Health (NIH) Image Gallery.

If cognitive psychology can break things like memory or language intoseparate areas or processes, is it possible to locate parts of thebrain where those things happen? That's the basic thinking behind ahugely successful field called cognitive neuropsychology,which involves trying to map abstract processes and functionsdiscovered through cognitive psychology onto very concrete areas ofthe brain that neuropsychologists have discovered (and vice-versa).Some psychologistsmodern-day mentalMercatorsget carried away in a frenzy to map the brain,forgetting that the ultimate goal is not to draw a tourist's guide to the insideof your head but to produce a scientific explanation of the mind: who we are andwhy we do the things we do.

While neuropsychologists do study healthy, functioning brains, they alsodevote a lot of their time to researching people whose brains havebecome damaged through such things as head injuries, strokes, ordegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's. We can discover much abouthow things like memory and language processing work by studying whatpeople can no longer do when specific areas of their brain aredamaged or destroyed. In the most spectacular cases, it's possible tofind people with very localized brain damage who can no longer dovery specific things (for example, recognizing faces or readingwords); we can infer from this that the damaged brain areas play akey role in whatever function has been lostand that helps us buildup a map of which parts of the brain do what.

People are hugely diverse and differentthat's one of the things that makeslife interesting. While it's difficult to define "normal"behavior, it's somewhat easier to point to examples of abnormalbehavior, which is harmful to people and those around them.Neuropsychological problems following brain injuries are one example,but behavior can also become abnormal for a wide variety of otherreasons, which we might broadly divide into behavioral, cognitive,and neurochemical/biological. Eating disorders such as anorexia andbulimia are believed to be largely behavioral and cognitive, forexample: you might develop an eating disorder if you convinceyourself you're fat, after becoming obsessed with skinny catwalkmodels. Illnesses such as Parkinson's disease are more to do withneurochemistry and biology: Parkinson's is believed to occur when nerve cells in the brainstop producing dopamine, an essential chemical neurotransmitter that sends messages around the brain.

Psychiatric disorders such as depression and schizophrenia are hugely complex andstill imperfectly understood. Depression can occur for many differentreasons, which might be behavioral (you feel nothing you do makes anydifference and become miserable through "learned helplessness"),cognitive (you analyze the world around you in a way thatpersistently makes you unhappy), neurochemical/biological (for onereason or another, the chemicals or the basic structure of your brainare geared to unhappiness), or some combination of these things. Thestudy of schizophrenia has a fascinating history, with attempts toexplain it shifting from anatomical/biological causes, through cognitive and behavioral ones, and back again. Originallydescribed as a kind of premature dementia ("dementia praecox"),by the 1960s it was being painted (by such figures as R.D.Laing) as akind of sane reaction to an insane world, and now it's much more likely tobe considered a consequence of a person's particular brain chemistry.

You'd think understanding the cause of a psychiatric problem would be thefirst step toward treating it but, remarkably, psychiatry has oftenworked in willful ignorance of what was happening in the mind, partlythrough the influence of behaviorism, partly through the challenge of anti-psychiatristswho refused to believe in what they called the"myth of mental illness," and also because the underlyingcauses of psychiatric problems were genuinely not known. Treatmentsfor psychiatric disorders were largely doled out on the basis of whatseemed to work and what didn't; if clinical trials found that drugscured more depressive patients than, say, group therapy (talkingabout your problems with other patients), drugs became the treatmentof choice. It didn't necessarily matter why they worked or how,providing the patients showed an improvement. That's how hugelycontroversial psychiatric treatments such aslobotomy (surgicalremoval or destruction of parts of the brain, also called leukotomy) andelectroconvulsive therapy(electrical shocks to the brain) became popular in the mid-20thcentury. Just as psychology tried to cloak itself in experimental andscientific rigor, so 20th-century psychiatry latched onto therespectability of medicine, often masking a substantial ignorance ofhow and why disorders actually occurred. Today, thanks to advances inneurology, neuropsychology, and neurobiology, we have a much clearerunderstanding of how the brain works and why it can malfunctionbutmany questions remain.

Photo: Psychologists are helping computer scientists to develop emotional robots like this one, pictured at Think Tank, the science museum in Birmingham, England.

In the 150 years or so since psychology became a science, hugeamounts have been discovered about why people behave as they do andhow we can relate different aspects of human behavior to what goes oninside our heads. Even so, teasing out the many, remaining mysteriesof the brain remains one of the last great challenges of science.Apart from being hugely interesting in its own right, anotherimportant prospect is the discovery of effective treatments forterrible degenerative diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Afurther interesting direction is the development of artificialintelligence, including computers and robots that can "think" andact in more humanlike ways. Will probing the mysteries of the mindhelp us perfect electro-mechanical rivals who make us obsolete? Orwill the act of developing intelligent machines sharpen our sense ofwhat it means to be human, making us happier and more fulfilled?Psychologists, you can be sure, will find the answer!

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Psychology: An introduction to the science of human behavior

Human Behavior

Psychological Facts about Human Behavior – Psych Lens

The psychological facts about human behavior that you might not know.

Human behavior is more complicated than you think. It is shaped by many instrumental factors that you may not aware of.

If you wonder how and why a person acts as he/she does, today youll learn the different factors that affect behavior. Here are the psychological facts about human behavior that you might not know.

High testosterone level could lead an individual to find pleasure in others irritation. Those who have a high level of this hormone tend to enjoy others agitation.

People who have the lower level of self-esteem engage in a stereotyping act or discrimination. Most of their victims are those who are better than them in a certain aspect of life. Humiliation boosts their self-esteem.

Someones making decision considers the presence of others. In fact, an individual may make favorable or good decision in a group than when no one is around. People being watched tend to behave accordingly.

People who committed undesirable acts tend to reshape moral standards. A robber, for instance, may perceive that stealing is good.

In most cases, we perceive someone who looks attractive and honest as trustworthy and sincere. While in fact, in some instances, the contrary is true. Appearance plays an important role in behavior.

Successful people are mostly considered as intelligent.

Most people who face hard challenges tend to do nothing. This may be the reason why most people are not successful.

These psychological facts about human behavior affect almost all of us. These concepts may have no significant effect on your life. But in extreme cases, they shape your attitude and behavior.

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Psychological Facts about Human Behavior - Psych Lens

Human Behavior

Similar behaviors influenced the 1918 pandemic and now COVID-19 in Missouri – KOMU 8

Beds with patients in an emergency hospital in Camp Funston, Kansas, in the midst of the influenza epidemic.

COLUMBIA Before COVID-19 was even on the worlds radar, MU School of Health Professions associate professor Carolyn Orbann had been studying how human behavior played a role in the 1918 pandemic.

Im very interested in humans and their culture and how their culture influences the way they interact with each other," Orbann said. I started working with someone in the department of anthropology who was studying the 1918 flu pretty extensively.

When COVID-19 emerged as a global pandemic on the same scale as the 1918 pandemic, Orbann started to notice some similarities.

Massive movements of population really played a role, she said.

For COVID-19, things like cars and commercial air travel are major factors for transporting the virus to new places. But in 1918, those things were in their infancy, yet the flu was able to spread around the world in the same fashion. Theres one big reason for that.

In the 1918 pandemic, you had this big global stage of World War I, she said. The circulation that was happening as the war was winding down, you had all these multinational people who and been in Europe fighting, who were now going home.

In her study of the 1918 pandemics effects in Missouri, Orbann found it spread across the state in a similar pattern as COVID-19 is spreading now.

The cities at the time seemed to have it earlier whereas some of the rural places at the time seemed to have it later, even up to years later.

While it hit rural areas later, it also hit them harder.

One of the things that happened in rural Missouri is that a lot of the medical professionals actually left to help with the war effort, she said.

Orbann said her study found people in rural areas in 1918 often felt more of a sense of patriotism and duty to serve their country as compared to people living in bigger cities like Kansas City and St. Louis.

Soon, Orbann will put her knowledge of the 1918 pandemics spread in Missouri to use in the COVID-19 fight.

Well start to look at state data and see if we have any similar patterns, Orbann said. There are reasons to think its possible we could see a similar pattern and reasons to think that it might not follow the same trajectory.

Even though a global war didnt bring on COVID-19, the virus didnt need one in order to spread as quick as at has.

Its the same patternin our time now its just so sped up that you have to really jump on the mitigation much faster, Orbann said. You just dont have as much time to plan because everything happens so much more quickly.

She said her knowledge of the 1918 pandemic may have played a role in her preparedness for COVID-19.

Having read some of the manuscripts and letters and all the historical stuff from the flu here, maybe I was a little more mentally prepared for these weeks and weeks of home quarantine, Orbann said.

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Similar behaviors influenced the 1918 pandemic and now COVID-19 in Missouri - KOMU 8

Human Behavior

Todays News: What You Need to Know – The New York Times

(Want to get this briefing by email? Heres the sign-up.)

Good morning.

Were covering new research on the coronaviruss arrival in New York, a virus-related cease-fire in Yemen, and Bernie Sanderss withdrawal from the presidential race.

We start today with a note of cautious optimism from our writer Dan Barry: The world began this week to see small but encouraging signs that concerted efforts to drastically change human behavior to suspend daily routines by staying at home are slowing the insidious spread of the novel coronavirus, which has killed tens of thousands and sickened more than a million others across several continents.

As the coronavirus disrupts the global supply chain, scientists in Africa and Latin America have been told by manufacturers that orders for testing kits cant be filled for months, because almost everything they produce is going to the U.S. or Europe.

All countries report steep price increases, from testing kits to masks.

So far, the developing world has reported far fewer cases and deaths, but public health experts fear that the virus could be especially devastating for countries with underfunded health systems.

Quotable: If it was just one country with an epidemic it would be fine, but all the major countries in the world are wanting the same thing at the same time, said the chief executive of a group that represents the testing industry.

Another angle: New Yorks network of group homes for people with special needs has seen a surge in infections.

Closer look: Food banks across the U.S. are struggling to meet demand. Crazy pretty much sums it up, a food bank official in Louisiana said.

Now that Bernie Sanders has withdrawn from the presidential race, Joe Biden is faced with the challenge of uniting the Democratic Party and winning the support of the younger, more liberal voters who powered the Vermont senators campaign.

Starting today, the Biden campaign is expected to highlight a series of policy positions that show how he has moved closer to Mr. Sanders on health care and other issues.

Quotable: In dropping out on Wednesday, Mr. Sanders said: I cannot in good conscience continue to mount a campaign that cannot win and which would interfere with the important work required of all of us in this difficult hour.

News analysis: The pandemic has turned the primary race into less of an ideological contest between the Democrats and refocused their attention on defeating President Trump in November, a correspondent for The Times Magazine writes.

Another angle: Republicans have fought the expanded use of mail-in ballots during the pandemic, arguing that it encourages fraud. Although there have been several documented fraud cases involving mail or absentee ballots in recent decades, some states that already conduct elections almost entirely by mail report little fraud. We checked some of the facts.

If you have some time, this is worth itHow can America emerge stronger?

The Timess Opinion section is starting an ambitious project to envision how the U.S. can eventually come out of the current moment stronger, fairer and more free.

In an introduction, our editorial page editor, James Bennet, writes: This pandemic offers the same opportunity that Americans have seized during past crises: to set aside petty differences, recognize national priorities and set to work again on creating a more perfect union. Were launching this initiative in hopes of supporting that national instinct.

Our special report on A.I.: As artificial intelligence evolves and expands, so does the impact on our lives. The Times examined the trend as it applies to fields including education, entertainment, science and sports.

Snapshot: Above, the Queensboro Bridge as seen from the East River promenade on the Upper East Side. Our critic Michael Kimmelman took a virtual tour of the waterfront with the architect Deborah Berke and found that it encapsulates New York Citys history.

Late-night comedy: After speaking to Senator Bernie Sanders on The Late Show, Stephen Colbert said, Bernie Sanders is saying Bernie Sanders cant win? Man, he is going to catch hell from Bernie Sanders supporters.

What were checking out: The Social Distancing Festival, a calendar of live-streamed events. Youve probably already exhausted your Netflix and HBO options, writes our national correspondent Mike Wines, so here are different options.

Cook: Green goddess dressing, perfect for dunking veggies, uses almost any soft herbs or greens, pured with something creamy, something garlicky or oniony, and a few anchovies.

Read: Theres a new collection of novellas from Don Winslow out, Broken. Janet Maslin says it shows his range, and his bite. One begins: No one knows how the chimp got the revolver.

Listen: Priya Parker has a new podcast for The Times, Together Apart, and the first episode is all about how to celebrate Passover, Ramadan or Easter. Here are the essential John Prine songs you ought to listen to. And April is National Poetry Month. Weve put together a great list of places you can stream poems and slams.

We have lots more ideas about what to read, cook, watch and do while staying safe at home.

Around the world, online habits are changing. But are we giving away too much? Shira Ovide, the host of our On Tech newsletter, chatted about that question on Twitter with Kara Swisher, a veteran technology journalist and an Opinion writer for The Times. Here are lightly edited portions of their conversation.

Shira: How do you feel about us relying more than ever on services from tech companies?

Kara: Im nervous about it. It doesnt abrogate the problems they had before.

What should tech companies like Amazon do to protect their workers?

Tech companies have lived off other peoples cheap labor for a long time whether its an Uber driver, a delivery person or Amazon warehouse workers. Its just coming into sharp relief.

These workers deserve much stronger pay and more benefits. Thats costly to the people who want to stay enormously wealthy, and to consumers who like a low price.

What is keeping you happy right now?

I just had a baby with my girlfriend, and staring at a baby who has no idea that any of this is happening is really quite something. Watch a baby eat bananas for the first time. You will feel just fine.

Thats it for this briefing. See you next time.

Chris

Thank youMelissa Clark provided the recipe, and Theodore Kim and Jahaan Singh provided the rest of the break from the news. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com.

P.S. Were listening to The Daily. Todays episode is about how New Orleans became a petri dish for the coronavirus. Heres todays Mini Crossword, and a clue: Old saying (five letters). You can find all our puzzles here. The Timess DealBook team will discuss the pandemics impact on media and advertising with our media columnist Ben Smith and our media industry reporter Edmund Lee at 11 a.m. Eastern today. R.S.V.P. here.

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Human Behavior

Not Just Coronavirus: Why Tiger King Is A Juggernaut For Netflix Its Not What You Think – Forbes

Netflix and 'Tiger King's' unexpected dominance (Photo by Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket ... [+] via Getty Images)

Today ratings tracker Neilsen released their numbers for Netflix NFLX s notorious and binge-inducing docu-series, Tiger King.

To the surprise of no one, Tiger King scored record highs, with 34 million viewers in just 10 days.

Some believe the special benefited from the COVID-19 pandemic, since were staying at home, discovering a new show together and talking about it via phone, email, text and social media. Sheltering-in-place can lead to all of us virtually embracing something as a global community. As a result, Tiger King did indeed go viral. Theres no doubt that the series performed exceptionally well due to most of us waiting out this virus together.

But thats not the real reason behind its massive success.

Others think the show succeeded because its yet another glimpse into the underbelly of America, a celebration of all thats tacky, trashy, criminal and outrageous. They say that in Trumps United States, we shouldnt be surprised that a carnival-barking opportunist like Joe Exotic would capture our national imagination.

Theyre not wrong, but that cant explain how universally popular the shows become, both with Trump supporters and those turned off by the president and his followers.

Some believe the series became such a ratings outlier due to the mix of low human behavior contrasted against the beauty and majesty of exotic cats particularly the 12-foot-long, 600-pound tigers. The series hit home how the tigers are the ones that should be free and these seemingly wild humans were the ones who belonged in cages.

Those whove seen the show know that at least one human does in fact end up behind bars; many predict others featured in the series will soon follow.

This contrast of man versus nature surely contributed to the shows success, but cant explain why the show set records for Netflix, especially with viewers not known for watching nature documentaries.

The answer behind the success of Tiger King is simple yet confounding: Tiger King is an example of excellent storytelling, perfectly designed for streaming.

James Gandolfini accepts one of many awards for the classic cable drama, 'The Sopranos.' (AP ... [+] Photo/Kevork Djansezian, File)

Since HBOs premiere of The Sopranos, subscription television has become home to what I call closed communities, where taboo things happen.

In example after example, premium cable, basic cable and ultimately streaming built their reputations and grew their audiences by featuring characters in situations unlike anything on free, broadcast TV.

Few among us are familiar with the stress of being a Jersey mob boss (The Sopranos); cooking meth and selling it, while fighting stage IV lung cancer (Breaking Bad); or being a woman performing stand-up in the 60s, in a male-dominated world (Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.)

Network television, after all, is known for featuring what I describe as extraordinary characters in ordinary situations.

Whether with domestic sitcoms, procedural dramas or reality competitions, broadcast TV is our comfort food, nurturing us with programs featuring an idealized view of whats exceptional about some of us, in our everyday lives.

We like whats familiar on broadcast; we demand peculiar and strange when we subscribe.

Some scrunch up their nose at Tiger King and what it may say about America and what it celebrates.They dont get it.

Americans are smart.

Americans know quality content when they see it. They understand and appreciate complex story-telling, unpredictable characters and rich, colorful settings. They love to watch the lengths some of us will go in pursuing our dreams, and the price some pay for such ambition. They want to escape and experience characters that ignore the law, or bend it to their will, consequences be damned.

America loves Tiger King for one, basic reason: its excellent.

This Netflix docuseries is king of the jungle because it embraces and skillfully executes on pay televisions First Commandment: feature a closed community, where taboo things happen.

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Not Just Coronavirus: Why Tiger King Is A Juggernaut For Netflix Its Not What You Think - Forbes