Human Behavior

Shame and pride | News, Sports, Jobs – Lock Haven Express

Shame and Pride was a popular self-help book written by Donald Nathanson, M.D., exploring the Birth of the Self. The book and its message take on new significance in todays political environment.

When I was a kid, my father had a friend who was a paraplegic. One of my strong childhood memories is going with my father to visit this man.

My dad wanted me to see that his friend, Nat, had a terrific sense of humor and was never downcast. His home was dark and scary to me.

Nat had an African American man who worked for him, helping him in and out of the wheelchair, to dress, bathe and take care of everyday activities.

I do not recall the assistants name, but he was always part of the conversation and was a thoroughly entertaining fellow.

My father once made a cryptic comment to me after a visit with Nat and his assistant: You know that his assistant is really a Black man, but he oils his skin with lemon to appear White. What is wrong with our society, that a man like this cannot feel comfortable in his own skin?

My how the world has changed. African Americans are now justly proud of who and what they are.

As one who knew Nats assistant and pays attention to the current sociology, I could not help but be quizzical about Jessica A. Krug.

She was a college professor at the prestigious George Washington University who pretended for most of her life to be African American, Latino or Caribbean.

In reality she is Jewish from Kansas City, Missouri.

Why is this woman living a lie, giving up the pride of being Jewish to take on another identity which is not hers?

Why has it become so unpopular to be Jewish but so acceptable to be Black?

In Israel there is a significant Black Jewish population from Ethiopia. Jews came to Israel not as slaves but rather were brought on numerous rescue missions beginning with Operation Solomon and Operation Moses. Those Black Jews have distinguished themselves in every walk of life, and proudly serve in the Israeli Defense Forces.

When Barrack Obama, as President, went to Israel, he was anxious to meet with Miss Israel who was an Ethiopian Jew.

So strong are the family bonds and traditions of Ethiopian Jews, that they discourage their kids from marrying non-Ethiopian Jews.

There is a lesson in the pathetic Krug story. One can simply dismiss the woman as schizophrenic, bipolar, or with a multiple personality disorder. Who knows what her pathology is, but we do know she is confused as between Shame and Pride.

Hopefully, we are raising our children to be proud of who and what they are, while always aspiring for the best, regardless of the color of their skin.

Is it possible that Krug simply adopted a new identity because she thought she could get further as a college professor by being a person of color from a background of either Latino or Caribbean? Is it simply a matter of fraud intended to advance her career?

I worry about people who lose a job or an education because someone else, who may come from a disadvantaged population, receives a privilege. The issue of reverse discrimination and the fairness of creating people of special privilege has even reached the level of the United States Supreme Court.

Should a wealthy and successful African American receive a special place at Harvard over a poor White person? Should we be judging people by the color of their skin or how badly their descendants were treated?

In 1911, my alma mater, New York University, imposed a limit on the number of Jews who could attend the University.

This form of bigotry spread throughout the college and university world. By the time I applied for school, I was told that certain Ivy League schools would not have me because they had created places for others considered underprivileged. The same form of reverse discrimination has occurred to Asian Americans.

It is time in America first to have the difficult conversation, but a necessary one, as to whether the unfairness perpetrated upon certain groups should be transferred to others deemed privileged in society.

No group of people on planet Earth could compete with the Jews for the sheer mass of bigotry, death and destruction which the Jewish people have endured.

There are some who have tremendous resentment for Jewish memory concerning the Holocaust in Europe during World War II, believing that there should be statute of limitations on empathy for the Jewish people.

Others believe that when a people have been enslaved or mistreated, they should receive special privileges until the political establishment has purged itself of the sins of its forebearers.

The world we should be striving for is one where our citizens going to school and looking for jobs receive equal opportunity.

If we try to live in the past, and address every evil of our ancestors, we will never be able to figure out a fair formula. Quite to the contrary, we will only continue to snap at each others heels and inflict more harm upon those who are viewed as different.

As to folks today, who are suffering or are disadvantaged, every civilized society needs to have a safety net to help uplift its members so that they too can draw upon their intellect and instincts to be successful.

Discriminating against some, to make up for the mistreatment of others, is a losing proposition.

Not only do we know that it does not work, but in fact it creates more animosity.

Shame and Pride will continue to be a fundamental modality of human behavior. Individuals and groups will continue to be driven by the very emotions that are most destructive.

There is a similarity, albeit a quirkish one, between Nats assistant and Ms. Krug.

What they were trying to achieve from their adopted status may not be clear to anyone else.

What we do know is that their fake identities were harmful to themselves and to others who might have truly appreciated what those people were really all about.

Cliff Rieders is an attorney based in Williamsport.

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Shame and pride | News, Sports, Jobs - Lock Haven Express

Human Behavior

Interview: Director Sean Durkin on Filming a Period Piece, Exploring Family Dynamics and Professional Ambition in The Nest – thirdcoastreview.com

Much like his frequent producing partners Antonio Campos (who directed the new Netflix drama The Devil All the Time) and Josh Mond (James White), filmmaker Sean Durkin has spent a great deal of the last 12 years producing works by the aforementioned directors and others, including Afterschool, Christine, The Eyes of My Mother, Piercing, and even this years Dave Franco-directed The Rental. But he also managed to find time to helm his own works, such as Martha Marcy May Marlene, the BBC miniseries Southcliffe; and his most recent effort, The Nest.

Image courtesy of IFC Films

In this gripping family drama set in the 1980s, Rory (Jude Law), an ambitious entrepreneur and former commodities broker, persuades his American wife, Allison (Chicagos own Carrie Coon), to leave the comforts of suburban America and bring the whole family to his native England. Sensing opportunity, Rory rejoins his former firm and leases a centuries-old country manor that he really cant afford. The promise of a lucrative new beginning starts to unravel, and the couple have to face the unwelcome truths lying beneath the surface of their marriage. Its a keenly observed work that deals with human behavior, the family dynamic, the specific period and state of the business world during the period that its set, and there might even be a ghost in the house.

Nine years ago, I was fortunate enough to moderate a Q&A with Durkin and his MMMM star Elizabeth Olsen, so it was great to be able to reunite with him so many years later, just late last week, for this phone conversation. There was certainly a great deal to unpack about The Nest, so please enjoy

I saw this film for the first time at Sundance, and it never even crossed my mind that it was a period film. But when I watched it again this week, I realized it was supposed to be set in the 1980s, but I dont think its ever mentioned

I love that youre saying this [laughs].

My forensic abilities finally kicked in, and I noticed there were no cell phones, the music is very period; it wasnt the usual things like clothes or hair. I feel like the subtlety is very deliberate.

I set it very specifically in 1986. In fact, I think the first scenes are in May 1986 and it ends in November. There are a lot of clues to that, very subtle clues, but I didnt want to have any big signifiers. I wanted it to be in the background, and one of the first things I said to my art and costume steams was When people make movies about the 80s, they have too much fun with it. They embrace all of the biggest signifiers they can, and I want to stay away from all of them. As we started to look at references, we looked at things other than pop culture references. We looked at daily references, and everyone pooled together their family photos and found references, and its almost indistinguishable. You cant really tell clothing wise, for example. We made a choice to leave out those things, and one of the first things we did was get Judes suits made by an amazing London tailor whos been working since the 60s, who knew exactly what was spot on, and it was all about the choice of shoulder width. You want enough of a shoulder that is accurate, but you dont want to go with the shoulder-pad 80s look. So it was all in the details. Its supposed to be in the backdrop and crucial to the story, but its also set then to reflect where we are today as well.

I know a little bit about your personal history of having moved to England when you were a kid, but why was it important to set the film in those specific months in that year?

It started off as a personal reflection. I went back to England in 2012 to make Soundcliffe for Channel 4 and I hadnt been there in almost 20 years, and in that time, I must have been been reflecting on things. Now the move between New York and London is seamless, but back then, it was a really big difference. So I wondered what it would be like to examine a family making this move at that time when it was a big difference. What would that move bring up for a family? And within that, dig further into the marriage and the secrets that people keep within each other, between each other in a marriage. Once I pinpointed the general time and knew I wanted Rory to be somewhat related to the finance world, I looked at 1986, which was a big year in London. It was the year of the so-called Big Bang, when there was huge deregulation and privatization; national companies were being sold off. And it was the first time international companies could trade on the London market. It was the beginning of this emerging global market that was coming, and 1986 was big for that. Plus, I wanted to set it before 1987, a time before the crash, it was a time of optimism, a time when Rory could see an opportunity and have the vision that this was the time and place where he could go to make something happen. And I wanted the values he is chasinggetting a taste of the American Dream, and then bringing it back home. I wanted to examine those values of greed and ambitionbigger is betterand put them at the core of the issue and the family.

All of his predictions about the way things are going turn out to be 100 percent accurate. It gave me hope that in the end he would make some money at some point after the film is done.

I really wanted that for the character. Hes got a lot of things going for him, but he doesnt know how to do the work. He knows how to make a splash but doesnt necessarily know how to close the details. That felt really important to me and felt really universal and modern too. I see it all the time.

The other things thats a bit ambiguous is the nature of the story youre telling, at least initially. Is it a family drama? It could be a ghost story at one point? Maybe its about the British business scene. You spend a great deal of time in each of those areas before this intrigue about the family emerges. With your first film, you jumped around in time and didnt seem interested in telling a completely linear story. What do you like about easing into the story rather than just jumping into it?

Its funny you say that, because I really do love things that jump right into story in a novel or short story or film. I think what I follow in these two films is that Im someone who is character-ledI let the characters lead above plot. The result of that maybe is letting that happen, as opposed to saying We need to hit this plot point by this moment, so maybe it has that effect a little bit. But I just tried to portray a family in their life at the moment when that gets interrupted and then follow the emotional fallout of that and how, when people get tested, especially Allison, over and over again, each time something new is revealed. Its about following what Allison is feeling, what Rory is feeling, what hes dreaming about, whats driving him, and letting them be the things that dictate the movie. The same with MarthaMarthas experience was about those weeks after escaping from a cult. I did a lot of research about it and wanted it to be truthful to those anecdotes that I heard from people. That was a confused time for them and one of real reckoning of what just happened to them.

Allison is such a wonderfully layered and complex character. She clearly enjoy the spoils of their lifestyleher fur coat really is something elsebut at the same time, she doesnt necessarily like the drive that Rory needs to be that successful because it changes the dynamic of their relationship, which starts out balanced and shifts when they move. Talk about those nuances in her as youre writing the character.

I really love characters who are not just one thing. So often in films, people are one thing, and theyre boiled down, and sometimes they have to be because they serve a purpose to a story. But I wanted her to be really complex, a product of her time so that some of her Stand By Her Man upbringing was there, but also to have the contradiction that she is also outspoken. And then theres the contradiction that someone can be a hard-working horse person who does physical labor on a farm but also likes to put on a fur coat and go out on the town and spend a bunch of moneymoney she doesnt have. Shes a part of that. Characters just grow; you write for years, pull things from places, and they just become cohesive over time, but its all very incremental for me. Then bringing in Carrie Coon was the key to making all of those dualities blend into one very powerful person and performance. She has the ability to have a very grounded energy and also do the glamorous, party schmoozingshe can do anything.

You have this mother-child theme happening with these bookend scenes between Allison and her mother in the States, Rory and his mother in London. Those two scenes reveal so much about them with very few words. And then theres also the dynamic between Allison and her kids. Tell me about those two scenes and how important they are.

Yeah, I wanted to show that all parents are children. Youve got these two grown-upsand I use that terms looselymaking decisions for the family, and I wanted you to see them as children with their mothers. I wanted to shine a light without trying to explain too muchThese are the values and this is the place where these people come from. Just to give you a moment when they arent the parent in the room; they arent the husband or the wife, they arent at work. I love that. I was trying to think about people in every facet of their live, not just one or two.

I think at the very least we figure out from those scenes that these two people are better parents than their parents were.

[laughs] Thats a great observation; I never really thought of it like that. I do hope that you get a sense of progress, that theyre doing better than they had growing up. That is something that comes up in the end.

Speaking of parents and kids, I think its so important when we get the perspective of the kids when theyre hearing their parents argue, because kids always know when something isnt right. Its a thing that unifies every single human being. And it alters our perception of whats happening when we consider it from the kids points of view.

Its a crucial point. It shows the effects of these things. As a parent, you can think youre protecting your kids from something, but like you said, the kids know. And even without hearing the fights, they always know. I love that sense of them asking the questions What has this become? What does this mean? but also hoping theres enough love there to get them through. At the end of the day, its about Do they stick together? How they stick together?, and trying to find those real family moments. Families go through these things together and have these difficult moments. What else can you do but sit down and have breakfast and keep going?

Theres a scene where Allison is hiding money, and I think theres even a moment where she says something to Rory like Is this happening again? Theres a sense that theyve been through something already and survived it. Can you talk about that a bit?

I think thats right. I wanted to create as sense that the family is in a cycle, and you see a bit of that cycle. Its happened before, maybe it will happen again, but also that this is the worse its ever been, and there is a revelation that comes out of it. Humans are cyclical and do the same things over and over again. Its about catching those things and having the ability to recognize it. Im very interested in those cycles and the repetition of human behavior.

Sean, thank you so much. Its great to talk to you again.

Take care. Thank you.

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Interview: Director Sean Durkin on Filming a Period Piece, Exploring Family Dynamics and Professional Ambition in The Nest - thirdcoastreview.com

Human Behavior

Highway healing: Motorcycle riders are happier and have less stress than most car owners, finds a study – Economic Times

If youve ever met a bike enthusiast, chances a re youve heard them tell you that theres nothing like riding a motorcycle. While the thought may be terrifying for some, its thrilling yet calming for bikers.

A recent study commissioned by Australias ING revealed that, on average, motorcyclists are happier than the average motorist. The study uncovered the therapeutic potential of motorcycle riding, with 82 per cent of riders agreeing that riding makes them happy compared to only around 55 per cent of motorists.

A similar study by UCLAs Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior recorded brain activity and hormone levels before, during and after riding a bike, driving a car and resting. The bike ride resulted in a 28 per cent decrease in biomarkers of stress.

Heres why riding a bike can help your mental and even physical health:

Reduces stressGetting stuck in traffic has to be the reason why many of us hate getting out. So, logically, riding a bike reduces anxiety, simply because youre not going to be jammed in, well, at least not as badly as your friends on four wheels. This can reduce stress and can even ease anxiety levels.

Improves brain healthIts all eyes and ears on the road when youre riding a motorcycle. This sensory focus means that riders are more alert to what is going on around them, increasing brain activity. Riding a bike increases alertness thats similar to drinking a cup of coffee.

Riding a bike can be likened to doing a form of low-impact exercise. Apart from this, riding a bike also helps your posture and improves your core muscles over the long term. Also, dont discount the vitamin D intake.

Part of a communityRiding a bike offers the best of both worlds: Solo time and being part of a larger biking community. Most avid motorcyclists are part of a larger community and this can boost happiness levels and improve mental health.

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Highway healing: Motorcycle riders are happier and have less stress than most car owners, finds a study - Economic Times

Human Behavior

Faculty and students create phone application, campaign for COVID-19 behavioral accountability – The Appalachian Online

Phone application Habitood allows students to hold one another accountable for their actions related to COVID-19 by tracking behaviors and using positive and negative reinforcement.

The app, introduced by Timothy Ludwig in the psychology department, aims to study, observe and encourage peer reinforcement to shape healthy COVID-19 behaviors.

Habitoods slogan and goal is, No Name, No Blame, No Shame. Only Infection Reduction.

App States Psychology Club and Psi Chi, the psychology national honor society, initiated the App State vs. COVID campaign, which allows App State students to become active participants in slowing the spread of the virus.

Psi Chi decided on what behaviors we want to pay attention to, so, once we identified what those behaviors were, we were working with Habitood to get those into the system so that data could be collected for that, said Connor Linden, a graduate student in the Industrial Organizational Psychology and Human Resources Management Program.

The Habitood app is interested in the collection of behavioral data only, such as how well students are abiding by COVID-19 regulations and restrictions.

Infection control behaviors include wearing a mask, washing hands, social distancing or using hand sanitizer.

This is an area of psychology that we call behavioral psychology. We are focusing on behavior change and, through the years, this process is built on reinforcement, Ludwig said. The idea of reinforcement is that if you do a behavior and come into contact with a consequence that is desirable, you are more likely to do it again.

The slogan explains there are no identifying features about a student that can be put into this app. It allows students to remain anonymous.

The home page on the app asks students to share whether they live on or off-campus. After students click on this button, they can choose a team to designate where they are on or off-campus, including academic buildings, common areas and dorms, or off-campus.

Data will be collected electronically and the trends will be publicly displayed.

Ludwig said, If we all join in and show that students are making a difference then, maybe, we will be able to stay on campus while protecting our community at the same time.

Already, data collected from the app over the first week has shown that the biggest risk is social distancing when unmasked in dorms and apartments around people who dont live there. Another risk is outdoor on campus, notably Sanford Mall.

Ally Curry, president of Psi Chi, said the club has continued to promote the app through virtual flyers, word of mouth, Zoom meetings and in the psychology department.

Well be doing this for as long as it will impact students on campus, which, right now is a really uncertain amount of time, Curry said.

Students, regardless of their department, are encouraged to participate and encourage safe behaviors on and off-campus through the application.

It does not take much effort to be active in our community and this is a good way to show love for those in it, Psychology Club treasurer Madison Billowus said. Plus, if we continue to try our best at staying safe and preventing further contagion, we are able to continue to have an open campus and lean toward a normal spring semester.

Students can download Habitood from the Play Store or App Store, and sign up using their App State email and a business code.

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Faculty and students create phone application, campaign for COVID-19 behavioral accountability - The Appalachian Online

Human Behavior

MUSEUM OF ART AND DESIGN AT MDC PRESENTS THE EXHIBITION THE BODY ELECTRIC – The Reporter

Miami, FL, Sept. 21, 2020Museum of Art and Design (MOAD) at Miami Dade College (MDC) presents The Body Electric, a major exhibition that looks at our fraught relationship to technology, particularly the increasingly inescapable interface between our bodies and screens. The remarkably varied art in the exhibition examines the last 50 years of artists addressing the way technological mediation has come to dominate our interactions with the world, with each other, and with ourselves. The Body Electric will be on view from Nov. 5, 2020, through May 30, 2021.

In an age dominated by digital technology, The Body Electric explores themes of the real and the virtual, the organic and the artificial, moving from the world into the screen and back again. Looking across the past 50 years, the exhibition presents an intergenerational and international group of 55 artists and collectives that have seized upon the screen as a place to rethink the body and identity, with a particular emphasis on questions of gender, sexuality, class, and race. The exhibition contextualizes contemporary artists who today engage with digital technology and the influence of the Internet within a broader art historical narrative to reveal shared interests that emerge across generations, despite differing technological means.

Video cameras record private moments and public spectacles, photographs capture alternate personas, and digital avatars simulate human behavior. Together, they reveal ways that technology changes our collective understanding of the body, everyday life, and sense of self. Works in the exhibitionfrom the inviting and familiar to the provocative and unsettlingquestion ways that photographic, televisual, and digital media affect our perceptions of the human body and ordinary experience.

The exhibition begins with a pioneering generation of artists active in the mid-1960sJaime Davidovich, Shigeko Kubota, Marta Minujn, Charlotte Moorman, Nam June Paik, and Wolf Vostellfor whom the television was both the subject and object of their expanded practices that spanned performance, sculpture, and the moving image. Footage of performances by the Wooster Group offers a frenetic meditation on the all-pervasive presence of technology, and the fusion of body and screen.

Works by Sanja Ivekovi, Anna Maria Maiolino, Ana Mendieta, Claudio Perna, Howardena Pindell, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, and Cindy Sherman chart a history of artists turning the lens of the camera onto their own bodies, creating personal spaces of performance, whether via the 1960s Portapak camera or todays selfie. Disembodied beings and digital avatars populate contributions by Laurie Anderson, Ed Atkins, Pierre Huyghe, and Sidsel Meineche Hansen, while sculptures by Robert Gober and Anicka Yi, as well as an immersive installation by Trisha Baga, explore the slippery ambiguity of materials poised between the digital and analog, the real and rendered.

For Gretchen Bender, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Sondra Perry, and Martine Syms, the lens of the camera creates a space to rethink the representation of sociopolitical identities and to question the structures that govern our understanding of race and gender. Works by Jes Fan, Josh Kline, Carolyn Lazard, Candice Lin & Patrick Staff, and Marianna Simnett reflect on the malleability of the body, speaking to themes of care, surgical intervention, and chemical and biological processes imperceptible to the human eye. And Zach Blass artificially intelligent Icosahedron (2019) takes the form of a crystal ball.

The works in The Body Electric investigate the issues raised by our growing dependence on electronic interfaces to learn about the world, to communicate with each other, and even to understand our own identities, said Rina Carvajal, MOADs Executive Director and Chief Curator. For more than five decades, as our reliance on technology has increased, the artists in this fascinating exhibition have delved into the many ways that screens have come to shape our reality.

Full list of artists in the exhibition: Vito Acconci, Laurie Anderson, Ed Atkins, Trisha Baga, Ivana Bai, Gretchen Bender, Zach Blas, Nancy Burson, James Byrne, Peter Campus, Petra Cortright, Andrea Crespo, Jaime Davidovich, Otavio Donasci, Juan Downey, Zackary Drucker, Rhys Ernst, VALIE EXPORT, Jes Fan, Simone Forti, Robert Gober, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Tishan Hsu, Pierre Huyghe, Juliana Huxtable, Sanja Ivekovi, Josh Kline, Shigeko Kubota, Carolyn Lazard, Candice Lin & Patrick Staff, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Anna Maria Maiolino, Helen Marten, Sidsel Meineche Hansen, Marta Minujn, Charlotte Moorman, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Bruce Nauman, Nam June Paik, Letcia Parente, Claudio Perna, Sondra Perry, Howardena Pindell, Ulrike Rosenbach, Cindy Sherman, Lorna Simpson, Marianna Simnett, Stelarc, Hito Steyerl, Martine Syms, Ryan Trecartin, Wolf Vostell, the Wooster Group, and Anicka Yi.

The Body Electric is organized by the Walker Art Center. The exhibition is made possible by generous support from the Carl & Marilynn Thoma Art Foundation. Additional support provided by Ellen and Jan Breyer and the David and Leni Moore Family Foundation. The Body Electric is curated by Pavel Py, Curator, Visual Arts, Walker Art Center, with Jadine Collingwood, Curatorial Fellow. The presentation at MOAD is organized by Rina Carvajal, Executive Director and Chief Curator, with Isabela Villanueva, Consulting Assistant Curator, and is made possible by the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor and Board of County Commissioners; and the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture. Additional support was received from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation as part of its Immersive Technologies in the Arts initiative.

Located in MDCs National Historic Landmark Freedom Tower, MOAD at MDC offers groundbreaking exhibitions and programs that aim to foster a reimagined Miami. Exploring the challenges and opportunities we face locally and globally, MOAD convenes artists, designers, and thinkers to address the urgent questions of our time. As the Colleges flagship museum, MOAD strives to be a catalyst for action and a place that empowers people to remake their city. MOAD follows the Colleges lead in operating across Miami with its Museum Without Boundaries initiative, which takes place in city neighborhoods and invites everyone to be a part of the conversation.

WHAT: The Body Electric

WHEN: Thursday, Nov. 5, 2020, through Sunday, May 30, 2021

WHERE: Museum of Art and Design at MDC

Freedom Tower

600 Biscayne Boulevard, Second Floor

Hours: Wednesday: 16 p.m.; Thursday: 18 p.m.; FridaySunday: 16 p.m.

Museum admission: $12 adults; $8 seniors and military; $5 students (1317) and college students (with valid ID); free for MOAD members, MDC students, faculty, and staff, and children 12 and under.

Accessibility challenges: please call 305-237-7710 for details.

The Museum is currently closed. We are scheduled to reopen on November 5. As part of Miami Dade College, MOAD and MDC Special Collections will continue to closely monitor COVID-19. MDC is coordinating efforts with the appropriate state and local authorities. We recommend that you visit MDCs information and resource page and check back frequently.

For more information regarding our closure and to stay tuned regarding the resumption of regular operating hours, please visit moadmdc.org and closely monitor our Facebook and Instagram channels.

For updates and a full schedule of events, please visit http://www.mdcmoad.org/.

Press Contacts: Caitlin Driscoll, MOADs Marketing Consultant: 305-237-7719, cdriscol@mdc.edu; JWI PRJessica Wade Pfeffer: 305-804-8424, jessica@jwipr.com.

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MUSEUM OF ART AND DESIGN AT MDC PRESENTS THE EXHIBITION THE BODY ELECTRIC - The Reporter

Human Behavior

Opinion/Goldstein and Krukowski: Who will be the vaccine influencers for COVID-19? – The Providence Journal

Carly Goldstein is an assistant professor at Brown University in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior. Becca Krukowski is an associate professor at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in the Department of Preventive Medicine.

Now is the time to prepare for the availability of a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine, particularly since currently only 65% of Americans report that they will be willing to get a FDA-approved vaccine provided at no cost. A vaccine will be an essential component to fully reopening schools and businesses and getting back to the activities that we love, so we must develop ways to improve uptake now, before the vaccine is available.

For sure, in addition to being affordable, receiving the vaccine should be convenient, particularly if it ends up requiring multiple doses. It should be offered at schools, employers and pharmacies, at minimum. Furthermore, for those who wish to receive the vaccine at their doctors office, receiving the vaccine should not require a separate doctors appointment for each family member. However, these efforts by the brightest minds in health care and public health will likely be insufficient to achieve herd immunity for COVID-19; we will need to be more creative and harness another natural resource the power of celebrity.

When rates of uptake of the polio vaccine were concerningly low among teenagers and adults in 1956, Elvis Presley lent his fame to the cause and was vaccinated on "The Ed Sullivan Show." Fast forward 64 years, which well-known individuals would be willing to step up and get the COVID-19 vaccine in the public eye to encourage others? We established a registry of people who are willing to join COVID-19 vaccine trials why not establish a list of those willing to use their fame to advocate for vaccination?

It is unlikely that one individual will inspire everyone we need many national and local influencers, including star athletes, actors, musicians, community leaders and religious leaders. As one example, Broadway superstar Kristin Chenoweth stepped up to promote COVID-19 testing on social media (and successfully hit a high note after the nasopharyngeal swab was removed!), and thus, thespians may see this video and get tested as needed. We will need a variety of influencers to effectively motivate different segments of the population to achieve herd immunity (estimated at 75 to 85%).

To be sure, we will need to harness the power of influencers to reach the communities most in need of the vaccine. COVID-19 infections and deaths have disproportionately impacted Black and Latinx communities, and now science is failing these groups again; COVID-19 vaccine trials have not done well in recruiting people who identify as Black and Latinx. It is not surprising that communities of color have not flocked to these trials, given the long history of brutal medical experimentation, research misconduct, and systemic racism. It will be an uphill battle to establish confidence in the vaccine in these communities, and it will likely not be the largely white medical or research community that can establish it because of this history.

We all saw how Tom Hanks COVID-19 diagnosis hit home that this disease will be a reality for those we love. We now need public figures to commit to being vaccinated. Only with widespread vaccination can we get back to do the activities that we love: hugging our relatives, traveling, and sending our kids to school.

Continued here:
Opinion/Goldstein and Krukowski: Who will be the vaccine influencers for COVID-19? - The Providence Journal

Human Behavior

The Role Of Mindset In Economic Development: Fixed And Growth Mindset: Part 2 – Modern Ghana

Placing too much emphasis on macro-economic models and econometrics in solving our socioeconomic problems over the years have not been helpful. They have not been helpful because they can only analyze the outcomes of our economic decisions without telling us the root causes of our economic malaise.

Mathematical models are used in economics to describe the past and the present policy decisions and help us predict the future behaviors and outcomes if all things remain unchanged. By themselves, mathematical models cannot help us change economic outcomes because they cannot change human behaviors.

Development does not only involve quantitative growth but also a qualitative change in human behavior. Nothing will change economically until we change the human behaviors that produced the undesired or desired outcomes. The only way to change the socioeconomic conditions prevailing in Africa or Ghana is to change people's Mindset.

The welfare mentality that is prevalent in sub-Saharan African countries, including Ghana that seeks solutions to our economic problems from outside, needs to change. It is not only the "welfare mentality" that needs to change, but all other cultural Mindsets that inhibit innovation and growth have to give way to a growth mindset.

In part 2 of the series, I argue that the critical factors influencing our economic development are cultural and social mindsets. There is a need for real ontological change in our mindsets when we humbly and honestly admit our limitations, while recognizing the great potentials we possess to bring about immense development in our country. The great philosopher Aristotle said, "A nation is not built by mountains and trees, notwithstanding it is built by its citizens' character." In other words, natural resources: Gold, bauxite, oil, manganese, rivers, and fertile soils do not build a nation, but the mindsets of its citizens. The mindset factors influence employees' productivity, citizens' work habits, use of technology, market habits, public stewardship, entitlement, employee engagement, work performance, and national character. The psychological, social, and cultural influences on decision-making significantly impact development outcomes but have been ignored in economic analyses.

We need to investigate what cultural mindsets influence household saving, and firms to invest and increase productivity, communities to reduce incidences of diseases, parents to improve children's cognitive development, and consumers to make wise choices in their expenditure patterns. Furthermore, Christians need to understand that the Holy book commands them to work six days a week. It is high time we realize that our economic problems do not stem from lack of natural resources, but instead from a lack of growth mindset.

We cannot deal with our socioeconomic problems without analyzing the mindsets that create the problems. As Albert Einstein once said, "Problems cannot be solved with the same mindset that created them." Individuals' perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors related to how they view situations are paramount in solving any problem. We need to examine our attitudes and mindsets about development. What are our thoughts about ideas as catalysts for development and growth?

Do we, as individual Ghanaian society members, believe that we can develop by harnessing our existing natural and human resources judicially or borrowing from outside? What are our leaders' mindsets about legacy as compared to acquiring wealth? Do they believe that we have enough talents both at home and abroad to solve our problems? How do we perceive challenges and obstacles in the course of our ordinary daily pursuits? Do we, as a nation, believe that tenacious efforts are critical to economic growth and development?

Carol Dweck, a psychologist at Stanford University, has studied the consequences of what people believe about their capabilities' mutability. In other words, are our capabilities to solve problems based on our innate talents, intelligence, smartness, or the amount of effort we put in a task? Her studies have revealed two distinct types of beliefs about human capabilities. The first is what she terms a fixed mindset. People with a fixed mindset see their capabilities, such as their collective efficacy in dealing with problems, as unchangeable.

The other type of belief is what she calls a growth mindset. People with a growth mindset view their capabilities as a potential that can be developed or harnessed: they believe that intelligence is plastic and that one can develop it through tenacious efforts. Do we as people throw our hands in the air when we face difficult challenges and say, "this cannot be done," instead of saying, "though we cannot do it today, given time, we will be able to do it?"

People with a fixed Mindset see their capabilities as primarily inborn, which are hardly changeable. They avoid challenges and respond to adversity as an indication of a lack of talent, often giving up early. They often respond to criticisms defensively and fail to own, recognize, and admit mistakes. People with fixed Mindset impede cooperation, feedback, and growth.

Contrarily, people with a growth mindset believe that capabilities are mutable by effort and effective learning strategies. These people try to learn and improve as much as possible and embrace challenges as opportunities where they can learn and grow. They interpret failure or adversity to indicate that more effort needs to be exerted, and better strategies need to be devised.

They consider criticism as productive feedback instead of letting it affect them negatively. What kind of Mindset do we have, a fixed one or a growth one? The idea of a growth mindset is now being applied in education, sports, and workplaces. It is used in organizational change models and as development tools in other developing countries.

In education, studies have shown that a growth mindset-the belief that intelligence is not fixed and can be developed reliably predicts achievement across a national sample of students, including almost all schools and socioeconomic strata. A recent study in Chile explored the relationship between income and Mindset and found that students from lower-income families were less likely to hold a growth mindset than their wealthier peers. However, students from low-income backgrounds who hold a growth mindset were appreciably buffered against poverty's deleterious achievement effects.

These results suggest that Mindset may be one mechanism through which economic disadvantage can affect achievement. We can teach a growth mindset to students, employees, organizational leaders, and political leaders through carefully designed workshops. While many African countries have not paid attention to the psychological basis of individuals' economic behaviors and the impacts of economic processes on individuals' psychology, the western countries have focused their attention in applying behavioral insights to its policy-making over the past decade.

As a nation, we need to begin exploring the critical factors that undermine our economic development instead of seeking help from outside and depending on economic models that were developed to deal with circumstances that might not apply to ours.

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The Role Of Mindset In Economic Development: Fixed And Growth Mindset: Part 2 - Modern Ghana

Human Behavior

How space travel puts the world in perspective – Asia Times

Frank White is an expert on space philosophy. Over time, he has written various renowned books about space exploration.

He wrote The Overview Effect: Space Exploration and Human Evolution about the psychological shift in thinking astronauts experience.Having interviewed many astronauts who have been to space, Frank understands the psychology of space exploration and has given extensive thought to the future of humanity beyond the Earth.

White spoke to Asia Times about his books, the need to foster international collaboration in the space sector, and the recent nomination of the International Space Station for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Vidhi Bubna: The Overview Effect was mentioned at the Democratic National Convention. How did you come about the idea of something as personal yet so overwhelming as the overview effect?

Frank White: The Overview Effect talks about the shift in perspective that a person undergoes when they witness the Earth from a distance. I have spent a great part of my life interviewing astronauts, whom I consider to be proxies for future space community members. I am a curious social scientist and I also have training in psychotherapy.

Through several experiences of personal growth and transformation, I have come to the understanding that astronauts have the potential to be agents for social change. Most astronauts say that being in space makes you realize that Were all in this together.

The Earth is a tiny place for human habitation and survival and the rest of the universe is vast. When you look at the Earth from far away, the realization hits you that this planet is really all that we have got.

Space travel changes our consciousness. We are able to develop a new appreciation of Earth as a system when we see it from above. And I am really interested in exploring how this shift in consciousness can impact our behavior. That is what the overview effect is all about.

VB:What excites you toward understanding the psychology of astronauts?

FW: Astronauts have to work in an environment where divisions created by human beings really do not last. They hail from different countries which could be entangled in several conflicts, but when they are out there, they need to build a station and work together.

They experience weightlessness. Their heart shrinks and they become taller as the spine is not compressed, and even their brain begins to change. The experiences of astronauts are really valuable when one seeks to explore the impact of shift in overall consciousness, over human behavior and community relations. It is not just about the visual consciousness, but also temporal.

Your understanding of time changes, because you witness around 16 sunrises and sunsets over the duration of what we know as one day.

These experiences that astronauts bring back to Earth could really be very insightful to explore their impact on human behavior and social structures, and most importantly, our ability to survive. As you would know, on Earth we enjoy protection from harmful radiations. But in outer space, [on the] moon or Mars, we are really very vulnerable. It is worth thinking how this is going to impact mutations and the possibility of diseases.

VB: With the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been increased nationalism. How can the world increase international collaborations during the pandemic?

FW: In the initial days of the Covid-19 outbreak, there had been a lot of collaboration among countries. I believe that much of it is probably still there, even though it is not being reported. I just hope that once we come out with a vaccine to counter the virus, we do not forget what living during the pandemic had been like. The world is in this together. Covid is trying to live in you no matter whether you are in India, China or the USA.

This is a lot similar to space exploration. The astronauts, when they come back, tell you that there is a lot of noise and division amongst us. But up there, they feel it as a matter of fact that we are all together. This sense of togetherness and cooperation needs to be augmented in us time and again, so that we dont let our older tendencies of tribal divisions interfere with our united humanitarian consciousness.

VB:What is the Copernican Perspective? Is it something that you came out with?

FW: Well, Copernicus was the first person to suggest that the sun does not revolve around the Earth, but it is rather the other way round. This understanding that the Earth in itself is not whole, but part of a larger system is what the Copernican perspective entails.

The visual and temporal shifts in consciousness that I just spoke about, these help us in building a new sort of connection with the universe in our minds. The farther away you shift from Earth, the greater the paradigm shift in your level of consciousness.

Being on the moon is going to be different than being on the Earths orbit. Being on Mars is going to be very different because of physical factors. Every planet and region in space will change our perspective differently. We need to understand that our perspectives will change a lot when we inhabit other places in space.

VB: There were three missions to Mars sent from different countries this year. Do you think that the countries could have collaborated for the Mars mission?

FW: One of my projects focuses on building a Human Space Program that will be about a global commitment to exploring the universe. The world needs to collaborate more as we explore outer space. Our goal should not be to send a particular country on this journey, but to send humanity as a whole. We need programs that aim to create and foster collaboration.

We need to realize that every choice that we make right now is going to impact the lives of our descendants on Mars and the moon who would have to live with the consequences of our decisions.

VB:Tell us something about the other book of yours, The Cosma Hypothesis, and what it deals with.

FW: When astronauts reach space, they get to see a lot more stars unblinking in their atmosphere. Experiences of the universe like these [are] what I have tried to capture in The Cosma Hypothesis.

It talks about our evolutionary purpose as a species which, I believe, is to make life and the universe more intelligent, and to help humanity.The hypothesis is that our purpose is to spread life, intelligence, and self-awareness into the universe; another way of saying it is to make the universe more alive, intelligent, and self-aware.

VB:The ISS has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize this year. Do you believe at some level, theres a broad correlation between your theory and the nomination itself?

FW: Well, I dont know if I had a part to play in it, but the International Space Station but The Overview Effect encourages environmental advocacy and greater peace on Earth. I was one of the people who sent a letter across in support of ISS winning the Nobel Peace Prize. I think they deserve it.

VB:Last, on a personal level, do you believe human settlement is going to find Mars as its new abode? How much do you agree or disagree on that? What are the challenges that will come in its way, psychologically and otherwise?

FW: If humans are going to live on Mars some day, it is worth wondering whether we would be terribly hit by homesickness and depression. Maybe people born there wont feel homesick, because they would be Martians.

I once spoke to the c0-founder of Mars One, a short-lived organization which was planning to offer one-way tickets to Mars. I told them that it wasnt a good idea to have one-way tickets because people would not want to go unless they could return. He said that many people who expressed interest to go did not want to come back and wanted to build a civilization there.

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How space travel puts the world in perspective - Asia Times

Human Behavior

Our short-lived Anthropocene and the coming Algorithmocene – Medium

The Anthroposcream

Almost lost in the cacophony of terrible news for us humans this year have been the recent signals of irreversible damage we humans have been doing to the planet.

The melting of Greenlands ice sheet has essentially passed the point of no return according to a study published this August in Nature. And as one of the studys co-authors puts it there is obviously more to come. In particular, there are now strong indications that other irreversible climate tipping points, like deforestation, permafrost thawing and slowing of ocean circulations, are rapidly being reached. All in all, more climate scientists are now seeing the International Panel on Climate Changes worst-case God help us scenario, once almost universally dismissed as alarmist climate porn, as the base-case for the future[1].

The blood-orange skies and destroyed homes from historic wildfires in the US, like the recent ones in the Amazon and Australia, offer a grim preview of such a future. Its also a grim future for wildlife and their habitat. The damage in the US this year is still ongoing, but in last years Australian fires alone, over a billion animals and just as many trees are believed to have perished. The Amazons ecosystem never evolved to cope with fire, but that is also now part of its future. As a result, the worlds largest rainforest and richest store of biodiversity is in danger of becoming a dry savannah within the next several decades. Overall, the planet has lost almost 70% of its wildlife since 1970, and possibly half of all species will be gone by the end of this century in what is now recognized as Earths 6th Great Extinction event. Here too, the once unthinkable is looking more like the inevitable.

Yet as surreal as it is to say it, climate change and species extinction are only a part of the seismic disruptions the Anthropocene the epoch of humans is creating this century. To my mind, they are probably the middle half. In order of what we can think of as their future geological footprint, the four biggest trends shaping the century are

Each of these trends alone is big and complex enough to count as its own challenge of the century for global civilization. So its understandable that theyre often discussed as if happening in separate silos. But of course they are anything but separate. Instead theyre deeply linked in a mutual feedback loop entangling the entire triad of society, the environment and technology. As such, their convergence to a perfect storm this century is not a coincidence. They are also driven by socioeconomic rules as old as the Neolithic revolution. That, to my mind at least, essentially guarantees their continuation no matter how many warning lights are flashed in our faces.

As humankind blithely stares down the barrel of the truly unthinkable, one possible outcome this century is the infamous Great Filter: a collapse of global civilization and probably human populations. For all we know, this may even be the most likely outcome. But like many, I wouldnt equate this scenario with the outright extinction of our species or even our technology. The minimum viable human population needed to avoid extinction is estimated to be less than 1,000 individuals. That could readily be managed, for example, in a few self-sustaining cave systems. Especially if, as expected under such extreme conditions, a disproportionate number of the survivors are engineers.

But if the survivors do eventually repopulate the planet, or if civilization manages to avoid collapse in the first place, one can argue it can only be with a very different dynamic between human society, the environment and technology. So different that, however this century plays out, the term Anthropocene as a new epoch in Earth history may not be as fitting as another: the Algorithmocene.

Before going there, lets understand the magnitude of each of the above four disruptions in the context of their future geological footprint on Earth.

Like a symphony is organized into movements, sections, phrases and measures, Earths 4.5 billion year history is organized by geologists into nested time intervals of eons, eras, periods and epochs (ignoring for simplicity the shortest interval of ages). Specifically, eons (10-10 years) are divided into eras(10-10 years) which are divided into periods (10-10 years) which are divided into epochs (10-10 years).

What we think of as human civilization began with the Neolithic revolution and has happened wholly within the

One peculiar thing of note is that each of the above is the shortest in its respective time unit. That is, our Holocene is the shortest of all of Earths 38 epochs. Similarly, our Quaternary, Cenozoic and Phanerozoic are the shortest among Earths 22 periods , 10 eras and 4 eons respectively. If we imagined selecting these as independent random samples[2], the odds of getting this streak would be about 0.003%; the same odds as getting a royal flush in 7-card Texas hold em. No doubt this just an odd coincidence (somewhat like Bodes Law in astronomy shows odd coincidences in the solar systems planetary orbits). But if we pretend for a moment that it isnt, the trend would predict something interesting (just as Bodes Law predicted Neptunes orbit). Namely, that our current Holocene epoch should be ending sooner than later.

And indeed, we know the Holocene is ending even faster than sooner. Sometime in the next year or so, the International Commission on Stratigraphy is due to officially introduce the long awaited Anthropocene the epoch of humans into Earths history book [3].

In keeping with the above imagined trend, the changes our species has set in motion go much further than moving to the next epoch. Specifically, we can see the following links

Before going further down the geological footprint list, lets pause for a moment and notice something important about ourselves. The fact that even our normal civilized activity (i.e. sans nuclear war or similar) is upending the last 65 million years of Earths history should leave us all stupefied. Such a terrifying tally should lead us, as rational, civilized beings, to an immediate and complete overhaul of our daily life and the socioeconomic rules that drove us here in the first place.

But of course nothing of the kind is happening, nor can we expect it to. After all, we still build homes in the middle of fire hazard zones and floodplains. Even during this pandemic, otherwise rational people are happy to gather in large, maskless crowds. More than 50 years after the first official warnings at the highest levels of government and industry, global carbon emissions still track one thing: global GDP. In short, the apocalypse remains abstract and remote for as long we think were able to personally avoid its consequences. As climatologist Ken Caldeira has remarked in the Guardian: If people are rich enough to air-condition their lives, they can watch whatever is the successor to Game of Thrones on TV, as the natural world decays around them.

Case in point: even after making this tally, I havent changed my daily routine. Sure, for a Western urbanite I try to behave in (what passes here for) an environmentally conscious way. But only until that hits an actual pain point. Things like recycling, public transport and buying local-organic are fortunately easy where we live. But I still binge on my favorite TV series and Youtube channels with a carbon footprint of 10 kg per hour; and I certainly wont give up my five cups of coffee a day, each with a water footprint of 130 liters per cup.

Thats not because I dont believe in the dangers Im writing about, but because thats just how we humans are. At least thats how humans in technological societies are. From the bottom of the pyramid to the top 1% and across the political belief spectrum, the vast majority of us will not leave our behavioral comfort zones until were blasted out with dynamite. Yes, there are deep-seated socio-psychological reasons for this. But its also because technological civilization is based on a simple premise. Even when faced with problems of our own making, why improve our behavior when we can improve our technology instead?

Which brings us to the existential irony of this point in human history. The problems created by our technological civilization are so massive and approaching so fast that only a virtual miracle can now avert the worst. If it can be averted at all. Blaming callous 1%-ers and their political cronies, socioeconomic inequality, poor education, wasteful consumer culture, human moral failing in general and even the Neolithic revolution itself may all have their proper place. But these debates are also centuries old and not going to move any needles anytime soon. Wishful thinking aside, at this point in the 21st century we are simply out of time to improve human behavior. The only miracle left to hope for is technology.

To be clear, thats not intended as a cornucopian argument as much as a fatalistic one. The risk of this miracle cure being worse than the disease is real. And it may be too late anyway: even if innovation is the infinite resource, as Ramez Naam claims, thats irrelevant when time is finite. Every collapsed civilization in history is a testament to that fact.

Either way, having broken Earths natural equilibria, our global 21st century civilization will try its technological best to impose its artificial equilibria. And as technologies go, artificial intelligence has the greatest potential of all to fall in that category.

AI is already driving the greatest technological arms race in history. Businesses and nations great and small already see AI as the ultimate strategic investment in their own future. From finance, design, manufacturing, distribution, and transportation to agriculture, politics, law-enforcement, work-life, social life, health and entertainment, AI is already transforming how our world works. Its also (one might say unsurprisingly) transforming how our very hackable minds work.

Yet its also clear to everyone that the story of artificial intelligence on planet Earth has barely begun. Its capabilities grow at least as fast as Moores Law, and the transformation of every corner of life is already baked in. Whatever fears (founded or unfounded) of a Terminator world we may have: the scale and complexity of navigating this century will, to my mind, ensure that AI will become the dominant factor shaping the world going forward. So much so that the concept of AI as a human tool, I argue, will eventually lose its meaning.

But before that sets off any woo-woo alarms: none of the above is a claim about the singularity, AI consciousness or even general artificial intelligence (all of which Im skeptical for different reasons). Its rather a claim about where the information processing action on planet Earth will be. And about how that action should be understood.

As the overwhelming mass of the worlds high-level information flow shifts from humans to machines, and algorithms get better at hacking into our mental space, an obvious question emerges. Where in the array of human affairs does any causal chain of events begin? How meaningful is the very concept of human intention in such a world? One might pretend that at least human programmers and their intentions are still behind it all, but in the age when algorithms pre-process everyones information and options, is this not merely a distinction without a difference?

In short, if visiting aliens survey our world next century and are able to follow the money i.e. the flow of information they may well decide theyre looking at a world run by machine-based algorithms. Whether they will pay much attention to the two-legged carbon-based creatures servicing them is another question. After all, any visiting aliens may well be machines from their own Algorithmocene age.

Its worth noting that for any future geologists, our Algorithmocene should leave a clear signal in the fossil record. Already there are more IoT devices in the world than humans, and their numbers are set to skyrocket in the coming decades. Given the 50 million tons of electronic waste the world produces every year, the fossil record may even already have its so-called golden spike: Agbogbloshie on the outskirts of Accra, Ghana. Agbogbloshie is said to be home to the worlds largest e-waste dump, nicknamed Sodom for its constant dumpster fires. As filmmaker Florian Weigsamer described it in a 2018 interview with CBC Radio When you first come there, it looks like an apocalyptic placeit seems like a place where everything ends

Image from the Blacksmith Institute for a Pure Earth, a non-profit working to improve recycling conditions in Agbogbloshie and elsewhere.

For the next few decades at least, its hard to see how the future will not continue to devolve into ever more terrible versions of the present. Everything trending badly in the world now is doing so for reasons much bigger than any conceivable public policy tweaks that might mitigate them. But for the longer term towards the end of the century, three possible scenarios seem conceivable enough to describe briefly in terms of famous sci-fi memes.

Footnotes:

[1] To dispel any illusions about the world effectively addressing climate change, see NOAAs atmospheric carbon dioxide monitoring site. Even the latest UN report on renewables 2020 states that current global commitments to reduce carbon fall far short of what would be needed to limit world temperature increases to less than 2 degrees Celsius.

[2] They are of course neither independent nor random. But even if the estimate is off by an order of magnitude, its an impressive coincidence.

[3] The term Anthropocene was widely popularized at the beginning of this century by Paul Crutzen and others since. However the International Committee on Stratigraphy is an extremely deliberative body. It is set to formally review the adoption of the term in 2021.

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Our short-lived Anthropocene and the coming Algorithmocene - Medium

Human Behavior

Parasite infestations revealed by tiny chicken backpacks – Jill Lopez

Blood-feeding livestock mites can be detected with wearable sensor technology nicknamed "Fitbits for chickens."

To help farmers detect mite infestations, a team of entomologists, computer scientists, and biologists led by UC Riverside entomologist Amy Murillo has created a new insect detection system. The team's work is detailed in the journalScientific Reports.

In recent years, concern for the well-being of livestock has given rise to more farms where poultry are allowed to roam. Though this freedom improves the quality of chickens' lives, free-range chickens are still subject to insect infestations.

"The trend in egg sales is 'cage free,' but that doesn't necessarily mean the chickens are insect free," Murillo said.

Of particular concern to scientists is the northern fowl mite, which Murillo said feeds on chicken blood and lives on hens in feathers surrounding "the butt area of the chicken."

In addition to the economic consequences of infected hens laying fewer eggs, mites can make the chickens sick and cause lesions to develop on their skin.

"Fowl mites are very unpleasant for the birds being fed upon and cause an itchy immune response," Murillo said.

To devise their detection system, Murillo's team first identified three key chicken pastimes closely linked to chickens' well-being: pecking, preening, and dustbathing. The team hypothesized they would see a big increase in preening and dustbathing among infected chickens because these activities keep feathers clean.

The team placed motion sensors into tiny backpacks the chickens could wear without discomfort. The next challenge was translating data from these sensors into algorithms that could be detected as behaviors.

Alireza Abdoli, a doctoral student in computer science at UCR, explained that quantifying fowl behavior isn't as simple as working with human behaviors like walking, because it isn't as regular.

In order to train a computer to recognize chicken behaviors, Abdoli had to take an unusual approach. He created an algorithm, or set of instructions, for the computer that considers the shape that the backpack sensor data makes on a graph, as well as features of the data such as mean and max.

"Most algorithms use either shape or features, but not both," Abdoli said. "Our approach is exciting because it increases the accuracy of the data so much and is key to making good decisions about the chickens' health."

Traditional animal behavior studies have had to rely on video or visual observations, which can be both time consuming and prone to errors. Murillo did some flock observations at the beginning of the project to make sure the computer's conclusions about behaviors were accurate. Once they were certain, observations were no longer necessary, and the computer could take over.

Not only does this new approach increase the reliability of scientists' observations, it also increases the number of animals and length of time they can be tracked.

The flock in this study did suffer from a mite infestation, which the team related to an increase in cleaning behaviors. Once the birds were treated and healed, the data showed preening and dust baths went back to normal levels.

Far more than farm fashion, these "Fitbits for chickens" offer valuable information for livestock farmers.

"These results could let farmers know it's time to examine their birds for parasites," Murillo said. "And the tools we developed can also be used examine the effects of any change in a bird's environment or diet."

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Parasite infestations revealed by tiny chicken backpacks - Jill Lopez