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Psychology
Could Your Immune System Be Making You Impulsive?
June 25, 2019
Being able to forego a reward now in favour of gaining something better later is known to be important in determining all kinds of desirable outcomes in life, including greater educational attainment, social functioning and health. However, choosing to delay gratification won’t always be the best option. If you’re in desperate circumstances – you badly need money to buy food, for example – taking the £10 today could be sensible. But this isn’t necessarily an entirely...
June 25, 2019
Being able to forego a reward now in favour of gaining something better later is known to be important in determining all kinds of desirable outcomes in life, including greater educational attainment, social functioning and health. However, choosing to delay gratification won’t always be the best option. If you’re in desperate circumstances – you badly need money to buy food, for example – taking the £10 today could be sensible. But this isn’t necessarily an entirely...
How Your Brain’s Executive Function Works — and How to Improve It
June 19, 2019
You use your brain's executive function every day -- it's how you do things like pay attention, plan ahead and control impulses....
June 19, 2019
You use your brain's executive function every day -- it's how you do things like pay attention, plan ahead and control impulses....
Emotional Evidence in Court
June 18, 2019
In the law, emotion is often viewed as extraneous to jury decision-making—either as an unavoidable byproduct of certain types of evidence or an impediment to the decision-making process. Even when the legal system does acknowledge the impact of emotion, it tends to overgeneralize across different types of emotions and legal judgments. Growing consensus in psychological science, however, reveals a much more complicated story. Emotion is not extraneous but rather inextricably intertwined with cognitive...
June 18, 2019
In the law, emotion is often viewed as extraneous to jury decision-making—either as an unavoidable byproduct of certain types of evidence or an impediment to the decision-making process. Even when the legal system does acknowledge the impact of emotion, it tends to overgeneralize across different types of emotions and legal judgments. Growing consensus in psychological science, however, reveals a much more complicated story. Emotion is not extraneous but rather inextricably intertwined with cognitive...
Incentives, Performance and Choking in Darts
June 14, 2019
This paper examines the effect of incentives on the performance of darts players. We analyze four data sets covering a total of 28,761 darts matches of professional, amateur, and youth players. The game of darts offers an attractive natural research setting, because performance can be observed at the individual level and without obscuring effects of risk considerations and behavior of others. We find that amateur and youth players perform better under moderately higher incentives, but choke when...
June 14, 2019
This paper examines the effect of incentives on the performance of darts players. We analyze four data sets covering a total of 28,761 darts matches of professional, amateur, and youth players. The game of darts offers an attractive natural research setting, because performance can be observed at the individual level and without obscuring effects of risk considerations and behavior of others. We find that amateur and youth players perform better under moderately higher incentives, but choke when...
“Shooting The Messenger” Is A Psychological Reality – Share Bad News And People Will Like You Less
June 12, 2019
But it turns out this phenomenon of “shooting the messenger” is not just restricted to fiction. A new paper in Journal of Experimental Psychology: General has demonstrated that we do tend to take a dim view of the bearers of bad news – even when these people are simply innocent messengers. Altogether, the research suggests that “shooting the messenger” has a real basis in the way people act in everyday situations. It seems to stem from a number of sources,...
June 12, 2019
But it turns out this phenomenon of “shooting the messenger” is not just restricted to fiction. A new paper in Journal of Experimental Psychology: General has demonstrated that we do tend to take a dim view of the bearers of bad news – even when these people are simply innocent messengers. Altogether, the research suggests that “shooting the messenger” has a real basis in the way people act in everyday situations. It seems to stem from a number of sources,...
It’s Not Just About the Money and Other Food for Thought for Mediators
May 29, 2019
Get under the surface. In a long-running claim worth many tens of millions, the decision-makers appeared to have reached the end of the road. In an effort to find a way forward, we spent four hours going through my ‘Questions for a Difficult Meeting’ questionnaire. The parties prepared privately first and then, meeting together, they alternated in giving their responses. The nature of the questions is such that they needed to dig deeper to look for answers. This opened up new levels of understanding...
May 29, 2019
Get under the surface. In a long-running claim worth many tens of millions, the decision-makers appeared to have reached the end of the road. In an effort to find a way forward, we spent four hours going through my ‘Questions for a Difficult Meeting’ questionnaire. The parties prepared privately first and then, meeting together, they alternated in giving their responses. The nature of the questions is such that they needed to dig deeper to look for answers. This opened up new levels of understanding...
UT Law: 41st Annual Corporate Counsel Institute
April 9, 2019
The 41st Annual Corporate Counsel Institute offers in-depth, practical discussions on legal issues for in-house counsel...
April 9, 2019
The 41st Annual Corporate Counsel Institute offers in-depth, practical discussions on legal issues for in-house counsel...
Updated Examples of Negotiation Theory
January 27, 2019
The stalemate in Washington D.C. has numerous pundits commenting on the negotiation strategies of the primary actors but I am going to just highlight a few from our colleagues. First, Russell Korobkin accurately predicted how the LA strike might end while the federal shutdown would not in his L.A. Times Op-ed last week. As he noted, If deals favoring either side of these disputes would be better for both than no deal at all, why are L.A. teachers on picket lines and national park rangers...
January 27, 2019
The stalemate in Washington D.C. has numerous pundits commenting on the negotiation strategies of the primary actors but I am going to just highlight a few from our colleagues. First, Russell Korobkin accurately predicted how the LA strike might end while the federal shutdown would not in his L.A. Times Op-ed last week. As he noted, If deals favoring either side of these disputes would be better for both than no deal at all, why are L.A. teachers on picket lines and national park rangers...
Does this make sense to you? AI in the insurance industry??
January 26, 2019
Businessinsurance.com reported that “Artificial intelligence and other technologies hold great promise for the insurance industry but are not without issues, such as adoption and security…” The January 17, 2019 article entitled “AI holds promise for insurance industry, but with caveats” is based on a “panel of insurance and technology industry executives speaking at the Insurance Information Institute’s Joint Industry Forum in New York” who opined: There are two areas that...
January 26, 2019
Businessinsurance.com reported that “Artificial intelligence and other technologies hold great promise for the insurance industry but are not without issues, such as adoption and security…” The January 17, 2019 article entitled “AI holds promise for insurance industry, but with caveats” is based on a “panel of insurance and technology industry executives speaking at the Insurance Information Institute’s Joint Industry Forum in New York” who opined: There are two areas that...
Incentives, Performance and Choking in Darts
January 13, 2019
This paper examines the effect of incentives on the performance of darts players. We analyze four data sets comprising a total of 123,402 darts matches of professional, amateur, and youth players. The game of darts offers an attractive natural research setting, because performance can be observed at the individual level and without the obscuring effects of risk considerations and the behavior of others. We find that amateur and youth players perform better under moderately higher incentives, but choke...
January 13, 2019
This paper examines the effect of incentives on the performance of darts players. We analyze four data sets comprising a total of 123,402 darts matches of professional, amateur, and youth players. The game of darts offers an attractive natural research setting, because performance can be observed at the individual level and without the obscuring effects of risk considerations and the behavior of others. We find that amateur and youth players perform better under moderately higher incentives, but choke...
