Recent article by Andrew Steptoe points to neuroendocrine and cardiovascular correlates of daily affect

Steptoe applies a methodology which he perfected studying the positive psychobiological effects of a good cuppa to show that positive emotion, like tea, has many positive effects and can guard against stress. This study uses ecological momentary assessment (EMA) whereby mood is assessed using rating scales at four periods throughout the day. They also use a stress test to evaluate cardiovascular reactivity and then relate this to affect throughout the day. Having a high level of positive affect througout the day means that you have lower levels of systolic BP at rest and after the stress task and also quicker diastolic BP recovery. Interestingly, having low positive affect was predictive of a greater cortisol response and this effect was independent of negative affect. Those who were high in positive affect did not differ from those low on positive affect in terms of negative affect indicating that they are separable concepts rather than existing on a continuum from negative to positive. Positive emotion aslo has independent effects indicated that merely focusing on removing ill-being is not enough.

This article pre-empts what will be quite a significant piece of work when the bloods from this study come back to show relationships between daily mood and a variety of measures of immune function, inflammation, and neuroendocrine function. They did not, however, include cardiovascular measures across the day. Steptoe seems to prefer to examine stress in the laboratory and relate this to daily affect. Coupling both methodologies would be worthwhile. The DRM may offer advantages over EMA and incorporating both into a study and seeing their level of similarity may be worthwhile.

Overall, demonstrating a protective effect of positive emotion on biological stress hormones which is independent of age, BMI, or importantly negative affect is a valuable finding which needs to be replicated in a larger sample.


Neuroendocrine and cardiovascular correlates of
positive affect measured by ecological momentary
assessment and by questionnaire

NBER 13430 Psychology and Economics: Evidence from the Field

Stefano DellaVigna
The research in Psychology and Economics (a.k.a. Behavioral Economics) suggests that
individuals deviate from the standard model in three respects: (i) non-standard preferences; (ii) non-standard beliefs; and (iii) non-standard decision-making. In this paper, I survey the empirical evidence from the field on these three classes of deviations. The evidence covers a number of applications, from consumption to finance, from crime to voting, from giving to labor supply. In the class of non-standard preferences, I discuss time preferences (self-control problems), risk preferences (reference dependence), and social preferences. On non-standard beliefs, I present evidence on overconfidence, on the law of small numbers, and on projection bias. Regarding non-standard decision-making, I cover limited attention, menu effects, persuasion and social pressure, and emotions. I also present evidence on how rational actors -- firms, employers, CEOs, investors, and politicians -- respond to the non-standard behavior described in the survey. I then summarize five common empirical methodologies used in Psychology and Economics. Finally, I briefly discuss under what conditions experience and market interactions limit the impact of the non-standard features.

Social integration is associated with less drinking and smoking and higher levels of well-being

The positive effects of engaging in conversation with a broad range of people such as a spouse, friend, neighbor, a fellow member of a community group, or work colleague on a regular basis are discussed in this article. It is thought that the positive effects of social integration are due "social pressure by the network to stay healthy and by greater responsibility of socially integrated people to others". This research is based on what is a pretty poor measure of ones social network (i.e. endorsing a yes/no response to engaging in conversation with a set list of categories of people at least once every two weeks). I think moving beyond scale measures of social support (e.g. receive a little, a lot of support etc.) to measures which actually record the frequency and content of interaction will allow a marked advance in the study of social networks. Measures such as well-being, drinking and smoking could be administered via social network sites such as bebo and facebook which contain a wealth of information in regard to the way in which people are related (e.g. as friends, family, in a relationship etc) and using this information combined with frequency of interaction, content analysis for emotional references and social network analysis on a large sample would produce the best data currently available in this regard.

Why Would Social Networks Be Linked to Affect and Health Practices?

greenstone iraq paper

michael greenstone has written an econometric analysis of the effects on the surge in Iraq on key indicators of Iraqi stability such as casualties, guards trained, financial market indicators.

this looks likely to be a template for a lot of similar work applying economic analysis to contemporary controversies.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1014427%20

worth also reading Steven Levitt's commentary

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/

J

I was just reading on the Columbia Stats Blog about a statistical program called J, which is related to R. I have heard that R is good for graphing, but it appears that J is quite good too. R is still on my to-do list, and now J is too!

http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~cook/movabletype/archives/2007/09/plot_the_data.html

"Focus on one good paper!"

Do you have four or five half-finished academic articles on your desk but would rather start a sixth than submit one? Do you often think that if you just carry out one more experiment then your work will be good enough to write up - but it never is?

Perhaps it seems that you spend all day working, but have nothing to show for it, or that you are just too busy to focus properly on your research?

If so then you may be a victim of "self-sabotage", according to the Times Higher Ed Supplement.

"Perfectionism, over-committing and procrastination are rife among PhD students and can stop talented high achievers from completing their theses on time or at all, according to Hugh Kearns, head of the staff development and training unit at Flinders University in Australia.

And because the stakes for academics only get higher after gaining a doctorate, self-sabotage can be a career-long problem.

The nature of the PhD encourages isolation, prompting anxiety to grow alongside a certain degree of perfectionism, Mr Kearns told the UK Higher Education Researchers' Development conference this week. Over-committing is a frequent response to this fear, giving students an excuse for failure.

For others, the knowledge that the thesis can never be perfect is so crippling that they can develop what he has jokingly termed "read-itis" or "experiment itis".

Supervisors should be careful not to let students go unsupported for long periods of time on the assumption that they'll get in touch if there is a problem. "That's the last time they're going to come to you," Mr Kearns said.

He also urged supervisors to "give that normalising effect, and explain where the standard is" since many dedicated PhD students end up writing as if for a Nobel Prize. He reminds students at his workshops: "If you hand in a thesis it's very likely you will be successful."

Mr Kearns is speaking in UCD on 4th Octocer on both time management for PhD students and the "seven secrets of successful PhD students": http://www.ucd.ie/graduatestudies/transferableskills/transferableskills_workshops_odgspdt.htm

There is a workshop on the "seven secrets" for PhD superviosrs on the 5th October.