Factors affecting the perceived value of coins

Subjects were asked to judge the relative values or assign absolute values to coins similar to the proposed new UK 20p and £1 coins along with other metal blanks, prior to the announcement of the new coins. Preliminary studies indicated that while a ‘yellow’ (gold-coloured) coin would not normally be rated higher in value than the blank 5p coin, the addition of extra thickness and an elaborate edge enhanced its apparent relative value. It was also shown that seven-sided ‘white’ (silver-coloured) coins were rated as more valuable than 12-sided or circular coins of about the same diameter. The absolute values assigned to such coins followed a similar trend to the relative values. Seven-sided white coins were assigned higher values than 12-sided white coins, and thicker yellow coins were assigned higher value characteristics and colour were examined independently. For smooth circular, milled circular and seven-sided coins, ‘red’ (cooper-coloured) coins were perceived as least valuable, and white and yellow coins were equally often assigned to intermediate and high values. For red, white and yellow coins, smooth circular coins were rated least valuable and seven-sided coins as most valuable. It appears that people assign learned ‘rules’ about features indicating value in a systematic and independent manner.     

Urbanization alters fear behavior in black-capped chickadees

Urban landscapes contain a multitude of novel sensory stimuli, and urban dwelling animals, such as songbirds living near human dwellings, must quickly learn how to respond to these unfamiliar cues. When exposure reveals that a stimulus is associated with a cost, fearful behavior should increase. Conversely, neophobic fear should decrease when negative outcomes do not regularly follow the stimulus. Because exposure to anthropogenic stimuli is more common in birds that inhabit urbanized landscapes, their fear response patterns should more accurately reflect the risks associated with these stimuli. We conducted a series of feeder and playback experiments to explore whether urbanization altered black-capped chickadees’ (Poecile atricapillus) fear responses to model cats, humans, a novel object, and anthropogenic noise. We predicted that fearful responses to cat models would increase in birds as urbanization increased because negative interactions with cats are more common in the city. However, we expected urban birds to be less fearful of our other stimuli because fitness costs are absent or less severe. As predicted, the fear of cats increased with urbanization, but the fear of noise decreased - as indicated by willingness to visit a feeding station. Other stimuli were not associated with urbanization, which may be related to the use of county and city parks where human presence is relatively common. Nonetheless, our results suggest that plastic fear responses to novel stimuli may facilitate urban success in the black-capped chickadee. More generally, behavioral plasticity may indicate the ability of a species to thrive in the urban environment.     

The effects of language on judgments of universal facial expressions of emotion

Because of the close connection between culture and language, a number of writers have suggested that bilinguals will differ in their behavior because of differences in the degree of assimilation of different cultures in the same individual. We tested this notion by obtaining data from bilingual (English and Hindi) college students in India using a well-studied cross-cultural research paradigm involving emotional perception. Subjects judged universal facial expressions of emotion in two separate sessions, one conducted entirely in English, the other in Hindi. In each session, they judged which emotion was being portrayed, and how intensely. Subjects recognized anger, fear, and sadness more accurately in English than in Hindi. They also attributed greater intensity to female photos of anger when rating in Hindi, but attributed greater intensity to female photos of sadness when rating in English. These findings were discussed in relation to the theoretical connection between culture and language.     

Inflation,decimalization and the estimated sizes of coins

Subjects who were asked, in 1976, to estimate the sizes of British coins either under their current names or under their names before decimalization in 1971, gave bigger estimates under the old names. This difference is attributed to the loss of value of the coins since 1971.     

ACCOUNTING FOR DEBASEMENTS: INDIVISIBILITY OR IMPERFECT RECOGNIZABILITY OF MONEY

The widespread prevalence of debasements in medieval Europe constitutes a puzzle under standard price theory because people voluntarily exchanged heavy coins for lighter ones; the difference being kept as seigniorage. I explore two properties of commodity monies that might make holding light coins more desirable, namely indivisibility and imperfect recognizability. If the agent trades indivisible coins, there are inefficiencies arising from over production of goods when the agent uses the heavier coin. Also, when coins are imperfectly recognizable, the heavy coin faces adverse selection. I find that under some parameters, indivisibility by itself leads to positive revenue following debasements, but in a way that eliminates co-circulation of coins. While with a sufficient degree of imperfect information, debasements can generate positive revenue and also co-circulation of coins. (JEL D82, D83, E40, E42, N10)     

Barriers to the Uptake of Emergency Accommodation by Young Runaways and Thrown‐out children and the Role of the ‘Transitional Person’

Young runaways and thrown‐out children, under‐16, face a number of barriers to accessing safe emergency accommodation. The need for such accommodation is not always apparent because children sometimes make themselves invisible to services through fear of being returned or fear of being removed from inappropriate accommodation. Young people's retrospective accounts of their experiences suggest the importance of a ‘transitional person’, an adult who has a pivotal role in trust‐building and who acts as a conduit to services and helps runaway and thrown‐out children overcome internal and external barriers to uptake of emergency accommodation.     

Violence against women with physical disabilities

This study explored risk factors for violence among a sample of adult women with physical disabilities. Fifty-six percent (100) of the 177 women participating in the study indicated a positive history of abuse. Of the women who reported abuse, most reported multiple abuse situations and abusers who were typically their male partners. In addition, only a small proportion of women sought and received adequate help. Women who indicated that they did not seek help were asked why this was the case. Their responses included: feeling that they could handle it themselves, having other sources of support available, being unaware of where to go, feeling embarrassed, feeling guilty about being a burden or that it was their fault, fear that abuser would come after them, fear of not being believed, and, to a lesser extent, concern that the shelter would lack appropriate accommodations. These findings highlight the importance of intervention strategies including advocacy activities for women with disabilities, activities with schools, activities to deter and prevent partner and caregiver violence, community awareness activities, and dissemination activities.     

Restaurant tipping in a field experiment: How do customers tip when they receive too much change?

Tipping behavior is analyzed in a field experiment where restaurant customers received excessive change, either 10 or 40 Shekels (about $3 versus $12). One third of the tables reported the extra change to the server and returned it. Tips were higher with the higher level of extra change. Returning the extra change was negatively correlated with tips. The interaction between the level of extra change and whether it was returned had no effect. Possible explanations that tips are higher when the excessive change is not returned due to a positive income effect or perceiving paying a tip out of excessive change as less costly because it is a forgone gain and not a loss, are not supported by the data. Subjects may have exhibited moral licensing and moral cleansing effects. These effects, however, were possibly mitigated by a self-selection effect going in the opposite direction: those who are more generous or altruistic by their nature are more likely to return the extra change and also more likely to tip generously. Receiving the larger amount of extra change may result in feelings of good mood, perceived luckiness, or individuation and unconscious fear of being observed, which increase tips. Interestingly, these feelings seem to remain even if the extra change was returned.     

Putting spiritual development of young people on the map: an English perspective

Youth work in the United Kingdom is a profession requiring three years of training, and its beginnings are strongly rooted in a spiritual (often specifically Christian) context. Until the past few decades, spirituality was also integrated within the educational system. The author argues that intentionally bringing spirituality to the center of youth work is a return to the historical and philosophical roots of youth work, with its value on the whole person, including beliefs and values. Yet there are obstacles. For example, rising concerns to protect children from abuse eclipse efforts to extend young people's development. Youth workers also report a reluctance to address spiritual questions with young people either because of their own lack of knowledge or because they fear offending someone. Two areas that would benefit from further research and reflection in the field are how spirituality can be measured, and how a youth worker's own spiritual journey shapes and is shaped by her or his work with youth. Green reminds readers that lighthearted and playful but deeply meaningful approaches are common in many traditions.     

A qualitative study on the pros and cons of ethnically matching culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) client families and child protection caseworkers

A review of the literature indicated that empirical research into the advantages and disadvantages of ethnically matching child protection caseworkers and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) client families is not extensive. The main aim of this study was to address this gap. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 29 CALD client families and 17 child protection caseworkers (as part of a larger study). It was found that if CALD families fear a breach of confidentiality (because of cultural reasons to protect the family's privacy and name), and this fear exceeds the two main benefits of ethnic matching – namely, that it helps overcome language barriers and provides (cultural) sensitivity – then they are likely to prefer a non-matched caseworker. This may be a challenge in child protection practice if the pool of culturally competent caseworkers is small. Another challenge identified was when CALD families preferred an ethnic match but was seen by case managers as a risk to the accurate assessment of a child's wellbeing because the caseworker was over-identifying with the client family. Thus, the provision of a culturally sensitive service can be at odds with the need to protect children from harm. This issue is seen as best addressed on a case by case basis. This study is significant because it has shown that ‘over-identification’ is an important work practice issue in this matter. It has also used empirical evidence to inform best practice principles regarding ethnic matching.     

Privacy as a Common Good in the Digital World

This article seeks to broaden our understanding of online privacy in three ways: first, by drawing out the differences between the physical world and the digital world as those differences affect privacy; second, by exploring how the concept of the 'commons' might help us to understand social and economic relationships in cyberspace; and third, by analysing two contrasting views of privacy: privacy as a private or individual good and privacy as a common good. In order to analyse similarities and differences in privacy in the physical world and the online world, each is assessed in three ways: the obvious level of privacy available; the possibility of modifying that level of privacy to create or choose more or less privacy for oneself; and the degree to which the, prior or contemporaneous, privacy decisions of others affect the amount of privacy that is available to all. Applying an analysis based on the 'tragedy of the commons', the article concludes that at least part of cyberspace can be conceived as a 'commons' and that personal information flows could be considered a 'common pool resource' within that commons. Based on the likely calculations that individuals and organizations will make about collection and uses of personal information, the article next evaluates what would be the most effective policy approach to ensure that the common pool resource of personal information is not overused and degraded. The article concludes that a policy approach of providing individuals with a private means, either through property rights or some means of redressing their grievances, is unlikely to provide an effective means of protecting the common pool resource of personal information. A policy approach that acknowledges the common good basis of privacy and views personal information as a common pool resource provides an alternative view of the policy problems and offers suggestions in terms of rules and institutions that may be effective in addressing those problems.     

Greed and adolescent financial behavior

Financial problems in adolescents have increased over the last decades. We investigated if individual differences in greed relate to financial behavior. Greed is an important motive for economic behavior and refers to the tendency to never be satisfied and to always want more. We developed a short version of the Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens, Zeelenberg, Van de Ven, & Breugelmans, 2015), which we then used in a large survey with adolescents (N = 3899). Dispositional greed is associated with them having more income, spending more, saving less often, and having debt more often. Identifying what personality characteristics influence financial behavior at a young age is important, as the financial habits that people learn during adolescence persist in adulthood. We find that greed has both positive effects (having a higher income), but also negative effects with the greedy being less likely to save and being more likely to have a debt.     

The Third-Person Effect in Communication

A person exposed to a persuasive communication in the mass mediasees this as having a greater effect on others than on himselfor herself. Each individual reasons: "I will not be influenced,but they (the third persons) may well be persuaded." In somecases, a communication leads to action not because of its impacton those to whom it is ostensibly directed, but because others(third persons) think that it will have an impact on its audience.Four small experiments that tend to support this hypothesisare presented, and its complementary relationship to a numberof concepts in the social sciences is noted. The third-personeffect may help to explain various aspects of social behavior,including the fear of heretical propaganda by religious leadersand the fear of dissent by political rulers. It appears to berelated to the phenomenon of censorship in general: the censornever admits to being influenced; it is others with "more impressionableminds" who will be affected.     

The Relationship Between Self-Reported Levels of Distress of Parents and Victims in Incest Families

A common clinical observation is that a "special" relationship exists between the father/perpetrator and child victim of incest. The purpose of this study was to test empirical indicants that father/perpetrators and child victims are involved in close, enmeshed relationships, specifically concerning symptoms of emotional distress. The primary hypothesis was that stronger associations would be obtained on indicants of distress (i.e., depression, fear, and anxiety) for father-victim dyadic relationships than for mother-victim dyadic relationships. Subjects in this study were 32 families referred from community agencies. Results indicated that victims' self-reported levels of anxiety were significantly related to both maternal and paternal indicants of distress; maternal, rather than paternal, distress was associated with victim's self-reported fears, and no significant associations were obtained between parental distress and victims' self-reported depression. Additionally, no significant differences were noted in the magnitudes of correlations between father/victim and mother/victim levels of distress. In contrast to clinical accounts, the study failed to find evidence of emotional enmeshment between victim and father/perpetrator. Rather, the results suggested that a dynamic of familial enmeshment is present in incest families.     

Credulity rather than general trust may increase vulnerability to fraud in older adults: a moderated mediation model

The present study aimed to clarify whether it is credulity or general trust that specifically affects vulnerability to fraud, as well as investigating the mediating role of susceptibility to persuasion and the moderating role of greed in this relationship. 254 Chinese older adults completed measures of credulity, general trust, susceptibility to persuasion, greed, and vulnerability to fraud. The results showed that credulity, but not general trust, was positively correlated with vulnerability to fraud, after controlling for demographic covariates. Susceptibility to persuasion partially mediated the effect of credulity on vulnerability to fraud. In addition, this mediating effect of susceptibility to persuasion was only significant in older adults with higher levels of greed. Our findings suggest that credulity, rather than general trust, is a risk factor in vulnerability to fraud among older adults, and may inform the development of supportive interventions to reduce this population’s risk of falling victim to fraud.     

The development of sexology as a discipline∗

The founding of the SSSS in 1957 was perhaps one portent of the sexual revolution of the sixties, which would break some of the power of the antisex forces. At the time, the Society had no competititon, whereas now there are various splinter groups. It would be better had sexologists kept united in the common cause of founding a new academic discipline of sexology. Meantime, there is no department of sexology in any medical school or teaching hospital in the Western hemisphere. Sexology, because human beings are a sexually dimorphic species, deals basically with a partnership, not an indivisual. It has four branches: experimental and investigative; clinical and therapeutic; education and training; and standards and certification. The SSSS and the JOSR can contribute to a more systematic and less laissez faire growth of sexology as an academic discipline.     

Knowledge of American sign language and the ability of hearing individuals to decode facial expressions of emotion

The relation between knowledge of American Sign Language (ASL) and the ability to decode facial expressions of emotion was explored in this study. Subjects were 60 college students, half of whom were intermediate level students of ASL and half of whom had no exposure to a signed language. Subjects viewed and judged silent video segments of stimulus persons experiencing spontaneous emotional reactions representing either happiness, sadness, anger, disgust, or fear/surprise. Results indicated that hearing subjects knowledgeable in ASL were generally better than hearing non-signers at identifying facial expressions of emotion, although there were variations in decoding accuracy regarding the specific emotion being judged. In addition, females were more successful decoders than males. Results have implications for better understanding the nature of nonverbal communication in deaf and hearing individuals.We are grateful to Karl Scheibe for comments on an earlier version of this paper and to Erik Coats for statistical analysis. This study was conducted as part of a Senior Honors thesis at Wesleyan University.     

Barriers to reporting sexual assault for women and men: perspectives of college students

The authors asked college students to rate the importance of a list of barriers to reporting rape and sexual assault among male and female victims. The authors' findings indicate that barriers prevalent 30 years ago, prior to efforts by the rape reform movement, continue to be considered important among college men and women. The barriers rated as the most important were (1) shame, guilt, embarrassment, not wanting friends and family to know; (2) concerns about confidentiality; and (3) fear of not being believed. Both genders perceived a fear of being judged as gay as an important barrier for male victims of sexual assault or rape and fear of retaliation by the perpetrator to be an important barrier for female victims.     

The effects of statistical fluctuations and perceived status of a competitor on the illusion of control in experienced gamblers

An experiment in gambling behavior was conducted under the most realistic conditions possible in our laboratory. Not only was there a significant monetary prize offered but subjects believed that they could be eliminated by a competitor. Subjects were 45 adults (25 females & 20 males; age range=23 to 73, mean age=51). Subjects were pitted in a gambling game against either a formidable or a vulnerable competitor. The competitor was a confederate playing one of the roles. The subjects either enjoyed a statistically favorable sequence of outcomes or suffered through a statistically negative sequence. In other words, they were made to lose badly, or made to win significantly. The object was to determine the effects of statistical fluctuations and the perceived status of a competitor on the illusion of control as measured by magnitude of risk taking. We hypothesized that we would see greater risks taken against a vulnerable competitor and during the favorable sequence, while lesser risks would be taken against a formidable competitor and an unfavorable sequence. However, neither variable was found to significantly effect the subjects on these measures. Unexpectedly, we identified a significant effect with respect to the number of wagers. It was found that subjects took significantly higher risks as a function of exposure to the gambling situation, without respect to conditions.     

Women's fear of crime: the role of fear for the well-being of significant others

A number of explanations have been suggested in the literature for the finding that women consistently report higher levels of fear of crime than males. The "shadow" hypothesis argues that fear of crime among females reflects fear of sexual assault. The "intimate" hypothesis argues that women's fear of crime is the result of exposure to intimate violence. Females' fear of crime is expected to be explained by their fear of partners' violence. The main argument of this article is that women's fear of crime might be the result of traditional family gender roles. When asked, women might express fear not only for their own well-being but for that of their children. A survey of a representative sample of women in the third largest city of Israel was used to test this assumption. Women's fear of crime was found to be affected by fear of sexual assault and fear of violent partners. In addition, consistent with the argument of this study, women's fear of violent and sexual victimization of their children had a significant effect on their perception of fear. Future directions for research are suggested.