by David Dobbs
Neuron Culture
September 15, 2010
Here is an excerpt:
Researchers generally use these (trolley) scenarios to see whether people hold a) an absolutist or so-called “deontological” moral code or b) a utilitarian or “consequentialist” moral code. In an absolutist code, an act’s morality virtually never depends on context or secondary consequences. A utilitarian code allows that an act’s morality can depend on context and secondary consequences, such as whether taking one life can save two or three or a thousand.
In most studies, people start out insisting they have absolute codes. But when researchers tweak the settings, many people decide morality is relative after all: Propose, for instance, that the fat man is known to be dying, or was contemplating jumping off the bridge anyway — and the passengers are all children — and for some people, that makes it different. Or the guy is a murderer and the passengers nuns. In other scenarios the man might be slipping, and will fall and die if you don’t grab him: Do you save him … even if it means all those kids will die? By tweaking these settings, researchers can squeeze an absolutist pretty hard, but they usually find a mix of absolutists and consequentialists.
As a grad student, Pizarro liked trolleyology. Yet it struck him that these studies, in their targeting of an absolutist versus consequentialist spectrum, seemed to assume that most people would hold firm to their particular spots on that spectrum — that individuals generally held a roughly consistent moral compass. The compass needle might wobble, but it would generally point in the same direction.
Pizarro wasn’t so sure. He suspected we might be more fickle. That perhaps we act first and scramble for morality afterward, or something along those lines, and that we choose our rule set according to how well it fits our desires.
The entire blog post is here.
Friday, July 12, 2013
Thursday, July 11, 2013
WellPoint to pay $1.7 million HIPAA penalty
By Rachel Landen and Joseph Conn
ModernHealthcare.com
Published July 11, 2013
WellPoint, which serves nearly 36 million people through its affiliated health plans, has agreed to pay a $1.7 million penalty to HHS for potential violations of the privacy and security rules under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996.
Between Oct. 23, 2009, and March 7, 2010, access to personal data for 612,402 people—their names, dates of birth, addresses, Social Security numbers, telephone numbers and health information—was made available to unauthorized users as the result of online security weaknesses, HHS said Thursday.
During an investigation of WellPoint's information systems, HHS' Office for Civil Rights found that the Indianapolis-based insurer had not enacted appropriate administrative, technical and physical safeguards for data as required by HIPAA.
The entire story is here.
ModernHealthcare.com
Published July 11, 2013
WellPoint, which serves nearly 36 million people through its affiliated health plans, has agreed to pay a $1.7 million penalty to HHS for potential violations of the privacy and security rules under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996.
Between Oct. 23, 2009, and March 7, 2010, access to personal data for 612,402 people—their names, dates of birth, addresses, Social Security numbers, telephone numbers and health information—was made available to unauthorized users as the result of online security weaknesses, HHS said Thursday.
During an investigation of WellPoint's information systems, HHS' Office for Civil Rights found that the Indianapolis-based insurer had not enacted appropriate administrative, technical and physical safeguards for data as required by HIPAA.
The entire story is here.
Medicare fraud outrunning enforcement efforts
By Fred Shulte
The Center for Public Integrity
Originally published on July 1, 2013
Citing massive budget and staff cuts, federal officials are set to scale back or drop a host of investigations into Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse — even though cracking down on government waste and cutting health care costs have been top priorities for the Obama administration.
The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General is set to lose a total of 400 staffers that are deployed nationwide as a primary defense against health care fraud and abuse. Though agency officials have yet to decide which investigations will be shelved as staff dwindles, the existing staff is already stretched so thin that the agency has failed to act on 1,200 complaints over the past year alleging wrongdoing — and expects that number to rise. The OIG began shedding staff at the beginning of the year.
The budget crunch surfaced during questioning at a June 24 hearing of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The hearing was called to examine prescription drug abuse in Medicare.
Gary Cantrell, Deputy Inspector General for the OIG Office of Investigations, said at the hearing that his unit “is shrinking” even as the federal Medicare and Medicaid programs grow in size and complexity. “We’re set to lose roughly 400 bodies out of a total of 1,800 at our peak in 2012. That’s really limiting our ability to expand our oversight in some of these areas,” he said.
Stuart Wright, Deputy Inspector General for the OIG Office of Evaluations and Inspections, added that 200 of those staffers will have departed by the end of this year and 200 more are out the door by the end of 2015.
The entire story is here.
The Center for Public Integrity
Originally published on July 1, 2013
Citing massive budget and staff cuts, federal officials are set to scale back or drop a host of investigations into Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse — even though cracking down on government waste and cutting health care costs have been top priorities for the Obama administration.
The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General is set to lose a total of 400 staffers that are deployed nationwide as a primary defense against health care fraud and abuse. Though agency officials have yet to decide which investigations will be shelved as staff dwindles, the existing staff is already stretched so thin that the agency has failed to act on 1,200 complaints over the past year alleging wrongdoing — and expects that number to rise. The OIG began shedding staff at the beginning of the year.
The budget crunch surfaced during questioning at a June 24 hearing of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The hearing was called to examine prescription drug abuse in Medicare.
Gary Cantrell, Deputy Inspector General for the OIG Office of Investigations, said at the hearing that his unit “is shrinking” even as the federal Medicare and Medicaid programs grow in size and complexity. “We’re set to lose roughly 400 bodies out of a total of 1,800 at our peak in 2012. That’s really limiting our ability to expand our oversight in some of these areas,” he said.
Stuart Wright, Deputy Inspector General for the OIG Office of Evaluations and Inspections, added that 200 of those staffers will have departed by the end of this year and 200 more are out the door by the end of 2015.
The entire story is here.
Privacy and the Threat to the Self
By MICHAEL P. LYNCH
The New York Times - Opinionator
Originally published June 22, 2013
In the wake of continuing revelations of government spying programs and the recent Supreme Court ruling on DNA collection – both of which push the generally accepted boundaries against state intrusion on the person — the issue of privacy is foremost on the public mind. The frequent mantra, heard from both media commentators and government officials, is that we face a “trade-off” between safety and convenience on one hand and privacy on the other. We just need, we are told, to find the right balance.
This way of framing the issue makes sense if you understand privacy solely as a political or legal concept. And its political importance is certainly part of what makes privacy so important: what is private is what is yours alone to control, without interference from others or the state. But the concept of privacy also matters for another, deeper reason. It is intimately connected to what it is to be an autonomous person.
What makes your thoughts your thoughts? One answer is that you have what philosophers sometimes call “privileged access” to them. This means at least two things. First, you access them in a way I can’t. Even if I could walk a mile in your shoes, I can’t know what you feel in the same way you can: you see it from the inside so to speak. Second, you can, at least sometimes, control what I know about your thoughts. You can hide your true feelings from me, or let me have the key to your heart.
The entire story is here.
The New York Times - Opinionator
Originally published June 22, 2013
In the wake of continuing revelations of government spying programs and the recent Supreme Court ruling on DNA collection – both of which push the generally accepted boundaries against state intrusion on the person — the issue of privacy is foremost on the public mind. The frequent mantra, heard from both media commentators and government officials, is that we face a “trade-off” between safety and convenience on one hand and privacy on the other. We just need, we are told, to find the right balance.
This way of framing the issue makes sense if you understand privacy solely as a political or legal concept. And its political importance is certainly part of what makes privacy so important: what is private is what is yours alone to control, without interference from others or the state. But the concept of privacy also matters for another, deeper reason. It is intimately connected to what it is to be an autonomous person.
What makes your thoughts your thoughts? One answer is that you have what philosophers sometimes call “privileged access” to them. This means at least two things. First, you access them in a way I can’t. Even if I could walk a mile in your shoes, I can’t know what you feel in the same way you can: you see it from the inside so to speak. Second, you can, at least sometimes, control what I know about your thoughts. You can hide your true feelings from me, or let me have the key to your heart.
The entire story is here.
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
How Reading Makes Us More Human
A debate has erupted over whether reading fiction makes human beings more moral. But what if its real value consists in something even more fundamental?
By Karen Swallow Prior
The Atlantic
Originally posted on June 21, 2013
A battle over books has erupted recently on the pages of The New York Times and Time. The opening salvo was Gregory Currie's essay, "Does Great Literature Make Us Better?" which asserts that the widely held belief that reading makes us more moral has little support. In response, Annie Murphy Paul weighed in with "Reading Literature Makes Us Smarter and Nicer." Her argument is that "deep reading," the kind of reading great literature requires, is a distinctive cognitive activity that contributes to our ability to empathize with others; it therefore can, in fact, makes us "smarter and nicer," among other things. Yet these essays aren't so much coming to different conclusions as considering different questions.
To advance her thesis, Paul cites studies by Raymond Mar, a psychologist at York University in Canada, and Keith Oatley, a professor emeritus of cognitive psychology at the University of Toronto. Taken together, their findings suggest that those "who often read fiction appear to be better able to understand other people, empathize with them and view the world from their perspective." It's the kind of thing writer Joyce Carol Oates is talking about when she says, "Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul."
Oatley and Mar's conclusions are supported, Paul argues, by recent studies in neuroscience, psychology, and cognitive science. This research shows that "deep reading -- slow, immersive, rich in sensory detail and emotional and moral complexity -- is a distinctive experience," a kind of reading that differs in kind and quality from "the mere decoding of words" that constitutes a good deal of what passes for reading today, particularly for too many of our students in too many of our schools (as I have previously written about here).
Paul concludes her essay with a reference to the literary critic Frank Kermode, who famously distinguishes between "carnal reading" -- characterized by the hurried, utilitarian information processing that constitutes the bulk of our daily reading diet -- and "spiritual reading," reading done with focused attention for pleasure, reflection, analysis, and growth. It is in this distinction that we find the real difference between the warring factions in what might be a chicken-or-egg scenario: Does great literature make people better, or are good people drawn to reading great literature?
The entire article is here.
By Karen Swallow Prior
The Atlantic
Originally posted on June 21, 2013
A battle over books has erupted recently on the pages of The New York Times and Time. The opening salvo was Gregory Currie's essay, "Does Great Literature Make Us Better?" which asserts that the widely held belief that reading makes us more moral has little support. In response, Annie Murphy Paul weighed in with "Reading Literature Makes Us Smarter and Nicer." Her argument is that "deep reading," the kind of reading great literature requires, is a distinctive cognitive activity that contributes to our ability to empathize with others; it therefore can, in fact, makes us "smarter and nicer," among other things. Yet these essays aren't so much coming to different conclusions as considering different questions.
To advance her thesis, Paul cites studies by Raymond Mar, a psychologist at York University in Canada, and Keith Oatley, a professor emeritus of cognitive psychology at the University of Toronto. Taken together, their findings suggest that those "who often read fiction appear to be better able to understand other people, empathize with them and view the world from their perspective." It's the kind of thing writer Joyce Carol Oates is talking about when she says, "Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul."
Oatley and Mar's conclusions are supported, Paul argues, by recent studies in neuroscience, psychology, and cognitive science. This research shows that "deep reading -- slow, immersive, rich in sensory detail and emotional and moral complexity -- is a distinctive experience," a kind of reading that differs in kind and quality from "the mere decoding of words" that constitutes a good deal of what passes for reading today, particularly for too many of our students in too many of our schools (as I have previously written about here).
Paul concludes her essay with a reference to the literary critic Frank Kermode, who famously distinguishes between "carnal reading" -- characterized by the hurried, utilitarian information processing that constitutes the bulk of our daily reading diet -- and "spiritual reading," reading done with focused attention for pleasure, reflection, analysis, and growth. It is in this distinction that we find the real difference between the warring factions in what might be a chicken-or-egg scenario: Does great literature make people better, or are good people drawn to reading great literature?
The entire article is here.
Three Shocking Truths About Lying At Work
By Keld Jensen
Forbes
Originally published June 24, 2013
Mark Twain famously said, “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.” However, the benefit of a guilt-free conscious and a crystal-clear mind appears not to be a strong enough incentive to deter lying, especially in the workplace.
The pandemic of lying does not just refer to high-profile cases, such as Bill Clinton’s affair, Lance Armstrong’s denial of doping, and Bernie Madoff’s financial deceit. Workplace lying is a far more widespread issue and it is taking place in offices around the world. There is a steady undercurrent of dishonesty, “white lies,” cheating, and bending the rules, and it’s time we pull the rug out and expose three simple truths about lying.
1) You lie at work—so does everyone else.
Most of us are willing to confess to it. According to a survey by psychotherapist and consultant Dr. Brad Blanton, 93% of respondents out of forty thousand Americans admitted to lying “regularly and habitually in the workplace.” Personally, I believe the other 7% are lying to themselves—and they probably believe it!
The entire story is here.
Forbes
Originally published June 24, 2013
Mark Twain famously said, “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.” However, the benefit of a guilt-free conscious and a crystal-clear mind appears not to be a strong enough incentive to deter lying, especially in the workplace.
The pandemic of lying does not just refer to high-profile cases, such as Bill Clinton’s affair, Lance Armstrong’s denial of doping, and Bernie Madoff’s financial deceit. Workplace lying is a far more widespread issue and it is taking place in offices around the world. There is a steady undercurrent of dishonesty, “white lies,” cheating, and bending the rules, and it’s time we pull the rug out and expose three simple truths about lying.
1) You lie at work—so does everyone else.
Most of us are willing to confess to it. According to a survey by psychotherapist and consultant Dr. Brad Blanton, 93% of respondents out of forty thousand Americans admitted to lying “regularly and habitually in the workplace.” Personally, I believe the other 7% are lying to themselves—and they probably believe it!
The entire story is here.
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Person as Scientist, Person as Moralist
By Joshua Knobe
Upcoming in Brain and Brain Sciences
Abstract
It has often been suggested that people’s ordinary capacities for folk psychology and causal cognition make use of much the same methods one might find in a formal scientific investigation. A series of recent experimental results offer a challenge to this widely-held view, suggesting that people’s moral judgments can influence the intuitions they hold both in folk psychology and in moral cognition. The present target article argues that these effects are best explained on a model according to which moral considerations actually figure in the fundamental competencies people use to make sense of the world.
-----------
Consider the way research is conducted in a typical modern university. There are departments for theology, drama, philosophy… and then there are departments specifically devoted to the practice of science. Faculty members in these science departments generally have quite specific responsibilities. They are not supposed to make use of all the various methods and approaches one finds in other parts of the university.
Now consider the way the human mind ordinarily makes sense of the world. One plausible view would be that the human mind works something like a modern university. There are psychological processes devoted to religion (the mind’s theology department), to aesthetics (the mind’s art department), to morality (the mind’s philosophy department) … and then there are processes specifically devoted to questions that have a roughly ‘scientific’ character. These processes work quite differently from the ones we use in thinking about, say, moral or aesthetic questions. They proceed using more or less the
same sorts of methods we find in university science departments.
This metaphor is a powerful one, and it has shaped research programs in many different areas of cognitive science. Take the study of folk psychology. Ordinary people have a capacity to ascribe mental states (beliefs, desires, etc.), and researchers have sometimes suggested that people acquire this capacity in much the same way that scientists develop theoretical frameworks (e.g., Gopnik & Wellman 1992). Or take causal cognition. Ordinary people have an ability to determine whether one event caused another, and it has been suggested that they do so by looking at the same sorts of statistical information scientists normally consult (e.g., Kelley 1967). Numerous other fields have taken a similar path. In each case, the basic strategy is to look at the methods used by professional research scientists and then to hypothesize that people actually use similar methods in their ordinary understanding. This strategy has clearly led to many important advances.
The entire article is here.
Upcoming in Brain and Brain Sciences
Abstract
It has often been suggested that people’s ordinary capacities for folk psychology and causal cognition make use of much the same methods one might find in a formal scientific investigation. A series of recent experimental results offer a challenge to this widely-held view, suggesting that people’s moral judgments can influence the intuitions they hold both in folk psychology and in moral cognition. The present target article argues that these effects are best explained on a model according to which moral considerations actually figure in the fundamental competencies people use to make sense of the world.
-----------
Consider the way research is conducted in a typical modern university. There are departments for theology, drama, philosophy… and then there are departments specifically devoted to the practice of science. Faculty members in these science departments generally have quite specific responsibilities. They are not supposed to make use of all the various methods and approaches one finds in other parts of the university.
Now consider the way the human mind ordinarily makes sense of the world. One plausible view would be that the human mind works something like a modern university. There are psychological processes devoted to religion (the mind’s theology department), to aesthetics (the mind’s art department), to morality (the mind’s philosophy department) … and then there are processes specifically devoted to questions that have a roughly ‘scientific’ character. These processes work quite differently from the ones we use in thinking about, say, moral or aesthetic questions. They proceed using more or less the
same sorts of methods we find in university science departments.
This metaphor is a powerful one, and it has shaped research programs in many different areas of cognitive science. Take the study of folk psychology. Ordinary people have a capacity to ascribe mental states (beliefs, desires, etc.), and researchers have sometimes suggested that people acquire this capacity in much the same way that scientists develop theoretical frameworks (e.g., Gopnik & Wellman 1992). Or take causal cognition. Ordinary people have an ability to determine whether one event caused another, and it has been suggested that they do so by looking at the same sorts of statistical information scientists normally consult (e.g., Kelley 1967). Numerous other fields have taken a similar path. In each case, the basic strategy is to look at the methods used by professional research scientists and then to hypothesize that people actually use similar methods in their ordinary understanding. This strategy has clearly led to many important advances.
The entire article is here.
Morality study finds conservatives show a ‘general insensitivity to consequences’
By Eric W. Dolan
The Raw Story
Originally published Sunday, June 23, 2013
When it comes to topics like abortion or assisted suicide, there seems to be no common ground between conservatives and liberals. Why is there such a noticeable rift between the two political orientations?
Research published June in Social Psychological and Personality Science suggests that religious individuals and political conservatives think about moral issues in a fundamentally different way than liberals.
The study by Jared Piazza of the University of Pennsylvania and Paulo Sousa of Queen’s University Belfast, which included a total of 688 participants, found religious individuals and political conservatives consistently invoked deontological ethics. In other words, they judged the morality of actions based on a universal rule such as, “You should not kill.” Political liberals, on the other hand, consistently invoked consequentialist ethics, meaning they judged the morality of actions based on their positive or negative outcomes.
“Does being religious or being conservative promote a rule-based ethic or does having a rule-based ethic promote religiosity and/or conservatism?” Piazza told PsyPost. “This question is difficult to answer definitively without running a longitudinal study, since you cannot really manipulate religious orientation, or being in possession of a deontological orientation, and then look at the consequences.”
The study’s cross-sectional methodology makes it impossible to say anything more than religion and conservativism are associated with deontological ethics. However, Piazza said prior research suggested that being religious underlies the adherence to deontological ethics,
The entire story is here.
The Raw Story
Originally published Sunday, June 23, 2013
When it comes to topics like abortion or assisted suicide, there seems to be no common ground between conservatives and liberals. Why is there such a noticeable rift between the two political orientations?
Research published June in Social Psychological and Personality Science suggests that religious individuals and political conservatives think about moral issues in a fundamentally different way than liberals.
The study by Jared Piazza of the University of Pennsylvania and Paulo Sousa of Queen’s University Belfast, which included a total of 688 participants, found religious individuals and political conservatives consistently invoked deontological ethics. In other words, they judged the morality of actions based on a universal rule such as, “You should not kill.” Political liberals, on the other hand, consistently invoked consequentialist ethics, meaning they judged the morality of actions based on their positive or negative outcomes.
“Does being religious or being conservative promote a rule-based ethic or does having a rule-based ethic promote religiosity and/or conservatism?” Piazza told PsyPost. “This question is difficult to answer definitively without running a longitudinal study, since you cannot really manipulate religious orientation, or being in possession of a deontological orientation, and then look at the consequences.”
The study’s cross-sectional methodology makes it impossible to say anything more than religion and conservativism are associated with deontological ethics. However, Piazza said prior research suggested that being religious underlies the adherence to deontological ethics,
The entire story is here.
Monday, July 8, 2013
Vignette 27: To Skate or Not to Skate
Dr. Logan Earthski works with adolescents and their families. During the course of treating one adolescent male, the parents, Mr. and Mrs. Hawk, expressed frustration with their son Tony’s lack of involvement with sports. The Hawks detailed how Tony enjoyed team sports in the past, but has not enjoyed participating due to anxiety and constantly comparing himself to others.
In order to bond and connect with the family, Dr. Earthski explained from his experience with teens, some male teens function better with individual sports. Dr. Earthski disclosed that he grew up skateboarding and taught lessons for several years. A few of the children and adolescents he taught fit the description of Tony. In those cases, the adolescent tried soccer or baseball, but did not really like it because they felt too anxious and overly competitive.
When it came to individual sports, like skateboarding, teens that became involved with individual sports usually showed a decrease in anxiety and an increase in self-confidence. However, sometimes, when adolescents first show up at the skate park, they may experience a similar level of anxiety and heightened self-awareness that Dr. Earthski helped remediate during his coaching sessions.
When it came to individual sports, like skateboarding, teens that became involved with individual sports usually showed a decrease in anxiety and an increase in self-confidence. However, sometimes, when adolescents first show up at the skate park, they may experience a similar level of anxiety and heightened self-awareness that Dr. Earthski helped remediate during his coaching sessions.
Dr. Earthski also revealed that he worked with one particular teenager who became very anxious and experienced episodes of panic related to going to the skate park. That adolescent did not think he was good and was weary of other kids watching and judging him. Dr. Earthski gave him some coaching on anxiety reduction techniques and worked through those negative, anxiety-provoking emotions. Further, he did very well at skateboarding once he conquered his symptoms of anxiety and panic. The teenager's self-confidence grew as he performed better at the skate park. Based on Dr. Earthski's revelations, the parents seemed reassured.
Prior to the next session, Dr. Earthski received a voicemail message from Mrs. Hawk asking if he could coach Tony on skate boarding.
After thinking about this request, Dr. Earthski calls you for a consult. Dr. Earthski puts forward the following concerns:
1. Is coaching a teenager-patient on anxiety-related issues in context of a skate boarding lessons definitively a dual relationship?
2. What if the coaching is time-limited, informed consent is given, and this activity is viewed as the exception rather than the rule? (“Time-limited” means between one and six sessions, depending on his response to treatment.)
3. Can time-limited skateboard coaching be incorporated as part of an in-vivo anxiety reduction technique and billed as therapy services?
4. Would Dr. Earthski’s malpractice insurance likely cover this activity?
5. What would happen if the teen-patient injured himself as part of coaching?
6. Dr. Earthski asks about the use of self-disclosure. What feedback might you give to Dr. Earthski about what he disclosed about himself?
7. Given everything you know about the case, what is/are the final recommendation(s) about this scenario?
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