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Maladaptive Smartphone Usage
No full textThis chapter examines the phenomenon of maladaptive smartphone consumption, considering its detrimental effects on individuals and exploring potential strategies to overcome this behavior. Despite the many beneficial aspects of smartphones, growing concern has been raised about the potential maladaptive nature of excessive smartphone usage. This chapter provides an overview of the literature on this topic. Specifically, we explore the habitual nature of smartphone usage and under what conditions it should be considered maladaptive. We further provide an overview of existing research on adverse consequences of smartphone usage for subjective wellbeing, cognition, academic performance, and employment-related consequences of smartphone overuse as well as social outcomes (e.g., phubbing). To overcome maladaptive smartphone usage, we summarize interventions to reduce smartphone usage based on different mechanisms (e.g., self-control approaches, digital nudges and design frictions, incentives) and highlight measurement issues when researching this topic. We conclude by providing recommendations for policy-makers, researchers, and businesses dealing with maladaptive smartphone consumption. Overall, this book chapter provides a comprehensive examination of maladaptive smartphone consumption, its consequences, and potential solutions. By addressing the multifaceted aspects of this behavior, it offers insights for researchers, firms, and policy-makers alike.yesPublishe
Non-Fiscal Tax Policies and State Sovereignty: From the Rise of Modern Nation States to Globalization and Corporate Feudalism
No full textIn this interdisciplinary book, Giulio Allevato explores how the non-fiscal function of the taxing power has contributed to the establishment, consolidation, and maintenance of an effective power to govern in modern nation states. Innovative in its historical approach, this book illustrates how the link between non-budgetary tax policies and state sovereignty continues to play out in the current global landscape.yesPublishe
Quantitative probability estimation of light-induced inactivation of SARS-CoV-2
Full text linkDuring the COVID pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus,studies have shown the efficiency of deactivating this virus via ultraviolet light. The damage mechanism is well understood: UV light disturbs the integrity of the RNA chain at those locations where specific nucleotide neighbors occur. In this contribution,we present a model to address certain gaps in the description of the interaction between UV photons and the RNA sequence for virus inactivation. We begin by exploiting the available information on the pathogen’s morphology,physical,and genomic characteristics,enabling us to estimate the average number of UV photons required to photochemically damage the virus’s RNA. To generalize our results,we have numerically generated random RNA sequences and checked that the distribution of pairs of nucleotides susceptible of damage for the SARS-CoV-2 is within the expected values for a random-generated RNA chain. After determining the average number of photons reaching the RNA for a preset level of fluence (or photon density),we applied the binomial probability distribution to evaluate the damage of nucleotide pairs in the RNA chain due to UV radiation. Our results describe this interaction in terms of the probability of damaging a single pair of nucleotides,and the number of available photons. The cumulative probability exhibits a steep sigmoidal shape,implying that a relatively small change in the number of affected pairs may trigger the inactivation of the virus. Our light-RNA interaction model quantitatively describes how the fraction of affected pairs of nucleotides in the RNA sequence depends on the probability of damaging a single pair and the number of photons impinging on it. A better understanding of the underlying inactivation mechanism would help in the design of optimum experiments and UV sanitization methods. Although this paper focuses on SARS-CoV-2,these results can be adapted for any other type of pathogen susceptible of UV damage. © The Author(s) 2024.This work has been partially supported by Project COV20-01244-CM funded by the Comunidad de Madrid. This study was also funded by a REACT-EU Grant from the Comunidad de Madrid to the ANTICIPA project of Complutense University of Madrid. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, preparation of the manuscript or decision to publish. The authors are very grateful to Dr. Gerard Conangla for his valuable analysis of the computational realization of randomly generated RNA chains and for his critical reading.yesPublishe
Taste-Based Gender Favouritism in High-Stake Decisions: Evidence from the Price is Right
Full text linkGender discrimination is present across various fields,but identifying the underlying mechanism is challenging. We demonstrate own-gender favouritism in a field setting that allows for clean identification of tastes versus beliefs: the One Bid game on the TV show The Price Is Right. Players must guess an item's value without exceeding it,leaving the last bidder with a dominant 'cutoff' strategy of overbidding another player by $ 1. We show that last bidders are significantly more likely to cut off opposite-gender opponents. This behaviour is explained by own-gender favouritism rather than beliefs that cutting off opposite-gender opponents is more profitable. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Economic Society.yesPublishe
Constitutions as moving targets
Full text linkConstitutions change in different ways,and some constitutions - such as the Chilean Constitution - change often. The significant changes to the Chilean Constitution have been frequent and fast,and they have accompanied the failed constitution-making processes of the previous years. Examples include crucial sub-constitutional statutes such as the electoral system regulation and same-sex marriage,political practices challenging the power of the president in the law-making process,constitutional rules such as term limits for legislators,judicial practices such as the enforcement of social rights and the amendment procedures of the Constitution itself. Despite the successful attempts at reforming the Constitution and the failed attempts at replacing it,Chileans are still trying to replace the constitutional document. However,the constitutional framework has become unstable,making it harder to agree on what exactly is wrong with it. This article seeks to open a conversation in the constitutional literature. It argues that constitutions can become moving targets and uses the Chilean case to show the need to theorize more about the moving target problem. © The Author(s),2023. Published by Cambridge University Press.yesPublishe
The two faces of hierarchy: CEO power and TMT learning diversity in technology venture innovation
Full text linkThe relationship between top management team (TMT) members’ learning behavior and the innovation strategy of technology ventures remains unclear,especially when complicated by social hierarchies within the team. We draw on organizational learning theory to theorize that diversity in TMT members’ learning behavior has both positive and negative latent effects that produce an inverted U-shaped relationship between TMT learning diversity and a firm’s radical innovation strategy. Building on the social hierarchy literature,we also suggest that CEO power moderates this relationship by altering the latent forces: structurally powerful CEOs neutralize the benefits of TMT learning diversity,turning the link between learning diversity and radical innovation strategy predominantly negative,whereas prestigiously powerful CEOs neutralize the costs of TMT learning diversity,turning its relationship with the firm’s radical innovation strategy predominantly positive. Longitudinal,multi-source data from 77 TMTs support our model. The findings contribute to the research on learning and social hierarchies by illustrating how hierarchies rooted in different sources of power have different effects on the relationship between TMT learning diversity and innovation strategy.Open access funding provided by University of St.Gallen This project received funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF 100018_169426).yesPublishe
Impressive Insults: How do consumers perceive self-deprecating advertisements?
Full text linkMost advertisements highlight a product's positive attributes to attract consumers. Yet, some brands deliberately criticize themselves by employing self-deprecation within their communications, such as Carlsberg's “Probably not the best beer in the world” campaign. This research examines whether, when, and why consumers react more favorably to self-deprecating advertisements. In six experiments, we demonstrate that when the self-deprecated attribute holds less importance to consumers, self-deprecating (vs. self-promoting) advertisements enhance brand trust by elevating the brand's social attractiveness and diminishing consumer skepticism. Importantly, self-deprecation in advertisements also lowers consumers' tendency to avoid them. We empirically rule out several alternative explanations (i.e., consumer engagement, sentiment, nonconformity, and novelty) for these effects. Our research builds on prior studies in impression management and social psychology, contributing to the literature on advertising, self-deprecation, and consumer skepticism by promoting the strategic use of self-deprecating advertisements to bolster brand trust and reduce advertising avoidance. We offer actionable insights for managers and practitioners, highlighting how self-deprecation can effectively address the challenges of building trust in diverse consumer-facing marketing contexts.yesPublishe
Staged trees and asymmetry-labeled DAGs
Full text linkBayesian networks are a widely-used class of probabilistic graphical models capable of representing symmetric conditional independence between variables of interest using the topology of the underlying graph. For categorical variables, they can be seen as a special case of the much more general class of models called staged trees, which can represent any non-symmetric conditional independence. Here we formalize the relationship between these two models and introduce a minimal Bayesian network representation of a staged tree, which can be used to read conditional independences intuitively. A new labeled graph termed asymmetry-labeled directed acyclic graph is defined, with edges labeled to denote the type of dependence between any two random variables. We also present a novel algorithm to learn staged trees which only enforces a specific subset of non-symmetric independences. Various datasets illustrate the methodology, highlighting the need to construct models that more flexibly encode and represent non-symmetric structures.yesPublishe
The Perfect Politician
Full text linkIdeas for integrating AI into politics are now emerging and advancing at accelerating pace. This chapter highlights a few different varieties and shows how they reflect different assumptions about the value of democracy. We cannot make informed decisions about which, if any, proposals to pursue without further reflection on what makes democracy valuable and how current conditions fail to fully realize it. Recent advances in political philosophy provide some guidance but leave important questions open. If AI advances to a state where it can secure superior political outcomes, leading perspectives in political philosophy suggest that democracy may become obsolete. If we find this suggestion troubling, we need to put the case for democracy on stronger foundations.yesPublishe
Walking Memories, Future Dreams: Exploring Design through Cartographies, Speculation and AI
Full text linkThis paper summarizes a design practice (“Take the Memory Out for a Future Walk”) conducted with undergraduate students in a park in Barcelona. Through walking, sensory mapping, artificial intelligence exploration, and prototyping, participants explored the interplay between embodied experiences, memory, future speculation, and design intervention. Walking the park fostered sensory engagement, shaping students' understanding of the site and its history. This informed the development of projects addressing environmental concerns and promoting sustainable practices through reimagined spaces or objects. Students employed AI tools to generate ideas where they envisioned alternative futures and challenged existing norms. This process encouraged non-canonical reflection, urging students to move beyond conformistic approaches while fostering future-oriented critical thinking. The practice yielded valuable insights for design education. Firstly, it showed why the integrating walking and sensory mapping into design processes can challenge space determinism. In addition, it contributed to the potential of speculative design and future studies to foster alternative imagination and address pressing issues like climate change, promoting planetary awareness. Further iterations could benefit from expanding on-site exploration and incorporating material limitations to deepen student engagement with the natural surroundings, community and project sustainability.YesPublishe