We compared private and social decision making to investigate the neural underpinnings of the effect of social comparison on risky choices. We measured brain activity using functional MRI while participants chose between two lotteries: in the private condition, they observed the outcome of the unchosen lottery, and in the social condition, the outcome of the lottery chosen by another person. Th...

OBJECTIVE To test a model of social competence in youth with spina bifida (SB). Involvement in social activities was expected to mediate associations between SB-related condition parameters (pain, body mass index, and motor function) and social competence. Internalizing symptoms were predicted to amplify the negative impact of condition parameters on social activity involvement. METHODS 108 y...

Background & Objective:  Social anxiety disorder, which involves excessive anxiety of social situation due to fear of negative evaluation, is a debilitating disorder that leads to social dysfunction. The purpose of this study is to investigate Efficacy of Cognitive-Behavioral Group Therapy (CBGT) versus Group Hypnotherapy (GHT) on Brain/Behavioral Systems of Social Phobia Patients.  Materials ...

the Dublin 1986 World Congress of IFIP (The International Federation of Information Processing Societies). It has served as a summing up of the work I had done in system development research together with colleagues and team members up to the mid 1980s. Since then, I have professionally mainly been working in objectoriented language design. Politically, the years 1988-1994 were consumed by my l...

The huge catalogues of video items currently available through live, on-demand and catchup TV based services coupled with the ever expanding range of online video services (Vimeo, YouTube, Netflix) provides users with unprecedented levels of choice. Not only is the choice of content expanding but so too are the range of formats, delivery mechanisms and the viewing devices (PC, TV/STB, mobile de...

To characterize economic development and diagnose the economic health condition, several popular indices such as gross domestic product (GDP), industrial structure and income growth are widely applied. However, computing these indices based on traditional economic census is usually costly and resources consuming, and more importantly, following a long time delay. In this paper, we analyzed near...

Studies show that a person is willing to join a social group activity if the activity is interesting, and if some close friends also join the activity as companions. The literature has demonstrated that the interests of a person and the social tightness among friends can be effectively derived and mined from social networking websites. However, even with the above two kinds of information widel...

It has been argued that power activates a general tendency to approach whereas powerlessness activates a tendency to inhibit. The assumption is that elevated power involves reward-rich environments, freedom and, as a consequence, triggers an approach-related motivational orientation and attention to rewards. In contrast, reduced power is associated with increased threat, punishment and social c...

Taylor and Lobel's (1989) model of social comparison processes under threat predicts that upward affiliation (a social activity) may be useful to improve the skills and to find inspiration in coping with HIV, whereas downward evaluation (a cognitive activity) may assist someone to feel better by comparing oneself to a less fortunate person. Participants with HIV were randomly assigned, using a ...