Individuals influence each others' decisions about cultural products such as songs, books, and movies; but to what extent can the perception of success become a "self-fulfilling prophecy"? We have explored this question experimentally by artificially inverting the true popularity of songs in an online "music market," in which 12,207 participants listened to and downloaded songs by unknown bands...

The facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR) has been identified as a reliable predictor of men's behavior, with researchers focusing on evolutionary selection pressures as the underlying mechanism explaining these relationships. In this paper, we complement this approach and examine the extent to which social processes also determine the extent to which men's fWHR serves as a behavioral cue. Specif...

1680 Modafinil for treatment of fatigue in post-polio syndrome: A randomized controlled trial O.M. Vasconcelos, O.A. Prokhorenko, M.K. Salajegheh, K.F. Kelley, K. Livornese, C.H. Olsen, A.H. Vo, M.C. Dalakas, L.S. Halstead, B. Jabbari, and W.W. Campbell 1687 Is prestroke use of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors associated with better outcome? N. Chitravas, H.M. Dewey, M.B. Nicol, D.L. Ha...

BACKGROUND Given the central importance of nitric oxide (NO) in the development and clinical course of cardiovascular diseases, we sought to determine whether the powerful predictive value of C-reactive protein (CRP) might be explained through an effect on NO production. METHODS AND RESULTS Endothelial cells (ECs) were incubated with recombinant CRP (0 to 100 microg/mL, 24 hours), and NO and ...

This study addresses the self-fulfilling prophecy effect, in the domain of economic decision-making. We present experimental data in support of the hypothesis that speculative forecasts of economic change can impact individuals' economic decision behavior, prior to any realized changes. In a within-subjects experiment, participants (N = 40) played 180 trials in a Balloon Analogue Risk Talk (BAR...

The magnitude of smoking as a public health concern in Britain is reflected in the recent government investment to develop smoking cessation services. Smoking in pregnancy is a priority. This article presents the findings of a small qualitative research study exploring barriers to pregnant women stopping smoking. The research was conducted in deprived areas of South Yorkshire, with levels of sm...

On October 11, 1983, “Baby Jane Doe” was born in Port Jefferson, NY, and diagnosed with hydrocephalus and myelomeningocele, the most common and serious form of spina bifida. Doctors advised her parents that she would die without surgery. With surgery, she would live from 2 to 20 years, paralyzed, bedridden, incontinent, and severely “retarded.” Based on this information, the parents declined tr...

IMPACTS OF WORLDVIEW, IMPLICIT ASSUMPTIONS, BIASES, AND GROUPTHINK ON ISRAELI OPERATIONAL PLANS IN 1973, by MAJ Barry L. Johnson 46 pages. This monograph examines some cognitive constructs such as worldview, implicit assumptions, and groupthink. Further, the monograph discusses biases such as anchoring, status quo bias, confirmation bias, sunk-cost bias, framing trap, halo and pitchfork effect,...

Three studies tested the hypothesis that babyfaced adolescent boys would compensate for the undesirable expectation that they will exhibit childlike traits by behaving contrary to it. Studies 1 and 2 revealed that babyfaced boys from middle- and lower class samples, including a sample of delinquents, showed higher academic achievement than their mature-faced peers, refuting the stereotype of ba...