We have just released the fifth edition of the EA Behavioral Science Newsletter.
Each newsletter curates papers, forum posts, reports, podcasts, resources, funding opportunities, events, jobs and research profiles that are relevant to the effective altruism and behavioral science community.
We have ~450 subscribers, and attract ~35 new subscribers per month.
You can read the newsletter in your browser or below.
Lucius Caviola, Stefan Schubert, Guy Kahane & Nadira S. Faber
Cognition (2022)
---
People routinely give humans moral priority over other animals. Is such moral anthropocentrism based in perceived differences in mental capacity between humans and non-humans or merely because humans favor other members of their own species? We investigated this question in six studies (N = 2217). We found that most participants prioritized humans over animals even when the animals were described as having equal or more advanced mental capacities than the humans. This applied to both mental capacity at the level of specific individuals (Studies 1a-b) and at the level typical for the respective species (Study 2). The key driver behind moral anthropocentrism was thus mere species-membership (speciesism). However, all else equal, participants still gave more moral weight to individuals with higher mental capacities (individual mental capacity principle), suggesting that the belief that humans have higher mental capacities than animals is part of the reason that they give humans moral priority.
Notably, participants found mental capacity more important for animals than for humans—a tendency which can itself be regarded as speciesist. We also explored possible sub-factors driving speciesism. We found that many participants judged that all individuals (not only humans) should prioritize members of their own species over members of other species (species-relativism; Studies 3a-b). However, some participants also exhibited a tendency to see humans as having superior value in an absolute sense (pro-human species-absolutism, Studies 3–4). Overall, our work demonstrates that speciesism plays a central role in explaining moral anthropocentrism and may be itself divided into multiple sub-factors.
Mélusine Boon-Falleur, Aurore Grandin, Nicolas Baumard & Coralie Chevallier
Nature Climate Change (2022)
---
Effective climate change mitigation is a social dilemma: the benefits are shared collectively but the costs are often private. To solve this dilemma, we argue that we must pay close attention to the nature and workings of human cooperation. We review three social cognition mechanisms that regulate cooperation: norm detection, reputation management and fairness computation. We show that each of these cognitive mechanisms can stand in the way of pro-environmental behaviours and limit the impact of environmental policies.
At the same time, the very same mechanisms can be leveraged as powerful solutions for an effective climate change mitigation. Human cooperation, which is essential for climate action, is shaped by the social cognition of individuals. This Review examines three mechanisms that play an important role in discouraging pro-environmental behaviours, but which can also provide effective solutions for collective action.
In a series of 10 studies, we find that people are more likely to make virtuous decisions on paper than on a digital device because they perceive choices on paper as more real (i.e., tangible, actual, and belonging to the physical rather than the virtual world) and hence as more self-diagnostic (i.e., representative of who they are). We first show people express more interest in donating and volunteering (Studies 1a and 1b), are more likely to donate (Study 2), and put more effort into helping a charitable cause (Study 3) when these choices occur on paper (versus tablet)—a pattern of decision making we label the good-on-paper effect.
Study 4 extends these findings to book choices (highbrow versus lowbrow) and to a device interaction that closely mimics writing on paper (i.e., tablet with digital pen). In the context of volunteering decisions, we then provide evidence for the sequential mediating roles of perceptions of realness and self-diagnosticity in the good-on-paper effect (Study 5 and Studies 6a and 6b). Finally, we show that chronic (Study 7) and situational (Study 8) perceptions of self-diagnosticity moderate this effect in the contexts of environmental protection and food choices (healthy versus indulgent), respectively. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.
See Habit Weekly’s jobs board for behavioral science job opportunities
See the Effective Thesis website for coaching, research and supervision opportunities
🗓 Events
EAecon Retreat 2022 [July 4-5, 2022], a 30-person retreat for facilitating connections between EA economists of all levels. Applications are open until Sunday, June 12th, 2022.
What is your background? Hello! I am a PhD candidate in Management & Organizations (MORS) at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. I have also received a Bachelor’s of Science from The Ohio State University in Social Psychology, a Master’s of Arts in Social Science from the University of Chicago, and a Master’s of Science in Management and Organizations from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.
What is your research area?
Moral psychology and organization science
What are you planning to focus on in the future? My research focuses on the following topics, in no particular order: 1. The psychological and cultural processes of moralization 2. Antecedents and impediments to effective, longterm, and habitual prosocial/charitable behavior 3. The psychology of charitable receiving and the psychology of suffering 4. Empirical global priorities research
Do you want help or collaborators, if so who?
Anyone interested in these research topics; especially those who have the bandwidth to lead projects. I’m also interested in learning from qualitative and big data social scientists, so if that’s you please reach out!
The EA Behavioral Science Newsletter #5 (June 2022)
We have just released the fifth edition of the EA Behavioral Science Newsletter.
Each newsletter curates papers, forum posts, reports, podcasts, resources, funding opportunities, events, jobs and research profiles that are relevant to the effective altruism and behavioral science community.
We have ~450 subscribers, and attract ~35 new subscribers per month.
You can read the newsletter in your browser or below.
Subscribe here.
June 2022
Psychologists for EA Facebook group
Researcher directory and Slack [researchers only]
Subscribe to the newsletter
Suggest feedback or content
Volunteer to support the newsletter
📖 Eighteen publications
📝 Five preprints & articles
💬 Thirteen forum posts
🎧/🎦 Five podcasts/videos
💰 Three funding opportunities
💼 One job
🗓 One event
👨🔬 Samantha Kassirer profiled
Humans first: Why people value animals less than humans
Lucius Caviola, Stefan Schubert, Guy Kahane & Nadira S. Faber
Cognition (2022)
---
People routinely give humans moral priority over other animals. Is such moral anthropocentrism based in perceived differences in mental capacity between humans and non-humans or merely because humans favor other members of their own species? We investigated this question in six studies (N = 2217). We found that most participants prioritized humans over animals even when the animals were described as having equal or more advanced mental capacities than the humans. This applied to both mental capacity at the level of specific individuals (Studies 1a-b) and at the level typical for the respective species (Study 2). The key driver behind moral anthropocentrism was thus mere species-membership (speciesism). However, all else equal, participants still gave more moral weight to individuals with higher mental capacities (individual mental capacity principle), suggesting that the belief that humans have higher mental capacities than animals is part of the reason that they give humans moral priority.
Notably, participants found mental capacity more important for animals than for humans—a tendency which can itself be regarded as speciesist. We also explored possible sub-factors driving speciesism. We found that many participants judged that all individuals (not only humans) should prioritize members of their own species over members of other species (species-relativism; Studies 3a-b). However, some participants also exhibited a tendency to see humans as having superior value in an absolute sense (pro-human species-absolutism, Studies 3–4). Overall, our work demonstrates that speciesism plays a central role in explaining moral anthropocentrism and may be itself divided into multiple sub-factors.
Leveraging social cognition to promote effective climate change mitigation
Mélusine Boon-Falleur, Aurore Grandin, Nicolas Baumard & Coralie Chevallier
Nature Climate Change (2022)
---
Effective climate change mitigation is a social dilemma: the benefits are shared collectively but the costs are often private. To solve this dilemma, we argue that we must pay close attention to the nature and workings of human cooperation. We review three social cognition mechanisms that regulate cooperation: norm detection, reputation management and fairness computation. We show that each of these cognitive mechanisms can stand in the way of pro-environmental behaviours and limit the impact of environmental policies.
At the same time, the very same mechanisms can be leveraged as powerful solutions for an effective climate change mitigation. Human cooperation, which is essential for climate action, is shaped by the social cognition of individuals. This Review examines three mechanisms that play an important role in discouraging pro-environmental behaviours, but which can also provide effective solutions for collective action.
The Good-on-Paper Effect: How the Decision Context Influences Virtuous Behavior
Maferima Touré-Tillery & Lili Wang
Marketing Science (2022)
---
In a series of 10 studies, we find that people are more likely to make virtuous decisions on paper than on a digital device because they perceive choices on paper as more real (i.e., tangible, actual, and belonging to the physical rather than the virtual world) and hence as more self-diagnostic (i.e., representative of who they are). We first show people express more interest in donating and volunteering (Studies 1a and 1b), are more likely to donate (Study 2), and put more effort into helping a charitable cause (Study 3) when these choices occur on paper (versus tablet)—a pattern of decision making we label the good-on-paper effect.
Study 4 extends these findings to book choices (highbrow versus lowbrow) and to a device interaction that closely mimics writing on paper (i.e., tablet with digital pen). In the context of volunteering decisions, we then provide evidence for the sequential mediating roles of perceptions of realness and self-diagnosticity in the good-on-paper effect (Study 5 and Studies 6a and 6b). Finally, we show that chronic (Study 7) and situational (Study 8) perceptions of self-diagnosticity moderate this effect in the contexts of environmental protection and food choices (healthy versus indulgent), respectively. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.
Other publications
What Works to Increase Charitable Donations? A Meta-Review with Meta-Meta-Analysis. Alexander K. Saeri et al., Voluntas (2022)
The Development of Speciesism: Age-Related Differences in the Moral View of Animal. Luke McGuire, Sally B. Palmer & Nadira S. Faber, Social Psychological and Personality Science (2022)
Empathy Modulates the Effect of Stress Reactivity on Generous Giving. Hagar Azulay, Nitzan Guy, Y. Pertzov, S. Israel, Frontiers in Neuroscience (2022)
It’s Time to be disgusting about COVID-19: Effect of disgust priming on COVID-19 public health compliance among liberals and conservatives. Kellen Mermin-Bunnell & Woo-kyoung Ahn, Plos One (2022)
Empathy at the Gates: Reassessing Its Role in Moral Decision Making. Afreen S. Khalid & Stephan Dickert, Frontiers in Psychology (2022).
Does a Low-Cost Act of Support Produce Slacktivism or Commitment? Prosocial and Impression-Management Motives as Moderators. L. S. Moussaoui, J. Blondé, Tiffanie Phung, Kim Marine Tschopp, O. Desrichard, Frontiers in Psychology (2022)
Reduced helping intentions are better explained by the attribution of antisocial emotions than by ‘infrahumanization’. Florence E. Enock & Harriet Over, Scientific Reports (2022)
Material Benefits Crowd Out Moralistic Punishment. Tage S. Rai, Psychological Science (2022)
Altruism under Stress: Cortisol Negatively Predicts Charitable Giving and Neural Value Representations Depending on Mentalizing Capacity. Stefan Schulreich, Anita Tusche, Philipp Kanske and Lars Schwabe, Journal of Neuroscience (2022)
Improving human decision-making by discovering efficient strategies for hierarchical planning. Saksham Consul, Lovis Heindrich, Jugoslav Stojcheski & Falk Lieder, Computational Brain & Behavior (2022)
The Relationship Between Prosociality, Meaning, and Happiness in Everyday Life. Brodie C. Dakin, Nicholas P. Tan, Tamlin S. Conner & Brock Bastian, Journal of Happiness Studies (2022)
Leveraging artificial intelligence to improve people’s planning strategies. Frederick Callaway, Yash, Raj Jain, Bas van Opheusden, Priyam Das Gabriela Iwama, Sayan Gul, Paul M. Krueger, Frederic Becker, Thomas L. Griffiths, and Falk Lieder, PNAS (2022)
Empathic choices for animals versus humans: the role of choice context and perceived cost. C. Daryl Cameron, Michael L. Lengieza, Eliana Hadjiandreou, Janet K. Swim & Robert M. Chiles, Journal of Social Psychology (2022)
Causal evidence of the roles of the prefrontal and occipital cortices in modulating the impact of color on moral judgement. Tian Gan, Yuqi Zhang, Dandan Song, Yan Zheng & Donel M. Martin, Neuropsychologia (2022)
The origins and psychology of human cooperation. J Henrich, M Muthukrishna, Annual Review of Psychology (2021)
Rethinking Government Capacities to Tackle Wicked Problems: Mind, Emotion, Bias and Decision-Making. An Experimental Trial using Mindfulness and Behavioural Economics. Rachel Lilley (2020)
Human behavior makes more sense when you understand “Anchor Beliefs”. Spencer Greenberg (2022)
Ten theories for how to achieve true happiness. Spencer Greenberg (2022)
Planting Seeds: The Impact Of Diet & Different Animal Advocacy Tactics. Faunalytics/Andrea Polanco (2022)
Animals Feel What’s Right and Wrong, Too. Nautlius/James Hutton (2022)
Most students who would agree with EA ideas haven’t heard of EA yet (results of a large-scale survey). Lucius Caviola, Erin Morrissey & Joshua Lewis
How many people have heard of effective altruism? David Moss & Jamie Elsey
Introducing EAecon: Community-Building Project. Brian Jabarian
Donating money, buying happiness. Michael Plant & Joel McGuire/Happier Lives Institute
Distillation and research debt. Lizka Vaintrob
Potential strategies for improving EA-related research distillation, recruitment, and pedagogy. Katrina
Happier Lives Institute: 2021 Annual Review. Barry Grimes & Michael Plant/Happier Lives Institute
Initial research on social movements & protest. James Ozden & Sam Glover
What interventions influence animal-product consumption? Plain-language summary of a meta-review, Emily Grundy/Ready Research
Giving What We Can—Pledge page trial (EA Market Testing), David Reinstein, Luke Freeman, Julian Hazell & Grace Adams
Transcripts of interviews with AI researchers, Vael Gates
New study on whether animal welfare reforms affect wider attitudes towards animals, Jamie Harris
Data Publication for the 2021 Artificial Intelligence, Morality, and Sentience (AIMS) Survey, Janet Pauketat
Chris Blattman on the five reasons wars happen. 80,000 Hours
Cognitive biases and animal welfare. Spencer Greenberg with Leah Edgerton
The State of Aquatic Animal Advocacy. EAG London
Presenting big ideas & complex data to the public. EAG London
What is Effective Altruism? [& why people tend to be so ineffective when giving to charity] Buddy Shah & Bastian Jaeger interviewed by Tim Dowling
Open Philanthropy is funding academics for the development of EA-adjacent university courses and providing early-career funding for individuals interested in improving the long-term future
A list of EA funding opportunities by Michael Aird
The FTX Future Fund is funding a range of research opportunities
See EA funds for other opportunities
Research Scientist, Cognitive Science, Scalable Alignment at DeepMind
See the EA internship board for volunteering and internship opportunities
See the 80000 Hours Job board, and the Effective Altruism Job Postings Facebook group for EA job opportunities
See Habit Weekly’s jobs board for behavioral science job opportunities
See the Effective Thesis website for coaching, research and supervision opportunities
EAecon Retreat 2022 [July 4-5, 2022], a 30-person retreat for facilitating connections between EA economists of all levels. Applications are open until Sunday, June 12th, 2022.
See EA global for future events
What is your background?
Hello! I am a PhD candidate in Management & Organizations (MORS) at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. I have also received a Bachelor’s of Science from The Ohio State University in Social Psychology, a Master’s of Arts in Social Science from the University of Chicago, and a Master’s of Science in Management and Organizations from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.
What is your research area?
Moral psychology and organization science
What are you planning to focus on in the future?
My research focuses on the following topics, in no particular order:
1. The psychological and cultural processes of moralization
2. Antecedents and impediments to effective, longterm, and habitual prosocial/charitable behavior
3. The psychology of charitable receiving and the psychology of suffering
4. Empirical global priorities research
Do you want help or collaborators, if so who?
Anyone interested in these research topics; especially those who have the bandwidth to lead projects. I’m also interested in learning from qualitative and big data social scientists, so if that’s you please reach out!
Do you want to share some of your work?
Decisional autonomy undermines advisees’ judgments
of experts in medicine and in life
People Are Slow to Adapt to the Warm Glow of Giving
Presentation: Donating or Volunteering: Which altruism feels more effective?
[You can contact Samantha at samantha.kassirer@gmail.com]
---
Want to be profiled? Submit a profile here
Psychologists for EA Facebook group
Researcher directory and Slack [researchers only]
Subscribe to the newsletter
Suggest feedback or content
Volunteer to support the newsletter
Creators:
Peter with help from Kai
--
Previous editions:
1, 2, 3, 4