Personhood
I used to think that we were at a place to incorporate an appreciation of personhood into the design of web software. By adapting to individual Users, software could then point each User to information and other Users without being specifically requested to do so by a User. I’m now of the opinion that in order to bring about what I refer to as Web2.U technologists will first have to learn more about human nature. Note that ‘human nature‘ is a misnomer!Kenneth L. Stein
Until then, because it’s so darn much to effectuate even small change, I’ve put off the ideas for web2.U and have been focusing on the interactive web, developing interactions that occur at a rate that affords the natural flow of emotions for the given interaction. One example is in the form of a posting at my weblog, On Valuing Creative Thinking. Another instantiation is in the form of a game I’m developing with a partner for Facebook.
Additionally, I’ve coded up my site plexAV to serve as a testbed for a technology that I’ve been developing. My goal, “to make apparent to others opportunities they would otherwise have failed to note.”
The Lead: In order for me to ask the following question without violating Google’s policies, I ask that you do not click the ads on any of the sites with which I am affiliated. The sites include:
The Google AdSense Policies :
Don’t ask others to click on Google ads. Users should click on Google ads because they’re interested in the services being advertised. Encouraging users to click on your Google ads, either directly or indirectly, can lead to inflated advertiser costs and can cause your account to be disabled. Encouraging clicks In order to ensure a good experience for users and advertisers, publishers may not request that users click the ads on their sites or rely on deceptive implementation methods to obtain clicks. Publishers participating in the AdSense program:
- May not encourage users to click the Google ads by using phrases such as “click the ads,” “support us,” “visit these links,” or other similar language.
The Google Terms and Conditions :
Prohibited Uses. You shall not, and shall not authorize or encourage any third party to: (i) directly or indirectly generate queries, Referral Events, or impressions of or clicks on any Ad, Link, Search Result, or Referral Button through any automated, deceptive, fraudulent or other invalid means, including but not limited to through repeated manual clicks, the use of robots or other automated query tools…
The Question : What if each blogger whenever visiting a site or reading an RSS Feed was to find a genuine interest in one ad located on the page, or feed? And, what if the Blogger, motivated by the genuine interest, was to each time click on the one ad located on the page or feed?
The Answer : I envision Blogging becoming a viable way to make a living. I envision Bloggers initiating the “Attention Economy.” I envision a turn towards a cooperation-based marketplace, and away from an exploitation-based marketplace.
The Concept : It becomes customary that a Blogger develops a genuine interest in one of the ads disposed on each site the Blogger visits. Motivated only by such a genuine interest then, the Blogger might click on the ad of interest.
The Follow : If Blogging is to become anything more than modernity’s version of the “town crier,” Bloggers will have to accept that they are collectively to act as agents of change, turning society and humanity towards a cooperative ideal, rather than a standard of exploitation.
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — With more new mothers in the workplace than ever before, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of child-care facilities in the United States.
At the same time, data from a variety of sources point to a growing prevalence of overweight infants and toddlers.
Is there a connection?
According to a new study co-written by University of Illinois community health professor Juhee Kim and Karen Peterson, a professor of nutrition and society at Harvard University’s School of Public Health, child-care factors and feeding practices may indeed play a role.
“Our study is the first to report, to our knowledge … the potential importance of infant child care on infant nutrition and growth,” the researchers said in an article published in the July issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, a publication affiliated with the Journal of the American Medical Association. “The results of this study indicate that structural characteristics of child care, such as age at initiation, type and intensity, were all related to infant feeding practices and weight gain among a representative sample of U.S. infants.”
Specifically, Kim and Peterson found that 9-month-old infants who routinely receive non-parental care – provided by relatives, licensed day-care centers or more informal child-care providers – may experience higher rates of unfavorable feeding practices. The babies also weigh more than those whose primary caregivers are their parents.
The researchers’ findings could have significant public-health ramifications, as weight gain in infancy can ultimately be a predictor of obesity later in life.
Obesity, in turn, is linked to a number of chronic illnesses, such as diabetes and hypertension, as well as adulthood morbidity and mortality.
In their study, Kim and Peterson analyzed baseline data from a nationally representative sample of 8,150 9-month-old infants to determine whether infant-feeding practices and non-parental care might be a factor in the rise in weight of the infants. They used data collected for children enrolled in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort, conducted by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics.
Kim and Peterson found that 55.3 percent of the infants had received regular, non-parental child care, with half of those infants receiving full-time child care. Among babies in child care, 40 percent began receiving such care at age 3 months; 39 percent, between 3 and 5.9 months, and 21 percent at 6 months or older.
“Weight gain and the prevalence of overweight were lowest among infants who received care by parents,” the researchers noted in the published article.
The researchers also examined data regarding breastfeeding initation for babies receiving parental and non-parental care, along with the stage at which solid foods were introduced to the infants. Only starting solid foods before 4 months of age was associated with increased overweight among infants.
“Infants who initiated child care before 3 months of age had lower rates of ever having been breastfed and higher rates of early introduction of solid foods,” they wrote. “Infants in parental care were more likely to have breastfeeding initiated and solid foods introduced after 4 months of age compared with those in child-care settings.”
Further, infants in part-time child care gained more weight – 175 grams – by 9 months of age, compared with those receiving only parental care. Those being cared for by relatives also showed a weight gain – 162 grams.
“A strength of our findings,” the researchers noted, “is that the observed effects of child-care factors remained significant after controlling for maternal pre-pregnancy BMI (body mass index) and a child’s birth weight.”
“Although both factors are known to be strong predictors of childhood overweight status, in our study, only birth weight was a significant factor in weight gain.”
Kim said there are a couple of important take-home messages from their research results for parents and child-care providers.
“Parents may want to have enough communication with child-care providers about when, what and how to feed their babies during their stay in day care, which is important to avoid potential risk of overfeeding or underfeeding at home,” she said.
“Child-care professionals can encourage parents’ active involvement in the decision process of what, when and how to feed infants. Child-care providers also need to participate in nutrition-education/training programs to understand the importance of starting solid foods, transition from breast milk or formula to foods, and how to implement recommended practices to ensure a healthy eating environment.”
Kim hopes to be able investigate relationships among child care, feeding practices and weight gain in children in other parts of the world.
“It would be interesting to conduct a cross-cultural study,” she said. “Considering eating is a socio-economical and cultural event, the impact of child care on infant feeding practices – food consumption – might be different among different countries.”
The current research was supported in part by the Berkowitz Fellowship of the department of nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health; an Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort training grant from the National Center for Education Statistics; and training grants on statistical analysis for education policy from the American Educational Research Association.
Image via WikipediaResearch using fMRI scans shows tendencies toward kindness When a child is shown a photo of someone accidently hurting himself, portions of the brain are activated which are related to pain. Click here for more information.
Children between the ages of seven and 12 appear to be naturally inclined to feel empathy for others in pain, according to researchers at the University of Chicago, who used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) scans to study responses in children.
The responses on the scans were similar to those found in studies of adults. Researchers found that children, like adults, show responses to pain in the same areas of their brains. The research also found additional aspects of the brain activated in children, when youngsters saw another person intentionally hurt by another individual.
“This study is the first to examine in young children both the neural response to pain in others and the impact of someone causing pain to someone else,” said Jean Decety, Professor in the Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Chicago, who reported the findings in the article, “Who Caused the Pain? An fMRI Investigation of Empathy and Intentionality in Children,” published in the currrent issue of Neuropsychologia. Joining him as co-authors were University students Kalina Michalska and Yuko Aktsuki. When a child sees pain intentionally inflicted on another, portions of the brain are activated that are associated with social interaction and moral reasoning in addition to those associated with… Click here for more information.
The programming for empathy is something that is “hard-wired” into the brains of normal children, and not entirely the product of parental guidance or other nurturing, said Decety. Understanding the brain’s role in responding to pain can help researchers understand how brain impairments influence anti-social behavior, such as bullying, he explained.
For their research, the team showed 17 typically developed children, ages seven to 12, animated photos of people experiencing pain, either received accidentally or inflicted intentionally. The group included nine girls and eight boys.
While undergoing fMRI scans, children where shown animations using three photographs of two people whose right hands or right feet only were visible.
The photographs showed people in pain accidently caused, such as when a heavy bowl was dropped on their hands, and situations in which the people were hurt, such as when a person stepped intentionally on someone’s foot. They were also shown pictures without pain and animations in which people helped someone alleviate pain.
The scans showed that the parts of the brain activated when adults see pain were also triggered in children.
“Consistent with previous functional MRI studies of pain empathy with adults, the perception of other people in pain in children was associated with increased hemodymamic activity in the neural circuits involved in the processing of first-hand experience of pain, including the insula, somatosensory cortex, anterior midcigulate cortex, periaqueductal gray and supplementary motor area,” Decety wrote.
However, when the children saw animations of someone intentionally hurt, the regions of the brain engaged in social interaction and moral reasoning (the temporo-parietal junction, the paracigulate, orital medial frontal cortices and amygdala) also were activated.
The study, which was supported by the National Science Foundation, provides new insights for children between childrens’ perceptions of right and wrong and how their brains process information, Decety said. “Although our study did not tap into explicit moral judgment, perceiving an individual intentionally harming another person is likely to elicit the awareness of moral wrongdoing in the observer,” he wrote.
Subsequent interviews with the children showed they were aware of wrong-doing in the animations in which someone was hurt. “Thirteen of the children thought that the situations were unfair, and they asked about the reason that could explain this behavior,” Decety said.
