Applying the SOR framework to mitigate single-use plastic tableware consumption and why does it work? Solving the dissonance with an extended SOR framework.

Although plastic pollution is a critical environmental issue worldwide and household consumption of single-use plastic tableware (SUPT) is a growing concern, research on the determinants of SUPT use is deficient. In light of the prevalent and frequent use of SUPT, the far-reaching nature of its consumption, and its distinctive health concerns, compounded by the lack of dedicated regulations, this article sheds light on the SUPT problem and strives to minimize SUPT consumption. The Stimulus-Organism-Response (SOR) framework has been extensively applied in various contexts but not yet in the context of household SUPT consumption. In this study, we aim to fill the lacuna by examining the motives behind SUPT consumption using two online questionnaires in two Western countries that are known for relatively high domestic SUPT consumption: Israel (Study 1, n = 408) and the USA (Study 2, n = 295). Our findings indicate that personal attitudes toward the plastic problem ("organism" in the SOR taxonomy) mediate the relation between plastic health problem awareness ("stimulus") and SUPT consumption ("response"). Moreover, we identified perceived behavioral control (PBC) as a significant predictor of behavior when behavior is not under volitional control (i.e., an action against the individual's self-interest), as in the SUPT context. Therefore, we propose expanding the SOR framework with the organism comprising attitude and PBC, thus supporting the dissonance theory (double mediation). We suggest that modifying personal attitudes toward the plastic problem by enhancing plastic health problem awareness may strengthen PBC and reduce SUPT consumption. Overall, this study deepens our understanding of SUPT consumption by highlighting the importance of attitude and PBC as mechanisms that link awareness to sustainable behavior.

Inducing collective action intentions for healthcare reform through medical crowdfunding framing.

As a response to the shortcomings of the U.S. healthcare system, Americans are increasingly turning to crowdfunding platforms to bankroll their health-related costs. However, although medical crowdfunding has rapidly become institutionalized as part of the U.S. healthcare financing landscape, empirical evidence on how Americans perceive its role in healthcare and the impact it might have on public attitudes is scarce. To shed more light on the above, we analyze data from one correlational and one experimental study conducted over September-November 2021. Our correlational study reveals that political orientation is associated with Americans' views on medical crowdfunding. Specifically, we find that those who self-identified as conservative perceived medical crowdfunding as a valid part of the system, and more positively than a universal healthcare system. In contrast, medical crowdfunding is perceived less positively, as hindering a system of universal and affordable healthcare by those more liberally-oriented. In our experimental study, we explore how medical crowdfunding narratives can induce social attitudes conducive to change. Specifically, we test the effect of politicized narratives (vs. control) on group efficacy and subsequently on collective action intentions for healthcare reform, as a function of political orientation. Our results show that politicized narratives might induce collective action intentions through higher group efficacy, but only among those who self-identified as conservative. Liberally-oriented individuals held high collective action intentions for healthcare reform and were not affected by the manipulation. Our work is the first to establish empirically that medical crowdfunding, when employing politicized narratives, can induce collective action intentions, but this effect is moderated by political ideology.

Political orientation, trust and discriminatory beliefs during the COVID-19 pandemic: Longitudinal evidence from the United Kingdom.

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the world in many ways; for example, evidence from the United Kingdom indicates that higher rates of discriminatory behaviours against immigrants have been recorded during this period. Prior research suggests that political orientation and trust are instrumental in discriminatory beliefs against immigrants. A longitudinal study (six waves and a follow-up) was conducted in the United Kingdom during the COVID-19 pandemic (September 2020-August 2021) using convenience sampling (N = 383). The hypotheses enquired about whether political orientation predicts trust in government, trust in science and discriminatory beliefs. Multilevel regression and mediation analyses were conducted, using repeated measures nested within individuals. It was found that conservative views are associated with higher discriminatory beliefs, lower trust in science and higher trust in government. Furthermore, trust in science promotes reduction of discrimination, whereas trust in government, increases discriminatory beliefs. However, a nuance revealed by an interaction effect, shows that a positive alignment between political and scientific authorities may be required to reduce prejudice against immigrants. Exploratory multilevel mediation showed that trust is a mediator between political orientation and discriminatory beliefs.

Young generations' hopelessness perpetuates long-term conflicts.

Transforming long-term conflicts into peaceful intergroup relations is one of the most difficult challenges for humanity. Such meaningful social changes are often driven by young people. But do young people living in contexts of long-term conflicts believe that change is even possible? In a series of six studies (Ntotal = 119,671) over two decades and across two unrelated intractable conflicts in Israel/Palestine and Cyprus, we found that younger (compared to older) generations from both respective rival groups have less hope for peace, and consequently less conciliatory attitudes. We also show that this gradual improvement of peace-promoting emotions and attitudes with increasing age can be experimentally accelerated in young people through a virtual reality-based aging simulation. These findings provide a new perspective on the fundamental question of why long-term conflicts are so difficult to resolve and highlight the importance of instilling hope in young generations to advance peace processes.

A Game-Theory-Based Approach to Promoting Health Policy among Minorities.

The importance of designing policy measures that government and other public bodies apply to different populations has been escalating in recent decades. This study seeks the best way to induce conservative minority groups to cooperate with healthcare policy. The case study focuses on the Bedouin population of Israel and its willingness to accept COVID-19 vaccination. The study is based on vaccination data from the Israel Ministry of Health for the country's entire Bedouin population, twenty-four semi-structured in-depth interviews with relevant key stakeholders, and the use of game-theory tools to profile the players, the utility functions, and various equilibrium combinations. By comparing the groups and integrating game-theory tools into the process, we reveal variables that may affect healthcare processes among conservative minority communities. Finally, cross-tabulating the results with the interview findings strengthens the insights and allows a culturally adjusted policy to be adopted. The different starting points of different minority populations have implications for the design of requisite policies in both the short and the long terms. The analysis of the game allowed us to indicate the strategy that policymakers should adopt in consideration of variables that should be taken into account in order to improve cooperation and the ability to apply policy. To increase vaccination rates among conservative minority communities in general and the Bedouin population in particular, trust in the government must be increased in the long term. In the short term, trust in the medical profession must be increased, and also health literacy.

Induced gratitude and hope, and experienced fear, but not experienced disgust, facilitate COVID-19 prevention.

Hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust may all be key to encouraging preventative action in the context of COVID-19. We pre-registered a longitudinal experiment, which involved monthly data collections from September 2020 to September 2021 and a six-month follow-up. We predicted that a hope recall task would reduce negative emotions and elicit higher intentions to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours. At the first time point, participants were randomly allocated to a recall task condition (gratitude, hope, or control). At each time point, we measured willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours, as well as experienced hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust. We then conducted a separate, follow-up study in February 2022, to see if the effects replicated when COVID-19 restrictions were relaxed in the UK. In the main study, contrary to our pre-registered hypothesis, we found that a gratitude recall task elicited more willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours in comparison to the neutral recall task. We also found that experienced gratitude, hope, and fear were positively related to preventative action, while disgust was negatively related. These results present advancement of knowledge of the role of specific emotions in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Meh, whatever: The effects of indifference expressions on cooperation in social conflict.

Conflicts are inherently emotional, yet parties in conflict may choose to explicitly express indifference. It is unclear, however, whether this represents an effective strategy. Drawing on emotions as social information (EASI) theory, we examined the interpersonal effects of indifference expressions in conflict and the processes that underlie these effects. Study 1 indicated that people believe indifference expressions constitute a neutral emotional signal. However, Study 2 demonstrated experimentally that counterparts' indifference expressions reduce focal negotiators' cooperative intentions through both affective (negative affective reactions) and inferential (decreased expected collaboration) processes when compared to negative (anger, contempt), positive (hope), and neutral (no emotion) expressions. Study 3 revealed negative effects of indifference (vs. neutral) expressions on cooperative intentions, expected collaboration, and heart rate variability as a physiological indicator of affective responding. Results further showed an indirect effect through expected collaboration, but not through affective reactions. Study 4 established the negative effects of indifference expressions on a behavioral measure of cooperation through expected collaboration. Studies 5 and 6 (preregistered) demonstrated that the impact of indifference expressions on cooperative intentions (Study 5) and actual cooperation (Study 6) via counterpart's expected collaboration is reduced when a counterpart explicitly indicates cooperative intentions, reducing the diagnostic value of indifference expressions. Across studies (N = 2,447), multiple expressive modalities of indifference were used, including verbal and nonverbal expressions. Findings demonstrate that explicit expressions of indifference have qualitatively different interpersonal effects than other emotional expressions, including neutral expressions, and cast doubt on the effectiveness of expressing indifference in negotiating social conflict. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Quick cell-free DNA testing for the prediction of postconcussion syndrome: a single-center prospective pilot trial.

OBJECTIVE: Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is a major cause of emergency room (ER) admission. Thirty percent of mTBI patients have postconcussion syndrome (PCS), and 15% have symptoms for over a year. This population is underdiagnosed and does not receive appropriate care. The authors proposed a fast and inexpensive fluorometric measurement of circulating cell-free DNA (cfDNA) as a biomarker for PCS. cfDNA is a proven, useful marker of a variety of acute pathological conditions such as trauma and acute illness. METHODS: Thirty mTBI patients were recruited for this prospective single-center trial. At admission, patients completed questionnaires and blood was drawn to obtain cfDNA. At 3-4 months after injury, 18 patients returned for cognitive assessments with questionnaires and the Color Trails Test (CTT). The fast SYBR Gold assay was used to measure cfDNA. RESULTS: Seventeen men and 13 women participated in this trial. The mean ± SD age was 50.9 ± 13.9 years. Of the 18 patients who returned for cognitive assessment, one-third reported working fewer hours, 4 (22.2%) changed their driving patterns, and 5 (27.7%) reduced or stopped performing physical activity. The median cfDNA level of the mTBI group was greater than that of the matched healthy control group (730.5 vs 521.5 ng/ml, p = 0.0395). Admission cfDNA concentration was negatively correlated with performance on the CTT1 and CTT2 standardized tests (r = -0.559 and -0.599), meaning that greater cfDNA level was correlated with decreased cognitive performance status. The performance of the patients with normal cfDNA level included in the mTBI group was similar to that of the healthy participants. In contrast, the increased cfDNA group (> 800 ng/ml) had lower scores on the CTT tests than the normal cfDNA group (p < 0.001). Furthermore, patients with moderate/severe cognitive impairment according to CTT1 results had a greater median cfDNA level than the patients with scores indicating mild impairment or normal function (1186 vs 473.5 ng/ml, p = 0.0441, area under the receiver operating characteristic curve = 0.8393). CONCLUSIONS: The data from this pilot study show the potential to use cfDNA, as measured with a fast test, as a biomarker to screen for PCS in the ER. A large-scale study is required to establish the value of cfDNA as an early predictor of PCS.

Neuropsychological assessments and cognitive profile mostly associated with shunt surgery in idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus patients: diagnostic and predictive parameters and practical implications.

BACKGROUND: Cognitive decline is a well-documented feature of idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus (iNPH) that can be reversible following cerebrospinal fluid tap tests (CSF-TT). The current gold standard for selecting iNPH patients for shunt surgery is measurable improvement in gait tests following CSF-TT. However, the diagnostic significance and predictive role of pre-surgical cognitive evaluations in probable iNPH patients is still controversial. PURPOSE: To find the neuropsychological (NPSY) tests and cognitive aspects mostly associated with shunt surgery in iNPH. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A retrospective comparison between probable iNPH patients who, after undergoing CSF-TT with gait and cognitive evaluations, ended up receiving a shunt (group 1) and probable iNPH patients who ended up with no shunt surgery (group 2). Differences in the diagnostic and predictive results of variety of NPSY tests at baseline, pre-CSF-TT, and post-CSF-TT were used for thorough statistical calculations. RESULTS: A total of 147 patients with probable iNPH were included. Of those, 58 (39.45%, group 1) patients underwent shunt surgery, while 89 (60.55%, group 2) did not. For the vast majority of the cognitive tests used, no statistically significant differences were found between the groups at baseline (pre-CSF-TT). Following CSF-TT, the "naming" component of the Cognistat test was the only single test to show statically significant difference in improvement between the two groups. Combining at least two tests led to increased levels of accuracy and specificity; however, the sensitivity remained < 50. The only two combinations that were associated with sensitivity ≥ 70 were either any improvement in the Cognistat test (p = 0.627) or any improvement in either its naming, memory, or judgment components (p = 0.015). CONCLUSION: Cognitive tests, even when combined to cover several cognitive aspects, are not sensitive enough to act as an independent reliable diagnostic and predictive tool, especially when relying on their scores as baseline. In order to avoid cumbersome and unnecessary tests to our patients and to reduce the number of patients who are denied proper treatment due to misdiagnosis, we recommend to use NPSY tests that examine the cognitive aspects of naming and memory, in addition to 2-3 tests for executive functions.

Trust between municipality and residents: A game-theory model for municipal solid-waste recycling efficiency.

Efficient and sustainable municipal solid-waste management is a social, environmental, and economic challenge. One practice that enhances the success of municipal solid-waste management is building and operating a household separation at source infrastructure for recycling. In this study, we use game-theory tools to identify difficulties that a municipality and its residents face in building and operating infrastructure for recycling under the Extended Producer Responsibility law. The model presents a holistic and broad perspective on the social and economic parameters that affect the efficiency of recycling in a municipality. We explain the strategies available to players and the factors affecting the utilities gained by waste separation and recycling. We present several Nash equilibria in pure and mixed strategies and specify the coordination game conditions. The model identifies parameters and their effect on the decision to recycle. The study presents changes needed to streamline a recycling system for an efficient equilibrium.

Direct Assembly in Aqueous Solutions of Stable Chlorophyllide Complexes with Type II Water-soluble Chlorophyll Proteins.

Water-soluble chlorophyll-binding proteins (WSCPs) from Brassicaceae constitute a small family of non-photosynthetic proteins that may provide a useful benchmark and model system for studying molecular aspects of chlorophyll-protein interactions such as the tuning of absorption and emission spectra, and binding selectivity. WSCP apo-proteins are readily expressed by recombinant DNA techniques and can be assembled in vitro with natural and synthetic chlorophyll derivatives. The complexes with native chlorophylls are exceptionally stable toward thermal dissociation and protein denaturation due to hydrophobic interactions with the chlorophyll's phytyl chains that stabilize the core of the WSCP tetrameric complexes. However, assembly requires the use of detergents or water-in-oil emulsions to introduce the hydrophobic pigments into the water-soluble apo-proteins. Here, we explore the direct assembly of recombinant WSCPs with the water-soluble phytyl-free chlorophyll analogue chlorophyllide a in aqueous solutions. We show that the complexes formed by mixing chlorophyllide and WSCP apo-proteins are exclusively tetrameric, and while they lack the extreme thermostability of the respective chlorophyll complexes, they are still thermostable up to around 60°C. Their absorption and CD spectra are very similar to the chlorophyll complexes albeit slight peak shifts and broadening of the bands indicate variations in pigment and protein conformations, and less rigid structures. Simplifying the assembly process of WSCPs opens new possibilities for their use in modelling natural chlorophyll-protein complexes, and as templates for designing novel artificial protein-pigment complexes.

Sexual addiction, compulsivity, and impulsivity among a predominantly female sample of adults who use the internet for sex.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Compulsive sexual behavior is characterized by extensive sexual behavior and unsuccessful efforts to control excessive sexual behavior. The aim of the studies was to investigate compulsivity, anxiety and depression and impulsivity and problematic online sexual activities among adult males and females who use the Internet for finding sexual partners and using online pornography. METHODS: Study 1- 177 participants including 143 women M = 32.79 years (SD = 9.52), and 32 men M = 30.18 years (SD = 10.79). The Sexual Addiction Screening Test (SAST), the Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS), Spielberger Trait-State Anxiety Inventory (STAI-T STAI-S) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Study 2- 139 participants including 98 women M = 24 years (SD = 5) and 41 men M = 25 years (SD = 4). The impulsivity questionnaire (BIS/BAS), Problematic online sexual activities (s-IAT-sex) and Sexual Addiction Screening Test (SAST). RESULTS: Study 1- Multiple regression analysis has indicated that a model which included BDI, Y-BOCS, and STAI scores contributed to the variance of sexual addiction rates, and explained 33.3% of the variance. Study 2- Multiple regression analysis indicated that BIS/BAS and s-IAT scores contributed to the variance of sexual addiction rates, and explained 33% of the variance. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: Obsessive-compulsive symptoms contributed to sexual addiction among individuals who use the Internet for finding sexual partners. Impulsivity and problematic online sexual activity contributed to ratings of sex addiction. These studies support the argument that sex addiction lies on the impulsive-compulsive scale and could be classified as a behavioral addiction.

Implementation and Benefits of a Vendor-Neutral Archive and Enterprise-Imaging Management System in an Integrated Delivery Network.

The use of digital imaging has substantially grown in recent decades, in traditional services, new specialties, and departments. The need to share these data among departments and caregivers necessitated central archiving systems that are able to communicate with various viewing applications and electronic medical records. This promoted the development of modern vendor neutral archive (VNA) systems. The need to aggregate and share imaging data from various departments promoted the development of enterprise-imaging (EI) solutions that replace departmental silos of data with central healthcare enterprise databases. To describe the implementation process of a VNA-EI solution in a large health system and its outcomes. We review the background of VNA and EI solutions development and describe the characteristics and advantages of such systems. We then describe our experience in implementation of these solutions in a large integrated healthcare delivery network in northeast Ohio. We then present the process, challenges, costs, advantages, and outcomes of such implementation. The VNA and EI solution was launched in December 2015 and is still ongoing. It currently includes 54 radiology and 26 cardiology sites affiliated with the University Hospitals health system. This process was associated with more than 10% cost savings, 30% reduction in storage costs, superior support for disaster recovery, and 80% decrease in unscheduled outages. All these were achieved despite a 120% increase in archive retrieval needs and a 40% growth in image production. Implementation of a VNA and EI solution was successful and resulted in numerous measurable and qualitative improvements in a large and growing health system.

Salient experiences are represented by unique transcriptional signatures in the mouse brain.

It is well established that inducible transcription is essential for the consolidation of salient experiences into long-term memory. However, whether inducible transcription relays information about the identity and affective attributes of the experience being encoded, has not been explored. To this end, we analyzed transcription induced by a variety of rewarding and aversive experiences, across multiple brain regions. Our results describe the existence of robust transcriptional signatures uniquely representing distinct experiences, enabling near-perfect decoding of recent experiences. Furthermore, experiences with shared attributes display commonalities in their transcriptional signatures, exemplified in the representation of valence, habituation and reinforcement. This study introduces the concept of a neural transcriptional code, which represents the encoding of experiences in the mouse brain. This code is comprised of distinct transcriptional signatures that correlate to attributes of the experiences that are being committed to long-term memory.

Testing the impact and durability of a group malleability intervention in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Fostering perceptions of group malleability (teaching people that groups are capable of change and improvement) has been shown to lead to short-term improvements in intergroup attitudes and willingness to make concessions in intractable conflicts. The present study, a field intervention involving 508 Israelis from three locations in Israel, replicated and substantially extended those findings by testing the durability of a group malleability intervention during a 6-month period of frequent violence. Three different 5-hour-long interventions were administered as leadership workshops. The group malleability intervention was compared with a neutral coping intervention and, importantly, with a state-of-the-art perspective-taking intervention. The group malleability intervention proved superior to the coping intervention in improving attitudes, hope, and willingness to make concessions, and maintained this advantage during a 6-month period of intense intergroup conflict. Moreover, it was as good as, and in some respects superior to, the perspective-taking intervention. These findings provide a naturalistic examination of the potential of group malleability interventions to increase openness to conflict resolution.

Disappointment expression evokes collective guilt and collective action in intergroup conflict: the moderating role of legitimacy perceptions.

Research on intergroup emotions has largely focused on the experience of emotions and surprisingly little attention has been given to the expression of emotions. Drawing on the social-functional approach to emotions, we argue that in the context of intergroup conflicts, outgroup members' expression of disappointment with one's ingroup induces the complementary emotion of collective guilt and correspondingly a collective action protesting ingroup actions against the outgroup. In Study 1 conducted immediately after the 2014 Gaza war, Jewish-Israeli participants received information about outgroup's (Palestinians) expression of emotions (disappointment, fear, or none). As predicted, outgroup's expression of disappointment increased collective guilt and willingness to participate in collective action, but only among those who saw the intergroup situation as illegitimate. Moreover, collective guilt mediated the relationship between disappointment expression and collective action, moderated, again, by legitimacy perception. In Study 2, we replicated these results in the context of racial tension between Black and White Americans in the US. We discuss the theoretical and applied implications of the findings.

Belief in the malleability of groups strengthens the tenuous link between a collective apology and intergroup forgiveness.

Although it is widely assumed that collective apologies for intergroup harms facilitate forgiveness, evidence for a strong link between the two remains elusive. In four studies we tested the proposition that the apology-forgiveness link exists, but only among people who hold an implicit belief that groups can change. In Studies 1 and 2, perceived group malleability (measured and manipulated, respectively) moderated the responses to an apology by Palestinian leadership toward Israelis: Positive responses such as forgiveness increased with greater belief in group malleability. In Study 3, university students who believed in group malleability were more forgiving of a rival university's derogatory comments in the presence (as opposed to the absence) of an apology. In Study 4, perceived perpetrator group remorse mediated the moderating effect of group malleability on the apology-forgiveness link (assessed in the context of a corporate transgression). Implications for collective apologies and movement toward reconciliation are discussed.

Perceptions of a changing world induce hope and promote peace in intractable conflicts.

The importance of hope in promoting conciliatory attitudes has been asserted in the field of conflict resolution. However, little is known about conditions inducing hope, especially in intractable conflicts, where reference to the outgroup may backfire. In the current research, five studies yielded convergent support for the hypothesis that hope for peace stems from a general perception of the world as changing. In Study 1, coders observed associations between belief in a changing world, hope regarding peace, and support for concessions. Study 2 revealed the hypothesized relations using self-reported measures. Studies 3 and 4 established causality by instilling a perception of the world as changing (vs. unchanging) using narrative and drawing manipulations. Study 5 compared the changing world message with a control condition during conflict escalation. Across studies, although the specific context was not referred to, the belief in a changing world increased support for concessions through hope for peace.

Automated volumetric analysis of four cardiac chambers in pulmonary embolism: a novel technology for fast risk stratification.

Identification of patients with acute pulmonary embolism (PE) who might be at risk of circulatory collapse by using a fast, automated system is highly desired. It was our objective to investigate whether automated cardiac volumetric analysis following computerised tomographic pulmonary angiography (CTPA) is useful to identify increased clot load and adverse prognosis in patients with acute PE. We retrospectively analysed a consecutive series of non-gated CTPA studies of 124 patients with acute PE and 43 controls. Right and left ventricular diameters (RV/LV) were measured on four-chamber view, while each cardiac chamber underwent automatic volumetric measurements. Findings were correlated to the pulmonary arterial obstruction index (PAOI). Outcome was expressed by admission to an intensive care unit (ICU) or mortality within 30 days. There was a significant positive correlation between the PAOI and the volumes of the right side cavities (r=0.25 for the atrium and r=0.49 for the ventricle), and between the right-to-left atrial and ventricular volume ratios (r=0.49 and r=0.57, respectively). Results for the combined outcome of mortality or ICU admission that fell in the upper tertile of the right atrial and right ventricular volumes yielded hazard ratios of 3.9 and 3.3, respectively, compared to those in the lower tertile. RV/LV diameter ratio did not correlate with outcome. In conclusion, adverse outcome and significant pulmonary clot load in patients with acute PE are associated with a volume shift towards right heart cavities, which correlates to prognosis better than the CT-measured RV/LV diameter ratio, suggesting the advantage of using fast fully automatic volumetric analysis to identify patients at risk.