Research on social influences often distinguishes between social and quality incentives to ascribe meaning to the value that popularity conveys. This study examines the neural correlates of those incentives through which popularity influences preferences. This research reports an functional magnetic resonance imaging experiment and a behavioral task in which respondents evaluated popular products with three focus perspectives; unspecified focus, focus on social aspects, and focus on quality. The results show that value derived with a social focus reflects inferences of approval (...) and reward value, and positively affects preferences. Value derived with a quality focus reflects inferences of quality and negatively affects preferences. This study provides evidence of two distinct inferential routes on both a neurological level, represented by different regions in the brain, and a behavioral level. These results provide the first evidence that a single popularity cue can in different ways influence the value derived from product popularity. (shrink)

There is a growing body of literature on ethical or socially responsible investment across a range of disciplines. This paper highlights the key themes in the field and identifies some of the major theoretical and practical challenges facing both scholars and practitioners. One of these challenges is understanding better the complexity of the relationship between such investment practices and corporate behaviour. Noting that ethical investment is seldom characterised by agreement about what it actully constitutes, and that much of the extant (...) research focuses on a narrow set of issues, the paper argues that there are benefits associated with examining ethical investment as a process. (shrink)

Interest in the notion of the possible financial sacrifice suffered by socially responsible investment (SRI) fund investors for considering ethical, social and environmental issues in their investment decisions has spawned considerable academic interest in the performance of SRI funds. Both the Australian and international research literature have yielded largely mixed results. However, several of these studies are hampered by methodological problems which can obscure the significance of reported results, such as the use of small sample sizes, inconsistencies in the time (...) frames selected to analyse performance and different modelling frameworks used to estimate investment returns. This study attempts to redress some of these issues by investigating the returns performance of 89 ethical funds in Australia over the period 1986-2005. Using a multi-factor CAPM model [Fama, E. F., and K. R. French (1996) J. Finance 51(1), 55] (which controls for factors such as size, book-to-market value and momentum) we find that ethical funds significantly under-perform the market in Australia, particularly in the most recent 5 years of our sample period (2000-2005). Risk adjusted returns (using Jensen's alpha) indicate that average annual underperformance is around 1.52% in the 2000-2005 period for our sample and .88% over the whole sample period. Our results contrast with many previous studies (both Australian and international), which have not found statistically significant differences in the performance of ethical funds relative to market benchmarks and/or a matched sample of conventional funds. (shrink)

The label ‘Translational Research’ (TR) has become ever more popular in the biomedical domain in recent years. It is usually presented as an attempt to bridge a supposed gap between knowledge produced at the lab bench and its use at the clinical bedside. This is claimed to help society harvest the benefits of its investments in scientific research. The rhetorical as well as moral force of the label TR obscure, however, that it is actually used in very different ways. In (...) this paper, we analyse the scientific discourse on TR, with the aim to disentangle and critically evaluate the different meanings of the label. We start with a brief reconstruction of the history of the concept. Subsequently, we unravel how the label is actually used in a sample of scientific publications on TR and examine the presuppositions implied by different views of TR. We argue that it is useful to distinguish different views of TR on the basis of three dimensions, related to (1) the construction of the ‘translational gap’; (2) the model of the translational process; and (3) the cause of the perceived translational gap. We conclude that the motive to make society benefit from its investments in biomedical science may be laudable, but that it is doubtful whether the dominant views of TR will contribute to this end. (shrink)

This article discusses the set of Harsanyi payoff vectors of a cooperative TU-game, also known as the Selectope. We reconsider some results on Harsanyi payoff vectors within a more general framework. First, an intuitive approach is used, showing that the set of Harsanyi payoff vectors is the core of an associated convex game. Next, the set of individual rational Harsanyi payoff vectors, the Harsanyi imputations in short, is considered. Existence conditions are provided, and if non-empty, we provide a description as (...) the core of a well-defined convex game, and show that it is an externally stable set. (shrink)

The stratum-specific treatment effect function is a random variable giving the average treatment effect (ATE) for a randomly drawn stratum of potential confounders a clinician may use to assign treatment. In addition to the ATE, the variance of the stratum-specific treatment effect function is fundamental in determining the heterogeneity of treatment effect values. We offer a non-parametric plug-in estimator, the targeted maximum likelihood estimator (TMLE) and the cross-validated TMLE (CV-TMLE), to simultaneously estimate both the average and variance of the stratum-specific (...) treatment effect function. The CV-TMLE is preferable because it guarantees asymptotic efficiency under two conditions without needing entropy conditions on the initial fits of the outcome model and treatment mechanism, as required by TMLE. Particularly, in circumstances where data adaptive fitting methods are very important to eliminate bias but hold no guarantee of satisfying the entropy condition, we show that the CV-TMLE sampling distributions maintain normality with a lower mean squared error than TMLE. In addition to verifying the theoretical properties of TMLE and CV-TMLE through simulations, we highlight some of the challenges in estimating the variance of the treatment effect, which lack double robustness and might be biased if the true variance is small and sample size insufficient. (shrink)

Often called the first of its kind, Frankenstein paved the way for science fiction writing. Its depiction of a then impossible scientific feat has in our time become possible and is essentially recognizable in what we now refer to as bioengineering, biomedicine, or biotechnology. The fiction of Frankenstein has as it were given way to scientific fact. Of more importance, however, is the challenge Mary Shelley’s novel presents to the ostensibly high-minded and well-intentioned hopes and promises of the scientist/technologist. Finally, (...) the fictional character, Victor Frankenstein, has come to serve as the poster child and whipping boy for all scientific and technological irresponsibility, so much so that thanks to him we are able to free ourselves and our scientists from any real responsibility, since none of us ever would or could be as monstrous as Frankenstein. (shrink)

Drawing on calls by researchers to examine corporate scandals involving potential conflicts of interest or compromise to professional independence involving the actuarial profession, this article outlines one such case. The consulting actuaries – to a large Australian listed company, James Hardie Industries Limited – found themselves advising two parties in a corporate restructuring where the interests of each were sometimes competing and the interests of the public appeared to be ignored. The James Hardie case is instructive in a number of (...) ways: first, it demonstrates the subtlety with which conflicts of interest or pressures on professional independence can arise; second, it demonstrates how important professional issues can be obfuscated by more obvious and pressing financial and strategic issues; and finally it demonstrates that adherence to professional codes of conduct and the ease with which professional ethics can be compromised when those codes are vague and transgressions are rarely actionable. The James Hardie case highlights structural issues in the employment of consulting actuaries which presents risks to the profession. It demonstrates that the combination of an aggressive corporate management with a strategic agenda reliant on consulting actuaries that have a vested interest in promoting and maintaining valuable relationships, both financially and professionally, results in ethical challenges. (shrink)

The Shapley value is the unique value defined on the class of cooperative games in characteristic function form which satisfies certain intuitively reasonable axioms. Alternatively, the Banzhaf value is the unique value satisfying a different set of axioms. The main drawback of the latter value is that it does not satisfy the efficiency axiom, so that the sum of the values assigned to the players does not need to be equal to the worth of the grand coalition. By definition, the (...) normalized Banzhaf value satisfies the efficiency axiom, but not the usual axiom of additivity. (shrink)

Jacques Ellul’s work on propaganda provides the basis for this analysis of life in technology. Advertising and the mass media rely on temptation and seduction and create a constant flow of propaganda, all of which serve the technological system. Propaganda aims to condition and regulate us so that we participate in and adapt ourselves to a desired pattern, specifically an existence adjusted to and in accord with the technological milieu. Technology tempts and seduces us with its promise and provision of (...) comfort, convenience, and efficiency. Above all, technology tempts and seduces us with power: power over nature and over human beings. Naively and paradoxically, we believe we have power over technology, even though it actually has power over us. Our immersion in a sea of temptation and seduction, of constant and total propaganda, may seem inescapable; however, to criticize and challenge the primacy of technology is to reassert our freedom. (shrink)

The Western Tradition has long struggled to define and understand evil, yet definitive answers continue to elude us. So, too, the role of evil in Goethe's Faust remains problematic. With the help of Mephistopheles, Faust acquires a forbidden,,knowledge of good and evil“, evoking the biblical story of the Fall. This study uncovers important layers of meaning in that story and reveals its special and unrecognized significance for Faust.

This essay considers the analysis Jacques Ellul carried out about the devaluation of language. This investigation also explores the consequences of that devaluation (or humiliation as Ellul called it) wrought by our orientation to technology. Our existence in technology transforms language and our use of it, shifting emphasis as well to the visual image. The technological mindset encourages a disregard for language. It entails as well the disuse and misuse of what is perhaps most human about us, language. As language (...) conforms to the technological order, our thought processes, narratives, relationships, freedom, even being human are altered and threatened. (shrink)

A cooperative game with transferable utility–or simply a TU-game– describes a situation in which players can obtain certain payoffs by cooperation. A value function for these games assigns to every TU-game a distribution of payoffs over the players. Well-known solutions for TU-games are the Shapley and the Banzhaf value. An alternative type of solution is the concept of share function, which assigns to every player in a TU-game its share in the worth of the grand coalition. In this paper we (...) consider TU-games in which the players are organized into a coalition structure being a finite partition of the set of players. The Shapley value has been generalized by Owen to TU-games in coalition structure. We redefine this value function as a share function and show that this solution satisfies the multiplication property that the share of a player in some coalition is equal to the product of the Shapley share of the coalition in a game between the coalitions and the Shapley share of the player in a game between the players within the coalition. Analogously we introduce a Banzhaf coalition structure share function. Application of these share functions to simple majority games show some appealing properties. (shrink)

The Internet has become a resource for everyone for everything. It is accordingly now also a source of sermons and much more for pastors of churches in the USA. In consequence, the Internet shapes and alters how pastors and parishioners practice their religion. Because “the medium is the message,” as Marshall McLuhan observed, Internet sermons necessarily reflect and convey something of their Internet source. So, too, the nature and content religious life changes and takes on the characteristics of its new (...) source of inspiration, the Internet. As the dominant expression of technology today, the Internet reveals technology ultimately and in the words of Jacques Ellul as “the real religion of our time.”. (shrink)

Our reception and perception, our experience of music, has been profoundly determined by our technological devices and media. Whatever music we happen to like and listen to, we can hardly experience it today apart from its production and reproduction in and through technology. The effects of technology on making and hearing music require critical analysis. Because of the pervasive role of technology, music today is almost entirely mediated and mediate, almost never unmediated and immediate, almost always “Memorex,” almost never “live.” (...) Music has been severely altered, reduced, even hollowed out. In this respect, music loses something of its reality. (shrink)

Over the years, many movies have presented on-screen a struggle between machines and human beings. Typically, the machines have come to rule and threaten the existence of humanity. They must be conquered to ensure the survival of and to secure the freedom of the human race. Although these movies appear to expose the dangers of an autonomous and hegemonic technology and to champion the human being, they do not. Humans do not in the end triumph over technology but merge with (...) the machine. Instead of liberation from technological domination, the movies in question depict as inevitable the total surrender and absorption of humanity to and into technology. These movies lead to a denial of the true conditions of our existence in technology. Many films could serve to illustrate the problem, but this study focuses on two representative film trilogies: The Terminator and The Matrix. (shrink)

This (by no means exhaustive) survey of Postman’s work reflects on his penetrating analyses of contemporary technology. He focused attention on the ways technology today, especially the television and the computer, inevitably change us. The essential questions he asks us to ask (and answer) are, How does technology affect us? Is it for good or ill? and Must we accept all technological advances? Postman recognized the current dominance and autonomy of technology as well as the concomitant dangers and consequently made (...) the case and the plea for the reassertion of human over technological values. (shrink)

Taking as its point of departure the works of Jacques Ellul, Sven Birkerts, George Steiner, Uwe Poerksen, and others, this article explores the status of language in a technicized civilization. It is argued that language has devolved under the impact of technology, particularly in the dimension of values and ethics. This diagnosis points to the way from which a possible cure may emerge.

We generalize the concept of a cooperative non-transferable utility game by introducing a socially structured game. In a socially structured game every coalition of players can organize themselves according to one or more internal organizations to generate payoffs. Each admissible internal organization on a coalition yields a set of payoffs attainable by the members of this coalition. The strengths of the players within an internal organization depend on the structure of the internal organization and are represented by an exogenously given (...) power vector. More powerful players have the power to take away payoffs of the less powerful players as long as those latter players are not able to guarantee their payoffs by forming a different internal organization within some coalition in which they have more power.We introduce the socially stable core as a solution concept that contains those payoffs that are both stable in an economic sense, i.e., belong to the core of the underlying cooperative game, and stable in a social sense, i.e., payoffs are sustained by a collection of internal organizations of coalitions for which power is distributed over all players in a balanced way. The socially stable core is a subset and therefore a refinement of the core. We show by means of examples that in many cases the socially stable core is a very small subset of the core.We will state conditions for which the socially stable core is non-empty. In order to derive this result, we formulate a new intersection theorem that generalizes the KKMS intersection theorem. We also discuss the relationship between social stability and the wellknown concept of balancedness for NTU-games, a sufficient condition for non-emptiness of the core. In particular we give an example of a socially structured game that satisfies social stability and therefore has a non-empty core, but whose induced NTU-game does not satisfy balancedness in the general sense of Billera. (shrink)

Lowest-unique sealed-bid auctions are auctions with endogenous participation, costly bids, and the lowest bid among all unique bids wins. Properties of symmetric NEs are studied. The symmetric NE with the lowest expected gains is the maximin outcome under symmetric strategies, and it is the solution to a mathematical program. Comparative statics for the number of bidders, the value of the item and the bidding cost are derived. The two bidders’ auction is equivalent to the Hawk–Dove game. Simulations of replicator dynamics (...) provide numerical evidence that the symmetric NE with the lowest expected gains is also asymptotically stable. (shrink)

Although agreement on the positive sign of the relationship between corporate social and financial performance is observed in the literature, the mechanisms that constitute this relationship are not yet well-known. We address this issue by extending management’s stakeholder theory by adding insights from psychology’s prospect decision theory and sociology’s resource dependence theory. Empirically, we analyze an extensive panel dataset, including information on disaggregated measures of social performance for the S&P 500 in the 1997–2002 period. In so doing, we enrich the (...) extant literature by focusing on stakeholder heterogeneity, perceptional framing, and disaggregated measures of corporate social performance. (shrink)

Although agreement on the positive sign of the relationship between corporate social and financial performance is observed in the literature, the mechanisms that constitute this relationship are not yet well-known. We address this issue by extending management’s stakeholder theory by adding insights from psychology’s prospect decision theory and sociology’s resource dependence theory. Empirically, we analyze an extensive panel dataset, including information on disaggregated measures of social performance for the S&P 500 in the 1997–2002 period. In so doing, we enrich the (...) extant literature by focusing on stakeholder heterogeneity, perceptional framing, and disaggregated measures of corporate social performance. (shrink)

The question we raise in this paper is, whether patient involvement might be a beneficial way to help determine and achieve the aims of translational research and, if so, how to proceed. TR is said to ensure a more effective movement of basic scientific findings to relevant and useful clinical applications. In view of the fact that patients are supposed to be the primary beneficiaries of such translation and also have relevant knowledge based on their experience, listening to their voice (...) early on in the innovation process might very well increase the effectiveness of the translation. After explaining how the concept of TR emerged and what it entails, this paper shows through a literature review which arguments have been put forward to promote patient involvement in health care research in a more general sense. We examine whether, and if so how, these arguments are relevant for the discourse on TR and we identify pitfalls and dilemmas. Ultimately, we conclude that it may be worthwhile to experiment with patient involvement in TR but that the design of such involvement requires careful consideration. (shrink)

We analyze the cognitive strategies underlying performance in the Number task, a Math game that requires both arithmetic fluency and mathematical creativity. In this game all elements in a set of numbers have to be used precisely once to create a target number with basic arithmetic operations. We argue that some instances of this game are NP complete, by showing its relation to the well-known Partition problem. We propose heuristics based on the distinction in forward and backward reasoning. The Number (...) Game is part of Math Garden, a popular online educational platform for practicing and monitoring math skills using innovations in computerized adaptive testing. These educational games generate enormous amounts of rich data on children's cognitive development. We found converging evidence for the use of forward proximity heuristics in the data of Math Garden, consisting of more than 20 million answers to 1,700 items. Item difficulties and the structure of correct answers were analyzed. (shrink)

We develop a theory of compliance with corporate governance codes by combining insights from agency, network and reputation theories. Subsequently, we test this theory using a unique dataset with fine-grained compliance information for the book year 2004 as to 130 Dutch stock-listed corporations. We find partial support for our theory.

The current study explores how the cultural distance of ethnic outgroups relative to the ethnic ingroup is related to stereotypical news representations. It does so by drawing on a sample of more than three million Dutch newspaper articles and uses advanced methods of automated content analysis, namely word embeddings. The results show that distant ethnic outgroup members (i. e., Moroccans) are associated with negative characteristics and issues, while this is not the case for close ethnic outgroup members (i. e., Belgians). (...) The current study demonstrates the usefulness of word embeddings as a tool to study subtle aspects of ethnic bias in mass-mediated content. (shrink)

Background: Debates over legalisation of physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia often warn of a “slippery slope”, predicting abuse of people in vulnerable groups. To assess this concern, the authors examined data from Oregon and the Netherlands, the two principal jurisdictions in which physician-assisted dying is legal and data have been collected over a substantial period.Methods: The data from Oregon comprised all annual and cumulative Department of Human Services reports 1998–2006 and three independent studies; the data from the Netherlands comprised all four (...) government-commissioned nationwide studies of end-of-life decision making and specialised studies. Evidence of any disproportionate impact on 10 groups of potentially vulnerable patients was sought.Results: Rates of assisted dying in Oregon and in the Netherlands showed no evidence of heightened risk for the elderly, women, the uninsured , people with low educational status, the poor, the physically disabled or chronically ill, minors, people with psychiatric illnesses including depression, or racial or ethnic minorities, compared with background populations. The only group with a heightened risk was people with AIDS. While extralegal cases were not the focus of this study, none have been uncovered in Oregon; among extralegal cases in the Netherlands, there was no evidence of higher rates in vulnerable groups.Conclusions: Where assisted dying is already legal, there is no current evidence for the claim that legalised PAS or euthanasia will have disproportionate impact on patients in vulnerable groups. Those who received physician-assisted dying in the jurisdictions studied appeared to enjoy comparative social, economic, educational, professional and other privileges. (shrink)

Optimism has reigned supreme for a long time regarding the potential of education (schooling) to address the many societal ailments that humankind has had to deal with. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 shifted all such aspirations to the back-burner. Now, after just more than a year after the initial outbreak of the pandemic, the question can be raised whether those who managed the pandemic in the educational context followed the correct policies and instituted the correct (ethical, (...) moral) measures in combatting the pandemic. This comparison between the situation in the Netherlands and South Africa reveals that although the role-players in both countries had a good understanding of the situation and of their duties in such conditions, they tended to treat education as just another facet of society, thereby demonstrating a lack of empathy with the unique demands of education (schooling). CONTRIBUTION: In this article, the authors investigate the governance performance of two different countries during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic concerning education and judge that performance based on a Biblically driven ethical-moral-pedagogical framework. (shrink)