Opponents

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Distribution within Humanities and Social Sciences

Kinds of Opponents

  • former opponent


  • Selected Abstracts


    Judo Strategy: 10 Techniques For Beating A Stronger Opponent

    BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW, Issue 1 2002
    David B Yoffie
    The idea of judo economics, building on analogies with the sport of judo, has been around for at least 20 years. But taking these ideas further to judo strategy means that a framework of strategic principles can be developed to help companies put stronger opponents on the mat. [source]


    Does sex education affect adolescent sexual behaviors and health?

    JOURNAL OF POLICY ANALYSIS AND MANAGEMENT, Issue 4 2006
    Joseph J. SabiaArticle first published online: 6 SEP 200
    This study examines whether offering sex education to young teenagers affects several measures of adolescent sexual behavior and health: virginity status, contraceptive use, frequency of intercourse, likelihood of pregnancy, and probability of contracting a sexually transmitted disease. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, I find that while sex education is associated with adverse health outcomes, there is little evidence of a causal link after controlling for unobserved heterogeneity via fixed effects and instrumental variables. These findings suggest that those on each side of the ideological debate over sex education are, in a sense, both correct and mistaken. Opponents are correct in observing that sex education is associated with adverse health outcomes, but are generally incorrect in interpreting this relationship causally. Proponents are generally correct in claiming that sex education does not encourage risky sexual activity, but are incorrect in asserting that investments in typical schoolbased sex education programs produce measurable health benefits. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management [source]


    The Supreme Court and the Interstate Slave Trade: A Study in Evasion, Anarchy, and Extremism

    JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY, Issue 3 2004
    DAVID L. LIGHTNER
    Opponents of slavery often argued that the federal government possessed the constitutional authority to outlaw the interstate slave trade. At its founding in 1833, the American Anti-Slavery Society declared that Congress "has a right, and is solemnly bound, to suppress the domestic slave trade between the several States." The idea had been endorsed earlier, during the Missouri controversy of 1819,1820, by both John Jay and Daniel Webster. Later on, in the 1840s and 1850s, it was supported by such prominent politicians as John Quincy Adams, Salmon P. Chase, and Charles Sumner. Defenders of slavery were, of course, horrified by the suggestion that the South's peculiar institution might be attacked in this way, and they vehemently denied that the Constitution permitted any such action. The prolonged debate over the issue focused on two key provisions of the Constitution. One was the Commerce Clause (Article I, Section 8, Clause 3), which says that Congress has the power to "regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes." The other was the 1808 Clause (Article I, Section 9, Clause 1), which says that the "Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight." Abolitionists held that the Constitution sanctioned congressional interference in the domestic slave trade both generally, by virtue of the Commerce Clause, and specifically, by virtue of the 1808 Clause. They argued that since slaves were routinely bought and sold, they obviously were articles of commerce, and therefore Congress had unlimited authority over interstate slave trafficking. Furthermore, they said, the words "migration or importation" in the 1808 Clause meant that as of January 1, 1808 Congress had acquired the right not only to ban the importation of slaves, but also to prohibit their migration from one state to another. Defenders of slavery replied that Congress could not interfere in property rights and that the power to regulate commerce did not include the power to destroy it. They also said that the word "migration" in the 1808 Clause referred, not to the domestic movement of slaves, but to the entry into the United States of white immigrants from abroad.1 [source]


    Shamans versus Pirates in the Amazonian Treasure Chest

    AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Issue 4 2002
    Beth A. Conklin
    This article explores how the recent rise of shamans as political representatives in Brazil addresses tensions and contradictions associated with the internationalization of indigenous rights movements. Identity politics and transnational organizational alliances concerning issues of environmentalism and human rights have greatly expanded the political leverage and influence of indigenous activism. However, some transnational environmentalist discourses collide with Brazilian discourses of national sovereignty, and the 1990s witnessed a nationalist backlash against Indians, whom politicians, military leaders, and media commentators have frequently portrayed as pawns of foreign imperialists. Opponents of indigenous rights also seized on apparent contradictions between rhetoric and action to discredit indigenous claims to environmental resources. The analysis examines how the shift to redefine knowledge as the core of indigenous identity circumvents some of these liabilities by shifting the basis for indigenous rights claims from environmental practices to environmental knowledge. As shamans mobilize and speak out against the threat of biopiracy, they blunt the nationalist backlash, repositioning indigenous peoples as defenders of the national patrimony and solid citizens of the Brazilian nationstate. [Keywords: Brazil, indigenous peoples, identity politics, shamans, biopiracy] [source]


    Searching for Common Ground between Supporters and Opponents of Affirmative Action

    POLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 5 2005
    Christine Reyna
    Supporters and opponents of affirmative action are often characterized as debating about a single, consensually understood type of affirmative action. However, supporters and opponents instead may have different types of policies in mind when thinking about affirmative action and may actually agree on specific manifestations of affirmative action policies more than is commonly believed. A survey conducted using a student sample and a sample from the broader Chicago-area community showed that affirmative action policies can be characterized into merit-violating versus merit-upholding manifestations. Supporters of affirmative action in general were more likely to think of affirmative action in its merit-upholding manifestations, whereas opponents were more likely to think of the merit-violating manifestations. However, both supporters and opponents showed more support for merit-upholding rather than merit-violating manifestations of affirmative action. The same pattern of results was upheld even when splitting the samples into those who endorsed negative racial attitudes versus those who did not, suggesting that even those who may be considered racist will endorse affirmative action policies that uphold merit values. The results are discussed in terms of the importance of clarifying the political discourse about what affirmative action is and what it is designed to do. [source]


    Analytics and Beliefs: Competing Explanations for Defining Problems and Choosing Allies and Opponents in Collaborative Environmental Management

    PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REVIEW, Issue 5 2010
    Christopher M. Weible
    The rationale for collaborative environmental management often hinges on two factors: first, specialized training creates biased analytics that require multidisciplinary approaches to solve policy problems; second, normative beliefs among competing actors must be included in policy making to give the process legitimacy and to decide trans-scientific problems. These two factors are tested as drivers of conflict in an analysis of 76 watershed partnerships. The authors find that analytical bias is a secondary factor to normative beliefs; that depicting the primary driver of conflict in collaborative environmental management as between experts and nonexperts is inaccurate; that compared to the "life" and "physical" sciences, the social sciences and liberal arts have a stronger impact on beliefs and choice of allies and opponents; and that multiple measures are needed to capture the effect of analytical biases. The essay offers lessons for public administrators and highlights the limitations and generalizations of other governing approaches. [source]


    The Revenue Impact of Repeated Tax Amnesties

    PUBLIC BUDGETING AND FINANCE, Issue 3 2007
    HARI SHARAN LUITEL
    Proponents argue that tax amnesties raise revenue both in the short and long run, by bringing former nonfilers back into the tax system. Opponents contend that amnesties produce little short-run revenue and weaken incentives for long-run tax compliance. However, over the last 21 years, 27 states offered tax amnesties for a second or third time. While previous research has estimated the impact of specific tax amnesties, none have estimated how the impact changes when offered repeatedly. We find that these additional tax amnesties generate less short-run revenue than predecessors and tend to magnify revenue losses associated with disincentives for long-run tax compliance. [source]


    Single Crossing Properties and the Existence of Pure Strategy Equilibria in Games of Incomplete Information

    ECONOMETRICA, Issue 4 2001
    Susan Athey
    This paper analyzes a class of games of incomplete information where each agent has private information about her own type, and the types are drawn from an atomless joint probability distribution. The main result establishes existence of pure strategy Nash equilibria (PSNE) under a condition we call the single crossing condition (SCC), roughly described as follows: whenever each opponent uses a nondecreasing strategy (in the sense that higher types choose higher actions), a player's best response strategy is also nondecreasing. When the SCC holds, a PSNE exists in every finite-action game. Further, for games with continuous payoffs and a continuum of actions, there exists a sequence of PSNE to finite-action games that converges to a PSNE of the continuum-action game. These convergence and existence results also extend to some classes of games with discontinuous payoffs, such as first-price auctions, where bidders may be heterogeneous and reserve prices are permitted. Finally, the paper characterizes the SCC based on properties of utility functions and probability distributions over types. Applications include first-price, multi-unit, and all-pay auctions; pricing games with incomplete information about costs; and noisy signaling games. [source]


    Display Plasticity in Response to a Robotic Lizard: Signal Matching or Song Sharing in Lizards?

    ETHOLOGY, Issue 10 2006
    C. Brian Smith
    Many territorial songbirds alter the structure of their songs after listening to and interacting repeatedly with the same neighbors. Here, we use a robotic lizard to test for similar learned changes in signal structure in male Sagebrush lizards, Sceloporus graciosus. Subjects were exposed to two types of headbob displays (species-typical and unusual) both in short-term tests and in repeated exposures for 10 d. We found no evidence for immediate changes in signal structure to match a particular opponent (signal matching) or long-term changes after repeated exposure (,song' sharing). If anything, the lizards' displays became less like that of the robotic stimulus over time. Further tests of other taxa are needed to identify the evolutionary forces that lead to these forms of behavioral plasticity and to determine whether song sharing and signal matching are unique characteristic of songbirds. Lizards also became more agitated and produced more highly aggressive displays of their own when confronted with headbob displays that violated the basic syntactic structure of their display system, confirming that they were paying attention to subtle differences in display structure despite the artificial nature of the treatments. Thus, our study also adds to the growing evidence supporting the use of robotic playbacks to study animal communication. [source]


    Memory of Social Partners in Hermit Crab Dominance

    ETHOLOGY, Issue 3 2005
    Francesca Gherardi
    We investigated the possibility that invertebrates recognize conspecific individuals by studying dominance relationships in the long-clawed hermit crab, Pagurus longicarpus. We conducted three sets of laboratory experiments to define the time limits for acquiring and maintaining memory of an individual opponent. The results reveal two characteristics that make individual recognition in this species different from standard associative learning tasks. Firstly, crabs do not require training over many repeated trials; rather, they show evidence of recognition after a single 30-min exposure to a stimulus animal. Secondly, memory lasts for up to 4 d of isolation without reinforcement. A third interesting feature of individual recognition in this species is that familiar opponents are recognized even before the formation of a stable hierarchical rank. That is, recognition seems to be relatively independent of repeated wins (rewards) or losses (punishments) in a dominance hierarchy. The experimental protocol allowed us to show that this species is able to classify conspecifics into two ,heterogeneous subgroups', i.e. familiar vs. unfamiliar individuals, but not to discriminate one individual of a group from every other conspecific from ,a unique set of cues defining that individual'. In other words, we demonstrated a ,binary', and not a ,true', individual recognition. However, 1 d of interactions with different crabs did not erase the memory of a former rival, suggesting that P. longicarpus uses a system of social partner discrimination more refined than previously shown. [source]


    Does Lateral Presentation of the Palmate Antlers During Fights by Fallow Deer (Dama dama L.) Signify Dominance or Submission?

    ETHOLOGY, Issue 5 2002
    Dómhnall J. Jennings
    A central aim of the study of animal communication is to identify the mode and content of information transferred between individuals. The lateral presentation of the antler palm between male fallow deer has been described as either a signal of individual quality or an attempt to avoid fighting. In the first case two phenotypic features have been proposed by which transmission of individual quality may be facilitated. These are antler size and antler symmetry. The alternative hypothesis proposes that the lateral presentation of antlers occurs as a consequence of averting a threatening posture and may signify a reluctance to fight. We examined whether mature fallow deer use lateral palm presentation as a display during fights to indicate antler size and symmetry. We found no relationship between presentation rate of the antler and antler size and symmetry. Furthermore, males did not preferentially present their larger antler to their opponent. We also investigated whether the rate at which males presented antlers laterally during a fight was related to their ability to win the fight. Our results show that the male who performed more presentations during a fight was more likely to lose it. There were behavioural differences in the way in which a bout of presentation ended; subsequent losers tended to turn their body away from their opponent and subsequent winners tended to lower their antlers to an opponent which we interpret as an invitation to continue fighting. We conclude that the lateral palm presentation serves to de-escalate fighting between mature fallow deer. It is not a mechanism by which to communicate individual quality but rather an indication that a male is less committed to continuing investment in the current contest. [source]


    The Long-Term Effects of Reconciliation in Japanese Macaques Macaca fuscata

    ETHOLOGY, Issue 11 2001
    Nicola F. Koyama
    With one exception, all previous studies of reconciliation in non-human primates (friendly reunion between former opponents) have focused on demonstrating the immediate, short-term effects despite the widely held view that reconciliation has a long-term function of repairing social relationships following aggression. To investigate this long-term function I compared mean interaction rates between opponents during the 10 d following reconciled and non-reconciled conflicts to baseline levels of interaction. Aggression rates during the 10 d after non-reconciled conflicts were significantly higher than the baseline rate, whereas after reconciled conflicts aggression was minimal. Similarly, grooming, proximity and approach rates during the 10 d after non-reconciled conflicts were significantly lower than the baseline rate whereas grooming, proximity and approach rates in the 10 d after reconciled conflicts were restored to baseline levels. These results indicate that there are consequences to not reconciling with a former opponent and highlight the fact that these may be costly in terms of increased risk of long-term aggression and reduced affiliation. The data support predictions from the Relationship-Repair Hypothesis suggesting that reconciliation functions as a mechanism for the repair of social relationships damaged by aggression. [source]


    Parasitized Salamanders are Inferior Competitors for Territories and Food Resources

    ETHOLOGY, Issue 4 2000
    Daria S. Maksimowich
    Parasites have been shown to impair the behaviour of their hosts, compromising the host's ability to exploit and compete for resources. We conducted two experiments to determine whether infestation with an ectoparasitic mite (Hannemania eltoni) was associated with changes in aggressive and foraging behaviour in the Ozark zigzag salamander, Plethodon angusticlavius. In a first experiment, male salamanders with high parasite loads were less aggressive overall than males with low parasite loads during territorial disputes. In addition, males with high parasite loads were more aggressive toward opponents with high parasite loads (symmetric contests) than toward opponents with low parasite loads (asymmetric contests). In contrast, males with low parasite loads did not adjust their level of aggression according to the parasite load of the opponent. In a second experiment, foraging behaviour of females was tested in response to ,familiar' (Drosophila) prey and ,novel' (termite) prey. Latency to first capture was significantly longer for parasitized than non-parasitized females when tested with ,familiar' prey, but not for ,novel' prey. Our results suggest that parasite-mediated effects may have profound influences on individual fitness in nature. [source]


    Color responses of the human lateral geniculate nucleus: selective amplification of S-cone signals between the lateral geniculate nucleno and primary visual cortex measured with high-field fMRI

    EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE, Issue 9 2008
    Kathy T. Mullen
    Abstract The lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) is the primary thalamic nucleus that relays visual information from the retina to the primary visual cortex (V1) and has been extensively studied in non-human primates. A key feature of the LGN is the segregation of retinal inputs into different cellular layers characterized by their differential responses to red-green (RG) color (L/M opponent), blue-yellow (BY) color (S-cone opponent) and achromatic (Ach) contrast. In this study we use high-field functional magnetic resonance imaging (4 tesla, 3.6 × 3.6 × 3 mm3) to record simultaneously the responses of the human LGN and V1 to chromatic and Ach contrast to investigate the LGN responses to color, and how these are modified as information transfers between LGN and cortex. We find that the LGN has a robust response to RG color contrast, equal to or greater than the Ach response, but a significantly poorer sensitivity to BY contrast. In V1 at low temporal rates (2 Hz), however, the sensitivity of the BY color pathway is selectively enhanced, rising in relation to the RG and Ach responses. We find that this effect generalizes across different stimulus contrasts and spatial stimuli (1-d and 2-d patterns), but is selective for temporal frequency, as it is not found for stimuli at 8 Hz. While the mechanism of this cortical enhancement of BY color vision and its dynamic component is unknown, its role may be to compensate for a weak BY signal originating from the sparse distribution of neurons in the retina and LGN. [source]


    Empathy and Strategic Interaction in Crises: A Poliheuristic Perspective

    FOREIGN POLICY ANALYSIS, Issue 2 2009
    Jonathan W. Keller
    Empirical evidence supports the poliheuristic (PH) theory of decision making, which states that leaders typically employ a two-stage non-compensatory decision-making process. In stage one leaders reject options that do not meet some minimum criteria of acceptability on one or more dimensions, and in stage two they choose among the remaining options using a more rational utility-maximizing rule. While PH theory has primarily been applied at the monadic level, to explain the process and content of states' decisions, we contend it has important implications for strategic interaction and can help to explain outcomes in world politics. Specifically, we argue that a crucial variable shaping crisis outcomes is the degree to which leaders' non compensatory decision criteria in stage one include options' acceptability to the opponent. When leaders empathize with their opponent and screen out those options the opponent considers unacceptable, crises will be resolved more quickly and with a lower likelihood of escalation. Empathy introduced during the second, utility-maximizing stage, may also dampen conflict but is less effective than stage one empathy. We illustrate this dyadic non compensatory model by examining two cases involving the U.S.,China and U.S.,Iraq bilateral relationships. [source]


    The Politics of Sir Thomas Fairfax Reassessed

    HISTORY, Issue 300 2005
    LUKE DAXON
    Sir Thomas Fairfax (1612,71) was one of the most distinguished parliamentarian soldiers of the Great Civil War. He assumed command of the New Model Army at its inception in 1645 and was at its head during the succeeding five years when it was transformed from a victorious military force into an engine of political revolution. An inarticulate and in some respects a staid and conservative figure, Fairfax has often been depicted as an impotent opponent of the army's radicalization or as a political innocent manipulated by his subordinates, principally Oliver Cromwell and Henry Ireton, for their own ends. This article seeks to challenge these conceptions. It examines the political connotations of his conduct during the war and his readiness to stand by his men throughout their conflict with the parliamentary Presbyterians after it. It further probes his response to the upheavals of 1648,9 and his attitude to the new republican regime. Whatever his reticence, Fairfax's actions do not resemble those of an apolitical neutral and a balanced assessment of his sympathies has the virtue of explaining much about how the army was able to retain a remarkable unity of purpose, albeit sometimes tenuous, as it stepped onto the political stage. [source]


    Agents that acquire negotiation strategies using a game theoretic learning theory

    INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS, Issue 1 2006
    Norberto Eiji Nawa
    Automated negotiation systems and real-world negotiation situations have many aspects in common. Time is a relevant factor for all parties; information about preferences is private, and there is no interest in having it disclosed; negotiators learn about the opponents and try to enhance their strategies while interacting with one another. Experiments were performed with computational agents employing a learning algorithm based on the ideas of the Experience-Weighted Attraction theory of learning in games, which has been shown to model well human behavior observed in experimental settings. Negotiation strategies are acquired as the agents play bargaining games against one another. The strategies determine the agents' behaviors: how much they offer to the opponent, when they make offers, and the conditions for accepting an offer. The results show that the learning agents were able to acquire sensible strategies even from the most unstructured and dynamic environments. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Int Syst 21: 5,39, 2006. [source]


    William Law and The Fable of the Bees

    JOURNAL FOR EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY STUDIES, Issue 3 2009
    ANDREW STARKIE
    Abstract Bernard Mandeville's Fable of the Bees (1723), an influential work of moral and economic theory, was decried as a libertine publication. The response of William Law to Mandeville, Remarks on the Fable of the Bees (1724), attacked the work on both the rational and the rhetorical level. Despite his reputation as a pious High-Churchman, Law was as adept as his opponent at employing the fashionable rhetoric of wit and irony. He appealed to Newtonian and Lockean ideas, and made alliance with Low-Church and Whig moralists in articulating a realist moral philosophy in opposition to Mandeville's libertinism. [source]


    The Effects of Negativity and Motivated Information Processing During a Political Campaign

    JOURNAL OF COMMUNICATION, Issue 1 2006
    Michael F. Meffert
    This research investigated how voters select, process, are affected by, and recall political information in a dynamic campaign environment. It was hypothesized that voters' information selection, processing, and recall are subject to a negativity bias (i.e., negative information dominates over positive information), a congruency bias (i.e., positive information about the preferred candidate and negative information about the opponent candidate dominate over negative information about the preferred candidate and positive information about the opponent), and a candidate bias (i.e., information about the preferred candidate dominates over information about the opponent). Motivated by an initial candidate preference, participants were also expected to develop more polarized candidate evaluations over time. Participants were exposed to quickly changing information in the form of newspaper-style headlines on a dynamic, computer-based information board. The results generally supported negativity bias and candidate bias, whereas congruency bias was only found during information recall. At the information selection and processing stages, participants with a strong initial candidate preference showed a disproportionate preference for negative information about the preferred candidate. However, they developed more positive attitudes at the evaluation and recall stage. This finding suggests that participants were engaged in motivated information processing by counterarguing negative information about their preferred candidate. [source]


    Unsanctioned aggression in rugby union: relationships among aggressiveness, anger, athletic identity, and professionalization

    AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR, Issue 3 2009
    J. P. Maxwell
    Abstract Aggressive players who intentionally cause injury to their opponents are common in many sports, particularly collision sports such as Rugby Union. Although some acts of aggression fall within the rules (sanctioned), others do not (unsanctioned), with the latter tending to be less acceptable than the former. This study attempts to identify characteristics of players who are more likely to employ unsanctioned methods in order to injure an opponent. Male Rugby Union players completed questionnaires assessing aggressiveness, anger, past aggression, professionalization, and athletic identity. Players were assigned to one of two groups based on self-reported past unsanctioned aggression. Results indicated that demographic variables (e.g., age, playing position, or level of play) were not predictive of group membership. Measures of aggressiveness and professionalization were significant predictors; high scores on both indicated a greater probability of reporting the use of unsanctioned aggressive force for the sole purpose of causing injury or pain. In addition, players who had been taught how to execute aggressive illegal plays without detection were also more likely to report using excessive force to injure an opponent. Results provide further support that highly professionalized players may be more likely to use methods outside the constitutive rules of Rugby Union in order to intentionally injure their opponents. Results are discussed within the context of the increasing win-at-all-cost attitude that is becoming more prevalent in sport and its implications for youth athletes. Aggr. Behav. 35:237,243, 2009. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


    Women's physical aggression in bars: an event-based examination of precipitants and predictors of severity

    AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR, Issue 4 2007
    R. Lorraine Collins
    Abstract Although women drink in bars and experience aggression in bar settings, much of the research has focused on men's experiences of aggression in bars. We used data from questionnaires and face-to-face interviews to examine the contributors to the occurrence and severity of women's experience of specific incidents of aggression in bars. Young women (n=92) provided event-based descriptions of their most recent experience of physical aggression in a bar during the past 24 months. Most aggression in bars was precipitated by rowdy behavior and involved female opponents who were strangers. The severity and overall aggressiveness of the respondent's behaviors were positively associated with initiating the incident and having a female opponent. The severity and overall aggressiveness of the opponent's behaviors were negatively associated with initiating the incident and positively associated with having a female opponent. This study adds to the paucity of research on women's aggression in bars and expands our understanding of women's roles as perpetrator and victim of such aggression. Aggr. Behav. 33:304,313, 2007. © 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


    Effects of trait anger and anger expression style on competitive attack responses in a wartime prisoner's dilemma game

    AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR, Issue 2 2002
    Howard Kassinove
    Abstract We assessed the role of trait anger and anger expression style on competitive/aggressive decision making and responding. In a 100-trial iterated Prisoner's Dilemma (IPD), with instructions to simulate wartime interactions, competition/aggression was defined as "attacking the opponent," and "waiting for troop reinforcements" was the noncompetitive alternative response. Prior to play, 92 university student players completed the State-Trait Anger Expression Inventory. They were then paired to play the IPD against partners of similar or dissimilar trait anger levels. At postplay, the State Anger scale was readministered. Results showed significant preplay to postplay increases in state anger, with greater increases shown by high trait anger players. Thus, high trait anger players were especially subject to arousal. Players in the high trait anger group made more competitive/attack responses, and they were more likely to do so when paired with a high trait anger partner. As a result of the high level of competitive/aggressive play, both groups ended with a negative troop count. Trait anger as a general personality temperament was predictive of state anger, competitive/attack responses, and the number of trials before a retaliation was made. The expressive style of anger-control was also related to manner of play. Trait anger had strong direct and indirect effects through anger control on the number of competitive attack responses. It was concluded that trait anger, especially trait anger/temperament, and anger control difficulties may be toxic personality factors in decision making and competitive behavior. Aggr. Behav. 28:117,125, 2002. © 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


    An aggression machine v. determinants in reactive aggression revisited

    AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR, Issue 6 2001
    Petri Juujärvi
    Abstract The relations between reactive aggression, situational cues, and emotion regulation were examined by means of the Pulkkinen Aggression Machine (PAM) task. In the PAM, provocation and response were systematically varied under two conditions: the impulsive aggression condition and the controlled aggression condition. In the impulsive condition, no information about the attacker was provided, while in the controlled condition the attackers were specified in terms of sex, age, and physical strength. The task was administered to 109 children aged 8 to 13 years. Boys (n = 61) and girls (n = 48), as well as subgroups of Adjusted (n = 67) and Maladjusted (n = 26) children were compared. The results confirmed earlier findings showing that there is a strong relationship between attack and response intensity. However, this relationship was consistently modified by the effects of situation and personality-related variables. This meant that, while for the impulsive condition response intensity was closely tied to stimulus intensity, in the controlled condition this effect was modulated by the characteristics of the opponent: the more equal the opponent the stronger the retaliations displayed. The Maladjusted children reacted more intensively in the impulsive condition and to minor provocation in the controlled condition than the Adjusted children. This suggests that the intensity of the elicited aggression in the Maladjusted group was particularly dependent on contextual rather than internal control. Aggr. Behav. 27:430,445, 2001. © 2001 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


    Effects of Acute Alcohol Intoxication and Paroxetine on Aggression in Men

    ALCOHOLISM, Issue 4 2009
    Michael S. McCloskey
    Background:, The purpose of this study was to examine the role of the serotonin (5-HT) system in alcohol-related aggression. Methods:, Specifically, we experimentally examined the effects of 5-HT augmentation on alcohol-related aggression in men (n = 56). After consuming either alcohol (mean blood alcohol concentration of 0.10%) or a placebo (no alcohol) drink, and taking either 20 mg of paroxetine (Paxil®) or a placebo pill, participants were provided the opportunity to administer electric shock to a (faux) opponent during a task disguised as a reaction-time game. Aggression was defined as the intensity of shock chosen and the frequency with which an extreme (clearly painful) shock was chosen. We predicted that 5-HT augmentation would be associated with lower aggressive behavior overall, and also reduce the aggression facilitating effects of acute alcohol intoxication. Results:, The results indicated that alcohol intoxication increased aggression, particularly under low provocation. Paroxetine decreased aggression, particularly during high provocation. These effects, however, occurred independently of each other. Conclusions:, The effect of alcohol on extreme aggression was moderated by previous aggression history, with more aggressive individuals showing greater alcohol-related increases in extreme aggression. [source]


    Revisiting Hrdli,ka and Boas: Asymmetries of Race and Anti-Imperialism in Interwar Anthropology

    AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Issue 1 2010
    Robert Oppenheim
    ABSTRACT, Physical anthropologist Ale, Hrdli,ka is often remembered as an institutional and political opponent of Franz Boas and as an advocate of racial typology against which the Boasian antiracialist position in American anthropology developed. I argue that Hrdli,ka nonetheless also has more subtle lessons to offer about the political limits of Boasian antiracism. Examining Hrdli,ka's engagement with the politics of Europe and East Asia from the 1920s to the 1940s, particularly with the intellectual grounding of Japanese imperialism, I suggest that he was perhaps uniquely cognizant of a "second problem of race in the world",the racist assimilationism of the Japanese empire,vis-à-vis the Boasian grasp of race, rooted in a response to U.S. and Nazi racisms, as a category of invidious difference. Moreover, I contend that the lacuna that Hrdli,ka helps us identify has continued to haunt the discipline at certain key moments of Boasian critique of other ideological forces. [source]


    Empire, Patriotism and the Working-Class Electorate: The 1900 General Election in the Battersea Constituency

    PARLIAMENTARY HISTORY, Issue 3 2009
    IAIN SHARPE
    The extent to which the Unionist victory in the ,khaki' general election of 1900 was the result of patriotic sentiment arising from the South African war has long been a source of controversy among historians. Battersea has been cited as an area that was largely unaffected by patriotic and imperial fervour during this period. This article examines the general election campaign in the Battersea constituency. The sitting MP, John Burns, was re-elected despite his opposition to the war, but the Conservatives achieved their highest percentage vote of that at any parliamentary election between 1885 and 1918. While the war was not the only issue raised during the campaign, it was the most prominent and clearly benefited the imperialist and pro-war Conservative candidate. In order to retain his seat Burns had to fight a far more dynamic local campaign than his opponent, and even then he won only narrowly. Although imperial sentiment was not quite enough to oust Burns from this otherwise safe seat, it was the main reason for the strong Conservative performance. [source]


    Type 1 diabetes intervention trials

    PEDIATRIC DIABETES, Issue 1 2001
    Massimo Pietropaolo
    This and the following article address the current controversies for the application of studies to predict and prevent type 1 diabetes, based on currently available methodologies. This article outlines the position of the proponent; the following article outlines the position of the opponent. The intent is to illuminate by intellectual debate. [source]


    No place like home: Testosterone responses to victory depend on game location

    AMERICAN JOURNAL OF HUMAN BIOLOGY, Issue 3 2009
    Justin M. Carré
    Several studies have demonstrated that a variety of factors influence testosterone responses to competitive interactions. This study examined the extent to which game location would influence testosterone responses to human competition. Male amateur ice hockey players (n = 10) provided saliva samples before and after competing against the same opponent on two separate occasions (one game at home and one game away). Although both games resulted in similar victories, the home victory was associated with a significantly larger rise in testosterone concentrations relative to the away victory. The factors responsible for the different testosterone responses are not known, however, it is possible that a rise in status in front of the home crowd is more rewarding to athletes, and thus, a more potent stimulus for the endocrine system. Am. J. Hum. Biol., 2009. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


    Mutual Optimism and War

    AMERICAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, Issue 4 2007
    Mark Fey
    Working with the definition of mutual optimism as war due to inconsistent beliefs, we formalize the mutual optimism argument to test the theory's logical validity. We find that in the class of strategic situations where mutual optimism is a necessary condition for war,i.e., where war is known to be inefficient, war only occurs if both sides prefer it to a negotiated settlement, and on the eve of conflict war is self-evident,then there is no Bayesian-Nash equilibrium where wars are fought because of mutual optimism. The fundamental reason that mutual optimism cannot lead to war is that if both sides are willing to fight, each side should infer that they have either underestimated the strength of the opponent or overestimated their own strength. In either case, these inferences lead to a peaceful settlement of the dispute. We also show that this result extends to situations in which there is bounded rationality and/or noncommon priors. [source]


    Testing the function of reconciliation and third-party affiliation for aggressors in hamadryas baboons (Papio hamadryas hamadryas)

    AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PRIMATOLOGY, Issue 1 2009
    Teresa Romero
    Abstract In social groups, agonistic conflicts can have different negative consequences. Several post-conflict interactions have been suggested as post-conflict management behaviors to mitigate those negative effects. In this study, we investigated the function of two post-conflict behaviors,reconciliation and aggressor-initiated third-party affiliation,on the aggressor's levels of post-conflict anxiety and aggression in a large colony of hamadryas baboons. We also examined variation in the aggressor's levels of post-conflict anxiety as a function of relationship quality between the opponents as predicted by the Integrated Hypothesis. We found that after conflicts hamadryas baboon aggressors showed increased rates of anxiety-related behaviors and that they were also more likely to be involved in renewed aggressive interactions. Although both reconciliation and aggressor-initiated third-party affiliation reduced the probability of receiving post-conflict aggression, only reconciliation reduced the rates of anxiety-related behaviors, suggesting that the aggressors' post-conflict anxiety might be owing mainly to the damage that the conflict causes to their relationship with the victim. Furthermore, aggressor's rates of post-conflict anxiety were higher after conflicts with individuals with whom they had a high-quality relationship, supporting the idea that levels of post-conflict anxiety mediate the occurrence of reconciliation depending on the quality of the relationship with former opponent as predicted by the Integrated Hypothesis. Am. J. Primatol. 71:60,69, 2009. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]