9 ms·
Impulsive Rich Kid, Impulsive Poor Kid (2015)
- kbenson 10y agoThought this looked familiar. It's from 2015, and was covered here before[1]. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9866632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9866632
- dang 10y agoThanks; added.
- newsat13 10y agoNeeds 2015 in the title. "Published Jul 8, 2015"
- smokinhotdaisy 10y agoThe moral lesson is to educate kids.
- komali2 10y agoEducate them with what values?
- Banthum 10y agoThe values which have, in the past, produced desirable outcomes.
- jimmywanger 10y agoThat's begging the question. Unless you state what you think are desireable outcomes, your statement means nothing Tautologically speaking, your statement just says "Do the things that we think are profitable."
- speedplane 10y agoIt's not so complicated. The article is about jail and impulse control, so the desired "outcome" is to stay out of jail and the "value", if you'd even call it that, is to temper momentary impulses to foster longer term thinking. Except in extreme cases, just spending time with someone and caring about that person gets you most of the way there, regardless of the specific values you're trying to impart.
- jimmywanger 10y agoHence you are begging the question. Why is tempering momentary impulses fostering long term thinking a good outcome? If you really want the conclusion, a shot to the back of the head tempers momentary impulses forever.
- Banthum 10y agoThis is kind of obtuse. If you want to regress forever you can quickly reach the bedrock question of, "Why do anything?" And if you want to drill hard enough, yes, there is no absolute answer to that. We get it. But, back in reality, most of us have a general handle on outcomes that are good and bad for humans, and what people want day to day and for society. Safety is better than danger. Health is better than disease. Joy is better than pain. Choice is better than slavery. And so on. If you want to have a hyper-abstract philosophical debate on bedrock values or is/ought, you should start a discussion that is targeting that question.
- komali2 10y agoThose "bedrock values" you call "bedrock" are not as such at all. What about those that get joy from pain? What about brothel owners that highly value the slavery that gets them their women? What about terrorists cells that desire chaos above safety?
- coldtea 10y ago>Unless you state what you think are desireable outcomes, your statement means nothing Only if we start as some kind of visitors from Mars who don't know the earthly ways. Else, the "desirable outcomes" are pretty much agreed upon, at least for most people: keep mentally and physically healthy, study, get a good job, support your family, be good to others, don't be a criminal (as in TFA), etc.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- komali2 10y agoOk, so your definition of values are >things that produce desirable outcomes Right, so let's look at it from the perspective of a group of ISIS members, and analyze first what a "desirable outcome" is. According to their own magazine, the objective of ISIS is to "[make it so] the Blessed flag [of their religion]...covers all eastern and western extents of the Earth, filling the world with the truth and justice of Islam and putting an end to the falsehood and tyranny of jahiliyyah [state of ignorance], even if American and its coalition despise such. " So basically, the "desirable outcome" is a Muslim (of the Wahabi brand ISIS prefers) world. Now we know what the "desirable outcome" of a large chunk of people is, let's take a look at what "values" can "produce" this desirable outcome. Judging from the actions of ISIS, these include * Public beheading * Rape and enslaving of non-Wahabi women * Destruction of historical monuments * Detonating explosives among gathered civilians So, are these the values you are arguing to teach children? Obviously not, but do you see my point?
- techbio 10y agoIf you are truly asking for a list of values, try spending awhile with someone who has none, and consider which ones would make an improvement.
- komali2 10y agoWhere can I find someone with no values? To clarify: Not merely someone with values that are the opposite of yours.
- fasquoika 10y agoQuite frankly, whatever values they want. Telling someone to be conscientious about their actions isn't indoctrination. If they take the time, step back from the situation, and make a decision different than the one you would've made, that's still a win.
- gromy 10y ago> 1. Recognize when their automatic responses might get them into trouble, > 2. Slow down in those situations and behave less automatically, > 3. Objectively assess situations and think about what response is called-for. I recently realized I have insecure attachment and have been working on overcoming it. The process I use is somewhat similar: 1. Recognize when you feel anxious or insecure. 2. Ask yourself what is causing it. 3. Either fix it or accept it.
- vikiomega9 10y agoStep 2 is perhaps the most import realization I've had in the past couple of years :)
- Animats 10y ago> 1. Recognize when their automatic responses might get them into trouble, > 2. Slow down in those situations and behave less automatically, > 3. Objectively assess situations and think about what response is called-for. Some martial arts training teaches that. The more defensive martial arts, such as aikido, focus on that. Training in a defensive martial art might help impulsive kids. It teaches them that lashing out blindly is a quick way to lose, and that there are much more effective responses to an attack.
- toomanybeersies 10y agoThis is a lot like the SAFE technique for crisis management. I was taught it in the context of wilderness survival (particularly when you get lost), and apparently it comes from kayaking. 1. Stop 2. Assess the situation 3. Formulate a plan 4. Execute Repeat steps 2-4 as you progress. (I guess you could make it SAFER, and make R for Repeat). I've found it very useful for general crisis management, especially for physical crises. Just forcing yourself through the steps makes you think of better options, rather than running off and making the problem worse. I don't think it's such a good pattern for long term problems though, the idea is that you're reacting to your immediate situation and dealing accordingly, so it's effective for events that need immediate attention, such as car crashes, first aid situations, or getting lost in the wilderness.
- mistermann 10y ago
- thriftwy 10y agoI don't think that these impulsive people do a single wrong thing that lands their in jail. Rather, they are a constant nuisance to everybody around them, and eventually it gets them in trouble. What they get locked up for is probably not their first transgression. They might not be criminals but they actively decrease quality of life for everybody involved. The kind of behavior people tend to leave with high school, and they should have left ever sooner. I wonder if therapy will help them avoiding behaving like a bad apple, not just avoid getting caught with their eventual out-of-bounds act.
- frogpelt 10y agoI don't think you fully understand what growing up in a terrible neighborhood entails. They aren't so much "a constant nuisance to everybody around them" as they are acting like many who are around them. When you grow up in the hood and your father is gone (dead, in jail, never in the picture) and your mother is on crack and all of your friends and siblings are in gangs and/or on drugs and/or selling drugs, changing your destiny is a difficult proposition.
- valuearb 10y agoPop psychology is the sweetest psychology.
- rsync 10y agoThis is a cognitive blind spot for human beings - I am not sure if there is a name for it. Some examples: "The steelers were winning the whole game - they only lost because of that fluke fumble in the end zone when time ran out..." "I was prepared and on-track for that job interview - if only the A train hadn't had a malfunction that morning and made me late..." "If I hadn't taken that wrong step at the end of the trail, I wouldn't have torn my ACL ..." These are bad conclusions. Both teams played by the same rules and then time ran out and the other team won and it doesn't matter how they won. Future predictions should be based on the win. You were late to the job interview because you're a person that screws times up. That's much more useful information than anything you could have contributed at the interview. I tore my ACL because my ACL was weak and was waiting to tear. If it hadn't been that step, it would have been a different one at a slightly different time. This insistence (I am, myself, guilty) to look for exceptionalism in results rather than accept the obvious data that are being shown to us is something we need to become aware of - and avoid.
- cup 10y agoThe three points you gave are not indicative of typical results though and by there nature are exceptional. I think you just rebuked yourself.
- rsync 10y agoThat's exactly my point: we want them to be non-indicative, but it's very likely that they are indicative. The better team is the team that finds a way to win - even if it is weird and flukey and doesn't fit a nice narrative. The better job candidate finds a way to get to the interview on time - regardless of unexpected difficulties. The strong ACL doesn't tear just doing normal activities. You step strangely every single day and don't notice it. (also, the word you are looking for is refuted, not rebuked)
- phamilton 10y ago> The better team is the team that finds a way to win - even if it is weird and flukey and doesn't fit a nice narrative. Except all of sports data science disagrees with you. Long term trends say that a team who keeps possession of the ball the majority of the time is the team that is more likely to win. An individual game might suggest otherwise - a team that has the ball 90% of the time can lose to a goal in other 10%. But over 100 games, the trend becomes pretty clear.
- itissid 10y agoCBT aka mindfulness these is just good tool to have overall. I have had my share of bad experiences at my job from automaticity and adaptive, impulsive response. Here is what I learnt from being mindful: 1. When faced with making a choice, you remember more vividly how the bad choice hurt you last time. 2. Put it another way, that promise I made to myself after that big mistake is harder to break. Pertinently, the reasons that justified the promise and the benefit of keeping it are also more lucent. 3. I tend to separate/check my emotional responses connected to a thought connected to bad memories. I could preach shorter sermons, but once I start I am too lazy to stop...
- charlieflowers 10y agoI was going to challenge you on saying that CBT is the same thing as mindfulness. Then I thought about it, and I think this is pretty insightful. CBT says there's a split second after the stimulus where you get to choose how you will think about the stimulus. That's an awful lot like mindfulness, at least from a big picture standpoint.
- ChairmanPao 10y agoExcept that even if you normalize for income you still see a range of behaviors. Read 'The Bell Curve'
- Fiachaire 10y agoJust a reminder: This article is an ad for a web crawler/content marketing service. The purpose of the article is to be viral. Data is selected and presented to that end. See especially "The Tragic Data Behind Selfie Fatalities" which charts data from a particularly poor Wikipedia list and what appears to be a google search.
- ice109 10y agoI say this every time pricenomics gets upvoted - they only do content marketing. I don't understand how people don't get it.
- droopyEyelids 10y agoMGAAS. "Malcolm Gladwell as a Service"
- dopamean 10y agoWith that in mind how would you expect my understanding of the article to change? Serious question because all of this is news to me.
- elevenfist 10y agoCan someone please flag these shills. The article is about how evidence-based behavioral therapies like cbt can reduce crime, and should be applied as an alternative to prison for kids. For those that don't know anything about cbt, in this context it's basically about reducing cognitive distortions that convince people to commit crimes.