Nobody likes to feel bad. Sadness saps our energy and motivation. Melancholy wrecks our health and invites disease. Misery leaves us -- well, miserable. Yet many experts believe that these negative emotions have an upside, that they clarify our thinking and foster more deliberate and careful decision making. Some even say that sadness is a reality check on unwarranted optimism and self-regard.
That's the so-called "sadder but wiser" theory. But is it true? Isn't it equally as plausible that sadness and melancholy sabotage some kinds of thinking, and lead to questionable choices and judgments? A team of psychological scientists -- Jennifer Lerner of Harvard and Ye Li and Elke Weber of Columbia -- call this the "myopic misery" theory. Since sadness arises from a sense of loss, they reason, isn't it possible that it triggers an unconscious need to replace what's been lost, and that this need leads in turn to a sense of urgency and impatience -- and thus to rushed decisions? They decided to pit the two competing theories against each other in the laboratory.
They tested the effects of sadness on what's called "intertemporal discounting rates." Don't worry -- that's just jargon for the way we think about rewards and self-control. Most people, if offered $10 a month from now, will accept something less than $10 if they can get their hands on the cash now. But how much less? A slight discount might be a smart deal -- even a wise one -- but discounting too much for immediate payoff shows impatience, lack of discipline -- in short, poor judgment.
The scientists wanted to test the effects of sadness on this kind of financial judgment, so they used a well-tested priming technique -- a video tearjerker about the death of a young boy's mentor -- to create feelings of sadness in some volunteers. Others watched a video about an unsanitary toilet to create feelings of disgust; they wanted to compare sadness to disgust in order to rule out the possibility that all negative feelings have the same effect on judgment. Still others, the controls, watched an unemotional video clip.
Then all the volunteers made a couple dozen discounting choices, taking either cash today or a greater amount of cash in the future -- anywhere from a week to six months in the future. If the myopic misery theory holds true, the sad volunteers would be expected to show dysfunctional levels of impatience -- willingly taking losses that don't make financial sense. And that's just what occurred. To put it in plain dollars and cents terms, the typical sad volunteer accepted a mere $37 today rather than wait three months for an $85 payoff. That's a 43 percent discount -- huge. As described in a forthcoming issue of the journal Psychological Science, the typical control (and notably, the typical disgusted volunteer as well) required $56 today to make the same bargain. In other words, those who were unhappy failed to drive a hard bargain -- or even a fair bargain -- even though there was real cash on the line. The others showed much more in the way of everyday financial savvy.
So sadder was not wiser in this experiment. But how did the bargainers actually arrive at their decisions, wise or unwise? The scientists explored this in a second experiment. They recruited a national, web-based sample of adults, age 10 to 69, and started with the same priming techniques as before. Then they offered all of them $50 immediately, or a range of greater amounts -- up to $105 -- in three months. So far, this is basically the same experiment as before, but in this study, the scientists asked the volunteers what was going through their minds as they arrived at the various choices. Just before closing the deals, they listed as many thoughts as they could think of -- including reasons for taking the cash now and reasons for holding out for more.
The results were clear and interesting. Again, the sad volunteers were much more impatient, demanding more money to wait three months for a payoff. Overall, when queried about their reasoning, the volunteers listed almost equal numbers of patient thoughts ("Up to $105 would be a really nice gift to receive") and impatient thoughts ("Extra money for Christmas if I take the money now"). But the sad volunteers listed many more impatient thoughts than the others, and they also listed their impatient thoughts much earlier. Apparently, sadness has the effect of bringing to mind "take the money and run" rationalizations, rapidly and elaborately, which can lead to lousy judgments and real financial losses.
This is the first evidence that sadness triggers an unconscious desire to reap rewards as soon as possible -- even when this urgency comes at a very real cost, in dollars and cents. But the implications go far beyond personal financial dealings. Irrational impatience leads to widespread social problems, like massive credit card debt and epidemic overeating. Indeed, people make many of the most consequential decisions of their lives in an unhappy "need it now" state-of-mind -- a psychological fact that future policy interventions might take into account.
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Sadder but wiser? The myopic misery effect | Jennifer Lerner
Sadder, but Not Wiser: The Myopia of Misery | Jennifer Lerner
Also The original Cause series by Ceanne DeRohan This series explores dark emotions and mixes creation I don't know I learned a lot how to discuss sad mental oddities with both these books but if you don't need to deal with sadness It isn't important also I look at Cellular Automata as well I think there is some philosophy in that stuff as well but it is not clinical and I don't know how I would write a clinical lesson plan to this stuff.
Most Disabled Veterans are only rated between 50 % and 80 % Disability,
That means they are living on $850 to $1,500 a month.
All those Backlogs of claims you hear about in the press concern getting the V.A. to connect damage from combat injuries to other parts of the body. Such as gun shot wounds in one leg causing the other leg to assume most of the wortk load and wearing out the knee or causing back problems when the injury interfers with your gait.
The Vet must see these Doctors over and over hoping for relief. At the same time they are barely about to take care of their family and getting a job when you have to take a lot of drugs just to walk or stand is almost out of the question. A Doctor actually told me "No one want to hire you because of your medical problems ", " you need to start your own business".
Well there are many stuck in this routine. The VA resist connecting the combat injuries and raising the compensation rates and the vet is faced with lot of pain and sadness from having his life ripped apart because he chose to serve his country. A deep sadness hits when they are told that 30% increase in disability rating is 10 % in compensation. So for a Disabled Veteran to be rated 100 % he must prove 130 % disability !!!!
Or is it job loss that makes such folks do such depressing things?
What came first? Chicken egg!
It was the egghead, just depends if it was the rounded side or the pointy one.
But it still might not have been, the indentical person!
I've been depressed and spent frivolously (cash seemingly permitting)
and I've been depressed in such a manner that includes personal and social concerns
that conflict and hamper my willingness to participate in business as usual, including personal ambition for making and therefore spending money.
Also its quite possible that some (at least a handful) of those sad souls may be less attached to money even if they have it.
Maybe they arent enthralled with the prospect and preservation of money as are the better adjusted"
So it re he healy depends.
Who knows? The individuals might have a clue. Id ask em before all the tinkering.
The conlusion somewhat depends on what you're tinkering to find and how you chose to distribute the math stats. I've known 'sad" folks who are terrified to so much as part with a dime for their greatest benefactors and happy ones just like that too.
I'm sure overweight people spend more on food than do the impoverished but It's probably not why they are overweight.
if I only still had ambition, I would have a super PAC. I'll bet those guys are real self satisfied.
So some may be generally true, but specifically erroneous.
Please, step into my office. 10 minutes all for only 25 cents. I would charge more but I don't want money for sch things and especially when it's not a difficult task
Why could we not conclude that those "take the money and run" rationalizations, rapidly and elaborately," brought on are not the cause of the sadness. I think that makes more sense; greed and victim thinking make one sad for themselves.