Word: expectance
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...year's frenzy, a worker at a New York Walmart was trampled to death when the store opened its doors; two shoppers were shot in a dispute at a Toys "R" Us in California. The ensuing safety concerns may have prompted some shoppers to think twice, but retailers still expect a bonanza: the weekend after Thanksgiving is expected to account for some $40 billion in sales. (See the top 10 things you didn't know about Thanksgiving...
That knowledge also helps the brain figure out how much pleasure it can expect from future experiences and, therefore, influences virtually any decision you make about what you might like or not like: whether you should buy the red shirt or black one, whether you'll enjoy watching Top Chef over Mad Men, whether you should leave your job or whether you should move in with your boyfriend...
...findings suggest that when dopamine is present during an imagined event - that is, even when you're not actually experiencing it in person - it still influences how much pleasure the brain will expect from it in the future. Researchers think the extra shot of dopamine may aid learning - that is, it boosts your brain's learned association between pleasure and whatever experience you're thinking about at the time. Or perhaps, the authors speculate, the extra dopamine makes us simply want something more while we're imagining it. In other words, it would be useful to have...
...With headlines crying "lies" and the defense ministry badly damaged, many expect the affair to reinforce German opposition to the Afghanistan deployment, which is the most substantial deployment since the end of World War II, and is taking on the character of a fighting mission. Some see the affair as a chance for Germany's government, and the Western alliance more broadly, to have a real debate about strategic goals in the Hindu Kush. "Zu Guttenberg is likely to emerge strengthened from this", Volker Perthes, the head of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, told TIME...
Despite Kazmi's efforts, few in India expect anything other than a guilty verdict for Qasab. The widows of two top anti-terror officials who were killed in the attacks met with Congress Party President Sonia Gandhi on Nov. 23 and demanded the death penalty for Qasab, although the verdict is months away. Mumbaikars' interest in the trial has waned, although it spikes with the occasional dramatic moment, as when the testimony of the photographer who captured Qasab on film brought the defendant to tears...