Word: rewards
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...relationships or meet the tedious obligations that family and friendships can impose, and yet I know that isolation is very bad for me. I know that my happiness depends, in large part, on human contact and intimacy. And so, as with everything else, I do it and reap the reward, or I don't do it and suffer the consequences...
Risk-taking, by definition, defies logic. Reason can't explain why people do unpredictable things - like betting on blackjack or jumping out of planes - for little or, sometimes, no reward at all. There's the thrill, of course, but those brief moments of ecstasy aren't enough to keep most risk takers coming back for more - which they do, again and again, like addicts...
...green-eyed monster, Range and three other scientists at the University of Vienna put together pairs of domestic dogs, each accompanied by an experimenter. Both dogs in each pair were given commands to place their paws in the experimenter's hands, and when they obeyed, they were given a reward - a piece of bread or sausage. But when one dog wasn't given a reward for obeying, and the other dog in the room was, the unrewarded dog would refuse to respond to the repeated commands. The scientists measured the dogs' responses by how many times they had to prompt...
...dogs' reactions to the unfair distribution of rewards is called "inequity aversion" - when an animal acts to stop perceived inequalities within its social group - and it's a defining characteristic of social, or cooperative, species. "They wanted the same reward for the same work," says Paul Morris, a lecturer in psychology at the University of Portsmouth who specializes in animal behavior. Morris is quick to explain that the study's results aren't anthropomorphic: "I'm not saying that dog jealousy is precisely like human jealousy." Instead, he says, the dogs likely experienced a primitive form of envy...
...Americans considered overweight or obese and most weight-reduction plans proving helpful at getting pounds off but far less so at keeping them off, Volpp and Lowenstein decided it was time to quit fooling around. Never mind fad diets and you-can-do-it affirmations. Better to just reward successful dieters with something even more lip-smacking than food: cash...