[From Fred Nickols (2007.08.10.0706 ET)]
The following was posted to another list where I spend some time and, upon reading it, I sensed a PCT explanation, having something to do with higher levels setting reference signals for lower levels - but with a twist - with conflict vertically situated in the hierarchy. Anyway I thought I'd pass it along. I believe it's from the Washington Post.
···
> Hot and Cold Emotions Make Us Poor Judges
> By Shankar Vedantam
> Monday, August 6, 2007; A03
> Why would David Vitter, a U.S. senator with four young children, have
> gotten involved with a seedy escort service? Why would Michael Vick, a
> gifted NFL quarterback, get mixed up with the sordid world of dog
> fighting? Why would Bill Clinton, a Rhodes scholar, six-time governor
> and president of the United States at 46, have an affair with an intern
> in the Oval Office?
> It isn't just men behaving badly. Remember Lisa Nowak, the married NASA
> astronaut who drove from Houston to Orlando (wearing diapers so she
> wouldn't have to make bathroom stops, police said) allegedly in order
> to kidnap her rival in a love triangle?
> Whenever these scandals break, the rest of us shake our heads and ask,
> "What were they thinking?"
> That feeling of incredulity is now the subject of a growing body of
> research. It isn't just that people find it difficult to understand or
> empathize with others who do crazy things. People find it very
> difficult to imagine how they themselves would behave when strong
> emotions are involved.
> Studies have found that, for some reason, an enormous mental gulf
> separates "cold" emotional states from "hot" emotional states. When we
> are not hungry or thirsty or sexually aroused, we find it difficult to
> understand what effects those factors can have on our behavior.
> Similarly, when we are excited or angry, it is difficult to think about
> the consequences of our behavior -- outcomes that are glaringly obvious
> when we are in a cold emotional state.
> Vitter (R-La.), for example, demanded in late June that the Title V
> Abstinence Education program be reauthorized: "These programs have been
> shown to effectively reduce the risks of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and
> sexually transmitted diseases by teaching teenagers that saving sex
> until marriage and remaining faithful afterwards is the best choice for
> health and happiness," he declared.
> A little more than two weeks later, Vitter was apologizing for a
> "serious sin" in his past, after his telephone number was found among
> the telephone lists of the alleged D.C. Madam. Hypocrisy? Possibly. But
> if the research is accurate, what it suggests is that
> Vitter-the-policymaker probably finds Vitter-the-escort-service-
> client as incomprehensible as everyone else does.
> "We tend to exaggerate the importance of willpower," said George
> Loewenstein, a professor of economics and psychology at Carnegie Mellon
> University who has studied the phenomenon of hot and cold emotional
> states and the surprisingly diverse implications of the gulf that
> separates them.
> Many health resolutions, for example, are made when people are in a
> cold state. But while they may intellectually grasp the temptation of a
> potato chip or a cigarette, they do not appreciate in advance how
> visceral the desire can be -- which is why many resolutions fail when
> put to the test.
> Psychologist Louis Giordano once asked heroin addicts on a maintenance
> course of the heroin substitute buprenorphine whether they would prefer
> an extra dose five days later or a sum of money. He found that when
> addicts were asked the question right before they got a dose -- when
> their craving was highest -- they valued the extra dose more than twice
> as much as addicts who had just taken their buprenorphine. The addicts
> who were in a craving state viscerally understood how much they would
> want the extra dose later; the satiated addicts, on the other hand,
> overestimated how easily they could do without the fix.
> Similarly, when cancer researcher Maurice Slevin quizzed medical
> professionals about whether they would endure grueling chemotherapy to
> extend their lives by only a few months, fewer than one in 10 said it
> was worth it -- they were evaluating the question in a cold state. When
> he asked patients who actually had cancer the same question -- these
> were dying people who were in a very hot state -- nearly half said a
> few more weeks of life was worth the pain of chemo.
> The empathy gulf between hot and cold states, Loewenstein said, might
> also explain why many patients are undertreated for pain. Patients
> viscerally experience their agony; doctors who are coolly evaluating
> the situation have to make a leap of imagination across the gulf that
> separates hot and cold states.
> Other experiments have found that shoppers at grocery stores spend more
> when they are hungry than they do when they are full.
> The empathy gap between hot and cold states not only keeps people from
> realizing how prone they can be to temptation but from enjoying things
> as much as they could: Marriage therapists, for instance, find that
> couples who report being uninterested in sex are usually surprised to
> find how much they enjoy intimacy once an encounter takes place.
> Couples in a cold state don't realize how they will feel once they are
> in a hot state.
> Loewenstein said his research made it difficult for him to serve on a
> university disciplinary committee, because he now empathizes with
> students who make mistakes in the heat of the moment. And when big
> public scandals break, he automatically thinks about the empathy gap
> that prompts so many people to be judgmental of others.
> "Most people have their own vices," he said. "When we are dealing with
> our vices, we are shortsighted, impulsive and make ridiculous
> sacrifices to satisfy our vices. But when we see other people
> succumbing to their vices, we think, 'How pathetic.' "
>
--
Regards,
Fred Nickols
Managing Principal
Distance Consulting
nickols@att.net
www.nickols.us
"Assistance at A Distance"