scholarly journals Embodied economics: how bodily information shapes the social coordination dynamics of decision-making

2010 ◽  
Vol 365 (1538) ◽  
pp. 291-301 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olivier Oullier ◽  
Frédéric Basso

To date, experiments in economics are restricted to situations in which individuals are not influenced by the physical presence of other people. In such contexts, interactions remain at an abstract level, agents guessing what another person is thinking or is about to decide based on money exchange. Physical presence and bodily signals are therefore left out of the picture. However, in real life, social interactions (involving economic decisions or not) are not solely determined by a person's inference about someone else's state-of-mind. In this essay, we argue for embodied economics : an approach to neuroeconomics that takes into account how information provided by the entire body and its coordination dynamics influences the way we make economic decisions. Considering the role of embodiment in economics—movements, posture, sensitivity to mimicry and every kind of information the body conveys—makes sense. This is what we claim in this essay which, to some extent, constitutes a plea to consider bodily interactions between agents in social (neuro)economics.

Author(s):  
Stephen J. Goldberg

In China, poetry, painting and calligraphy are traditionally known as the ‘Three Perfections’ of the cultivated scholar. They are construed as ethico-aesthetic acts of self-signification and are evaluated as to their efficacy in fostering harmonious relations of social exchange within the concrete circumstances of particular social contexts. In contrast to Western notions of mimesis, the Chinese poetic tradition assumes the existence of fundamental, mutually implicating correlations between the patterns (wen) immanent in nature and those of human culture. This gives rise to two traditions of Chinese poetics. First, there is the canonical tradition of Confucian exegesis, in which a poem was assumed to invoke a network of pre-established categorical correlations (lei) between poet and world, which enabled the imagery to be read as verbal indices of both personal feeling and the relative stability of the social and natural order. Second, there is the non-canonical tradition of neo-Daoist and Buddhist-inspired poetics which represented a shift from the didactic to the affective power of natural imagery to make reference to the poet’s state of mind. Calligraphy and painting were adopted by the gentleman-scholar as ethico-aesthetic practices of xiushen (self-cultivation) and self-expression, and for promotion of social exchange. Early writings describing calligraphy and painting deploy metaphorical imagery that makes reference to both nature and the body. This imagery invoked the indigenous correlative rhetoric that sought consonance between the patterns immanent within the natural order and those of the human realm. The embodiment of tradition, through the practice of making artistic references to the past, was fundamental to the art of the scholar-painter, for it served to establish one’s artistic lineage and to sanction or authorize one’s own self-presentation within a particular historical situation.


2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 100-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandra Crampton

This article uses three levels of body analysis as presented by Nancy Scheper-Hughes and Margaret Lock to compare old age as a construct in population aging discourse with research on lived experience of people aging in the United States and Ghana. I first describe how demographers construct social bodies as becoming “gray” through population statistics and how policy makers then use dependency ratios to rationalize intervention on behalf of older adults in the body-politic.  The construction of old age within this discourse is then compared with ethnographic research that suggests this construct leaves out much of the lived experience familiar to anthropologists of aging.  Rather than debunk the old age construct, however, the purpose of this article is to argue for study of population aging discourse as constituting a social body reflecting cultural constructions of nature and society.  Moreover, this representation is made real through policy and social intervention work, and with very real effect on people’s lives. As such, an anthropology of aging bodies can include the social life of old age as a social construct.


2010 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher J. Ferguson ◽  
Stephanie M. Rueda

This article explores commonly discussed theories of violent video game effects: the social learning, mood management, and catharsis hypotheses. An experimental study was carried out to examine violent video game effects. In this study, 103 young adults were given a frustration task and then randomized to play no game, a nonviolent game, a violent game with good versus evil theme (i.e., playing as a good character taking on evil), or a violent game in which they played as a “bad guy.” Results indicated that randomized video game play had no effect on aggressive behavior; real-life violent video game-playing history, however, was predictive of decreased hostile feelings and decreased depression following the frustration task. Results do not support a link between violent video games and aggressive behavior, but do suggest that violent games reduce depression and hostile feelings in players through mood management.


Author(s):  
Rosemary J. Jolly

The last decade has witnessed far greater attention to the social determinants of health in health research, but literary studies have yet to address, in a sustained way, how narratives addressing issues of health across postcolonial cultural divides depict the meeting – or non-meeting – of radically differing conceptualisations of wellness and disease. This chapter explores representations of illness in which Western narrators and notions of the body are juxtaposed with conceptualisations of health and wellness entirely foreign to them, embedded as the former are in assumptions about Cartesian duality and the superiority of scientific method – itself often conceived of as floating (mysteriously) free from its own processes of enculturation and their attendant limits. In this respect my work joins Volker Scheid’s, in this volume, in using the capacity of critical medical humanities to reassert the cultural specificity of what we have come to know as contemporary biomedicine, often assumed to be


2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 283
Author(s):  
Inga Narbute ◽  
Sanda Jegere ◽  
Indulis Kumsars ◽  
Dace Juhnevica ◽  
Agnese Knipse ◽  
...  

Together with calcified lesions, saphenous vein grafts, chronic total occlusions and unprotected left main lesions, bifurcation lesions are complex lesions that remain among the outstanding challenges of treatment with percutaneous coronary intervention. Bifurcation lesions are associated with increased rates of procedural complications, restenosis and adverse events than lesions in the body of the vessel. The introduction of drug-eluting stents for the treatment of bifurcation lesions has dramatically decreased restenosis rates, especially in patients suffering from diabetes. However, abrupt side branch closure, side branch ostial restenosis and stent thrombosis remain areas where further improvement is needed. Although a provisional T-stent strategy is most often used when side branch stenting is required, there are true bifurcation lesions where the selected use of more complex bifurcation approaches (such as the crush technique, T-stenting or the culotte technique) seem appropriate, particularly when the main branch and side branch are larger vessels with more diffuse side branch disease. The major challenge with any technique is to ensure that the side branch is protected and there is a satisfactory final result. Many technical questions rise in trying to ensure this outcome and lower the risk of intra- and post-procedural complications such as side branch closure and restenosis, stent thrombosis, dissection and fracture of a jailed wire: how can difficult side branch access be solved? How can unfavourable side branch anatomy be re-wired after main vessel stent placement? How can fracture of a jailed wire be avoided? Is side-strut dilation beneficial?


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Chavoshian ◽  
Sophia Park

Along with the recent development of various theories of the body, Lacan’s body theory aligns with postmodern thinkers such as Michael Foucault and Maurice Merlot-Ponti, who consider body social not biological. Lacan emphasizes the body of the Real, the passive condition of the body in terms of formation, identity, and understanding. Then, this condition of body shapes further in the condition of bodies of women and laborers under patriarchy and capitalism, respectively. Lacan’s ‘not all’ position, which comes from the logical square, allows women to question patriarchy’s system and alternatives of sexual identities. Lacan’s approach to feminine sexuality can be applied to women’s spirituality, emphasizing multiple narratives of body and sexual identities, including gender roles. In the social discernment and analysis in the liberation theology, we can employ the capitalist discourse, which provides a tool to understand how people are manipulated by late capitalist society, not knowing it. Lacan’s theory of ‘a body without a head’ reflects the current condition of the human body, which manifests lack, yet including some possibilities for transforming society.


GIS Business ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 202-206
Author(s):  
SAJITHA M

Food is one of the main requirements of human being. It is flattering for the preservation of wellbeing and nourishment of the body.  The food of a society exposes its custom, prosperity, status, habits as well as it help to develop a culture. Food is one of the most important social indicators of a society. History of food carries a dynamic character in the socio- economic, political, and cultural realm of a society. The food is one of the obligatory components in our daily life. It occupied an obvious atmosphere for the augmentation of healthy life and anticipation against the diseases.  The food also shows a significant character in establishing cultural distinctiveness, and it reflects who we are. Food also reflected as the symbol of individuality, generosity, social status and religious believes etc in a civilized society. Food is not a discriminating aspect. It is the part of a culture, habits, addiction, and identity of a civilization.Food plays a symbolic role in the social activities the world over. It’s a universal sign of hospitality.[1]


2010 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erhard Schüttpelz
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  

The contribution re-establishes Marcel Mauss's concept of body functional techniques: the social-anthropological basis, the theoretical technical position and the systematic programming of this term. According to Mauss, modern body functional techniques and their media inventions can be interpreted in different ways: as strategies for the reduction of the body and as a project of a reciprocal, psychosomatic, ritualistic and medial intensification.


2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 184
Author(s):  
Sari Herleni

This article describes about the figure of children world in a short story “Anggrek Rara” written by Ina Inong, by connecting the social structure in the text and in the real life. After analyzing the social structure in the story, it is found that the plot of this story was the progressive plot, the background was from the social fact that came from inner house and outer house, otherwise the central character were Rara and Bunda. By analyzing social structure of text, it was found that a family (home) is the serious and formal environment while outer house is free and non formal. The result of the research showed that the children short story “ Anggrek Rara” was expected to give the figure outlines of the children world.AbstrakPenelitian ini membahas tentang gambaran dunia anak dalam cerita pendek anak “Anggrek Rara” karya Ina Inong dengan menghubungkan struktur sosial teks dalam karya dan struktur sosial teks dengan realitas. Melalui analisis struktur sosial dalam karya terungkap bahwa alur cerita ini merupakan alur lurus, latar terdiri dari fakta sosial yang bersumber dari rumah dan di luar rumah, sedangkan tokoh Rara dan Bunda adalah tokoh sentral. Melalui analisis struktur sosial teks dengan realitas terungkap bahwa keluarga (rumah) merupakan lingkungan yang sifatnya serius dan formal, sedangkan di luar rumah bahkan bersifat bebas dan non formal. Hasil yang diperoleh dari analisis ini menunjukkan bahwa cerita pendek anak “Anggrek Rara” dianggap mampu memberikan garis-garis besar gambaran kehidupan dunia anak.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 16
Author(s):  
Lisa Guenther

In The Body in Pain, Elaine Scarry analyzes the structure of torture as an unmaking of the world in which the tools that ought to support a person’s embodied capacities are used as weapons to break them down. The Security Housing Unit (SHU) of California’s Pelican Bay State Prison functions as a weaponized architecture of torture in precisely this sense; but in recent years, prisoners in the Pelican Bay Short Corridor have re-purposed this weaponized architecture as a tool for remaking the world through collective resistance. This resistance took the form of a hunger strike in which prisoners exposed themselves to the possibility of biological death in order to contest the social and civil death of solitary confinement. By collectively refusing food, and by articulating the meaning and motivation of this refusal in articles, interviews, artwork, and legal documents, prisoners reclaimed and expanded their perceptual, cognitive, and expressive capacities for world-making, even in a space of systematic torture.


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