Cognition On Tap

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-104
Author(s):  
James Steinhoff
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Popular Media ◽  
The Social ◽  
Technical Details ◽  
Algorithmic Bias ◽  
Development And Evolution ◽  
Do So

Abstract The thriving contemporary form of artificial intelligence (AI) called machine learning is often represented sensationally in popular media as a semi-mystical technology. Machine learning systems are frequently ascribed anthropomorphic capacities for learning, emoting and reasoning which, it is suggested, might lead to the alleviation of humanity’s woes. One critical reaction to such sensational proclamations has been to focus on the mundane reality of contemporary machine learning as mere inductive prediction based on statistical generalizations, albeit with surprisingly powerful abilities (Pasquinelli 2017). While the deflationist reaction is a necessary reply to sensationalist agitation, adequate comprehension of modern AI cannot be achieved while neglecting its material and social context. One does not have to subscribe wholeheartedly to the social construction of technology thesis1 to allow that the development and evolution of technologies are influenced by social factors. For AI, the most important aspect of the current social context is arguably capital, which increasingly dominates AI research and production. One former computer science professor describes a “giant sucking sound of [AI] academics going into industry” (Metz 2017). This paper introduces capital’s theory of AI as utility and initiates a discussion on its social consequences. First, I discuss utilities and their infrastructures and introduce a few critical thoughts on the topic. Second, I situate modern AI by way of a brief history. Third, I detail capital’s view of AI as a utility and the technical details underpinning it. Fourth, I sketch how AI as a utility frames a social problematic beyond the important issues of algorithmic bias and the automation of work. I do so by extrapolating from one consequence of AI as a utility which multiple capitalist firms predict: the curation of human subjectivities.

A Qualitative Study on Friends and the Social Context of Sexual Victimization: Implications for Campus-Based Interventions

2020 ◽  
pp. 107780122095427
Author(s):  
Jessica A. Blayney ◽  
Tiffany Jenzer ◽  
Jennifer P. Read ◽  
Jennifer Livingston ◽  
Maria Testa ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Sexual Victimization ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Potential Danger ◽  
The Social ◽  
Barriers To Implementation ◽  
College Drinkers

Sexual victimization (SV) risk can begin in social contexts, ones where friends are present, though it is unclear how friends might be integrated into SV prevention. Using focus groups, female college drinkers described (a) the role of friends in preventing SV, (b) the strategies friends use to reduce vulnerability, and (c) the barriers to implementation. Friends-based strategies (keeping tabs on one another, using signals to convey potential danger, interrupting escalating situations, taking responsibility for friends, relying on male friends) and barriers (intoxication, preoccupation, situation ambiguity, social consequences) were discussed. Interventions can draw on these strategies, but must address the critical barriers.

The Psychological Dimensions and the Social Consequences of Incarceration

2013 ◽  
Vol 651 (1) ◽  
pp. 122-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Schnittker
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Factors ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Social Connections ◽  
Criminal Record ◽  
Representative Survey ◽  
The Social ◽  
Nationally Representative ◽  
Psychological Dimensions ◽  
Do So ◽  
Former Inmates

This article explores the psychological costs of incarceration, with a particular focus on how psychological factors are related to the social and economic difficulties of reentry. Using descriptive information from a nationally representative survey, this study reveals considerable anxiety, fear, and uncertainty among former inmates. The evidence also reveals that psychiatric disorders are, in some cases, even more disabling among former inmates than among others. The article situates this evidence within the larger debate on the social consequences of incarceration and discusses its implications. Psychological factors are certainly not the only barriers former inmates will face, but they are neglected in the literature and play an important role in how former inmates respond to other difficulties. They are also at the center of a persistent dilemma: former inmates must establish social connections upon release, but they must do so while harboring the stigma of a criminal record. Furthermore, former inmates who have a psychiatric disorder may be particularly disadvantaged because they experience two stigmas simultaneously.

Current Child Care Policy in its Social Context

1983 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 16-17
Author(s):  
Lois Bryson
Keyword(s):  
Child Care ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
Child Care Policy ◽  
Care Policy ◽  
Rates Of Change ◽  
The Social ◽  
Do So

Child care policy must always relate to the wider social context, indeed it will inevitably do so as we are all affected by broader changes in the social structure and changes in ideology. Nonetheless, rates of change in various areas are not always synchronous. Today, I want to look at some broader changes in society and point to some of their implications for child care policy.

scholarly journals God Is Dying in Turkey as Well: Application of Secularization Theory to a Non-Christian Society

Open Theology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 192-211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Volkan Ertit
Keyword(s):  
Social Transformation ◽  
Sexual Relationship ◽  
Popular Media ◽  
Family Structures ◽  
Traditional Family ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Muslim Majority ◽  
Christian Society ◽  
Do So

Abstract It has been stated in academic studies and popular media that Islam began its rise in dominance in Turkey with the accession of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) to power in 2002 under the leadership of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. However, contrary to claims of societal Islamization, in light of quantitative and qualitative studies this study argues that despite the AKP and its leader Erdoğan being in power, the following evidence has been observed in Turkey: praying rates have decreased, extramarital sexual relationship has become prevalent, the number of mosques per person has decreased, the belief in virginity is a point of honour for fewer people, people‘s clothes have become more flatteringly formfitting and more attractive, including women’s head-scarves; secular experts rather than religious officials are being sought for help concerning problems in daily life, homosexuality has become more socially acceptable visible, traditional family structures has been shattered. Therefore, it is claimed that AKP (or Erdoğan) has failed in efforts to Islamize Turkey over the past 15 years (2002-2017) despite having all the governmental means and opportunities to do so. This study argues that the classical theory of secularization, which claims that modernization leads to secularization, can still explain not only the social transformation seen in historically Christian and Western European countries and their offshoots, but also the social transformation of Turkey, a Muslim-majority country that has been governed for the past 15 years by a political party with clear Islamic sensitivities.

The role of social context in the interpretation of sexist humor

2013 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jared Alan Gray ◽  
Thomas E. Ford
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Local Norm ◽  
The Social ◽  
Sexist Humor ◽  
Critical Humor ◽  
Professional Workplace ◽  
Workplace Setting ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Do So

AbstractAn experiment supported our hypotheses about the relationship between the social context in which sexist humor is delivered and the adoption of a non-critical humor mindset to interpret it. First, a professional workplace setting implied a local norm that is more prohibitive of sexist jokes than the general societal norm, whereas a comedy club implied a local norm of greater approval of sexist jokes. Second, offensiveness ratings revealed that participants were less likely to adopt a non-critical humor mindset to interpret sexist jokes delivered in a professional workplace setting and more likely to do so in a comedy club setting, compared to a setting governed by only the general societal norm. Finally, meditational analyses revealed that participants used the local norm of acceptability of sexist jokes to determine whether they could interpret the jokes in a non-critical humor mindset.

It’s complicated: Sex and the BDSM subculture

Sexualities ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 136346072096130
Author(s):  
Julie Fennell
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Determinants ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Sexual Experience ◽  
Internet Survey ◽  
Convenience Sample ◽  
Profound Impact ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Relationship

Drawing from extensive insider ethnographic work and an internet survey with a convenience sample of 1642 BDSM practitioners, I show that the social context of the BDSM subculture has a profound impact on pansexual BDSM practitioners’ interpretation of the relationship between BDSM and sex. Greater involvement in the public BDSM subculture and participation in feminine Dominance/masculine submission are both strongly associated with less preference for and experience of sexual BDSM. Greater involvement in the BDSM subculture increases participants’ likelihood of viewing their sexuality in terms of BDSM but decreases their likelihood of viewing BDSM in sexual terms. BDSM practitioners who meet new BDSM partners in BDSM subcultural contexts, even ones where sex is allowed, are much less likely to have sex with their partners than practitioners who met anywhere else. I argue that research should focus more on the social factors that influence participants’ experience and interpretation of BDSM, particularly on the influence of the BDSM subculture, and that theorists should think more broadly about the social determinants of “sex” and “sexual experience.”

scholarly journals On Quantifying and Understanding the Role of Ethics in AI Research: A Historical Account of Flagship Conferences and Journals

10.29007/74gj ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcelo Prates ◽  
Pedro Avelar ◽  
Luis Lamb
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Quantitative Evidence ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Work And Employment ◽  
And Robotics ◽  
Do So

Recent developments in AI, Machine Learning and Robotics have raised concerns about the ethical consequences of both academic and industrial AI research. Leading academics, businessmen and politicians have voiced an increasing number of questions about the con- sequences of AI not only over people, but also on the large-scale consequences on the the future of work and employment, its social consequences and the sustainability of the planet. In this work, we analyse the use and the occurrence of ethics-related research in leading AI, machine learning and robotics venues. In order to do so we perform long term, historical corpus-based analyses on a large number of flagship conferences and journals. Our experiments identify the prominence of ethics-related terms in published papers and presents several statistics on related topics. Finally, this research provides quantitative evidence on the pressing ethical concerns of the AI community.

scholarly journals “Clinician Knows Best”? Injustices in the Medicalization of Mental Illness

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Abigail Gosselin
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Mental Disorders ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Ideal Theory ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
The Social ◽  
And Control

This paper uses a non-ideal theory approach advocated for by Alison Jaggar to show that practices involved with the medicalization of serious mental disorders can subject people who have these disorders to a cycle of vulnerability that keeps them trapped within systems of injustice. When medicalization locates mental disorders solely as problems of individual biology, without regard to social factors, and when it treats mental disorders as personal defects, it perpetuates injustice in several ways: by enabling biased diagnoses through stereotyping, by exploiting and coercing people who are seen as insufficiently competent, and by perpetuating idealized conceptions of choice and control that do not take into account people’s real limitations and the social context of health. Through practices of diagnosis, treatment, and recovery, medicalization can perpetuate injustices toward people who have serious mental disorders.

Waiting for the Right One: The Role of Social Proximity and Location in the Decision to Use Cannabis for the First Time

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 625-644 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Bouchard ◽  
Krysta L. Dawson ◽  
Morena Anamali
Keyword(s):  
Substance Use ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Social Contact ◽  
Factors Associated ◽  
The Social ◽  
Canadian City ◽  
The Right ◽  
First Time ◽  
Do So

The study examines the social context of a cannabis offer, an outcome rarely examined in research on substance use. Drawing from a survey conducted among 15-year-old students in a mid-sized Canadian city, we examine (a) the differences between three types of users (immediate, late, and nonusers) and (b) the factors associated with accepting a cannabis offer more quickly. The findings show that 40% of the sample received an offer, that 25% of those who accept an offer do so on the first occasion, and that among the others, it takes up to seven offers before accepting. The social context of the offer distinguishes between the types of users, and offers are accepted more quickly when adolescents are first offered by a close social contact, and when the offer occurs in familiar settings. The study also identifies a type of nonuser, those who are exposed to drugs but decide not to participate.

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