In Brief

Join the club

Remember high school?

You probably didn't think joining the debate club would change your life. You almost certainly didn't connect the drama club to the future of American democracy. Yet recent research shows that extracurricular activities may cause youth to develop into politically active adults.

Researchers Daniel McFarland and Reuben Thomas analyzed the responses to two surveys that tracked people from their early adolescence through their mid-twenties. In a paper published in the American Sociological Review, McFarland and Thomas report that when teens belonged to certain youth organizations including service clubs, student council, and even drama and musical groups they were more likely as adults to participate in political activities such as voting, performing community service, and joining a political campaign. This was true regardless of the teenagers class or social background.

The authors argue that public speaking, performance, debate, and community service imbue youth with the skills, interests, relationships, and communal identities necessary for adult political behavior. Interestingly, they found that for the most part, playing team sports had no effect on later political activity. One sport cheerleading actually had a negative association, " suggesting that the activity may be generating self-conceptions (possibly gender-related) that counter the positive political efforts occurring in other activities." The authors also found that sporadically volunteering on political and environmental campaigns had less impact on adult political activity than consistent community service.

For years, social scientists have documented declines in Americans political participation and group membership. This research suggests that encouraging young people to get involved in extracurricular activities can help revitalize civic engagement. Indeed, their results are especially compelling at a time when schools continue to cut music and drama clubs. McFarland and Thomas argue that not only should these programs be preserved, they should be extended to homeschooled and underprivileged students. In this way, they write, schools can nurture " more communally oriented people who are engaged, critical citizens willing to work together to improve our pluralistic democratic society."
—Naazneen Barma

The biology of empathy

Gender stereotypes presume that men are less emotionally intelligent than women; research has found that the truth is not so simple.

Yet a new study suggests that when it comes to empathy, gender might matter.

Dutch neuroscientist Erno Jan Hermans and his colleagues set out to test whether testosterone directly inhibits a person's ability to empathize with someone else that is, whether it makes him less prone to take another person's perspective and understand what she is thinking or feeling. To gauge empathy in their study's 20 female participants, the researchers showed the women 16 short video clips of happy or angry faces (see figure). As the women watched the clips, an instrument called an electomyograph recorded the muscle movement in their faces, measuring how much their expressions unconsciously mimicked the faces in each video. Previous research has shown this kind of facial mimicry to be an accurate marker of empathy.

Before watching the clips, the women received either a dose of testosterone or a placebo. As the researchers had predicted, mimicry of both kinds of facial expressions was weaker after the women had received testosterone.

Although these results do suggest that testosterone might reduce empathic behavior, there are some limitations to this study. For instance, while facial mimicry may be one component of empathic behavior, it is clearly not the defining feature. Before we conclude that testosterone leaves men at an emotional disadvantage, additional studies must show that testosterone affects the many other dimensions of empathy.
—Mario Aceves

A focusing illusion

Does money buy happiness? When we see a multi-millionaire on her yacht or pictures of a family vacation in a place we can t afford, it s awfully hard to answer, " No." But scientific research has repeatedly challenged that assumption. Now a recent study has found that although people with high incomes are more likely than others to say they're generally happy with their lives, this difference virtually disappears when they make a moment-to-moment assess- ment of how happy they really are.

In the study, published in Science, Nobel prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman and his co-authors argue that a phenomenon known as the " focusing illusion" misleads people into believing that more money can or does make them happier.

" When people consider the impact of any single factor on their well-being not only income they are prone to exaggerate its importance," write the authors. So when survey respondents are asked, for example, whether wealthier people are happier than those less well-off, they tend to focus on financial status as the root of happiness. Perhaps seduced by thoughts of plasma TVs and seaside resorts, they make too much of the effect wealth can have on one s well-being.

In reality, according to the study, higher income does little to improve life satisfaction, and may even cause more anxiety and stress. " In some cases," explain the authors, " this focusing illusion may lead to a misallocation of time, from accepting lengthy com- mutes to sacrificing time spent socializing." Indeed, in the results of a national survey the authors analyzed, people with an income above $100,000 reported spending more time at work and commuting. This may help to explain why so many people with relatively high incomes reported in the survey that they're generally happy with their lives, but don't actually experience as much happiness in their daily lives as they say they do. " People do not know how happy or satisfied they are with their life in the way they know their height or telephone number," the authors write.
—Tanya Vacharkulksemsuk