Comments on: The Young and the Lucky http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/ Fri, 17 May 2013 07:41:21 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: How Situational Self-Schemas Influence Disposition « The Situationist http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-6032 Tue, 21 Aug 2007 04:03:03 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-6032 [...] fascinating research has been the subject of previous Situationist posts (including “The Young and the Lucky,” and “The Perils of Being Smart (or Not So Much”). This post compliments those posts as well [...]

]]> By: The Loss of Empathy in Japan? « The Situationist http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-1424 Mon, 21 May 2007 13:02:58 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-1424 [...] other writings on The Situationist that examine empathy, see “March Madness” and “The Young and the Lucky. And, for a sample of postings looking at situational influences on ethics, see [...]

]]> By: kabababrubarta http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-353 Tue, 27 Mar 2007 00:29:35 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-353 Nice site! kabababrubarta

]]> By: Corey Tomsons http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-92 Wed, 28 Feb 2007 18:37:01 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-92 A follow up – on second thought, the ‘falling from the sky’ example might not be a good one. It might invoke ideas of divine beneficence.

]]> By: Corey Tomsons http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-91 Wed, 28 Feb 2007 18:34:03 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-91 Thanks for the link to the article. I’ll make a dangerous comment, given that I’ve not yet read it, but the impression that I get from your precis is that this has nothing to do with attributions of luck. Instead, it is just about preferences for persons who possess resources, and a disinclination towards those who do not have resources. Expectations of sharing or benefits of association might also come into play.

It would be interesting to design a study to compare attitudes about ‘desert’ and ‘good fortune’: a child’s attitude to one who finds money on the street, another who receives it as a gift, another who receives it as a reward for ‘good character’, and another who received it in payment for labour.

To disambiguate finding money from merit (because finding might just be about good hunting skills) perhaps a ‘falling from the sky’ case might offer a better insight into attitudes about luck.

One last point: the results may be coloured by empathy and mirroring effects. A child might simply be more likely to point to an unhappy face when they see unhappy people, in which case their signal has nothing to do with whether or not they like the people.

And that is entirely too much to say without reading the article itself… Treat these as anticipatory speculations.

Thanks again for the link to the research.

]]> By: Doug S. http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-85 Wed, 28 Feb 2007 05:19:34 +0000 http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-young-and-the-lucky/#comment-85 Sometimes it’s really hard to tell the difference between unearned success and earned success – and unearned success is still success that could potentially be shared with you. I imagine a preference for “lucky” people could be also interpreted as a preference for successful people.

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