Publications by authors named "Ven N"

Creating effective nudges, or interventions that encourage people to make choices that increase their welfare, is difficult to execute well. Recent work on megastudies, massive field experiments that test many interventions simultaneously, reveals that nudge effectiveness both varies widely and is difficult for experts to predict. We propose an Iterative Crowdsourcing Procedure, which uses insights from members of the target population to generate and preselect nudges prior to testing them in a field experiment.

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Introduction: Bacterial infections are frequently seen in the emergency department (ED), but can be difficult to distinguish from viral infections and some non-infectious diseases. Common biomarkers such as c-reactive protein (CRP) and white blood cell (WBC) counts fail to aid in the differential diagnosis. Neutrophil CD64 (nCD64), an IgG receptor, is suggested to be more specific for bacterial infections.

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In this paper, we present the Online Coalition Game (OCG): an open-source tool written for the open-access research platform oTree that enables high-powered interactive coalition formation experiments. Besides containing a tutorial on conducting and configuring studies using the OCG, we discuss two previous implementations. With these examples, we demonstrate that online use of the OCG provides the benefits of large sample sizes and fast data collection, while leading to convergent and robust findings.

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Research on the effect of emotional tears on perceived competence has yielded an inconsistent pattern of findings, with some studies showing that tearful individuals may be perceived as less competent, while others report no such effect. These mixed results point to the likely existence of third variables influencing the link between tears and perceived competence and suggest that crying may affect competence only in specific circumstances. In the current project, we reexamine this link using a large, openly available dataset of responses to tearful faces collected across 41 countries and 7,007 participants (Zickfeld et al.

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A key observation in coalition formation is that bargainers with most resources are often excluded from coalitions: the Strength-is-Weakness effect. Previous studies have suffered from low sample sizes and lack of (appropriate) incentives and have rarely focused on underlying processes. To address these issues, we conducted a cross-platform replication using the Online Coalition Game.

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Background: The Botswana Tsepamo study reported neural tube defects (NTDs) in 4 of 426 (0.94%) infants of women receiving preconception dolutegravir (DTG) antiretroviral therapy (ART) vs 14 of 11 300 (0.12%) receiving preconception non-DTG ART.

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Several toxic substances, inhaled or swallowed, can cause similar respiratory symptoms. We present two young patients with respiratory symptoms, one after inhaling chlorine gas and the other after ingesting lamp oil. Pathophysiology and clinical effects of these two substances differ.

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Purpose: In this systematic literature review, the effects of the application of a checklist during in hospital resuscitation of trauma patients on adherence to the ATLS guidelines, trauma team performance, and patient-related outcomes were integrated.

Methods: A systematic review was performed following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses checklist. The search was performed in Pubmed, Embase, CINAHL, and Cochrane inception till January 2019.

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Background: Musculoskeletal symptoms in people living with HIV (PLWH) such as pain, joint stiffness, and fatigue are commonly reported. Prevalence rates of up to 45%, 79% and 88% respectively have been reported. However, very little is known about differences in prevalence and impact of musculoskeletal symptoms on physical functioning and quality of life of PLWH on effective combined antiretroviral treatment (cART) in high and low-resource settings.

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Background: Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) is a rapidly progressive fatal neurodegenerative disorder. We report an unusual case of pathologically confirmed sporadic CJD developing in a HIV-positive patient but presenting with clinical and radiological features suggestive of variant CJD.

Case Presentation: A 63-year-old man with chronic stable HIV developed progressive difficulties with decision-making, obsessive compulsive disorder and visual hallucinations over 3 months.

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Admiring a moral role model has been found to inspire people to become better persons themselves. But what are the antecedents that trigger admiration and thus make inspiration more likely? In three studies, we tested the effect of perceived importance and perceived surprisingness of the moral action on resulting admiration and inspiration. Study 1 finds that perceived importance, and to a lesser extent, the perceived surprisingness of a moral action, are related to stronger admiration.

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Social network users often see their online friends post about experiential purchases (such as traveling experiences) and material purchases (such as newly purchased gadgets). Three studies (total  = 798) were conducted to investigate which type of purchase triggers more envy on Social Network Sites (SNSs) and explored its underlying mechanism. We consistently found that experiential purchases triggered more envy than material purchases did.

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Two key emotions people can experience when someone else is better than them are envy and admiration. There are conflicting findings in the scientific literature on which behaviour is elicited by these emotions. In one study (with two samples, total N = 345), we test which motivations are triggered by envy and admiration.

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Earlier research found that the mere sight of tears promotes the willingness to provide support to the person shedding the tears. Other research, however, found that deliberate responses towards tearful persons could be more negative as well. We think this is because tears have ambivalent effects on person perception: We predicted that tearful people are seen as warmer, but also as less competent.

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The question what specific functions the production of emotional tears fulfills has received only limited attention of behavioral scientists. We report the results of two studies on the social impact of emotional tears. In Study 1 (96 Dutch females), perceived helplessness and felt connectedness predicted the willingness to help a person depicted as crying tearfully, while perceived friendliness did not.

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Moral licensing refers to the effect that when people initially behave in a moral way, they are later more likely to display behaviors that are immoral, unethical, or otherwise problematic. We provide a state-of-the-art overview of moral licensing by conducting a meta-analysis of 91 studies (7,397 participants) that compare a licensing condition with a control condition. Based on this analysis, the magnitude of the moral licensing effect is estimated to be a Cohen's d of 0.

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Greed is an important motive: it is seen as both productive (a source of ambition; the motor of the economy) and destructive (undermining social relationships; the cause of the late 2000s financial crisis). However, relatively little is known about what greed is and does. This article reports on 5 studies that develop and test the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (DGS).

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Unlabelled: Combinations of direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) can cure hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the majority of treatment-naïve patients. Mass treatment programs to cure HCV in developing countries are only feasible if the costs of treatment and laboratory diagnostics are very low. This analysis aimed to estimate minimum costs of DAA treatment and associated diagnostic monitoring.

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Although greed is both hailed as the motor of economic growth and blamed as the cause of economic crises, very little is known about its psychological underpinnings. Five studies explored lay conceptualizations of greed among U.S.

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Previous research has yielded inconsistent findings concerning the relationship between envy and schadenfreude. Three studies examined whether the distinction between benign and malicious envy can resolve this inconsistency. We found that malicious envy is related to schadenfreude, while benign envy is not.

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We examined whether counterfactual thinking influences the experience of envy. Counterfactual thinking refers to comparing the situation as it is to what it could have been, and these thought processes have been shown to lead to a variety of emotions. We predicted that for envy the counterfactual thought "it could have been me" would be important.

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Envy is a frustrating emotion that arises from upward social comparison. Two studies investigated the appraisals that distinguish benign envy (aimed at improving one's own situation) from malicious envy (aimed at pulling down the superior other). Study 1 found that appraisals of deservingness and control potential differentiated both types of envy.

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Three studies confirm the existence of the return trip effect: The return trip often seems shorter than the initial trip, even though the distance traveled and the actual time spent traveling are identical. A pretest shows that people indeed experience a return trip effect regularly, and the effect was found on a bus trip (Study 1), a bicycle trip (Study 2), and when participants watched a video of someone else traveling (Study 3). The return trip effect also existed when another, equidistant route was taken on the return trip, showing that it is not familiarity with the route that causes this effect.

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Four studies tested the hypothesis that the emotion of benign envy, but not the emotions of admiration or malicious envy, motivates people to improve themselves. Studies 1 to 3 found that only benign envy was related to the motivation to study more (Study 1) and to actual performance on the Remote Associates Task (which measures intelligence and creativity; Studies 2 and 3). Study 4 found that an upward social comparison triggered benign envy and subsequent better performance only when people thought self-improvement was attainable.

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The fear of being envied makes people act prosocially, in an attempt to ward off the potentially destructive effects of envy. In three experiments, people who were in a superior position and could be envied were more likely than control participants to give time-consuming advice to a potentially envious person or to help a potentially envious person pick up erasers she had accidentally scattered. However, helping behavior increased only if envy was likely to be malicious rather than benign.

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