PSYCHOLOGY: The Cost of Equal Opportunity

Equal Opportunity.

Equal opportunity for all.

By sequencing tens of millions of TCRa transcripts from naive mouse CD8 T cells, Genolet et al (2012) show that the TCRa repertoire is at least as diverse as the TCRb repertoire. This overturns a long held view in the field that recombination of the Tcra locus occurs in a co-ordinate sequential bidirectional manner that relies on proximity of Va and Ja gene segments. The observation that rearra...

On the Design of Equal-opportunity Policies

We study in this paper mechanisms to construct equal-opportunity policies for resource allocation. In a model where individuals enjoy welfare as a function of the e ort they expend, and the amount of a socially provided resource they consume, the aim is to allocate the social resource so that the inequality of welfare across individuals at the same relative e ort level is minimized. In doing so...

Tobacco: an equal-opportunity killer?

In their article, Jamrozik et al (see page 258) have explored the mortality hazard associated with smoking by gender and provide evidence that Australian men and women with similar smoking histories (namely, cigarettes smoked per day and time since quit) experience similar rates of death from smoking. Given the limitations of the data in this study, caution should be used in interpreting these ...

Running head: OPPORTUNITY COSTS The opportunity cost of time modulates cognitive effort A. Ross Otto Department of Psychology, McGill University

A spate of recent work demonstrates that humans seek to avoid the expenditure of cognitive effort, much like physical effort or economic resources. Less is clear, however, about the circumstances dictating how and when people decide to expend cognitive effort. Here we adopt a popular theory of opportunity costs and response vigor and to elucidate this question. This account, grounded in Reinfor...