HUMS staff week of December 17, 2018

Paleolithic middle school age dinosaurs during free time. 
For a smile click below -
https://youtu.be/VVSD00ZpCBw

5 days.... hold on ... we are almost here.  

ITEMS:

1.  December 18 - Middle School Staff meeting - Agenda is located in the blog cloud.  We have a few items to discuss.

2.  Assembly this coming Thursday - ELO 2 - band, hosts, fun and lots more.  Please remind students often about expectations this week.  We are working on a student run and led assembly - thanks for your help.

3.  Here is the ELO-X information for recovery options at the high school.  Due to the number of issues that occurred on Friday  - I am not sure if Lisa T had the opportunity to meeting during 1b - we can discuss further on Tuesday.

Click here for a gift.. if you read this... 

4. How Making Too Many Decisions Can Erode Their Quality

            In this New York Timesarticle, John Tierney explores “decision fatigue” – the research finding that having to make lots of decisions degrades people’s ability to decide wisely. This can happen, for example, to judges, quarterbacks, and couples preparing for a wedding (the decision-fatigue equivalent of Hell Week, says Tierney). 

In one experiment, college students were offered the chance to keep one item from a store’s going-out-of-business sale. The treatment group (deciders) had to make a series of choices: A pen or a candle? A vanilla-scented candle or one with an almond scent? A candle or a T-shirt? A black T-shirt or a red T-shirt? The control group (non-deciders) looked over the same items for a similar amount of time but didn’t have to make any choices; they were asked what they thought about each product and how often they had used it over the last six months. Afterward, all the students were subjected to a classic test of self-control: how long they could hold their hand in ice water. Those who had been required to make lots of decisions gave up much sooner (28 seconds, on average) than the non-deciders (67 seconds). Making all those decisions had sapped the deciders’ willpower. 

Similar experiments with people who’d been making purchasing decisions in a suburban mall, deciding on multiple features on a tailor-made suit, and deciding on extra features on a new car produced similar results. The most intriguing experiment looked at the parole decisions made by judges at different times of day. It turned out that prisoners had a much lower chance of being paroled just before lunch and late in the afternoon, when judges had been making difficult decisions for hours. At those points, they were more likely to make the non-decision of keeping a prisoner locked up. “Once you’re mentally depleted,” says Tierney, “you become reluctant to make trade-offs, which is a particularly advanced and taxing form of decision making.”

“Decision fatigue helps explain why ordinarily sensible people get angry at colleagues and families, splurge on clothes, buy junk food at the supermarket, and can’t resist the dealer’s offer to rustproof their new car,” says Tierney. “No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price. It’s different from ordinary physical fatigue – you’re not consciously aware of being tired – but you’re low on mental energy.” That leads people to take shortcuts – acting impulsively, taking the easy way out, or deciding not to act (the judges not granting parole). It seems that people have a finite amount of decision-making energy, and when it’s depleted, they’re less able to make good decisions. 

            Tierney offers another case study: Julius Caesar’s dilemma as he returned from Gaul in 49 B.C. and had to decide whether to cross the Rubicon River with his army (bringing his troops with him was forbidden and would lead to civil war). The three phases of the decision were: (a) pre-Rubicon – weighing the options; (b) deciding to cross the river, at which point the die would be cast; and (c) what to do after crossing. Modern researchers have found that the second step in a Rubicon-type decision is by far the most mentally taxing. 

            Making choices when grocery shopping is particularly challenging for the poor, says Tierney. Multiple trade-off decisions with very limited resources deplete mental energy, leaving people vulnerable to impulse buying when they get to the cash register – which is, of course, why the sweet snacks are displayed there. And there’s a reason that sugary products are temptingly available at that location: glucose restores mental energy very quickly. The problem, Tierney says, is that it’s short-term mental energy, not the kind of wise decision-making energy that serves people best. That’s why dieting is a decision-making Catch 22: In order not to eat, the dieter needs willpower; but in order to have willpower, especially after resisting temptation all day, the dieter needs to eat, and sweets are tempting – but not helpful. Protein and other more-nutritious foods eaten throughout the day are better.

            Even with better food choices, decision fatigue is still a factor. The study of the parole judges found that just after a mid-morning snack, they made more merciful decisions, but an hour or so later, they were back to harsher decisions, keeping prisoners locked up, even with exactly the same characteristics. The same was true just after lunch – more mercy – and late afternoon – slim chances of being paroled.

“To Choose Is to Lose” by John Tierney in The New York Times, August 17, 2011, 

https://nyti.ms/2yhofEq(see Memo 619 for a related article on “compassion fatigue”)