David Epstein

When I see IRT used on psychological/psychiatric inventories, I question "difficulty." Low correct-response rates reflect difficulty if items measure knowledge or skill. But symptom/trait/state endorsement? Low "yes" rates may mean many things--not a construct called "difficulty." Change my mind.

Micro interventions based on real-time monitoring of affective instability: a proof-of- concept study. Merlijn Olthof et al. Excerpt 1 of 3: Design: We used a quasi-randomized within-person experimental design for testing the micro-intervention effects during increased EWMSD [exponentially weighted moving standard deviation of affect ratings] vs. control periods (with EWMSD below the threshold). At the start of the study, participants were assigned at random to one of two phases: the experimental phase (micro-intervention is applied when there is increased EWMSD) and the control phase (micro-intervention is applied semi-randomly). [David’s comment: This is the appropriate control for Forer effects, and no one else ever uses it!] Excerpt 2 of 3: Interestingly, from the data viewing sessions, we also learned that there was a large heterogeneity in how persons experienced - and reacted to - the intervention and burst measurements. While some persons were really enthusiastic about the intervention, others found it annoying or confronting because they found that they had no time to engage in the intervention. Some persons never actually performed the activity they selected, some nearly always performed it in the next 30 minutes, but others used it as 'a reminder'… [David’s comment: This is the kind of frankness we need more of.] Excerpt 3 of 3: These results can inform future research, which, who knows, may at some point be able test the hypothesis that we were after. [David’s comment: OK, marry me.]

Unsuccessful trial, good preprint. I fervently hope the final sentence makes it through peer review.

For me, the transformation of a grim industrial/parking space underneath I-83 into a venue for many dozens of local artists/craftspeople was...inspiring, lovely. It was also noisy (due in part to the nearby bandstand), but that was OK. I admired the act.

Tweets from June 8, 2020. Payton Jones: “You may want to reconsider your use of trigger warnings. Our new paper, just appearing in Clinical Psychological Science, suggests they may do more harm than good.” Me, in a series of five replies: “This is a nicely conducted experiment, but it's a very limited operationalization of the broad question it means to address— limited both by the stimuli used and the responses assessed….The "markedly distressing" cues (text from Dosteovsky, Ballard, etc.) were tame indeed. I don't see anything in the Results to indicate that they even markedly bothered anyone! So, not a very stringent test of whether trigger warnings help or harm. Re responses assessed: If nothing else, use of TWs conveys courtesy and respect. Presentation of highly disturbing material without TWs can convey an indifference or erasure that might be inherently distressing to people with trauma histories. Your study didn't assess that aspect of people's responses to your stimuli and TWs--a major omission in any consideration of TWs' cost:benefit or risk:benefit ratio. (But, again, you would have needed nastier stimuli to assess this.) In sum: an interesting demonstration and a very worthy endeavor, but I wouldn't use it to conclude that if I plan to show graphic films of sexual assault to a roomful of survivors, the best thing I can do for them is omit a warning. This study won't generalize to that.”

Pinker's assertion about trigger warnings (that they "can do more harm than good") is based on research that doesn't generalize to the intended situations, as I told the author five years ago.

I've been telling people how the use of full labeling on an ordinal response scale can clarify what you get from a survey/EMA item. I didn't mean this.

Side one of sign, from an old issue of the Onion's "American Voices" feature: "Phrases like 'massive redistribution of wealth' have historically brought rivers of blood. That said, it's time for a massive redistribution of wealth." Side two of sign: "Austerity? You go first, E.M. I'll join in if it looks good."

New weekend of Tesla Takedown protests, new two-sided sign.

(I'm reading 𝘍𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘺 𝘉𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘛𝘳𝘶𝘦, Christine Wenc's excellent book about the history of The Onion.)

Graph of Tesla stock freefalling: "You can't keep a good man down. But THIS schmuck? You can."

New sign made for tomorrow's Tesla Takedown. As a scientist, I've had it drummed into me--you're always supposed to show data.

Just looked at a questionnaire that has: "I feel blue"; "I feel downhearted"; "I feel sad"; "I feel gloomy"; "I feel depressed"; "I feel low." Plus: "I am quick tempered"; "I have a fiery temper"; "I am a hot-headed person"; "I fly off the handle."

"Dear participant: I don’t respect your time."

Barnum/Forer effect by proxy: That's when researchers think a published scale measures their construct of interest because the scale has exactly the right title (plus the usual reliability metrics and validity claims). The items on the scale are weird and repetitious, but only respondents see it.

Correction: Woodlawn, not Catonsville.

Side one of sign: "Let's get a little more juice in that third rail." Side two of sign: "Uncap FICA."

My two-sided sign for today's "Hands Off" protest outside the Social Security Administration building in Catonsville, MD.

The Baltimore Banner put the crowd at "over 300," but I think it was 𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳 over that. And Catonsville is but a suburb.

There’s more to it, but perhaps one piece of what we’re seeing in national politics is the outcome of a tech/business culture in which affirmative meanings started inhering in word “disrupt.” I was raised to have that word default to the pejorative.

Abstract: Craving is a central phenomenon in cocaine use disorder (CUD), significantly influencing relapse risk and treatment outcomes. The STANDUP® method, an innovative telemedicine-based intervention, integrates structured behavioral modification, cognitive restructuring and digital therapeutics to target reward, relief and obsessive craving subtypes. The six-month structured routine program includes daily behavioral exercises that focus on: • Breaking addictive cycles through structured daily planning (Mappa del Giorno). • Cold showers as a physiological and psychological tool for increasing self-discipline and stress tolerance.

Going cold, turkey.

I saw this paper on April 1, but it was not published on April 1.

It's great to see moves toward assessing SUD symptoms/criteria in their dynamic flux, potentially as outcome measures to match inclusion criteria. I did that with the old SDSS (a DSM-IV-based addiction interview with a past-30-day time frame) but this is more sophisticated and more promising.

Alcohol use disorder symptoms are kinda detectable in daily life (but it depends on how they are operationalized) Kevin King Dani Kang Megan Schultz Christine Lee Jonas Dora Cassandra Boness Ashley Watts

This title made me happy out of all proportion to the stimulus. I want to thank it.

Right now it's only a preprint. Together, psychological-science Bluesky, we can commit to editor/reviewer stances that might bring it all the way to publication. And that would be kinda great.

I look forward posting more of my lightly rebarbative know-it-all comments on addiction research and the behavioral sciences in general. That was always the crux of my being on Twitter-then-BlueSky. But...priorities.

On both sides of the road in Owings Mills, MD, there were ~200 of us making it less socially comfortable to do business with Tesla. It matters. Purchases are elections that happen every day.

Nearly nonstop response of thumbs-up honking from drivers-by, including 18-wheelers. Salt of the earth.

For me, it's just arranging my workspace the way I like it! I don't want the figures to be scattered in the results section where I have to keep scrolling up to them as I'm reading the discussion.

When I'm reviewing a manuscript, I duplicate the pdf and remove pages from each copy. One copy is the body of the text; the other is the references, tables, and figures. I keep both open.

-‘Internalizing’ is much narrower than the current model suggests (but a broader dimension like ‘emotional dysfunction’ could be useful to group the fear, distress, eating pathology, sexual problems, and somatoform domains)

-Harmful substance use should be distinct from core externalizing

2/2

Despite the title's reference to "self-report," it doesn't seem as if there was any effort to predict dropout by asking patients to discuss their treatment experiences and dropout intentions. Maybe compare these tasks and algorithms to that straightforward and respectful approach?

Let's not forget "implicated," as in "the nucleus accumbens is implicated in reward." You could power a small house or two from the wind power of the handwaving.

This is peripheral, but: do the pdf files need all of that 500gb? Tools such as NXpowerLite can batch shrink them, sometimes by 50-90%, usually with no appreciable loss of quality. (This is not an ad! I'm a real person who hates file bloat.)

Credit-card companies seem to be good at detecting fraudulent transactions in real time--and fraudulent transactions are not etiologically homogeneous biological entities. The way to inference them is to use appropriate inputs. Same logic can apply to current psych diagnostic entities or events.

Psychiatric nosologies may be limiting the success of, say, genomically based prediction models. But that's a different point.

Counterpoint 2 of 2: The most accurate clinical inferencing I've ever seen (sensitivity and PPV were each .97) was for transition to a manic state, which is a psychiatric nosological category if ever there was one. (doi 10.1109/JBHI.2014.2343154)
(2/2)

Article in JAMA Psychiatry: "Are Psychiatric Nosologies Limiting the Success of Clinical Prediction Models?" Authors say yes.

Eh.

Counterpoint 1 of 2: Automated detection/prediction is usually also inaccurate for discrete, verifiable behavioral events, such as instances of drug use.
(1/2)

Screencaps of tweets from 2022, in which someone wrote: "i feel like you could shrink joss whedon's face and no one would notice. like 15-20% shrinkage and you could do it undetected. he might not even notice it in the mirror" So I obliged.

You've created a situation whereby I have to post one of my old tweets.

From the ACNP website: "NEW in 2024: Member invited guest invitations will be limited to 400. The College has reached the limit of 400 member guest invitations. Member guest invitations are no longer available for the 2024 Annual Meeting."

I had an invitation lined up for my virtual attendance to #ACNP2024, but we left it too long, and ACNP has shut the door. Attendees, please post prolifically about the goings-on. I ask with puppydog eyes. If puppydog eyes could talk.

Screenshot of output from an AI app called the Bluesky Roaster (blueskyroast.com), based on my Bluesky content. "David Epstein: The Neuroscience Nerd with a Side of Sarcasm." "David's tweets are like an academic paper that took a detour through a comedy club—insightful, often dense, but always with a punchline waiting at the end. Just when you think you're lost in the jargon, he'll throw in a zinger about convenience samples that feels like a punch to the gut (in a good way)."

I haven't posted enough for this RoasterBot to work well, but it kinda worked well anyway.