Socos Labs

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Socos Labs

A "mad science" incubator experimenting with new visions of work, education, innovation, & inclusion.

Studies have shown that metacognition, general cognitive ability, socioemotional competency, creativity, and curiosity--the Muse curriculum--significantly affect life-outcomes producing happier, healthier, more productive lives. Our goal is to send research-based activities that help you maximize your child’s life-outcomes, one day at a time.

21/10/2021

Can a good story literally save a life?

When sick kids listen to stories, oxytocin increases while cortisol and reported pain decrease.

Storytelling is a unique human skill, yet we know little about its physiological and psychological impact. This study provides evidence of the biomarker changes and beneficial effects of storytelling in children admitted to an intensive care unit. We found that, compared with an active control condi...

20/09/2021

Grouping elite students together raises "average human capital," but it "decreases intergenerational mobility" in the remaining students. On net, the longer-term community-wide gain of mixing students outweighs near-term small losses to elites.

Another paper on intergenerational mobility found "at least 1/3 of long-term persistence is attributed to environmental factors." The diffusion of resilience throughout a school via peer role modeling likely lifts the majority of students, while those students starting with advantages experience relatively little decrement.

Read here: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257%2Faer.20190553

Heckman and colleges find that support for at-risk families has benefits that diffuse through the entire family, and returns $9 for every dollar invested. In the long run, more equitable, integrated schools almost certainly means more absolute gains for everyone.

Read here:https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w29004/w29004.pdf

Abstract. We analyse the impact of unequal school opportunity on intergenerational income mobility and human capital accumulation. Building upon the classical B

10/09/2021

Superpowers, cyborgs, diabetes, Presidents, autism, and psychic rabbits. Join us for the finale of "Jitterbug" and learn how Dr. Vivienne Ming built an AI to treat her son's illness...and then happily gave it away.

As we changed Thumper's diabetes treatment based on the data we collected, I found that he spent 40% less time with too much sugar in his blood without any increase in dangerous low blood sugar episodes.

07/09/2021

We are very excited and proud to announce that our episode in the three-part PBS series "Future of Work" premiers TOMORROW, September 8th on PBS.

The series explores the monumental changes in the workplace and the long-term impact on workers, employers, work-culture, educators, and communities.

"Future of Work" airs September 1, 8 & 15 at 10EST/9 Central. Please be sure to check your local listings!

A new three-part PBS docuseries airing Wednesday at 10 p.m., “Future of Work,” explores the neverending impact of automation threatening traditional manual jobs and redefining the American dream.…

27/08/2021

Track people's gaze while they read a ballot and you can predict their voting behavior. Sound like another call to ban AI? Read more closely.

The researchers used gaze tracking to measure how (often intentionally) confusing language on a ballot influences voters.

More than 100 countries allow people to vote directly on policies in direct democracy elections (e.g., 2016 Brexit referendum). Politicians are often responsibl...

17/08/2021

If the following apply to audiobooks, Dr. Ming is screwed:
Listening to instrumental music before bed produces night-time earworms and "worsened polysomnography-measured sleep quality." In fact...

Music just before bed seems to increase in "frontal slow oscillation activity, a marker of sleep-dependent memory consolidation." These bedtime earworms hijack our hippocampus like a memetic virus. There's got to be a sci-fi story in that.

In any case, your "sleepytime chill mix" is probably not helping like you thought.

Many people listen to music for hours every day, often near bedtime. We investigated whether music listening affects sleep, focusing on a rarely explored mechan...

11/08/2021

In Dr. Vivienne Ming's episode on "Remote Work," she identified several trends she was seeing in data. A newly published analysis supports many of our findings, such as fewer "meetings with supervisors," less "uninterrupted work," and "productivity fell by about 20%."

Read our 8-part series on "Remote Work" by signing up at https://www.socos.org/remote-part-1/

Read More:https://bfi.uchicago.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/BFI_WP_2021-56.pdf

Business as usual, but People Are Different

02/08/2021

In Dr. Vivienne Ming's last episode, the Secret Service freaked out when she wore Google Glass to the White House Pride celebration in 2013. In her latest, Thanksgiving in a pediatric intensive care unit drives her to invent a superpower.

Read the whole story at https://www.socos.org/jitterbug/.

Hack Diabetes. Commit crimes. Eat Goose.

28/07/2021

"Nearly 25 years ago I flipped a coin to decide my future field of study. When it came up heads, I thought I’d spend my life sticking wires into cat brains. Little did I know, I’d instead be building cyborgs." — Dr. Vivienne Ming, SXSW 2021

From SXSW 2021, this discussion with humm CEO Iain McIntyre and Socos Lab CEO Vivienne Ming covers a lot of the future of brain enhancements.From the origina...

26/07/2021

Listen to Maria Spiropulu (CERN) and Dr. Vivienne Ming talk about "Quantum AI" for CERN's "Future Intelligence" podcast.

An episode by The CERN Sparks! Podcast - Future Intelligence

23/07/2021

How can we ensure artificial intelligence is being used responsibly and to the best of its ability to solve an intended problem? In Dr. Vivienne Ming's second piece with Roche, let's discuss:

Dr. Vivienne Ming discusses the importance surrounding the ethics of artificial intelligence and what's humanly needed to harness its power.

21/07/2021

As Dr. Vivienne Ming put it, "It is a weird damn world that sees a self-described 'mad scientist' as a 'Brilliant Woman in AI Ethics' :)"

Thanks for the recognition!

The mission of Women in AI Ethics (WAIE) initiative is to recognize and empower brilliant women working on the ethics of AI. It was heartening to see many leaders from the 2019 Women in AI Ethics list like Joy Buolamwini, Kathy Baxter, Safiya Noble, Meeri Haataja, and many others who continue to lea...

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