When women sell themselves short on team projects

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Working on a team is always a challenge, but a new study highlights a particular challenge to women: how much they credit themselves in a joint success. Women will devalue their contributions when working with men but not with other women, according to the new research. The study suggests yet another reason why women still tend to be under-represented at the highest echelons of many organizations.

Michelle Haynes of the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, had examined how other people evaluate men and women working together. She decided to build on that work to look at how women view themselves on teams after herself reading glowing group feedback for a conference submission she co-authored.

"As I was reading this extraordinary review, I thought: 'Wow! Those other co-contributors must have really written something amazing for us to have gotten this kind of feedback.' And then it hit me like a ton of bricks: I do this too," she says. She did not recognize her own positive contribution to the team endeavor.

Haynes and colleagues then set out to design an experiment to examine how women evaluate their own contributions to collaborative work outcomes, particularly when working with men on tasks that are considered to be "masculine." She says: "If you get an A on a paper, it is pretty clear who deserves the credit for that A. But if the A is the product of a group effort, how does the credit get distributed?"

In a series of four experiments, published today in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Haynes' team asked participants to work remotely with another person on tasks traditionally associated with a male role: acting as a managing supervisor at an investment company; in actuality, there was no other teammate. Under various conditions, they received feedback about their team's performance.

When given positive group feedback, the female participants gave more credit to their male teammates and took less credit themselves. They would only credit themselves with success in the task when working with a male if their individual role in the task was clear.

The study also found that women did not undervalue their contributions when their teammates were female. "This finding is critical because it debunks the notion that what we found is simply a function of women being modest in groups," Haynes says. "Rather, it underscores how the expectations women hold of themselves, and those they work with, influence how they process group feedback. Furthermore, it reveals that gender continues to play a role in how individuals derive these performance expectations."

These findings contribute to a body of work about how stereotypes affect women in the workplace. Past work in this area has generally focused on how an individual's work is evaluated ? for example studies have shown that the same resume will be evaluated more favorably if it has a male versus female name attached to it. But other research has found that consistently stellar individual performance is often enough to overcome the influence of stereotypes in evaluations of a woman's competence.

"But our work focuses on group outcomes, which are not inherently diagnostic of individual contribution," Haynes says. "What we have found is that sometimes outcomes and performance ? no matter how stellar ? are not enough to trump the biasing effects of stereotypes, particularly when the nature of individual contribution is unclear."

"This is one of many factors, among a great many, that may hinder women's earning power and career progress," she adds. If women view their own contributions less favorably than they regard the contribution of their male co-workers, it is "likely to impact how women view their efficacy at work and the degree to which they are likely to vie for competitive projects and promotions."

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Society for Personality and Social Psychology: http://www.spsp.org

Thanks to Society for Personality and Social Psychology for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/128179/When_women_sell_themselves_short_on_team_projects

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NBC's Richard Engel back to Syria after kidnapping

NEW YORK (AP) -- NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel is back quickly and safely from his first trip to Syria since he and his team were kidnapped and held captive there last December.

Engel interviewed rebel fighters who allege the Syrian government used chemical weapons in an attack last month. His reports were airing Wednesday on the "Today" show and "NBC Nightly News."

Engel traveled with photographer John Kooistra, who was kidnapped with him in December.

Engel took some time off after the kidnapping and said his bosses weren't anxious to send him back to Syria. But he said it was important to go because of the story.

"It did make me feel better," he said via telephone from Turkey on Wednesday. "It was important for me to go back, but I won't say that I went back to prove to myself that I could do it."

He and his team were captured by forces loyal to the Syrian government in December and were subjected to mock executions during a four-day period of captivity. They escaped during a firefight with rebel forces.

It was a smaller NBC team that went this week, primarily because it was a shorter trip. The team spent less than 24 hours in Syria, talking to rebel fighters and commanders about the chemical-weapons allegations.

"There are so many stories circulating about chemical weapons," Engel said. "The only way to find out who is telling the truth is by going to the areas and seeing what they have to offer."

President Barack Obama's administration has said it is considering providing weapons to vetted units in the armed opposition to Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime, among other military options, following last week's revelation a U.S. intelligence assessment suggested chemical weapons use by the regime.

Officials in Syria's capital, Damascus, deny claims the Assad regime has used chemical weapons.

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NBC is controlled by Comcast Corp.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nbcs-richard-engel-back-syria-133536419.html

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Lucky bacteria strike it rich during formation of treatment-resistant colonies: Research could help in battle against infections that do not respond to powerful drugs

May 8, 2013 ? In biology, we often think of natural selection and survival of the fittest. What about survival of the luckiest?

Like pioneers in search of a better life, bacteria on a surface wander around and often organize into highly resilient communities, known as biofilms. It turns out that a lucky few bacteria become the elite cells that start the colonies, and they organize in a rich-get-richer pattern similar to the distribution of wealth in the U.S. economy, according to a new study by researchers at UCLA, Northwestern University and the University of Washington.

The study, to be published online May 8 in the journal Nature, is the first to identify the strategy by which bacteria form initial colonies in biofilms. The research may have significant implications for battling stubborn bacterial infections that do not respond to powerful drugs, as well as for other applications.

Biofilms are colonies of bacteria that form on surfaces, including human tissue. Bacteria in biofilms change their gene expression patterns and are far more resistant to antibiotics and the body's immune defenses than individual, free-swimming bacteria, because they mass together and surround themselves with a matrix of proteins, DNA and sugars. This makes seemingly routine infections potentially deadly.

Gerard Wong, a professor in the UCLA bioengineering and chemistry departments; Erik Luijten, an associate professor of applied mathematics and of materials science and engineering at Northwestern University; and Matthew R. Parsek, a professor of microbiology at the University of Washington, led a team of researchers who elucidated the early formation of biofilms by using algorithms to track the development of different strains of the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa and by conducting computer simulations to map the movements. P. aeruginosa can cause lethal, difficult-to-treat infections. Examples include infections found in cystic fibrosis and AIDS patients.

Surprisingly, the researchers found that the individual bacteria that start the formation of micro-colonies have no special inherent qualities.

As bacteria move across a surface, they leave trails composed of a specific type of polysaccharide, or long sugar molecules.

"Some of the bacteria remained fixed in position," Parsek said, "but some moved around on the surface, apparently randomly but leaving a trail that influenced the surface behavior of other bacteria that encountered it."

Bacteria arriving later also lay trails, but tend to be guided by the trails from the pioneers. This network of trails creates a process of positive feedback and enables bacteria to organize into micro-colonies that mature into biofilms. By being at the right place at the right time, and by using communally produced polysaccharides, a small number of lucky cells -- often ones that come later -- become the first to form micro-colonies, which give cells many survival advantages over other bacteria.

Interestingly, these biofilms develop in accordance with Zipf's Law, which is one special form of the rich-get-richer phenomena. A well-known example of this is the distribution of wealth in the United States. Recent statistics indicate that the wealthiest 20 percent of the population have more than 80 percent of the total wealth. Most of the wealth in this elite group is in turn owned by a small elite fraction within the elite, and so on.

"It turns out bacteria do the same thing," Wong said. "By effectively taking a census of bacteria using our recently developed methods, we find that the way they organize into micro-colonies is not random, as was previously thought."

Extending the economic analogy, Wong said the research may provide insight into how to fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria. "Typically, when we want to get rid of bacteria, we just kill them with antibiotics," he said. "As a result, they develop defense mechanisms and grow stronger. Maybe that's not always the best way to treat biofilms. Perhaps we can regulate bacterial communities the way we regulate economies. Our work suggests that new treatment options may use incentives and communications as well as punishment to control bacterial communities."

"A truly beautiful aspect of this work is how it relies on a combination of experiments and computer simulations," Luijten said. "Only through combination of the totally different types of expertise of three different research groups has it been possible to disentangle what is going on, and how polysaccharides influence the organization of bacteria into micro-colonies."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/ZOF5HRdreKE/130508131819.htm

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An ex-con's crusade to bring baseball to the inner city

Jennifer Brown / The Star-Ledger

Newark Eagles Little League team player William Jones gives Coach Rodney Mason a high-five as he arrives at practice at the practice field at Weequahic Park on May 15, 2008.

The statistics are sobering. Newark, N.J., has a murder rate double that of the Bronx. A third of its residents live in poverty. Only 40 percent of its students graduate from high school. Behind those numbers, though, are people trying to beat the odds.

In his new book, ?A Chance to Win: Boyhood, Baseball, and the Struggle for Redemption in the Inner City,? reporter Jonathan Schuppe chronicles that effort through the story of a fledgling Little League team, its improbable coach and inspiring players.

---

At the center of the narrative is Rodney Mason, a drug-peddling ex-con left paralyzed from a drive-by shooting who decides he can make a difference by starting a baseball team in a city where America?s pastime holds little allure.

Below is an excerpt from ?A Chance to Win,? published May 7 by Henry Holt:

For weeks, Rodney had been combing the neighborhood for recruits, but now it was late March, a couple of weeks before the start of the 2008 Little League season, and he had only a handful of completed registration forms.

Baseball just didn?t seem to be on many people?s minds. Some kids had actually told Rodney that they hated baseball, recoiling as if it were some kind of social disease. He couldn?t understand it. This was the national pastime, the game everyone played when he was growing up.

Jennifer Brown / The Star-Ledger

Coach Rodney Mason talks to the Newark Eagles Little League team after they suffered an emotional loss against the Philly Stars at Weequahic Park on May 14, 2008.

And today was the day. If kids didn?t show up this morning, then they never would.

Rodney hoisted himself out of the tub and dried off. He slipped on a condom, fitted to a urine collection bag, and strapped the contraption to his right leg. He ironed his jeans and white T-shirt and switched to a battery-powered scooter that the family of an elderly neighbor had given him after the old man died.

Then he rode a lurching elevator to the lobby and rolled out in the gray chill. The neighborhood was just starting to come alive, people stepping onto their stoops, assessing the weather, waving to neighbors, retreating inside.

The field was empty. So was the parking lot. Rodney pulled up to the dugout, jammed his hands into the pockets of his Yankees windbreaker, and waited. Please god, he prayed. Help me make this happen.

***

Sometimes, when he was not working and his children were at school, Thaiquan Scott stopped by the Jackie Robinson South Ward Little League?s old field at the St. Peter?s Recreation Center to catch a game.

The diamond was lousy with lumps and the quality of play was terrible, but he occasionally noticed a gifted athlete who, if he found the right coach and stuck with it, could probably go on to play in high school or college. Thaiquan wondered why more black kids weren?t interested in baseball.

Thaiquan and his family lived on the second floor of a narrow three-family house with cream-colored vinyl siding on Peshine Avenue. Their block was not what you?d call kid-friendly, though there were many children.

Dope fiends and drunks puttered around in the abandoned lot across the street. Brash young drug dealers played noisy games of dice on the stoops of homes, the tenants too frightened or too complacent to complain. A few days after the Scotts moved in, a thirty-nine-year-old woman was killed in a drive-by around the corner.

Thaiquan and his wife wanted to leave Peshine Avenue, but their house was one of the only places they could find that was cheap and large enough for the seven of them. So they made the best of it by keeping the kids busy and trying to expose them to the world outside the city.

Thaiquan saw baseball, and sports in general, as a bulwark against the streets; the more his kids played, the less chance that something bad would ever happen to them. His father had been an amateur player ? a damn good one, he?d heard, but drinking got in the way, and the old man left home without ever passing the game on to Thaiquan.

Now he wanted to give his two oldest children ? Nasir, his biological son, and Kaneisha, his stepdaughter ? that chance he never got. He pledged that as soon as they reached playing age, he?d sign them up for Little League.

In late March, Thaiquan got word that Nasir and Kaneisha had been assigned to a team. They went to meet their coach and were surprised to see that he was in a wheelchair. Thaiquan introduced himself and felt like he understood Rodney immediately.

?He?s from the struggle,? Thaiquan said later. ?But that don?t mean he?s not about the kids. He?s a product of his environment, so he knows how the kids are and how they grow up. I could tell right away that he was doing it from the heart.?

***

It began with a trickle: a child here, another there, and soon there was a crowd. Among the first arrivals was Derek Fykes, who arrived with his grandmother Irene. He was ten but had the face of a tired man: eyes narrowed, brow rumpled, lips slack.

He had just been removed from his father?s apartment by the state child welfare agency. This wasn?t the first time he?d been abruptly pulled from one home and placed in another. Probably wouldn?t be the last, either. Irene worried about the lasting damage of an unsettled childhood. But baseball was one of the few things that helped Derek regain his footing.

Derek was an anomaly in that he?d played Little League before. Just one other boy, a heavy trash-talker named William (who went by ?Pooh?), had any experience. The others were young and scrawny and clueless; most didn?t have gloves, and some didn?t know if they threw right-handed or left-handed.

Jennifer Brown / The Star-Ledger

Newark Eagles coach Rodney Mason leads the way back to the bus stop after buying DeWan "Puda" Johnson a new baseball glove and batting gloves.

DeWan Johnson, a magnetic 10-year-old with a gap-toothed grin and nubby dreadlocks that poked from his head like spring shoots, was one of the most promising recruits. No one had taught him how to swing a bat or throw a ball or encouraged him to play baseball at all, for that matter. What little he knew about the game came from watching kids in the park and the Yankees on TV. He had an untethered rocket of an arm and bravely planted himself in front of hard-hit grounders. Rodney assigned him to third base.

The kids were arriving in packs now. A pickup game began. Rodney suddenly looked overwhelmed. A couple of fathers offered to hit grounders, keep the books, whatever they could do to assist. Another man showed up and said he, too, wanted to coach.

By that afternoon, Rodney figured that he?d talked to about a hundred people. When Kelley, the league president, stopped by to see how things were going, she found dozens of kids calling themselves Eagles. They threw like shot-putters, swung bats like axes, ran shrieking through the infield with little clue what they were doing.

It was hard not to chuckle, watching them swirl around Rodney as he tried to figure out what to do next. His sister Darlene showed up and was startled by the sight.

?Where did you get those kids?? she said, aghast. ?They cannot play baseball.?

Rodney didn?t care. The hardest part, in his mind, was over; he now had something to work with, something that he could shape into a team. It would not be pretty. But it would happen. Finally. He couldn?t wait to get started.

?That?s all right,? Rodney told his sister. ?I?m-a teach them.?

Copyright ? 2013 by Jonathan Schuppe?

Jonathan Schuppe is a national enterprise reporter for NBC's local news websites and a former staff writer at the Newark Star-Ledger

Jennifer Brown / The Star-Ledger

Newark Eagles Little League player Nasir Scott slides into home after a victory lap following the team's win over the Black Yankees at Weequahic Park on June 14, 2008.

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Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/08/18105574-newarks-field-of-dreams-an-ex-cons-crusade-to-bring-baseball-to-the-inner-city?lite

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Prosecutors say soldier had cigarette, then killed

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. (AP) ? Shortly before beginning a shooting rampage through a mental health clinic in Iraq, an Army sergeant sat in a vehicle outside the building and smoked a cigarette, prosecutors said.

The government on Monday began laying out its case against Sgt. John Russell during the opening of his court-martial, arguing Russell was not overwhelmed by rage but instead plotted the shooting that killed five fellow service members. Prosecutors described interactions in which Russell had indicated his wish to leave the Army and how he grew angry at a doctor who told him he was mentally OK.

"This is not a case about rage," said Lt. Col. Robert Stelle, an Army prosecutor. "This is a case about revenge."

Russell has already pleaded guilty to the 2009 killings ? describing himself as in a "rage" ? but says he didn't kill with premeditation. That's something prosecutors are now trying to prove.

Stelle described how a witness had seen Russell smoking in an SUV outside the clinic before the shooting. After entering the building, Russell came across a group of soldiers in a classroom. Russell peered in the room, Stelle said, but showed restraint and continued down the hallway before beginning his killings.

Defense attorneys reserved their opening statements for later but were successful earlier in the day in their quest to introduce evidence that suggested Russell may have had brain abnormalities. Col. David Conn, the military judge overseeing the case, agreed to allow that evidence along with the perspectives of other experts who deemed Russell's brain normal.

The first witness to testify Monday afternoon was retired Staff Sgt. Enos Richard, who had been tasked with escorting Russell to and from a stress clinic on the day of the shooting. When the two returned to the unit headquarters, Richard described how Russell took Richard's gun from the back seat and demanded the keys.

"Give me the keys or I will shoot you," Russell said, according to Richard's testimony.

After getting the keys and getting in the vehicle, Russell sped away. It was about 30 minutes before the shooting began ? about the time needed to drive to the stress center.

Prosecutors showed a video of the route all the way back to the stress clinic, often leaving the windowless courtroom in silence to view the slow, bumpy and congested roadways that Russell may have followed after taking the vehicle.

Killed in the shooting were Navy Cmdr. Charles Springle, 52, of Wilmington, N.C., and four Army service members: Pfc. Michael Edward Yates Jr., 19, of Federalsburg, Md.; Dr. Matthew Houseal, of Amarillo, Texas; Sgt. Christian E. Bueno-Galdos, 25, of Paterson, N.J.; and Spc. Jacob D. Barton, 20, of Lenox, Mo.

Russell, who is from Sherman, Texas, is being held at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, about 40 miles south of Seattle.

His previous plea agreement means he will avoid a death sentence. His maximum sentence would be life in prison.

The shooting was one of the worst instances of soldier-on-soldier violence in the Iraq war and raised questions about the mental health problems for soldiers caused by repeated tours of duty.

A hearing on possible charges was held in August 2009 at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Two evaluations presented during that hearing said Russell suffered from severe depression with psychotic features and chronic post-traumatic stress disorder. A March 2011 evaluation said the major depression with psychotic features was in partial remission.

Russell was nearing the end of his third tour when his behavior changed, members of his unit testified in 2009. They said he became more distant in the days before the May 11, 2009, attack, and that he seemed paranoid that his unit was trying to end his career.

On May 8, Russell sought help at the combat stress clinic at Camp Stryker, where his unit was located. On May 10, Russell was referred to the Camp Liberty clinic, where he received counseling and prescription medication.

Witnesses have previously described seeing Russell the following day crying and talking about hurting himself. He went back to the Camp Liberty clinic, where a doctor told him he needed to get help or he would hurt himself. Richard testified Monday that Russell tried to surrender to military police to lock him up, but they let him go.

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Associated Press writer Mike Baker can be reached on Facebook: http://on.fb.me/HiPpEV

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/prosecutors-soldier-had-cigarette-then-killed-005751058.html

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White House says would veto debt prioritization bill

By Mark Felsenthal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said on Tuesday the president would veto legislation that would prioritize U.S. debt payments if the nation hits its borrowing limit, sending an early salvo in the next round of federal budget skirmishes.

The nation's debt ceiling has been a centerpiece of budget fights between President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans for several years and brought the nation to the brink of defaulting on its debt in the summer of 2011.

While there has been a lull in the dispute, matters are expected to soon fester again when the administration begins running out of ways to raise money to pay U.S. government obligations.

On May 19, the borrowing limit's temporary suspension voted by Congress in March comes to an end. Then, a new debt ceiling lawmakers approved would go into effect at the level necessary to pay U.S. debt up to that point.

That new cap is anticipated to be about $16.9 trillion, up from the current level of $16.4 trillion.

With U.S. debt immediately meeting the new ceiling, the Treasury will then juggle its funds to meet federal financial obligations through at least the end of July, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

In the interim, some Republicans would like to use the borrowing cap to extract fiscal concessions from the president, either in the form of spending cuts or tax cuts.

To pressure the administration, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives is considering legislation that would allow lawmakers to put off raising the debt ceiling by requiring the U.S. Treasury to pay public bondholders and beneficiaries of government programs if Congress doesn't raise the cap.

The measure would almost certainly fail to pass the Democrat-led Senate and is therefore unlikely to become law. But it shows that Republicans aim to use the debt issue for leverage.

The White House Office of Management and Budget said in a statement that the administration "strongly opposes" the debt payment prioritization measure, which it described as "political gamesmanship" and said would result in Congress refusing to pay obligations it has already agreed to.

VOW TO VETO

"This bill would threaten the full faith and credit of the United States, cost American jobs, hurt businesses of all sizes, and do damage to the economy," OMB said in a statement. "If the president is presented with legislation that would result in the Congress choosing to default on the full faith and credit of the United States, he would veto it."

The president this year has refused to negotiate with Congress over raising the debt ceiling, saying that a U.S. debt default should be unthinkable to either political party.

At the last face-off between the White House and Republicans over budget issues in February, Republicans stood firm on letting across-the-board spending cuts go into effect March 1 despite dire warnings from the administration the cuts would damage the economy.

But Republicans backed away from making an issue of the debt ceiling at that time and voted to allow it to be suspended until this month.

As a policy matter, Republicans are focused on debt and deficit reduction and shrinking the size of government. Democrats' primary focus is on strengthening economic growth and job creation - which is helped by federal spending. They therefore advocate a more gradual approach to deficit reduction.

After the deepest recession since the Great Depression and wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the debt held by the public as a percentage of the nation's output has soared from 35.5 percent in 2007 to 71.3 percent in 2012. During that time, Congress has raised debt limit from $9.8 trillion to its current $16.4 trillion.

Republicans have said the need to raise the nation's borrowing cap should be an opportunity to discuss reining in spending or tax reform.

"Every single one of the half-dozen proposals that have actually worked to reduce spending in Congress over the last three decades have come out of this same process," Senate Budget Committee member Rob Portman, a Republican, said Tuesday at a conference sponsored by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation.

"Why? Because the American people do not like to extend the debt limit," he said.

(Editing by Philip Barbara)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/white-house-says-veto-debt-prioritization-bill-235230310.html

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Dropbox to hold its first DBX developer conference on July 9th

While there's an abundance of cloud storage services, few of them have dedicated conferences to help developers exploit that online space. Dropbox could well be a vanguard on that front, then -- it just announced its inaugural developer conference, DBX. The initial event takes place on July 9th at San Francisco's very familiar-sounding Fort Mason Center. Along with providing help straight from the source for the Sync API and other coding tools, DBX will serve as the launch platform for "new products." There aren't any clues as to what that entails, but we suspect that's enough of a tease to have some Dropbox diehards booking their flights.

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