The hottest Social Sciences Substack posts right now

Morality is more than just virtue; it involves judgments of wrongness and desire for punishment.
The explanation for morality may go beyond altruism and virtues, delving into darker aspects.
Understanding moral judgments involves looking at nonconsequentialism, desire for punishment, impartiality, and presence of a victim.

The research economy is increasingly focused on speed over quality, especially with the rise of generative AI, which can have negative impacts on reproducibility and diverse fields of knowledge.
Data models in research need to be carefully scrutinized for accuracy and not blindly relied upon, even in specialized areas like protein folding, climate science, or medical diagnostics.
Speed and heuristics shouldn't overshadow the importance of deliberation, qualitative research, and embracing complexity in arriving at meaningful solutions to multidimensional problems.

Mathematics can change the way you think by showing how words correspond to underlying structures.
2x2 games, like the Prisoner's Dilemma, are simple models that offer powerful insights into cooperation, trade, and decision-making.
Understanding game theory, particularly 2x2 games, can help in analyzing real-world scenarios such as economics, politics, and social interactions.

Science is publishing more, but the disruptive nature of research papers has decreased, focusing more on incremental progress.
The decline in disruptive science may have significant implications for social sciences, affecting the breadth and depth of new discoveries.
To optimize 'real' discoveries in Africanist social sciences, researchers should embrace diverse research approaches, read and cite more African-based research, write more comprehensive books, and maintain long-term study in specific regions.

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Research papers on SSRN cover various topics like volatility modeling, portfolio asset selection, and sentiment analysis using machine learning.
In the field of quantitative finance, there have been recent advancements in areas such as optimal portfolio selection, volatility forecasting, and financial sentiment analysis.

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Attending elite prep schools like the fictional Barton Academy can significantly impact future success, leading to better chances of admission to prestigious colleges and higher income levels.
Distinctively Black names have always existed in the United States, and research shows that having these names does not necessarily imply disadvantages in the labor market.
Moving to better neighborhoods during childhood can have a positive impact on future outcomes, such as higher education attainment and earnings, particularly if the move occurs at a young age.

In academia, citations reflect what the industry values and can lead to grants, tenure, and status.
Research on Black Lives Matter often focuses on promoting radical causes rather than saving lives directly.
There is a need for a major reorientation in social science research to prioritize studies that can save lives, especially in law enforcement.

Econometrics helps to reveal truths in small-scale matters, but applying them to large societal issues requires many assumptions. Democratizing knowledge generation can be a social game-changer by putting economic tools in the hands of more people.
Academics often focus on big questions about human nature, but the implementation of policies by governmental and social organizations could benefit from more hands-on and practical application of econometric tools to measure the impact of these policies.
Government and social institutions should embrace a more incremental approach, like carpenters, making gradual improvements as opposed to sweeping changes. There's potential for significant social change when institutions start questioning and measuring the effectiveness of their own operations.