Football as Metaphor

Because I had tired of hearing relentless chatter, today, for the first time, I watched an American professional football game with the volume muted.  First, a little background for those unfamiliar with televised games.

Each professional football game is explained via commentary from a triumvirate of play-by-play, analyst, and sideline reporters.  Their job is to keep viewers attentive, informed, and satisfied, especially during inevitable lapses in game action.  To do so, often they stretch to fill voids with the most trivial information such as, “This is the first time in three years that a place kicker scored four times in one quarter.”  The triumvirate has conditioned us to depend on them for our game evaluation and viewing pleasure.

By muting the sports reporters, I empowered myself to be the agent who determined what was and was not worth my attention.  In the language of pop psychology, I facilitated my football viewing mindfulness. As a result, I experienced a great sense of relief, and enjoyed the game far more than I had similar games.

Previously, by default, I had accepted triumvirate intrusions as natural, inevitable features of televised professional football.  That attitude implicitly acknowledged that I’m not a football expert; I presumed that I should not question or resist the wisdom of the National Football League establishment and its promoters.  Writing Justifiably Paranoid: Resisting Intrusive and Malicious Influences did not automatically inoculate me from being swayed by firmly entrenched cultural influences, sports or otherwise.  I inadvertently proved, once again, to myself that neither I nor anyone can let their guard down.

You undoubtedly recognize where I am going with this blog. In the 21st century, there are play-by-play, analyst, and sideline reporters of all types, seeking to influence your every thought and action.  They are relentless in directing you toward their self-serving purposes.  As with football viewing, you have been conditioned to listen to the influencers, rather than to depend on your own play by play, analysis, and sideline observations.

The game of football pales in comparison to the game of life that you play minute by minute, day by day, involving such critical issues as your wellness, happiness, and relationships.  And because these issues are the most intimate, personal, and idiosyncratic aspects of life, no one, other than you, can decide what is best in your circumstances.  Sadly, however, those facts do not deter professional influencers, determined to tell you what to pay attention to and what to do.

For me, the trivial event of watching muted football yielded a surprisingly valuable lesson. You quite likely, also, could profit by choosing a common, unexamined life experience of your own about which to introspect.  You might discover that a seemingly routine, unimportant habit can provide insight into taken-for-granted behaviors that you had established long ago.

Be Sure to Know What You Need to Know

Every day you are besieged by people who think they know better than you.  That conviction is especially strong among marketers, and others intent on selling you an item or service.  Three leaders of the most powerful companies on earth have subscribed to the “we know them better than they know themselves" attitude.  One was the late Steve Jobs of Apple who in a 1998 Business Week interview said, “A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.”  The others are Eric Schmidt and  Jonathan Rosenberg of Google who, in their 2014 book, How Google Works, wrote,  “Giving the customer what he wants is less important than is giving him what he doesn’t yet know he wants.”

Obviously all three of the aforementioned technology titans are correct to a point: one certainly cannot want something until she/he becomes aware of it.  Moreover, marketers, and others who sell, sometimes must presume that they know what you will want, otherwise they never would invest the time, money and other resources to develop innovations. 

This blog, however, is not so much about marketers, and others intent on selling you an item or service, as it is about you, and your awareness of what you want.  More specifically, it is about what you must want to become healthier.

Let's suppose for the moment that Jobs', Schmidt's, and Rosenberg's beliefs can be applied to your health---namely, that you actually do not know precisely what you want health-wise.  Now, of course, you know in a very general sense.  For instance, you would like to have an optimal weight, blood pressure, and blood sugar level.  But to achieve and maintain health, you must know more than those health dimensions, and know how to fight continually to maintain a comprehensively healthful lifestyle.  That stance, in turn, requires you to know which specific health obstacles impact you, personally.  If you are content to laze about, over-eat, and over-work, you do not truly know with sufficient specificity what you need to be healthy.

Presuming that you know clearly enough what you want, you then can turn your attention to what Jobs, Schmidt, and Rosenberg types presume that you want.  More important than those three, of course, are the marketers and sellers of "junk foods," edible and inedible.  Junk food can come in many forms, such as mindless television programs that keep you sitting on the couch for hours, or rabble-rousing politicians who add to your stress.  You need to know how to resist junk food in all its manifestations.

So, you should strive to know, as precisely and personally as possible, what you need to know and do to be healthy. With that secure base, you can prioritize your goals and be more discriminating when marketers and others, intent on selling you an item or service, try to exert their influence on you.  You then rationally can decide whether what they offer will contribute to your health or will undermine it. 

References

Business Week (May 25, 1998). Steve Jobs interview.

Schmidt, E., & and Rosenberg, J. (2014).  How Google Work.  Grand Central Publishing

On Track to a Positive Identity

Nothing is more fundamental than our sense of identity.  And identity depends upon perceiving a continuity of self.   When we do not behave consistently with our sense of self, we feel self-alienated and try to remedy the self-continuity dissonance.  Self-continuity is an internal compass that guides our actions, thoughts, and feelings.  Moreover, when our sense of self is unstable, the instability powerfully influences how others regard and relate to us.

Given the centrality of self-continuity, psychologists carefully study the concept and its implications for our well-being.  One such study focused on college student “derailment,” meaning the discrepancy between how they had seen themselves in the past and how they currently see themselves.  Kaylin Ratner and her colleagues (2019) sought to determine the derailment-depression relationship within a sample of 939 undergraduates.  The investigators were especially interested in whether derailment could cause depression or be a consequence of it.

Each quarter of the school year, the students completed measures of derailment and depression.  Over that period, scores on both were relatively consistent within individual students.  In general and overall, the two scores tended to correlate intra-individually – for each person, high or low scores on one predicted a similar level on the other.  However, the Ratner group discovered, to their surprise, that higher derailment scores earlier in the year sometimes preceded lower depression scores at year’s end.  To explain the surprising result, the investigators speculated that the discomfort of derailment probably caused some students proactively to reassess and/or change their behavior.  For instance, those whose depression decreased might have perceived their early-year derailment discomfort and responded by initiating salutary lifestyle changes later in the year.  Presumably that meant that they either tweaked their sense of identity, or found a way to incorporate the new salutary lifestyle changes into it.

The study can alert us to the value of introspection.  We always can find some external reason why we feel down.  We can blame Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Mark Zuckerberg, our spouse, or our boss for our discontent, but there probably is little, or nothing, we can do to change them.  By focusing on oneself, we can determine what we are doing, thinking, and feeling.  Then we can begin to make the behavioral, thought, and emotional changes necessary to turn our lives around, and restore a positive personal identity.  More than anything else, we must focus on what we can control and avoid dwelling on that which is beyond our control.  Of course, that presumes that we are willing to initiate salutary changes for the controllables.   Do your best to recognize when your sense of self is derailed, and get back on track to reclaiming your identity!

Reference

Ratner, Kaylin; Mendle, Jane; Burrow, Anthony L.; & Thoemmes, Felix (2019).  Depression and derailment:  A cyclical model of mental illness and perceived identity change. Clinical Psychological Science, Vol 7(4), 735-753.      http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2167702619829748

Healthful Intentions and Healthful Actions

No literate or electronically-connected 21st century human can pretend not to know the importance of a healthful lifestyle.  If anything, many people might complain that they are inundated with irritating, preachy lifestyle messages from those intent on selling them some device or service.

So, for purposes of this blog posting, I assume that we all, more or less, accept the importance of healthful diet, exercise, stress reduction, and so forth.  I further presume that virtually all of us intend to behave healthfully.  Since many factors contribute to our acting or failing to act upon good intentions, in the interest of time, I have chosen to focus on merely one-- action readiness.

Research endorses the critical role of “action readiness” that Gaurav Sur and associates (2015) define as “the ease with which an action may be initiated given the preaction launch state of the individual.”  Action readiness influences the costs-benefits associated with a behavior. Persons in a high action readiness condition tend to act even when the payoff seems meager, whereas those in a low action readiness condition tend to refrain from acting even when the payoff is substantial.  In colloquial terms, those in a high readiness condition are prepared, willing, and able to act with little provocation.

The action readiness concept, therefore, begs the question: what can we do to become action ready for health-enhancing behaviors.  Among other things, we can think deliberately and comprehensively about the short- and long-term consequences of healthful vs unhealthful behaviors.  Quite often, even most often, the short-term "benefits" of unhealthful behaviors are the more attractive.  A third glass of wine or helping of dessert provides immediate satisfaction.  So we need somehow to project ourselves beyond the moment to recognize the self-defeating nature of our unhealthful choice.

To think "long-term," obviously, requires one to project her- or him-self into the future.  And the more authentic and believable the projection, the more effective it will be.  An especially useful strategy for authentic, believable projection is to employ "constructive episodic simulation" by which we retrieve and incorporate recollections of past experiences into future expectations (Schacter & Addis, 2007). That is, we cull real bits and pieces from our past negative lifestyle choices, to anticipate the future negative consequences of our current choices.  The more precise and detailed this effort, the more likely it is to influence our health.  For instance, you remember instances wherein you felt either sick or incapacitated at work after over-drinking or over-eating the previous night, and you incorporate those recollections into your evaluation of current, on-line expectations.

Hal E. Hershfield and colleagues (2011) used a variation of constructive episodic simulation to investigate the value of the method for promoting retirement savings.  They achieved especially authentic and believable projections by age-progressing photos of their subjects to help them to imagine themselves as elderly, viewing very credible pictures of their future selves. In that manner, the subjects could better contrast how they had been living their lives in the recent past with obvious implications for the quality of their live when aged.  The Hershfield group concluded that “In all cases, those who interacted with virtual future selves exhibited an increased tendency to accept later monetary rewards over immediate ones.”

The take-away lesson is that one must create a favorable pre-action launch state in order to translate healthful intentions into healthful actions.  If you can vividly and realistically project yourself beyond an immediate gratification situation, whether through constructive episodic simulations or otherwise, you can gain the time and space you need to make more healthful choices.  You will be action ready.

References

Hershfield, H., et al. (2011).  Increasing saving behavior through age-progressed renderings of the future self.  J Mark Res. 2011 Nov; 48: S23–S37.

Schacter DL, Addis DR. The cognitive neuroscience of constructive memory: remembering the past and imagining the future. Phil Trans R Soc B. 2007;362:773–786.

Suri, G, et al. (2015) The Role of Action Readiness in Motivated Behavior.  Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, Oct 5 , 2015, No Pagination Specified. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0000114.

A Fundamental, Unspoken Reason Why America Cannot Control Its Guns

America is treating gun control in the same divisive way that it treats most controversial issues, such as abortion and inter-group bias.  Those who have power and platform try to enforce their positions while demonizing the opposition.  Although there are exceptions, the power and platform holders tend to endorse more extreme—my way or no way—positions.  They are convinced of their righteousness and wisdom, and presume that persons opposed are mad or bad.

Since those with power usually have platform and vice versa, they use money and media in an effort to overwhelm the opposition.  However, the assault merely helps incite and motivate the opposition to redouble their resistance.  Almost never is there a decisive victory on either side.  And the campaigns eventually morph into relentless guerrilla warfare.

Anyone with a functional cerebrum knows that gun control is on most American minds.  We all have an intuitive sense of the scope of the problem.  We all can find enough statistics to reinforce our concern.  For instance, the Pew Research Center cites CDC data indicating that, 39,773 Americans died from gun-related injuries in 2017, and that 60 percent were suicides, 37 percent murder, and 3 percent “other.”

I am a Marine Corps,Viet Nam veteran who had a top-secret security clearance, carried a weapon for almost all of my four-years active duty, and currently am a psychologist with 40 plus years of experience.

Although I do not profess to be a gun control expert, I have some ideas that, I believe, can make a modest contribution to improving our situation.  So, I wrote to my Pennsylvania governor, US senator, and US congresswoman, asking to be heard.  I made it clear that I did not expect to talk directly with them, but would be happy to speak with an appropriate aide.  I emphasized that I have very specific ideas that I have never seen offered by anyone.

How did the office of the Pennsylvania governor, US senator, and US congresswoman respond to me?  You guessed it.  I got a form letter, enumerating all the wonderful things that they had done and expected to do to control guns.  It was quite apparent that no one cared about hearing what I have to say. They wanted only to reinforce their scripted messages that give them political cover.

A week ago, I contacted an investigative reporter at the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper, leaving him a voice mail and email about my frustration.  He left me a voice mail, saying that I should call him which I did. I, of course, got his voice mail, and left him another voice message.  The reporter also said that he will respond to my email.  He has not.  Let’s see if he does.

It's Not What You Say, But How You Say It

As children, many of us chanted, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”  Parents encouraged the chant in order to help fortify their children against verbal assault.  But as the children matured, they realized that words sometimes can be more powerful than either sticks or stones.  They ultimately discovered not only that the pen is mightier than the sword, but that the spoken word can be mightier than the sword.

Since words are delivered by a sender and interpreted by a receiver, both determine the impact of the words spoken and heard.  You cannot control what others say, but you do have at least some control on what you hear.  That is, you can interpret another's remark many different ways.  Some of those interpretations will have a neutral or salutary affect on you, and some will have a neutral or negative affect.

Psychologists often use the term "construal" to describe how an individual interprets that which she/he hears.  Sometimes people construe in an abstract fashion, and sometimes, in a concrete fashion.  For instance, if I say that you did a great job when remodeling your kitchen, you might construe it abstractly as my referring to "a shiny, roomy cooking space," or more concretely as an expensive stainless steel oven, dishwasher, and refrigerator, and an attractive granite counter and back splash."

Of course, some construals regard more weighty matters, and such was the focus of a study by A. B. Carter and colleagues (2019).  The investigators focused on workplace decisions that negatively impacted the workers, with the specific negative consequence concerning layoffs from the company.  Half the experimental sample were provided reasonable reasons WHY the layoffs had been necessary.  And half the sample were told HOW the company respectfully conducted the layoffs.  As predicted, those in the WHY group with an abstract construal orientation regarded the company decision as more fair and held a more positive view of the company than did those with a HOW orientation.  Conversely, the other half of the group who were told HOW and who had a concrete construal orientation regarded the company decision as more reasonable than did those with a WHY orientation.

We can apply the Carter study WHY and HOW insights to our own situations.  If we do our best to analyze bad personal experiences in terms of why they happened, we might be able to distance ourselves, at least somewhat, from the negative outcomes.  And if we do our best to analyze good personal experiences in terms of how they happened, we might be able to feel closer to the experiences, and derive greater satisfaction from them.  

The WHY and HOW strategy admittedly is simplistic and reductionistic, but sometimes simplistic and reductionistic thoughts, at least, confer a placebo effect.  And that placebo effect can be palliative.  It can't hurt to try the strategy. That  said, I certainly would not limit my processing and problem solving efforts solely to a WHY and HOW approach.  

Reference

Carter, A. B., Bobocel, D. R., & Brockner, J. (2019). When to explain why or how it happened: Tailoring accounts to fit observers’ construal level. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. Advance online publication.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xap0000236

Emotional Autonomy Vs. Group Contagion

Stop pressuring me.  I will make my own choices, and act as I see fit.  No! Help me.  I don’t understand what is happening.  What should I do?

At the extremes, the above two diametrically opposite attitudes depict a fundamental, perhaps the fundamental, social conflict that assails us virtually every day.  Should we look within or without for guidance?  Not surprisingly then, psychology has considered the independence-dependence conflict as being pivotal in our intra-personal and inter-personal psychodynamics. 

In previous blogs and books, I have written about the self-determination theory (SDT) of Edward L. Deci and Richard Ryan (2002).  According to SDT, autonomy and relatedness are two of the three major, relatively controllable factors, critical for our social well-being.  Although autonomy and relatedness need not always conflict, no one can have their own way all the time.  When involved in interpersonal situations, we should expect to have our autonomy reduced to some extent.

Since emotions frequently guide our thoughts and feelings, let's think about emotional autonomy and dependence as implied by a study conducted by Amit Goldenberg and his colleagues (2019). The study targeted subjects' negative emotions, relative to the emotions expressed by their reference group.  More specifically, the investigators sought to determine whether there might be a kind of "collective emotion" that arises due to the emotional interactions of members of a given group.  In theory, individual group members would be impacted by their group's collective emotion, and, also, contribute to it.  This idea is not particularly new; most of us recognize that persons in a group can be incited into emotion of a quality and/or intensity that they ordinarily do not manifest.  The Goldenberg study attempted to present a framework from which psychology can explore the collective emotion concept, but we will avoid that aspect of the study, and, instead, infer its application to everyday people in everyday situations.

The authors suggested common reasons that might cause an individual to alter their emotional condition in the direction of the group norm.  One might identify with the group and want to maintain that identity by "feeling" in a group-consistent way.   Alternatively, an individual might regard herself as not quite accepted, and adopt the group feeling to gain entry. Third, she might assume the group feeling to try to understand what the group understands.  Finally, she might derive pleasure from feeling whatever emotion the group members are expressing.  For instance, their expressions of anger might enable her to ventilate her own anger, regardless of its source.

The Goldenberg group also offered common reasons that might cause an individual to alter their emotional condition in the direction opposite of the group norm.  Those reasons obviously could be the converse of reasons for altering emotions in the direction of the group.  However, the research paper specifically mentions three reasons to resist the group norm: to differentiate herself from the reference group, to maintain her idiosyncratic identity, or to rebel against a group emotional attitude toward which she is opposed.

Essentially, the reasons offered for altering emotion either toward or away from the group norm fall into four broad categories: identity, acceptance, understanding, and pleasure.  Sounds like this research mostly substantiates common sense.  The application of the research for everyday life concerns the extent to which you understand the particular factors that bias you toward emotional autonomy vs. emotional dependency relative to your reference groups.

Your independence-dependence predilections are critical because they profoundly influence your every thought, feeling, and action.  Even when you are alone, reference group norms within your mind can sway you in their direction.  Sometimes that is to your advantage, and sometimes to your detriment.  Try to be mindful of your reference group norms, then, and use that insight to decide when independence or dependence is in your best interest.  To paraphrase the proverbial wisdom, "Show me your company, and I'll tell you who you are," I offer the suggestion, "Show me your reference group, and I'll tell you how you feel."

References

Goldenberg, A., Garcia, D., Halperin, E., Zaki, J., Kong, D., Golarai, G., & Gross, J. J. (2019). Beyond emotional similarity: The role of situation-specific motives. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Advance online publication.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0000625

Ryan, R. M. & Deci, E. L. (Eds.), (2002). Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. American Psychologist, 55, 68-78. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.55.1.68

Throwing Money at People to Force Them into Health

You may not know it, but some governments have begun to dole out money in an attempt to promote the health behaviors of certain citizen groups.  Good idea?  Bad idea?

First, some context by way of a 2019 Journal of the American Medical Association report (Thirumurthy, et al 2019) entitled "The Uncertain Effect of Financial Incentives to Improve Health Behaviors."  Among other things, the article detailed several relevant studies.  In one, 1503 cardiovascular patients were chosen from three American health care systems. For 12 months, the subjects were entered into a lottery in which they could win more than $1000, if they took their statin medication and lowered their LDL-C cholesterol.  Three other studies focused on HIV positive patients in an attempt to increase their compliance with antiretroviral therapies so as to improve their abilities to suppress the virus.  All three HIV studies provided their participants with financial incentives.  In neither the cardiovascular study nor in any of the HIV studies did monetary rewards produced their desired outcomes.

After noting that some other studies had inferred health compliance benefit from financial inducements, Thirumurthy and his colleagues offered suggestions about how one might pay patients to take better care of their own health.  Among other things, the authors cautioned against what they cited as the "Peanuts Effect" in which patients are paid too little to incentivize them. To quote, "These considerations suggest not being stingy with financial incentives when great value is at stake—or at least not assuming that incentives cannot be effective when small incentives do not succeed."  After addressing several factors regarding patient monetary incentives, the authors subsequently reached the common sense conclusion that the manner in which a financial reward patient program is "designed" is central to its success.

What do you think?  Should some big institution--almost always a government agency--pay people to behave in ways that profit those very same people?  The United States tried paying children to attend school, and that mostly ended with fraud by the administrators and no significantly improved attendance by the students. Nevertheless, there still are pay-to-attend-school crusaders.  Foremost among these is Brentin Mock (2017) who, writing for City Lab-- owned by The Atlantic, one of America's oldest literary magazines--asserted that "We need to pay high school students to go to school. I don’t mean some punk-ass weekly or monthly allowance, or a gift card for Dave & Busters. I’m talking about a deposit of somewhere in the ballpark of $50 to $100, every school day. That’s not for making honor roll; it’s just for making it to school in the morning and staying until the end of the day. Yes, compensated just for showing up. Think Universal Basic Income—but for kids."  Critically evaluate that for a moment: If instituted, the recommendation would cost between $9,000 and $18,000 for each and every student.  Based on 2013-2014 enrollment statistics, for Wyoming, the state with least students, the yearly cost would have ranged from 833 million, 67 thousand dollars at the low end to 1 billion, 666 million, 134 thousand dollars at the high end.  For California, the state with most students, the yearly cost would have ranged from a low of 53 billion, 962 million, 686 thousand dollars at the low end to 107 billion, 925 million, 372 thousand dollars at the high end.  Those new educational expenses, of course, would have to be added to Wyoming's usual pupil yearly expenditures of 1 billion, 560 million,764 thousand dollars, and added to California's usual pupil yearly expenditures of 72 billion, 641 million, 244 thousand dollars.

Just for the moment, set aside the expense.  Instead, be aware that research over the decades has proven that external rewards destroy intrinsic motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2017).  So paying people to force them into physical and mental health easily could backfire.  For instance, studies (Dweck, 2006) have found that when external rewards are withdrawn, those previously rewarded tend to return to their pre-existing behaviors.  And what about those who already had the intrinsic motivation to behave healthfully before financial incentives were offered?  Might they not rebel, demanding to be paid as much, or more, than the slackers in order to continue behaving healthfully?

References

Dweck, C. (2006).  Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.  New York: Random House

Mock, B. (2017). We Will Pay High School Students To Go To School. And We Will Like It.
April 3.  https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/04/lets-just-pay-high-school-students-to-go-to-school/521694/

Ryan R. M., Deci E. L. (2017). Self-determination theory: Basic Psychological Needs in Motivation Development and Wellness. New York, NY: Guilford Press

Thirumurthy, H., Asch, D., & Volpp, K. (2019) The Uncertain Effect of Financial Incentives to Improve Health Behaviors.  JAMA. 2019;321(15):1451-1452. doi:10.1001/jama.2019.2560

The Rights of Minority States

Majority rule has been recognized as a gold standard of democratic processes.  When Americans assert that “the people must decide,” they mean that whoever or whatever receives the most popular votes should be accepted.  However, only a moment’s reflection is needed to realize the limitations of majority rule.  If the Ku Klux Klan, Fascists, or Nazis win the popular vote, should their views prevail?  Alexis de Tocqueville (1831), a Frenchman, coined the term “tyranny of the majority” to emphasize the danger inherent in blind allegiance to majority rule.  In doing so, however, he merely provided a phrase that encapsulated beliefs already enshrined in the American political system—namely, the 1778 Connecticut Compromise which decreed that the House of Representative should be apportioned according to population, and the Senate should be comprised of two senators per state, regardless of population.  The Compromise succeeded because it ensured that both large and small states would be represented, respected, and protected.

Bullying is, and has been, a hot topic in contemporary America.  In 1991, Georgia became the first state to initiate anti-bullying legislation, and, in 2015, Montana became the fiftieth and final one. The laws passed bipartisanly and overwhelmingly.  Virtually no one could argue convincingly to justify intimidating and coercing the weak.  State sponsored bullying legislation passed because it was regarded as both a practical and moral issue rather than as a political one.

Bullying certainly is a practical issue. An environment of bullying is an environment of exploitation and fear.  Sooner or later, the bullied will unite to confront their oppressors.  Bullying surely is a moral issue, too.  Those who condone bullying tend to be either sociopaths who care only about themselves, or borderline personality disordered persons, comfortable with cognitive splitting by which they regard one position as all bad and another as all good. 

In 2019 America, federal bullying is decidedly, almost exclusively, political.  Many politicians want to eliminate the Electoral College that enables small states to have equal representation in presidential elections.  If the Electoral College were abolished, nine states---California, Texas, Florida, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Georgia, and Michigan---voting together would decide who is elected president.  The other 41 would be irrelevant.  The nine bullies then could maintain their own coalition that pushes for policies and laws that favor the large states over the small.  You might notice that all nine of the large states are located on the nation's periphery.  One could imagine a dystopian scenario in which power resources were allocated preferentially within that periphery, at the expense of the rest.

What might the other 41 states do?  Should they rise up in a 21st century civil war, or fearfully kowtow to the bullies, passively accepting their second class status?  One thing is certain: Federal bullying would create a Disunited States of America that in time would lead to the nation's demise.

New Book and New Blog

Never in human history have so many professions made influencing the masses their primary or secondary goals. Most of those professionals are motivated by desire for fortune and fame. A few others sincerely believe that they, and they alone, know what is best for society, in general, and for you, in particular. And the professional influencers are not billeted only in America, Russia, China, or Korea. Virtually every country has its own professional influence warriors. All of them train and research tactical strategies, and all employ the latest high tech influence weapons.

After years of concern, I decided to blow the whistle on the practice.  As a psychologist, myself, I am troubled by the ways that psychologists have been deployed in the influence wars. Psychology research too often has facilitated methods of mass manipulation. Accordingly, I recently published a new book, Justifiably Paranoid: Resisting Intrusive and Malicious Influences, and I also began a new blog, https://resistingintrusivemaliciousinfluences.blogspot.com/ 

Unlike the manipulators, I do not have a self-serving agenda and I do not profess to know what is best for you. I do know that you, and you alone, are qualified to determine the influences that should be accepted and rejected. I expect and encourage you to be as justifiably suspicious of the information that I present in my books and blogs as you would be of that contained in any other. I look forward to your feedback on the new book and blog.