levels are likely to make traders foolhardy.
“Rising levels of testosterone and cortisol prepare traders for taking risk,” said John Coates, who led the study. “However, if testosterone reaches physiological limits, as it might during a market bubble, it can turn risk-taking into a form of addiction, while extreme cortisol during a crash can make traders shun risk altogether.”
These Cambridge researchers found that daily testosterone was significantly higher on days when traders make more than their one-month daily average. Whether the higher levels contributed to the success outcomes or whether the levels were higher because they were so successful was not mentioned in the news report of this study. It could be either way.
However, the Cambridge researchers did report that their work suggested that the rapid decisions the traders were pressured to make may be biased by emotional and hormonal factors that have not so far been considered in any detail. Coates said that this bias may help explain both rational and irrational behavior.
Can we extrapolate this to apply to government leaders? Because this could account for the almighty necessity to maintain the political leaders’ seats in government for which they sell their souls. They are addicted to the hormonal effects of high-level decision making. But these decisions can be compromised by their emotional and hormonal levels.
Power corrupts says the old cliché, which is absolutely true; however, power both compromises and corrupts. Former US President Bill Clinton started out with good intentions–health care that got squashed as a consequence of a huge campaign of lies by the insurance companies and the medical industry who are getting fat on sick Americans. In 2007, a report showed that the US has the most expensive health care system in the world and it does not provide the best care. Clinton was trying to do a good thing. Then several years later, President Clinton ended up handing over the digital air wave spectrum to the media giants for nothing when it could have been leased for $70Billion which would go a long way in getting the health care program up and running.
Speaking of the lies that the insurance companies and the health industry propagated in that health care campaign. Advertisers on American TV are not allowed to broadcast lies about the products they sell, but the political candidates and their super-paks can broadcast blatant lies in their TV attack ads with impunity. The Swift Boat ads against John Kerry when he was running for President stand out. This is another case where the leaders and would-be leaders can be as corrupt as they choose to be.
It would seem that the stronger the male dominance, the more corrupt the society. In India, corruption is rampant. Edward Luce wrote that nearly a fifth of parliament members have been indicted for at least one crime,
“Many people, especially foreigners, do not appreciate the extent of corruption in India…they think it is an additional nuisance to the system… in many parts of India it is the system.”
Very few people can resist the temptations of power. We think fondly of former Prime Minister of Canada (now deceased) Pierre Trudeau because he was a man who was strong enough to withstand the destructive addiction of power. He never lost sight of the fact that the man in the limelight was a dramatic role he was playing on the world stage–not his real life person.
So men are not better decision makers than women. Indeed, they have conflicting hormonal influences at work in their decision-making. Surely the Cambridge study by Dr. Coates helps us understand how men in power can get so far off the rails with their original decent intentions, and why they need women who are not testosterone driven to participate in the leadership of the communities, cities, and nations.
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