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A Brain-Based Explanation For Why Old People Get Scammed
sciencehabit writes "Despite long experience with the ways of the world, older people are especially vulnerable to fraud. According to the Federal Trade Commission, up to 80% of scam victims are over 65. One explanation may lie in a brain region that serves as a built-in crook detector. Called the anterior insula, this structure — which fires up in response to the face of an unsavory character — is less active in older people, possibly making them less cagey than younger folks, a new study finds."
Just sayin'... the guy looks like such a crook; I always wondered how he could get supporters.
Only during the early TV years did everyone seem so honest and wonderful. Leave it to Beaver, My Three Sons and about a million other goody goody TV shows makes the newer generations think that life back then was so golly gee whiz good. There never was a Mayberry and people were just as dishonest then as they are now, the internet just allows us to see it more often.
--- If the bible proves the existence of God, then Superman comics prove the existence of Superman.
They're also (as a general populace) more lonely, less educated, more dependent on repairmen to do tasks for them, and more financially well-off than their younger counterparts.
They're basically the perfect soup for travelers, gypsy trash, and other assorted con-artist-pieces-of-shit to take advantage of. Makes me want to go back to the days when a tall tree and short noose waited for that filth when they got caught. There is very little in this world lower than someone willing to take advantage of the elderly.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
If anything people were less honest. In the 1950s lots of crimes went totally unreported and still their crime rates where rather high. Physical, mental or sexual abuse of family members was very often unreported. In most states a wife could not even report a rape by her husband as no such crime existed.
The homicide rate today for the USA is lower than it was in 1960.
All brain functions are in decline throughout most of our lives, I doubt any one specific area has much more of an impact than any other. Judgement, trust, memory, reasoning, caution, etc.
Up to a certain point, sheer experience helps prevent older folks from being scammed, but somewhere there's going to be a tipping point in most people's cognitive skills in general that make them an easier mark. A headline like "Elderly found to be easier to scam!" just gets "no kidding!" from me.
I'd also wager the average 85 yr old is easier to coax into a stranger's car than the average 5 yr old.
I'm sure I'll get a reply from one or two telling me their Aunt Gracie was sharp as a whip till the day she died at 90, and you'll run into that from time to time, but those people are by far the exception to the rule.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
As we all know, the human cerebral cortex is heavily wrinkled, allowing a very large sheet of neural network to fit inside the skull.
During the aging process, the wrinkles gradually diffuse through the skull, collecting on the skin surface, and leaving the cerebral cortex much less efficiently packed. This, obviously, is why old people are wrinkly and suffer cognitive decline. What theory could be simpler or more parsimonious?
Yes this, now mind you it is even worse with my grandmother as she is hard core christian. She thinks everyone is good and can be trustworthy My grandmother got scammed TWICE from those door to door energy people who have crazy high rates (although maybe not technically a scam as they do provide the service, the rates are outrageous) Twice from those people who call up claiming they are from Microsoft and say they found errors on her PC .. even after me repeatedly telling her to immediately hang up the phone if she ever gets a call from people claiming to help out with her computer. Sad part is both times she called me up immediately after asking if it was the right choice.. so I had to tell her to call her credit card company right away, as well as clean up her computer
Almost got hit by one of those Nigerian 419 scams, she was in communication with them and was just about to send them her banking details before she called up my father asking about it first.. thank God..
Sad part is, each time she falls for this scam, she tells everyone the story and almost brags/seems pleased that she got scammed.. I don't get it
Called the anterior insula, this structure — which fires up in response to the face of an unsavory character
Just because someone's shady looking, does not mean they're a thief. The inverse holds true as well.
Truth be told, most-if-not-all of us have been robbed of far more by white guys in suits, rather than black guys in hoodies.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
almost brags/seems pleased that she got scammed.. I don't get it
Attention seeking behavior. Look on the bright side, decades earlier she would have been wearing miniskirts and bikinis, aren't you glad she's changed tactics?
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Wouldn't a hardcore christian know about things like 'original sin' and(if catholic) 'concupiscence' or (if protestant) the necessity of salvation through grace? There are certainly variants of christianity that emphasize the redeemability of all people; but what flavors espouse the notion that the world isn't actually pretty full of malicious dickheads, albeit ones that might be redeemed?
If young people weren't all such self-involved pricks and actually bothered to spend the 30-45 minutes EVERY TWO YEARS that it takes to CAST A FUCKING VOTE then maybe there wouldn't be such a death grip on this country from the elderly...
One good troll deserves another.
If they think the elderly are easy, they haven't met doctors, newly successful pro athletes and salesmen of all kinds.
I am not a crackpot.
That's like saying she deserved to be raped because she didn't go to her self-defense classes.
I've found in my life that kids 15 and under fall for scams much more often than senior citizens. Think 'fad' if you don't agree. Fad is after all, just a slow scam. Got any beany babies?
If your head is too far up your own ass to go cast a ballot for the politicians that best represent your interests [...]
Unless you feature in Forbes Magazine, no politician on the ballot represents your interests.
There never was a Mayberry and people were just as dishonest then as they are now
I have to disagree at least for the US. Over the past half century a lot of rural places have changed from not locking one's doors to widespread theft of agricultural equipment and various manifestations of the drug war, such as marijuana growing and meth labs.
Another place is college. Try leaving a laptop or bicycle unlocked and unattended. Fifty years ago you could have gotten away with it except for perhaps the most urbanized colleges.
It is worth noting that just as there is the myth of Mayberry, there's also the myth of the Children of the Corn, namely, that small towns have "dark secrets". My view is that small towns were more honest because that is what it takes for a small, isolated society where everyone knows everyone, to survive. It also becomes much harder for dishonesty to profit. You have a small set of possible targets, and they'll figure it out eventually.
When you get large urban societies or a massive, flat society like the internet, potential con artists can easily move from one mark to the next as well as filter through large numbers of potential targets for a mark. Thieves have a sea of targets to choose from. The payoff for dishonesty and theft is much better.
So I agree that the people haven't really changed. But the payoffs for various sorts of dishonesty have changed.
If anything people were less honest. In the 1950s lots of crimes went totally unreported and still their crime rates where rather high. Physical, mental or sexual abuse of family members was very often unreported. In most states a wife could not even report a rape by her husband as no such crime existed.
The homicide rate today for the USA is lower than it was in 1960.
Citation needed
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=homicide+rate+in+united+states+over+century
Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
There were some pluses to living in the 1950's, but there were almost all related to the fact that men ages 20-50 were in short supply after WWII. For instance, white men could get better (in terms of wages, benefits, and hours) jobs than are available now and could marry better (because they were so outnumbered by women who wanted to get married).
That difference is actually key to the modern American social conservative narrative, which sells the (completely bogus) idea that if we had the same social structure white people had in the 1950's, we'd have the economic success that white families enjoyed in the 1950's. And of course, if you weren't white, it's a completely different story.
I am officially gone from
Rape without physical force is possible, and probably relatively common compared to physical rape.
Don't think that all guys happily accept sex anytime with just any woman. We're choosy too, though it may not be as obvious.
I'm a guy, and I've been pushed into sex. It was bordering on rape as I didn't really want to, but felt pushed into it. (I don't want to go into detail.) I wouldn't call my situation a clear case of rape because of the situation (still don't want to go into detail) but I can well imagine people who are pushed into sex by blackmail and other non-violent pressure.
But to scoff at it and say "Suuure he didn't want it. He's a guy, so of course he want's it." is actually extremely painful. Do I sound soppy? Not manly enough? I'm posting AC because although I'm about as blokey (in some ways a jock) as they come (pun not intended), I'm also human and have feelings. But as a guy, it's usually best to hide such feelings for fear of being ridiculed. And that is how things such as non-violent rape fly under the radar.
Weed got legalised because they held a vote on the actual issue. Of course it's worthwhile voting on individual issues. Jeez.
Voting for a person rather than on issues as a way to express your opinion is like asking your taxi driver to solve a set of riddles rather than telling him your actual destination. How does voting for a specific person say that you want weed legalised? Maybe you abhor weed, but you agree with the rest of the guy's policies, etc. I'd rather we had a system of being allowed to nominate issues and vote on them. Voting certain people into certain positions of authority is probably still a good idea, but it's a very poor way to make your wishes known, and it's dumb to act like things aren't going the way you want simply because you didn't vote for a certain individual.
which is totally what she said
Try Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Those 2 books have a ton of wise quotes.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Try more recent data slick.
2010 4.8
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/tables/10tbl01.xls
Not sure how one would measure moral decay. My guess is it would include a bunch of things I do not find immoral.
Vote for the one with lube. Obviously.
If I were God, wouldn't I protect my churches from acts of me?
Sorry i suck at analogies, but here is what gets my goat, and I've found this seems to hold true for anybody over 30 that isn't a geek. Old scam + New tech = success.
For example look at the "You've won a $1000 gift card from (insert store)", now that scam ain't worked online for years except for the completely gullible, the kind that still fall for the Nigerian prince kind of foolish, but you send that exact same email as a text on their smartphone? And you'd be surprised how many will fall for it. I must get a dozen calls from customers a week that if it weren't for me saying "No, its a scam, no major retailer is gonna alert a contest winner by text" they would fall for it hook, line, and sinker...why?
That is the part I just can't figure out, why would simply changing from an email to a text magically drop everybody's defenses? And it ONLY seems to work on those over 30, my oldest had some of his college buddies over the other day and i asked them if they had gotten any and they all said "Sure but its a scam, we just toss 'em". Is there something about being over 30 that keeps you from connecting one tech to another? Are people under 30 naturally more cynical and therefor harder to feel? Damned if I know but its really irritating, its like having to tech the noobs how to deal with the net all over again.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Hmmm... this makes me remember a story I heard from a penetration tester. He 'lost' a usb-stick in a non-conspicuous place in the toilet nearest to the IT department of a business he was hired to test. Guess what... .pdf on a system that was connected to the net... and he found himself on the yellow brick road with a little dog called Toto, and full access to the systems of the wicked witch of the east! :-)
Within 45 minutes someone inserted the stick, opened the malicious
Lesson learned: even old tech works with geeks
How is that for a brainfest huh?
rm -rf --no-preserve-root /