Birth order has been examined over a wide variety of dimensions in the context of modern populations. A consistent message has been that it is better to be born first. The analysis of birth order in this paper is different in several ways from other investigations into birth order effects. First, we examine the effect of birth order in an egalitarian, small-scale, kin-based society, which has not been done before. Second, we use a different outcome measure, fertility, rather than outcome (...) measures of social, psychological, or economic success. We find, third, that being born late in an egalitarian, technologically simple society rather than being born early has a positive outcome on fertility, and fourth, that number of older siblings and sibling set size are even stronger predictors of fertility, especially for males. (shrink)

Several studies have suggested a matrilateral bias in allomaternal (non-maternal) infant and child caregiving. The bias has been associated with the allomother’s certainty of genetic relatedness, where allomothers with high certainty of genetic relatedness will invest more in children because of potential fitness benefits. Using quantitative behavioral observations collected on Ngandu 8- to 12-month-old infants from the Central African Republic, I examine who is caring for infants and test whether certainty of genetic relatedness may influence investment by allomothers. Results (...) indicate a matrilateral bias in caregiving by extended kin members, but this does not affect the total level of care infants receive when fathers and siblings are included in the analysis. These results replicate a previous study done among an adjacent foraging population and emphasize the importance of examining children’s complete social environments when addressing caregiving and child development. (shrink)

Namesaking can be viewed as a mechanism to increase perceived parent-child similarity and, consequently, parental investment. Male and, to a lesser extent, firstborn children are more frequently namesakes than female and later-born children, respectively. However, a direct link between namesaking and parental investment has not been examined. In the present study, 632 participants from Central Europe indicated their first name, sex, birth order, number of siblings, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, paternal and maternal first names, as well as relationship (...) quality with, and time and financial investment they received from, both parents during childhood. Mixed-effects models revealed associations between namesaking and parental investment. However, the effect of namesaking often appeared significant only in interaction with specific predictors, such as sex and primogeniture. It suggests instead that namesaking has an additive effect—it enhances the effect of biological factors on parental investment. In general, we found evidence for the bias in parental investment linked to name similarity among both parents, and support for the hypothesis that namesaking serves as a mechanism to increase paternity confidence and, thus, paternal investment. The effect of namesaking influences only certain types of parental investment—namely, those at the level of relationship quality. In addition, nonheterosexual orientation was the strongest negative predictor of paternal investment. Our study extends the research on parental investment by showing that cultural mechanisms, such as namesaking, can also exert some influence on parental rearing behavior. (shrink)

Growth of different body parts in humans is sensitive to different resource constraints that are mediated by parental investment. Parental investment can involve the expenditure of material, cognitive, and emotional resources on offspring. Cranial volume, an important predictor of cognitive ability, appears understudied in this context. We asked whether there are associations between growth and family structure, self-reported estimates for resource availability, and sibling number; and whether these constraints relate to head and body growth in a similar (...) manner. We assessed the associations between parental investment, height, and cranial volume in a cross-sectional study of Estonian children. Height correlated negatively with the number of siblings but this association became negligible in a model controlling for birthweight, parental heights, and mother’s age at birth. Unlike height, cranial volume was unrelated to sibling number, but it was negatively associated with self-reported meat and general resource shortage. Cranial volume was related to family structure and paternal education. Children living with both birth-parents had larger heads than those living in families containing a step-parent. Since these family types did not differ with respect to meat or general resource shortage, our findings suggest that families including both genetic parents provide non-material benefits that stimulate predominantly cranial growth. For the studied developmental period, cranial volume appeared a more sensitive marker of growth constraints than height. The potential of using cranial volume for quantifying physical impact of non-material parental investment deserves further attention. (shrink)

Supporting Hamilton’s inclusive fitness theory, archival analyses of inheritance patterns in wills have revealed that people invest more of their estates in kin of closer genetic relatedness. Recent classroom experiments have shown that this genetic relatedness effect is stronger for relatives of direct lineage (children, grandchildren) than for relatives of collateral lineage (siblings, nieces, nephews). In the present research, multilevel modeling of more than 1,000 British Columbian wills revealed a positive effect of genetic relatedness on proportions of estates allocated to (...) relatives. This effect was qualified by an interaction with lineage, such that it was stronger for direct than for collateral relatives. Exploratory analyses of the moderating role of benefactors’ sex and estate values showed the genetic relatedness effect was stronger among female and wealthier benefactors. The importance of these moderators to understanding kin investment in modern humans is discussed. (shrink)

The One-Child Policy dramatically changed the Chinese family structure, and the literature indicates that only children may have an advantage in terms of family resource dilution. Moreover, as Chinese families traditionally prioritize investing in sons, only daughters are found to have been empowered by the policy because they did not need to compete with their brothers for parental investment. However, the literature is limited to only teenage children when they were still living in their parents' homes. It is unclear (...) whether—when the generation of only children grew up and married—their family structure differed from that of children with siblings and whether married only daughters retained more family resources from their parents. Based on the data analysis of a 2016 survey, “Study of Youths in 12 Cities of Mainland China,” including a sample of 1,007 fathers and 2,168 mothers born between 1975 and 1985, this study explores the empowerment of married only daughters, employing the theory of family resource dilution in expanded Chinese families. Using educational investment in children as an example, and with random intercept models, this study presents empirical evidence that the dilution of family resources in Chinese expanded families still benefits males and patrilineal practices. Thus, this study demonstrates that Chinese families still tend to sacrifice the interests of married daughters to ensure support for their adult sons. However, it also illustrates that married only daughters could still connect to their parents' resources, giving them a relatively dominant position for decision-making regarding the family's educational expenditure on her own children. Thus, this study extends our understanding of the family resource dilution theory to Chinese expanded families, underscoring the need for further research on Chinese only children after they marry and form families of their own. (shrink)

The well-established finding that siblings growing up in the same family turn out to be very different from one another has puzzled psychologists and behavior geneticists alike. In this theoretical note we describe the possible ontogeny and phylogeny of a sibling differentiation mechanism. We suggest that sibling competition for parental investment results in sibling differentiation on a number of characteristics, producing different developmental trajectories within families. Variations in developmental trajectories within families may have had fitness advantages (...) in ancestral environments because(a) sibling competition for extrafamilial resources would be reduced and(b) these variations would be suited to environments containing a variety of niches or to changing environments. Predictions derived from this model and an example of an application to attachment theory are presented. (shrink)

Paternity certainty and matrilineal family ties have been used to explain the asymmetric caregiving of grandparents and aunts and uncles. The proximate mechanisms underlying biased kin investment, however, remain unclear. A central question of the study presented here was whether the parent-kin relationship is an important link in the caregiving. In a two-generational questionnaire study, we asked subjects to estimate the intensity of their relationships to parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles (emotional closeness, investment received in childhood). In addition, (...) the subjects’ parents rated their emotional closeness to their parents and siblings. We found that the parent-kin relationship was closely linked to the relatives’ child care and could partly explain asymmetric caregiving. Maternal aunts played a special role as caregivers. Especially the mother’s younger or last-born sister cared intensively for nieces and nephews, regardless of her closeness to the subjects’ mother. (shrink)

Data from the Kipsigis of Kenya are used to test two models for how parents invest in offspring, the Trivers-Willard and local resource competition/enhancement hypotheses. Investment is measured as age-specific survival, educational success, marital arrangements, and some components of property inheritance, permitting an evaluation of how biases persist or alter over the period of dependence. Changes through time in such biases are also examined. Despite stronger effects of wealth on the reproductive success of men than women, the survival of (...) sons and daughters is not related to parental wealth. However, a Trivers-Willard effect characterizes educational investment: poor families show a greater concern for daughters’ (vis-à-vis sons’) schooling than do rich families, a trend that has increased over time. In regard to models of local resource competition and enhancement, men’s reproductive success decreases with number of brothers and increases with number of sisters; this pattern of competition with same-sex sibs and cooperation with opposite-sex sibs is not found among women. As predicted from these observations, parents show reduced investment in sons with a large number of brothers, and increased investment in sons with a large number of sisters. By contrast, investment in daughters is entirely unaffected by number of sisters and is influenced only in subtle ways by number of brothers. Levels of investment in relation to sibship size (irrespective of siblings’ sex) are highest for younger children of large sib sets.Discussion of the results in relation to those from other studies leads to three conclusions. First, predictive models for how investment biases vary across societies must consider a broad range of socioecological factors constraining parental options and payoffs. Second, the timing of investment biases within societies will be affected by the value of children and the costs of parental investment. Third, measures of investment appropriate for between-sex and between-class comparisons need careful attention. Each of these issues is brought to bear on the question of why, in contrast to so many other parts of the world, sex preferences are so muted in Africa. (shrink)

Modern industrialized populations lack the strong positive correlations between wealth and reproductive success that characterize most traditional societies. While modernization has brought about substantial increases in personal wealth, fertility in many developed countries has plummeted to the lowest levels in recorded human history. These phenomena contradict evolutionary and economic models of the family that assume increasing wealth reduces resource competition between offspring, favoring high fertility norms. Here, we review the hypothesis that cultural modernization may in fact establish unusually intense reproductive (...) trade-offs in wealthy relative to impoverished strata, favoring low fertility. We test this premise with British longitudinal data (the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children), exploring maternal self-perceptions of economic hardship in relation to increasing family size and actual socioeconomic status. Low-income and low-education-level mothers perceived the greatest economic costs associated with raising two versus one offspring. However, for all further increases to family size, reproduction appears most expensive for relatively wealthy and well-educated mothers. We discuss our results and review current literature on the long-term consequences of resource dilution in modern families. (shrink)

Life history data, attractiveness ratings of male photographs, and attitudes towards partnership and child-rearing of 321 women were used to test four evolutionary models (quantitative reproductive strategy, male short-age, polygyny indication, and maternal reproductive interests) which attempt to explain the influence of family composition on reproductive strategies. Links between early menarche and other markers of reproductive strategy were investigated. Childhood stress and absence of a father figure, whether genetically related or not, were found to have accelerated menarche whereas having younger (...) siblings decelerated it. Early menarche was associated with attractiveness ratings, the number of partners desired for the immediate future, and the early onset of intimate relationships. It was not linked with sociosexual orientation, mate choice criteria, and investment in the subjects’ own children, but these three markers were interrelated. The implications of the findings for the four evolutionary models are discussed. (shrink)

When wealth is heritable, parents may manipulate family size to optimize the trade-off between more relatively poor offspring and fewer relatively rich ones, and channel less care into offspring that compete with siblings. These hypotheses were tested with quantitative ethnographic data collected among the Karo Batak—patrilineal agriculturalists from North Sumatra, Indonesia, among whom land is bequeathed equally to sons. It was predicted that landholding would moderate the relationship between reproductive rate and parental investment on one hand, and the number (...) of same-sex siblings on the other, among boys but not girls. The predicted interaction effect was observed in interbirth intervals and immunizations, but only a trace of the effect was detected in age-five mortality. The study raises questions about the coevolution of human behavior and social structure. (shrink)

Research in nonindustrial small-scale societies challenges the common perception that human childhood is universally characterized by a long period of intensive adult investment and dedicated instruction. Using return rate and time allocation data for the Savanna Pumé, a group of South American hunter-gatherers, age patterns in how children learn to become productive foragers and from whom they learn are observed across the transition from childhood to adolescence. Results show that Savanna Pumé children care for their siblings, are important economic (...) contributors, learn by doing rather than by instruction, and spend their time principally in the company of other children. This developmental experience contrasts with that of children in postindustrial societies, who are dependent on adults, often well past maturity; learn in formal settings; and spend much of their time in the company of adults. These differences raise questions about whether normative behaviors observed in postindustrial societies are representative of human children. This comparison also identifies the potential mismatch between hunter-gatherer and postindustrial societies in the extent to which children may be well adapted to learn from and teach each other. In particular, spending time in autonomous work and play groups develops the cooperation and coordination skills that are foundational to human subsistence and growing up to be socially and productively adept adults and parents. (shrink)

Contemporary trends in low fertility can in part be explained by increasing incentives to invest in offspring’s embodied capital over offspring quantity in environments where education is a salient source of social mobility. However, studies on this subject have often neglected to empirically examine heterogeneity, missing out on the opportunity to investigate how this relationship is impacted when individuals are excluded from meaningful participation in economic spheres. Using General Social Survey data from the United States, I examine changes in the (...) relationship between number of siblings and college attendance for White and Black respondents throughout the 1900s. Results show that in the early 1900s, White individuals from larger families had a lower chance of completing four years of college education than those from smaller families, whereas the likelihood for Black individuals was more uniform across family sizes. These racial differences mostly converged in the later part of the century. These results may help explain variations in the timing of demographic transitions within different racial groups in the United States and suggest that the benefits of decreasing family size on educational outcomes may be conditional on the specific economic opportunities afforded to a family. (shrink)

Social support networks play a key role in human livelihood security, especially in vulnerable communities. Here we explore how evolutionary ideas of kin selection and intrahousehold resource competition can explain individual variation in daily support network size and composition in a south-central Ethiopian agricultural community. We consider both domestic and agricultural help across two generations with different wealth-transfer norms that yield different contexts for sibling competition. For farmers who inherited land rights from family, firstborns were more likely to report (...) daily support from parents and to have larger nonparental kin networks. Compared with other farmers, firstborns were also more likely to reciprocate their parents’ support, and to help nonparental kin without reciprocity. For farmers who received land rights from the government, middle-born farmers reported more nonparental kin in their support networks compared with other farmers; nonreciprocal interactions were particularly common in both directions. This suggests a diversification of adult support networks to nonparental kin, possibly in response to a long-term parental investment disadvantage of being middle-born sons. In all instances, regardless of inheritance, lastborn farmers were the most disadvantaged in terms of kin support. Overall, we found that nonreciprocal interactions among farmers followed kin selection predictions. Direct reciprocity explained a substantial part of the support received from kin, suggesting the importance of the combined effects of kin selection and reciprocity for investment from kin. (shrink)

Competition for resources is one of the main evolutionary explanations for dispersal from the natal area. For humans this explanation has received little attention, despite the key role dispersal is thought to play in shaping social systems. I examine the link between dispersal and resources using historical data on people from the small farming town of Oakham, Massachusetts (1750–1850). I reconstruct individual life histories through a variety of records, identifying dispersers, their age at dispersal, and their destinations. I find that (...) sex, father’s wealth and social status, and age at father’s death were all significantly associated with one or more dispersal variables. Birth order and number of siblings were not significantly associated with any of the dispersal variables. I also use wills and deeds to study transfers of land from fathers to sons. More stayers than dispersers acquired Oakham land from their fathers, but some sons who acquired Oakham land later dispersed. I discuss the causality underlying the relationship between dispersal and resource acquisition, as well as implications for a general understanding of human dispersal. (shrink)

What explains variation in hunting success? This paper examines foraging success among Inuit hunters, paying particular attention to factors that account for differential returns in hunting. Although there are several possibilities for explaining hunting success, this study finds that birth order and age are important predictors of foraging returns. Furthermore, data on food sharing suggests that birth order has important effects on the distribution of food. That is, early-born hunters not only produce more food, they give much of that food (...) to their parents, who then distribute it to the hunter’s younger siblings. These findings are discussed within the context of local resource enhancement and the value of early-born sons to Inuit parents. (shrink)

Recuperating the sibling -- Sibling logic -- Fraternity and revolution -- The shadows of fraternity -- Economizing desire : the sibling (in) law -- Genealogical sciences -- Living languages : comparative philology and evolution -- The east comes home : race and religion.

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing is synonymous with sustainable investment for socially responsible investors. Unfortunately, the diversity of ESG investing remains unattended amidst the growth in ESG literature, as the academic literature focuses dominantly on measuring performance. An understanding of a wide range of subjects entailing ESG is required before future research on ESG investing is performed. To overcome the challenge, this systematic literature review uses bibliometric mapping to reveal four significant research themes within the ESG investing literature: (...) investor behavior and motivations for ESG investing; cost and risk mitigation in ESG investing; portfolio screening and ESG investing; and ESG performance. The review critically examines each theme and broadens the research agenda for future studies. In addition to the significant themes, this paper also discusses theoretical and recent research trends in the ESG investing literature. The review identifies clashes and crossovers between these themes to appropriately interpret one theme using another and emphasizes the heterogeneity in ESG investing. Lastly, discussion over concerns and criticisms of ESG investing highlights greenwashing as a major cause of concern for investors. (shrink)

There is a growing body of literature on ethical or socially responsible investment across a range of disciplines. This paper highlights the key themes in the field and identifies some of the major theoretical and practical challenges facing both scholars and practitioners. One of these challenges is understanding better the complexity of the relationship between such investment practices and corporate behaviour. Noting that ethical investment is seldom characterised by agreement about what it actully constitutes, and that much (...) of the extant research focuses on a narrow set of issues, the paper argues that there are benefits associated with examining ethical investment as a process. (shrink)

Deciding whether to grant an expanded access request for a child whose sibling is enrolled in a gene therapy trial involves a number of complex factors: considering the best interests of the child, the psychosocial and economic impact on the family, and the concerns and obligations of researchers. Despite the challenges in coming to a substantively fair outcome in cases of discordant eligibility, creating a procedurally fair decision-making process to adjudicate requests is essential.

One of the more controversial uses of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) involves selecting embryos with a specific tissue type so that the child to be born can act as a donor to an existing sibling who requires a haematopoietic stem cell transplant. PGD with HLA tissue typing is used to select embryos that are free of a familial genetic disease and that are also a tissue match for an existing sibling who requires a transplant. Preimplantation HLA tissue typing (...) occurs when parents select embryos that are not at risk of a familial genetic disease to be a match for an existing sibling who requires a transplant. In Victoria, Australia, applications to use PGD with HLA tissue typing are reviewed by the Infertility Treatment Authority on a case by case basis. Preimplantation HLA tissue typing is prohibited prima facie because the embryo to be tested would not be at risk for a genetic abnormality or disease. Arguments for or against the use of PGD/HLA tissue typing are based on several key issues including the commodification and welfare of the donor child. This essay aims to show that that the same arguments apply to both PGD with HLA tissue typing and Preimplantation HLA tissue typing, and that the policy distinction between the two procedures is therefore ethically inconsistent. (shrink)

In Victoria, Australia, some parents are now able to select embryos free from genetic disease which will provide stem cells to treat an existing siblingA n Australian couple from Victoria have been given permission to use in vitro fertilisation technology to screen an embryo in order to “create a `perfect match’ sibling” for their seriously ill child. In vitro fertilisation is regulated in Victoria by the Infertility Treatment Authority which restricts access to people who are medically infertile or who (...) have a family history of genetic disease. The approval given to the Victorian couple is for a new application of IVF consisting of preimplantation genetic diagnosis together with tissue typing.The couple’s three year old daughter Christina has Fanconi’s anaemia, a rare genetic condition, that means she will die before she turns 15 unless she receives blood from the umbilical cord of a “perfect match” sibling. Some people are saying this use of IVF amounts to the creation of a genetically engineered “designer” baby. 1–6Preimplantation genetic diagnosis is an IVF technique …. (shrink)

We show that if a countable structure M in a finite relational language is not cellular, then there is an age-preserving $N \supseteq M$ such that $2^{\aleph _0}$ many structures are bi-embeddable with N. The proof proceeds by a case division based on mutual algebraicity.

Interest in the notion of the possible financial sacrifice suffered by socially responsible investment (SRI) fund investors for considering ethical, social and environmental issues in their investment decisions has spawned considerable academic interest in the performance of SRI funds. Both the Australian and international research literature have yielded largely mixed results. However, several of these studies are hampered by methodological problems which can obscure the significance of reported results, such as the use of small sample sizes, inconsistencies in (...) the time frames selected to analyse performance and different modelling frameworks used to estimate investment returns. This study attempts to redress some of these issues by investigating the returns performance of 89 ethical funds in Australia over the period 1986-2005. Using a multi-factor CAPM model [Fama, E. F., and K. R. French (1996) J. Finance 51(1), 55] (which controls for factors such as size, book-to-market value and momentum) we find that ethical funds significantly under-perform the market in Australia, particularly in the most recent 5 years of our sample period (2000-2005). Risk adjusted returns (using Jensen's alpha) indicate that average annual underperformance is around 1.52% in the 2000-2005 period for our sample and .88% over the whole sample period. Our results contrast with many previous studies (both Australian and international), which have not found statistically significant differences in the performance of ethical funds relative to market benchmarks and/or a matched sample of conventional funds. (shrink)

Definition of the problem The creation and selection of children as tissue donors is ethically controversial. Critics often appeal to Kant’s Formula of Humanity, i.e. the requirement that people be treated not merely as means but as ends in themselves. As many defenders of the procedure point out, these appeals usually do not explain the sense of the requirement and hence remain obscure. Arguments This article proposes an interpretation of Kant’s principle, and it proposes that two different instrumental stances be (...) distinguished. I argue that the creation of “saviour children” is a form of instrumentalization that I dub “preemptive instrumentalization” and that it is categorically different from earlier forms of instrumental attitudes concerning human reproduction. Conclusion Critics are wrong to claim that Kant’s principle is either compatible with the selection of saviour siblings or too vague to serve as an ethical principle. (shrink)

This article addresses the growing industry of retail socially responsible investment (SRI) profiled mutual funds. Very few previous studies have examined the final consumer of SRI profiled mutual funds. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to, in an exploratory manner, examine the impact of a number of pro-social, financial performance, and socio-demographic variables on SRI behavior in order to explain why investors choose to invest different proportions of their investment portfolio in SRI profiled funds. An ordinal logistic (...) regression analysis on 528 private investors revealed that two of the three pro-social variables had a positive impact on how much the consumer invested in SRI profiled funds. Moreover, there was proof of a non-altruistic motive for investing in SRI as consumers who perceive that financial return of SRI is equal or better than "regular" mutual funds, invested a greater proportion of their portfolio in SRI profiled mutual funds. Furthermore, the results showed that women and better-educated investors were more likely to invest a greater proportion of their investment portfolio in SRI. Overall, the findings indicate that both financial perceptions and pro-social attitudes are connected to consumer investment in SRI. (shrink)

>With assets of over US$1.0 trillion and growing, public pension funds in the United States have become a major force in the private sector through their holding of equity positions in large publicly traded corporations. More recently, these funds have been expanding their investment strategy by considering a corporations long-term risks on issues such as environmental protection, sustainability, and good corporate citizenship, and how these factors impact a companys long-term performance. Conventional wisdom argues that the fiduciary responsibility of the (...) pension funds trustees must be solely focused on their beneficiaries and, therefore, their investment criteria must be based strictly on narrowly defined financial measures. It is also asserted that well-established financial measurements of corporate performance already include long-term risk assessment through discounted present value of future flow of earnings. Consequently, all other criteria are contrary to the best interest of the pension funds beneficiaries. In this paper, we assert that, contrary to conventional wisdom, pension funds, and for that matter other mutual funds, must be concerned with the long-term survival and growth of corporations. These measures are generally referred to socially responsible investing (SRI) and when applied to corporations, it is termed socially responsible corporate conduct (SRCC). We demonstrate that current measurement of future risk assessment invariably understates, and quite often completely overlooks, these long-term risks because of the inherent bias towards short-run on the part of financial intermediaries whose compensation depends greatly on short-term results. Furthermore, there is ample evidence to suggest that these intermediaries have been engaging in self-serving practices and thus failing in their duties to serve their clients, i.e. pension funds, best interests. Because of their large holdings in the total market as well as individual companies, these funds cannot easily divest from poorly performing companies without destabilizing the companies stock and overall markets. Hence, they must opt for a strategy of emphasizing investment criteria that encourage companies to take into account long-term aspects of their operations in terms of their impact on environment, sustainability, and community welfare, to name a few. We argue that an exclusionary, and even a primary, focus on short-term financial criteria is no longer a viable option. It also calls for the pension funds to encourage greater transparency and accountability of the entire corporate sector through improved corporate governance. Thus socially responsible investing practices are not merely discretionary and desirable activities; they are a necessary imperative, which both the corporations and public pension funds, and other large institutional holders, will ignore at serious peril to themselves. Finally, the paper considers some of the recent developments where corporations have been responding to these challenges and how their actions might be strengthened through greater disclosure and transparency of corporate activities. It also makes recommendations for the pension funds to support further research in creating new measurement standards that further refine the concept of socially responsible investing as a necessary ingredient of long-term corporate survival and growth in the context of a changing economic, environmental and socio-political dynamic. (shrink)

Philosophy has long been concerned with ‘moral status’. Discussions about the moral status of children, however, seem often to promote confusion rather than clarity. Using the creation of ‘savior siblings’ as an example, this paper provides a philosophical critique of the moral status of children and the moral relevance of parenting and the role that formative experience, regret and relational autonomy play in parental decisions. We suggest that parents make moral decisions that are guided by the moral significance they attach (...) to children, to sick children and most importantly, to a specific sick child (theirs). This moral valorization is rarely made explicit and has generally been ignored by both philosophers and clinicians in previous critiques. Recognizing this, however, may transform not only the focus of bioethical discourse but also the policies and practices surrounding the care of children requiring bone marrow or cord blood transplantation by better understanding the values at stake behind parental decision making. (shrink)

ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to examine the structure of sibling relationships among preschool children in China and develop a questionnaire.MethodsThe concept of sibling relationships among preschool children in China was established through literature review, open interviews, and expert review, and the initial project was designed. Using the questionnaire survey method, with 651 mothers of preschool children as the research objects, we performed item analysis, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and reliability and validity tests on the (...) initial questionnaire.ResultsThe questionnaire for the sibling relationships among preschool children in China had 18 questions covering dimensions of sibling interaction, sibling acceptance, sibling warmth, and sibling rivalry. The questionnaire fitting indexes were better. The internal consistency coefficient between the total questionnaire and each dimension was 0.759–0.8548, and the total questionnaire significantly correlated with each dimension and the total score of parental self-efficacy.ConclusionThe Sibling Relationship Questionnaire for Chinese Preschool Children exhibited good reliability and validity, making it an effective tool for the evaluation of sibling relationships among preschool children. (shrink)

Ethical investing is all the rage. Unfortunately, excitement about it has outpaced plausible philosophical discussions. This article asks and answers two questions: “What counts as investment?”, and “What moral choices do investors have?”. I answer the first question broadly. Investment is pervasive in our economy, and by participating we share responsibility for corporate practices. These facts lead to an “austere conclusion”: short of outright withdrawal from the standard forms of investment, we have little hope of avoiding participation (...) in immoral activities. Thus we must withdraw. Fortunately, the answer to the second question mitigates this disturbing result. Under certain circumstances, shareholder activism aimed at moral goals is a valuable way to participate in a deeply flawed system. By demonstrating the pervasiveness of investment and analogies with consumption and democratic political participation, the conclusions of this paper illuminate not only the ethics of investment but a more-general problem of individual responsibility in complex institutions. The paper is informative both for its applicability to these latter questions, and for its demonstration that investment is not merely a side-topic for business ethics texts, but rather a central problem of modern market societies. (shrink)

This study examines child survival and growth in a patrilineal Ethiopian community as a function of father absence and sex. In line with evolutionary predictions for sex-biased parental investment, the absence of a father and associated constraints on household resources is more detrimental for sons’ than daughters’ survival in infancy. Father absence doubles a son’s risk of dying in infancy but has a positive influence on the well-being of female members of the household, improving daughter survival, growth, and maternal (...) nutritional status. Lack of paternal investment may be compensated for by other matrilateral kin through increased reciprocity between mother, daughter, and sister. (shrink)

Promises of a customary, interpersonal kind have received no small amount of philosophical attention. Of particular interest has been their capac- ity to generate moral obligations. This capacity is arguably what distinguishes promises from other, similar phenomena, like communicating a firm intention. But this capacity is common to still other nearby phenomena, such as oaths and vows. These latter phenomena belong to the same family of concepts as promises, but they are structurally and functionally distinct. Taken in their turn, they (...) fill out what I call the ‘breadth criterion’: Theories of promising should cover not only customary, interpersonal promises but also sibling phe- nomena, including oaths and vows. Accommodating the breadth criterion is not something all theories of promising are positioned to accomplish. I focus on the challenge that the breadth criterion poses for Scanlon’s influential ex- pectation view of promising and suggest a normative powers account will fare better. (shrink)

Carpendale & Lewis (C&L) provide a convincing argument for how children construct social understanding through social interaction. Certainly mothers are important in family interaction; however, sibling interaction may also be key in the process of developing social understanding. In particular, the highly affective and reciprocal dynamics of the sibling relationship in both positive and conflictual interaction may be critical.

Although the family is the safest environment for each member, sometimes violence and abuse can come from the family members. Violence causes family relationships to deteriorate as in all other relationships among people. Sibling violence, as a form of domestic violence, can sometimes have dire consequences that can result in family breakup, death or long-term loss of one of the siblings. In this study, sibling violence, which has the potential to harm family relations in such a way, will (...) be discussed in the context of two stories in the Qurʾān. It is aimed to contribute to other disciplines that study on this subject by examining the attitude of Islam against this violence, which affects the family, and the solutions of the Qur’ān to sibling violence. These stories in the Qur’ān are the story of Prophet Adam’s two sons who narrate an incident of violence that result in the brother killing his brother, and the story of Prophet Joseph and his brothers who narrate the sibling violence resulting in long-term loss. Both stories provide clues to the prevention of violence in the light of the causes of sibling violence and the behavior of the victim sibling in the development of events. In addition, because of the fact that these stories have taken place in the family of the prophets, they give people the message that sibling violence can happen in any family.Summary: Because of the social nature of the mankind, it must live in structured societies. Family is the medium for him where he is born, raised, socializes and prepares for his future life. It is normal sentiments of love, mercy and tolerance which dominate in a family. But despite this, it is possible for a family member to be a transgressor against another family member’s rights. Emotions like jealousy and hostility can cause violence between siblings. Psychologists generally attribute the source of this kind of violence to the parents’ failure to show equal love and affection to all children. While this is an important cause for violence among the siblings, craving for attention and acceptance from society, trying to achieve material and sensual superiority and desire for social success can incite feelings of envy among the siblings. While feelings of jealousy is unproblematic when its intensity can be considered normal, it can cause psychological imbalance if it increases to the level beyond manageable limits. If the latter case occurs, this produces a state of mind where a sibling becomes capable of committing every act of transgression to another sibling, which is the most important cause for the violence among siblings.Archetypical stories of Cain and Abel, and Prophet Joseph in the Qur’ān provide some clues pertaining to recognition and prevention of violence among the siblings. In these two parables, the real reason for envy does not lie in the other sibling. According to the Qur’ān, the true reason for this envy is attributed exclusively to the transgressor. In the parable of Cain and Abel, source of the problem between the siblings is the sacrificial offering to Allah. While the offering of Abel was accepted, Cain’s was not. Cain felt jealous and threatened his brother with death. Facing with his brother’s threat, Abel stayed firm and peaceful, said to his brother that if he were to attack him, he will not retaliate even for self-defence. He reminded Cain that his envy and anger was not due to him, Abel. Abel reminded Cain that the act that Cain was contemplating was a great sin in Allah’s eyes and that it is punishable by eternal hellfire. Cain, despite these warnings, went on to implement his intention of murder successfully.When we inspect the parable we can see that Abel was free from any guilt on his part for his brother’s envy which is the source of his transgression. His sacrifice was accepted because Abel was among the pious and this doesn’t harm or effect negatively Cain in anyway. Therefore the main cause for the jealousy of Cain is his unworthiness in the eyes of Allah, in reality, the reason is solely Cain himself. Therefore it is totally unfair when Cain put the blame on his brother Abel. By the way of this example, the Qur’ān reminds mankind not to blame others for his problems and to take responsibility. Envy, which is the main reason for violence among siblings, will cloud judgment and prevent clear thinking. In the parable of Cain and Abel, the Qur’ān recommends not to taunt the already jealous sibling by way of words and actions and instead, encourages warning against the grave consequences of evil intentions both in this world and in the hereafter. In the parable of Prophet Joseph, because of jealousy of their father from Joseph, bigger brothers of Joseph planned to kill him but they give up on the idea of killing him and instead they dumped him in a well. Later on in the parable, some merchant finds Joseph and brings him to Egypt. There, Joseph becomes a high ranking statesman and meets with his older brothers. Because of the famine, older brothers are in need of Joseph for food and asks him for it, without knowing that the person they are asking from is their little brother, Joseph. Although Joseph faces with his brothers on a superior position his behavior exemplifies the best course of action to end violence among the siblings. In order to remove animosity and callousness from his brothers’ heart, the gradual plan that Joseph had implemented is a great example for healing the wounds that violence among the siblings can cause. It is unreasonable to expect all the animosity and jealousy that brothers of Joseph held for years to go away completely in a moment. Prophet Joseph did not remind his brothers of their crime, on the contrary he was very generous to them. He brought their father and their brother Benjamin to Egypt and in front of them Prophet Joseph forgave his older brothers for the crimes they had committed against him. In this way, Prophet Joseph prevented his brothers potentially denying every transgression they did if he were to confront them in their first meeting, and made them ready to accept their evil deeds.Parables of Cain and Abel and Prophet Joseph are important for recognizing that envy can destroy the mercy that the siblings innately have for each other. It is understood from the parables that envy must be controlled and violence can’t be realized under any circumstances. It is clear from these parables that violence is never a solution for the jealousy among the siblings. A positive and viable solution would be for Cain to seek Allah’s approval instead of killing Abel and for brothers of Joseph this would be to earn their father’s love and respect. Introspection and analysis regarding possible reasons for jealousy and trying to resolve them and striving to be a better human, sibling, or child is a solution prescribed by the Qur’ān. Also, importance of speaking in a soft tone with the person who is experiencing intense jealousy, avoiding provocative language and behavior and trying every possible way to set this person straight is emphasized. The Qur’ān reminds us through these two parables that the human nature is prone to evil suggestions from the satan and for this reason humans need generous and benevolent help from others in order to clear themselves from these evil temptations. (shrink)

Ethical or socially responsible investment is one of the most rapidly growing areas of finance. New government regulations mean that all pension funds are obliged to take such considerations into account. However, this phenomenon has received little critical attention from business ethicists, and a clear conceptual framework is lacking. This paper, by a practitioner in the field, attempts to fill this analytical gap. It considers what difference, if any, lies between the terms ‘ethical’, ‘green’, or ‘socially responsible’. It also (...) tackles the difficult question of how any public form of investment can be called ‘ethical’ in an overtly pluralistic society. The paper provides an account of the historical development of ethical investment, and traces the evolution of the varying terms used to describe it. This is followed by a conceptual analysis of these terms, and a description of ethical decision‐making in this context. The paper ends by considering the role of shareholder action within ethical investment, and assesses the utility of the stakeholder model as a theoretical justification. (shrink)

What motivates grandparents to their altruism? We review answers from evolutionary theory, sociology, and economics. Sometimes in direct conflict with each other, these accounts of grandparental investment exist side-by-side, with little or no theoretical integration. They all account for some of the data, and none account for all of it. We call for a more comprehensive theoretical framework of grandparental investment that addresses its proximate and ultimate causes, and its variability due to lineage, values, norms, institutions (e.g., inheritance (...) laws), and social welfare regimes. This framework needs to take into account that the demographic shift to low fecundity and mortality in economically developed countries has profoundly altered basic parameters of grandparental investment. We then turn to the possible impact of grandparental acts of altruism, and examine whether benefits of grandparental care in industrialized societies may manifest in terms of less tangible dimensions, such as the grandchildren's cognitive and verbal ability, mental health, and well-being. Although grandparents in industrialized societies continue to invest substantial amounts of time and money in their grandchildren, we find a paucity of studies investigating the influence that this investment has on grandchildren in low-risk family contexts. Under circumstances of duress there is converging evidence that grandparents can provide support that helps to safeguard their children and grandchildren against adverse risks. We conclude by discussing the role that grandparents could play in what has been referred to as Europe's demographic suicide. (shrink)

By using tissue typing in conjunction with preimplantation genetic diagnosis doctors are able to pick a human embryo for implantation which, if all goes well, will become a “saviour sibling”, a brother or sister capable of donating life-saving tissue to an existing child.This paper addresses the question of whether this form of selection should be banned and concludes that it should not. Three main prohibitionist arguments are considered and found wanting: the claim that saviour siblings would be treated as (...) commodities; a slippery slope argument, which suggests that this practice will lead to the creation of so-called “designer babies”; and a child welfare argument, according to which saviour siblings will be physically and/or psychologically harmed. (shrink)

Innovations in aligning investment with sustainability led to impact investing, enabling investors to achieve conventional financial returns and measurable social and environmental returns. Since its inception in 2007, it has grown manifolds, with significant efforts being made to create a global ecosystem. However, due to limited academic literature, the theme is yet to garner the scholarly interest it deserves. In this study, we analyse and visualise a knowledge map of the impact investment research field through a comprehensive bibliometric (...) analysis by employing a research corpus of 421 studies sourced from Web of Science and Scopus. We identify the growth trajectory, geographical concentration, productive and influential authors, journals and significant articles and examine the inter-disciplinarity of the field. The major research themes interlinked with impact investing included; social entrepreneurship, social innovation, social finance, impact investment market, innovative financial instruments, financialisation of essential services and impact reporting. To drive the field forward, future research needs to develop an impact investment ecosystem, address behavioural issues, stakeholder management and institutional context in impact investment theme, develop and diffuse innovative financial instruments, develop a framework for standardised accounting and reporting practices to measure financial and non-financial dimensions, tackle impact washing by fund managers, address lack of financial access to the third sector and develop the legal and regulatory framework for third sector organisations. (shrink)

Do foreign direct investment (FDI) and international business ventures promote positive social and economic development in emerging nations? This question will always prove contentious. First, the impacts differ according to context. Second, the social consequences and spillover effects of knowledge diffusion and technology-sharing may be limited and hard to measure. Third, contributions to enhancing social responsibility and improving living standards in host countries are delayed in effect, causally complex, and also hard to measure. Outcomes often critically depend on collaboration (...) of governments, international institutions, the business world, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Research in this area is challenging and requires interdisciplinary collaboration between economists, financial experts, sociologists, ethicists, and other specialists. This paper explores: (1) the evidence to support the proposition that FDI and international business improve social conditions in less-developed countries, and: (2) how these improvements are linked to strategies of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and ethical business practice. The paper draws insights from development, FDI, poverty alleviation, and bottom-of-the-pyramid (BOP) literature. Applications are demonstrated using examples from poverty-stricken areas of Sub-Saharan Africa. The paper attempts not only to argue theoretically but also to provide practical evidence. The approach is simultaneously descriptive, analytical, and prescriptive in order to address a wide audience. It also highlights issues and trends for further academic research and presents the viewpoint that some limitations lie in the nature of ethics frameworks widely referenced in business and that these often fail to consider the compatibility of ethical constructs with relevant incentives. In this vein, we explore the application of Homann’s framework for advantage and incentive-based ethics. (shrink)

Ethical investors are widely thought of as having two main goals. The negative goal of avoiding their investments to be morally tainted. The positive goal to further a certain ethical value they embrace or some normatively laden idea they hold by investing their money in a certain company. In light of these goals, the purpose of this paper is to provide an account of how we can explicitly include investors’ intentions when conceiving of ethical investment. The central idea is (...) that an investor’s intentions may act as both a negative and a positive qualifier for making investing ethical. If we subscribe to this account, there are interesting upshots with respect to how ethical investing compares to ethical giving as effective altruists construe it. (shrink)

It is important for energy enterprises to research on the investment potential of the energy markets in countries along the “Belt and Road,” which can help them optimize the regional investment structure, reduce investment risks, and conform to the development trend of “going global.” Therefore, we construct an investment potential assessment system of 29 indexes including five dimensions: politics, economy, society, energy, and cooperation and assess energy investment potential of 48 sample countries along the “Belt (...) and Road” using principal component analysis to provide reference meanings for energy enterprises. The results show that the assessment results of investment potential are affected by a combination of multiple indexes. In addition, compared with Central Asia and South Asia, which have weak economic foundations and greater political and legal risks, the investment potential of Central and Eastern Europe and some emerging economies in Southeast Asia is higher. (shrink)

In this paper we examine three categories of reasons that have been given against the creation of savior siblings (harm to the child, autonomy violations, and effects on wider society) and argue that all can be defeated. We then outline the conditions under which the practice is morally permissible and argue that these conditions are no different from those under which it is ever morally permissible to procreate. Our surprising conclusion is that savior siblings do not present a special case (...) in procreative ethics and it is permissible to create them whenever it is permissible to create any other child. (shrink)

Post-conflict economies often prove daunting for foreign investors. Many of these nations are reaching out to diasporans, emigrants, and their descendants living abroad, for much-needed foreign investment capital. Little is known about why diasporans invest in their countries of origin. Recent scholarly inquiry regarding investment decision making has suggested that non-pecuniary, psychological concerns often motivate investment decisions. We develop a conceptual model identifying three types of investment return expectations — financial, emotional, and those related to social (...) status — that may drive diaspora investment interest. We contend that the psychological realities and social-status structure of the diaspora experience generate greater salience for non-pecuniary investment motivations, particularly when the origin country emerges from a period of conflict. We outline an agenda for future research and discuss the implications of our model for policies seeking to promote peace utilizing diaspora investment. (shrink)

Impact investing is progressively losing focus in ensuring investments really do make a difference; therefore, the growth of the market may not make real social and environmental change. We propose three ways to put the “impact” back into the heart of impact investment.

Can the perception that one’s partner is investing effort generate a sense of commitment to a joint action? To test this, we developed a 2-player version of the classic snake game which became increasingly boring over the course of each round. This enabled us to operationalize commitment in terms of how long participants persisted before pressing a ‘finish’ button to conclude each round. Our results from three experiments reveal that participants persisted longer when they perceived what they believed to be (...) cues of their partner’s effortful contribution. Crucially, this effect was not observed when they knew their partner to be an algorithm, nor when it was their own effort that had been invested. These results support the hypothesis that the perception of a partner’s effort elicits a sense of commitment, leading to increased persistence in the face of a temptation to disengage. (shrink)

“Ethical investing” is interpreted in the following paper to be the use of non-financial normative criteria by investors in the choice ofsecurities for their portfolios.Ethical investors may aim at fulfilling duties they feel they have, possibly including increasing the amount of good in society through theconsequences of their buying and selling behavior. The main duties are those of not-profiting from bad corporate behavior and of punishing bad firms. The main consequence desired is that managers manage corporations in a more ethical (...) manner. But ethical investors also aim at receiving returns based on the market risk of their investments.If the aim of managers is to maximize shareholder wealth, then ethical investors can fulfill their duties or achieve their desired consequences only if their trading activities affect shareholder wealth, i.e., share price. A theoretical argument is presented to show that this trading activity will not affect share price or return. In addition, reference is made to results of empirical studies which show that ethical stocks yield market returns, i.e., that the share price of ethical firms is unaffected by the actions of ethical investors.If the trading activity of ethical investors fails to affect share price and return, then these investors fail to fulfill any of their goals or to achieve their ends. (shrink)