Reading — 2026 Jan–Apr Recall Set 10

Slow Food began when Carlo Petrini, an Italian journalist, was dismayed by the opening of a fast food restaurant on the famous Piazza di Spagna in Rome. He decided it was time to celebrate the fast-disappearing virtues of the slow production, preparation and eating of food. What he had in mind when he began the Slow Food organization were local foods which were prepared in their traditional manner and eaten at leisurely meals with family and friends. Slow Food is the antithesis of everything fast food stands for, and it is now a thriving international organization with members in 45 countries, a successful publishing operation and a biannual trade show. In addition, Slow Food has launched a project called the ‘Ark of Taste’ and a concept called ‘virtuous globalization’. The Ark of Taste is the catalog of endangered food plant and animal species that Slow Food has resolved to protect against the rising global tide of fast food. Some examples of the biodiversity promoted by the Ark of Taste include Iroquois white corn and the Narragansett turkey, both of which are old, or heritage, foods in North America. Biodiversity is a term commonly associated with discussions of threats to wild species, but according to Slow Food the biodiversity of the domesticated species people have depended on for centuries is no less important. For example, when the latest patented hybrid variety of plant proves unable to withstand fungal or bacterial disease, plant breeders will need the disease-resistant genes which can be obtained from heritage plant varieties. If Iroquois white corn had fallen out of production, as it very nearly did two decades ago due to the commercial launch of a new hybrid corn, irreplaceable and possibly crucial sets of corn genes would have been lost forever. For some time, plant-saver groups have been preserving heritage plant varieties, but Slow Food takes that project a step further. The movement understands that all the food and plant species in its Ark of Taste carry not only information about genetic traits but they also embody a set of social practices, and in some cases even a way of life of previous generations. Slow Food teaches that when a variety of food or breed of animal disappears, something greater also disappears: a specific, irreplaceable mode of life that a particular people have devised for living in a particular part of the Earth. An example of this is the Iroquois white corn. By working to find new markets for this ancient variety of corn, Slow Food is ensuring a source of income for the Native Americans who grow, roast, and grind this corn and, at the same time, helping to preserve the specific cookery and religious uses that the corn has been selected to support over hundreds of years. Slow Food has moved away from the traditional locations for preserving rare animal and plant species. For example, instead of zoos for rare animals and botanic gardens for rare plants, Slow Food maintains that its plants and animals are best preserved on the dishes and plates of discerning customers. To this end, Slow Food has introduced the concept of virtuous globalization, which recognizes that the best way to ensure a safe future for distinctive local products and practices is to find a global market for them. In this way, local producers will be able to continue producing the food which for many years has been a defining factor of their cultural identity. The characteristics of the virtuous globalization of Slow Foods show how different the concept is from the globalization of fast foods. Whereas global fast food companies aim to sell food that has an unchanging taste wherever in the world it is eaten, the taste of a recognized Slow Food is unique to that food. Another aspect is the quantities sold of these two types of food. In the case of fast food, these are enormous, but the quantities of Slow Food products which are available for selling are limited, due to the rarity of the plants or animals. The customers of virtuous globalization Slow Foods are affluent people who value novelty and are undeterred by the costs, which are high when compared to fast food. Some years ago, a network of farmers in the USA volunteered to take part in a national Slow Food project. The project was for the farmers to raise a total of 5,000 turkeys from eggs which had been selected from four varieties of endangered turkey. The farmers had to begin by hatching the eggs they had been supplied with, then raising the young turkeys to adults. They were promised a guaranteed price per pound for the adult turkeys. The object of the enterprise was to raise heritage turkeys for the North American holiday of Thanksgiving. Although chefs in some restaurants where the turkeys were on the menu complained that the Slow Food turkeys were smaller than industrially produced turkeys, the distinctive flavors were very well received by consumers. By the following year, the world population of these turkeys had nearly doubled. It may seem strange that taking pleasure in eating could be a strategy for preserving biodiversity because pleasure is not normally associated with environmentalism. However, pleasure is part of what Slow Food aims to bring back, by demonstrating that, at least when it comes to the politics of food, the best choice is often the one that provides the most enjoyment.

A It has long been held that decisions made collectively by large groups of people are more likely to turn out to be accurate than decisions made by individuals. The idea goes back to the ‘jury theorem’ of Nicolas de Condorcet, an 18th-century French philosopher who was one of the first to apply mathematics to the social sciences. Condorcet’s theory describes collective decisions, outlining how democratic decisions tend to outperform dictatorial ones. If, for example, each member of a jury has only partial information, the majority decision is more likely to be correct than a decision arrived at by a single juror. Moreover, the probability of a correct decision increases with the size of the jury. B Now it is becoming clear that group decisions are also extremely valuable for the success of social animals, such as ants, bees, birds and dolphins. Bees make collective decisions, and they do it rather well, according to Christian List of the London School of Economics, who has studied group decision-making in humans and animals. Researchers led by Dr List looked at colonies once the original colony reached a certain size. The queen goes off with about two-thirds of the worker bees to live in a new home or nest, leaving a daughter queen in the old nest with the remaining workers. Among the bees that depart are some that have searched for and found some new nest sites, and reported back using a characteristic body movement known as a ‘waggle dance’ to indicate to the other bees the suitable places they have located. The longer the dance, the better the site. After a while, other bees start to visit the sites signalled by their companions to see for themselves and, on their return, also perform more waggle dances. The process eventually leads to a consensus on the best site and the breakaway swarm migrates. The decision is remarkably reliable, with the bees choosing the best site even when there are only small differences between alternative sites. C But exactly how do bees reach such a robust consensus? To find out, Dr List and his colleagues used a computer-generated model of the decision-making process. By experimenting with it, they found that, when bees in the model were very good at finding nesting sites but did not share their information, this dramatically slowed down the migration, leaving the swarm homeless and vulnerable. Conversely, bees in the model blindly followed the waggle dances of others without first checking. The researchers concluded that the ability of bees to identify successfully and quickly the best site depends on both the bees’ interdependence in communicating the whereabouts of the best site, and their independence in confirming this information for themselves. D Another situation in which collective decisions are taken occurs when animals are either isolated from crucial sources of information or dominated by other members of the group. Jose Halloy of the Free University of Brussels in Belgium used robotic cockroaches to subvert the behaviour of living cockroaches and control their decision-making process. In his experiment, the artificial bugs were introduced to the live ones and soon became sufficiently socially integrated that they were perceived by the real cockroaches as equals. By manipulating the robots, which were in the minority, Halloy was able to persuade the living cockroaches to choose an inappropriate shelter—even one which they had rejected before being infiltrated by the robots. E The way insects put into effect collective decisions can be complex and as important as the decisions themselves. At the University of Bristol, in the UK, Nigel Franks and his colleagues studied how a species of ant establishes a new nest. Franks and his associates reported how the insects reduce the problems associated with making a necessarily swift choice. If the ants’ existing nest becomes suddenly threatened, the insects choose certain ants to act as scouts to find a new nest. How quickly they accomplish the transfer to a new home depends not only on how soon the best available site is found, but also on how quickly the migration there can be achieved. F Once the suitable new nest is identified, the chosen ants begin to lead others, which have made it to the new site or which may simply be in the vicinity, back to the original threatened nest. In this way, those ants which are familiar with the route can help transport, for example, the queen and young ants to the new site, and simultaneously show the way to those ants which have been left behind to guard the old nest. In this way, moving processes are accomplished faster and more efficiently. Thus the dynamics of collective decision-making are closely related to the efficient implementation of those decisions. How this might apply to choices that humans make is, as yet, unclear. But it does suggest, even for humans, the importance of recruiting dynamic leaders to a cause, because the most important thing about collective decision-making, as shown by these insect experiments, is to get others to follow.

A study of non-verbal communication carried out in 1967 continues to be widely quoted today. David Lapakko looks at limitations in the original study. Description of the Study The findings of a study on verbal and non-verbal messages in communication by Albert Mehrabian and his colleagues at UCLA in 1967 have been quoted so frequently that they are now often regarded as a self-evident truth. In the first experiment, subjects were asked to listen to a recording of a female saying the word “maybe” in three tones of voice to convey liking, neutrality, and disliking. The subjects were then shown photos of female faces expressing the same three emotions and were asked to guess the emotions in the recorded voice and the photos. It was found that the photos received more accurate responses than the voices. In the second experiment, subjects listened to nine recorded words spoken in different tones of voice. Three words had positive meanings (e.g. honey), three were neutral (e.g. oh), and three were negative (e.g. terrible). Again, the subjects had to guess the speaker’s emotions. It was found that tone of voice carried more meaning than the individual words. From these experiments the researchers concluded that 7% of our feeling towards a speaker is based on the actual words they use, 38% on their tone of voice, and 55% on their body language (e.g. facial expression). Methodological Issues However, a closer look at the study reveals several limitations. The first is that the entire study involved only 62 subjects. Of these, 25 were used to select the word for the first experiment, while the key issue – comparing verbal and non-verbal communication – was determined by only the 37 remaining subjects. All were female undergraduates who participated as part of their introductory psychology course, and their ages and academic qualifications seem remarkably uniform. Thus, the findings may simply be a product of the nature of the sample. Critics have also pointed out that the 7–38–55 formula is flawed since it was pieced together from two different experiments, neither of which involved all three channels (verbal, vocal, and facial). In addition, in the first experiment the single word “maybe” was used throughout so it was impossible for the effects of changes in verbal input to be assessed. The researchers intentionally used a “neutral” word so naturally the subjects found little meaning there. Clearly, such a methodology lacks validity. In the real world, people communicate in a particular context and speak in phrases and full-blown sentences, making extensive use of the multi-faceted vehicle of language. My concern is that interpretations of this study have gained such prominence in our pedagogical literature. This 7–38–55 formula appears in many basic texts, used for training in public speaking, interpersonal communication, and organizational communication. Lessons to consider Clearly, one appealing aspect of the Mehrabian study is its numerical precision. Communication is a complex phenomenon, but it seems less so when we can rely on these three magical numbers. In contrast to the ambiguities of language, numbers seem to possess exactness. And the popular appeal of the study has given the 7–38–55 formula enormous credibility. There is a certain mystique about non-verbal communication, and the continued references to this research sustain it, encouraging people to believe in the overwhelming importance of the non-verbal message compared with the verbal one. Yet we know that even one ill-chosen word to a colleague or friend can make or break a communicative effort. Words do matter. Bradley (1991), one of the few textbook writers to criticize the Mehrabian study, makes the same point when he observes, “If we could communicate 93% of information and attitudes with vocal and facial cues, it would be wasteful to spend time learning a language.” Mehrabian himself believes his research should not be interpreted to devalue the role of language in communication, saying: “Please remember that all my findings… dealt with communications of feelings and attitudes… it is absurd to imply or suggest that the verbal portion of all communication constitutes only 7% of the message… anytime we communicate abstract relationships (e.g., x = y – the square of z) clearly 100% of the entire communication is verbal.” (Mehrabian, 1995) To be fair, many textbook writers attempt to be faithful to the context of Mehrabian’s research. For example, Stewart and D’Angelo (1988) write: “Mehrabian argues that when we’re uncertain about what someone’s feeling, or about how much we like him or her, we rely… only 7% on the words that are spoken.” Others try to play down the specific percentages, saying that an understanding of the general importance of non-verbal cues is more important. Nonetheless, other textbook authors simply use the numbers without placing any limits on their meaning. Conclusion Since this relatively small study was first published it has achieved an influence far beyond its intended scope. We need to put it into its proper perspective and learn some important lessons from it regarding social science research, communication pedagogy, and the forces which have created widespread misunderstanding about communication.