1 . Many economists predict 2024 will be the time shoppers tighten their belts. That doesn’t mean people will stop spending, say retail (零售) analysts. But it will change what they choose to buy. With a slowing job market, global consumers are likely to move away from more high-priced purchases and focus instead on smaller, less expensive treats.     

The economic uncertainty means that consumers are becoming more discriminating about their purchases, says Ethan Chermofsky, senior vice president of marketing at intelligence platform Placer. ai. “There are the things we decide are necessary, and then there’s another category of things that aren’t necessary but that we consider affordable luxuries, he says. This desire for these “affordable luxuries” is common in difficult economic times. Some economists refer to the phenomenon as the “lipstick index”: a small economic increase led by budget-minded consumers seeking out relatively affordable splurges (挥霍), like small cosmetics (化妆品).

Analysts at Deloitte say consumers will spend on little luxuries like specialty coffees and snacks as well. Additionally, stressed-out shoppers are prioritizing small splurge purchases for wellness and personal care.

As retailers see shoppers turning to little luxuries, they’re offering more and more of them. Target, for example, has staked a flag in what they refer to as “affordable joy”, which includes a selection of self-care and cosmetic products, along with wellness-centric beauty products. Beyond diversifying their offerings, stores are also bringing in luxury-feeling products at lower price points to appeal to more consumers.

Ethan says not every shopper will shift their spending to little luxuries-but even those who are still longing for the “must-haves” of social media will also look to get a deal. They want the feeling of purchasing lower-priced affordable treats. To get these goods, shoppers are likely to tap into the re-sale market for designer items at a more reasonable price. They want things that make them feel good about themselves-they just want to do it without breaking the bank.

2 . Studies have shown the mere exposure effect, also referred to as the familiarity principle, inspires our decisions. It is a helpful psychological mechanism that helps us sustain our energy and focus our attention on other things. Getting used to new things takes effort and it can be exhausting. So unless we have a terrible experience, we are likely to buy from companies we’ve got used to. That is why companies spend so much money on advertising and marketing and why insurance companies openly charge existing customers more than new ones.

It’s not the case that we only desire things we already know. Some studies suggest when invited to share our preferences, we sometimes see less familiar options as more desirable. But when acting on that preference, we fall back to what we know. This might explain why sometimes the things we want and the things we do don’t quite match up. We might even return to companies that treated us poorly in the past or stay in bad relationships.

It’s easy to paint the familiarity principle as an enemy or something to battle as if it is something that holds us back from living our dreams. But this attitude might be overwhelming because it tends to encourage us toward big-picture thinking. Where we imagine that change requires a substantial dramatic swing that we don’t feel ready for. Some articles suggest the solution to familiarity frustration is complete exposure to novelty. While this can appear effective in the short run, we may only end up replacing one problem with another. It also risks overwhelm and burnout.

So what if we can work with the familiarity principle instead? Familiarity is something we can learn to play with and enjoy. It is a setting for creativity and a pathway to expansion. We can broaden the zone of familiarity bit by bit. If we think of familiarity as something that can expand, we can consider changing the conditions in and around our lives to make more space for our preferences to take root and grow gently. From here, we will start to make decisions, drawing from an ever-deepening pool of valuable options.

4 . The road to a Nobel Prize, the most respected scientific award in the world, is growing ever longer, with almost half of winners now waiting more than 20 years from making a Nobel-worthy discovery to receiving the prize.

One analysis shows that the average time between publishing the work and receiving one of the science prizes has nearly doubled in the past 60 years. Across the three science prizes, chemistry now has the longest “Nobel lag”—an average of 30 years over the past decade—and physiology or medicine has the shortest, at 26 years.

Alfred Nobel’s will stated that the prizes should be awarded “to those who, during the previous year, shall have given the greatest benefit to mankind.” In reality this has only happened a few times. But in the first half of the twentieth century, it was common for Nobel prize winners to be in their 30s -and that is unheard of now, says Santo Fortunato, now a computational social scientist at Indiana University.

There are a number of possible reasons for this, says Yian Yin, a computational social scientist at Cornell University. It could be that the overall number of breakthroughs is increasing each year, so awards cannot keep up with the number of people who deserve to be recognized, he says. It is also the case that the importance of some works, which Yin describes as “sleeping beauties” are only realized years or decades later. Besides, the lengthening gap could be a sign that there has been a decrease in “disruptive” science - important studies or discoveries that change the paradigm (范式) of their field. This could be causing the Nobel committees to focus more on the past.

Fortunato points out that, if the gap continues to grow, outstanding scientists could miss out on the award owing to the Nobel Committee’s rule banning posthumous prizes (追授奖项). “It has to stop at some point,” he says, adding that a rethink of the posthumous-awarding ban would allow more people’s work to get the recognition that it deserves.

5 . In 1970s, a psychologist named J. P. Guilford conducted a famous study of creativity known as the nine-dot puzzle (九点谜题). He challenged research subjects to connect all nine dots using just four straight lines without lifting their pencils from the page. All the participants limited the possible solutions to those within the imaginary square. Only 20 percent managed to break out of the confinement (束缚) and continue their lines in the white space surrounding the dots.

The fact that 80 percent of the participants were effectively blinded by the boundaries of the square led Guilford to jump to the sweeping conclusion that creativity requires you to go outside the box. The idea went viral. Overnight, it seemed that creativity experts everywhere were teaching managers how to think outside the box. The concept enjoyed such strong popularity that no one bothered to check the facts. No one, that is, before two different research teams-Clarke Burnham with Kenneth Davis, and Joseph Alba with Robert Weisberg-ran another experiment.

Both teams followed the same way of dividing participants into two groups. The first group was given the same instructions as the participants in Guilford’s experiment. The second group was told that the solution required the lines to be drawn outside the imaginary box. Guess what? Only 25 percent solved the puzzle. In statistical terms, this 5 percent improvement is insignificant as this could be called sampling error.

Let’s look a little more closely at the surprising result. Solving this problem requires people to literally think outside the box. Yet participants’ performance was not improved even when they were given specific instructions to do so. That is, direct and clear instructions to think outside the box did not help. That this advice is useless should effectively have killed off the much widely spread — and therefore, much more dangerous — metaphor (比喻) that out-of-the-box thinking boosts creativity. After all, with one simple yet brilliant experiment, researchers had proven that the conceptual link between thinking outside the box and creativity was a misunderstanding.

7 . It’s hard to predict which songs will become hits. It’s even more difficult to predict which artists topping today’s charts will go on to record more hits and who will see their fame end.

To figure out if there’s some kind of principle that can help explain who becomes a flash in the pan and who has a lasting music career, Justin Berg, a social scientist who researches creativity at Stanford University’s business school, studied the songs from pop music charts. He used a database of about 3 million songs from 1959-2010 released by record labels that had produced at least one hit in the United States over that time. Of those songs, nearly 25,000 landed on the weekly Billboard Hot 100. That provided Berg with a list of nearly 4,900 artists who had one or more songs that made the list, his yardstick (标准) for defining a hit.

Hits are rare, the data show. Of the 69,000 artists in the original database, 93 percent never had a hit, 3 percent had one and 1 percent had two hits. The success rate for additional hits drops from there.

Artists with more variety in their music type have a better chance to land repeat hits. But there’s a dilemma for artists who want to be popular over the long term. Variety isn’t what helps artists land that first hit, Berg reports. It’s the similarity of a new song to recent hits.

According to Berg’s study, musical artists who produced music like other already existing music were about twice as likely to have their first hit. But those who created a more creative and varied music type before fame hit were more likely to make a series of hits.

However, Berg doesn’t want his research to diminish (贬低) the accomplishments of one-hit wonders. “A lot of them in their time were quite famous and successful,” he says. “You go out and try to make a song that catchy. It’s not an easy challenge.”

8 . Earlier this month, TikTok announced that it will be introducing screen time limits for the accounts of users aged under 18. Children under 13 will require a parent or guardian to type in a password to continue scrolling (滚屏) through their feed, and those aged 13-17 will be asked to set their own passwords when the viewing time goes beyond the limit.

Studies suggest that 30 minutes may be the sweet spot for social media use, where users are able to stay connected with friends and family and view entertainment. However, many other studies show that overly-heavy social media use can lead to a lot of problems, such as physical issues and depression.

By suggesting 100 minutes as a hard line where a password is required to be created by the user, TikTok is gradually making the standards clear as to what may be regarded as problematic social media habit in young people. Although these passwords for older teenagers can obviously be bypassed, they are a step in the right direction in encouraging children to use social media responsibly.

Also, parents who own their own TikTok accounts will be able to link with their children’s accounts, gaining additional, such as muting notifications (消息免打扰) and customizing time limits for different days in the week.

Algorithms (算法) that could tell parents if the child has been viewing dangerous material could soon be put into use. However, the difficulty in this is the amount of content available on the internet.

Ultimately, apps such as TikTok and Instagram will need to continue introducing more measures to improve online safety for children.

Lawmakers around the world are paying close attention to the effect social media has on the young, meaning that the development of new tools to improve its use will no doubt take place soon if big tech wishes to avoid additional legal issues.

10 . Recently I bought a book about signposts. Signposts aren’t very interesting, you’re thinking. Well, that, of course, depends on whether you happen to be lost! Ancient travelers would have been grateful for these when settlements were smaller and further apart. In winter, the ability to reach shelter for the night could be the difference between life and death.

One of the very earliest way-marks discovered is in Cumbria. Dating from Roman times, it had lain fallen until 1836, when a farmer ploughing his fields came across a sandstone shaft (碑文). There are other stone posts that have stood by roadsides for centuries. It wasn’t until 1697 that an act was passed declaring that guide-stones must be built.

This applied to remote parts of the country where there might be confusion as to which path led to the nearest market town. Later, with the appearance of the Royal Mail, the number rose still further. Nowadays many of these early road signs are designated (指定) as Listed Monuments.

“How times change!” Lucy, an enthusiastic walker, to whom I loaned the book, exclaimed.

“I suppose now we all rely far more upon mobile phones to guide us.”

“Yet they aren’t perfect. Whenever I go out, I prefer a map. I never have to worry about running out of battery.” “I’m always grateful to whoever is placing way-markers along the route,” she added, “I suppose that however sure we are, a little outside confirmation is always welcome.”

Lucy is quite right there. Life itself can offer us a great many choices of path, and sometimes it isn’t easy to know if we’ve chosen the best one.

Perhaps when it comes to gratitude, we should also include thanks for those people who appear in our lives when we most need them — either giving us gentle warning that we might be heading in the wrong direction, or reassurance that we are on the right track. After all, we’d be lost without them!