There is a scene in Hulu’s new series, “The Dropout,” where Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, wearing a white blouse, stands in front of a mirror and practices saying, “This is an inspiring step forward.” With each iteration, her voice deepens. As the world has learned about Theranos’ web of deception – whether through John Carreyrou’s...
Keith Richards’ opening guitar riff to “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” has sent throngs of Rolling Stones crowds into screaming fits since the song debuted nearly 60 years ago. The riff introduced something else: the Maestro fuzz-tone guitar pedal. Decades later, an Iowa State University designer has expanded his research – creating visuals out of...
Immigration has been a politically charged topic for decades in the U.S. What’s missing from the discussion is consideration of criminal justice practice and policy, says Xavier Perez, a criminology faculty member in DePaul University’s College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences. He calls the intersection of the two “crimmigation” and says that although immigration...
The U.S. tech sector is growing 10 times faster and has wages twice as high as the rest of the economy. This industry also wins the race for high profits and stock returns. At the same time, the tech sector’s professional, managerial and executive labor forces are overwhelmingly white and male. It is not surprising,...
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has posed difficult questions for governments and private entities, alike, which have been forced to face “uncomfortable questions about just how willing they are to cut off the flow of Russian cash” – and in some cases, access to Russian commodities. While export-blocking sanctions on things like luxury goods have not been...
While there is a debate among economists about the benefits of increasing the minimum wage, a new study found that a higher minimum wage was associated with fewer people defaulting on their rent payments – until landlords responded by raising rent. The study – recently published in the Journal of Urban Economics – was one of the...
Two new studies – a survey of residents in hurricane-battered Florida and Texas and a survey of people in wildfire-scarred California – reveal that negative personal experiences are among key variables in pushing people to take or accept protective measures like flood insurance and planned power shut offs. The wildfire survey, published in Energy Research & Social Science, is among...
The first study ever to examine sleeping behavior in a wild group of primates has challenged a central tenet of sleep science: that we must make up for lost sleep. Even after sleeping poorly, wild baboons still spent time on other priorities, such as socializing with group-mates or looking out for predators, rather than catching up...
A new paper in Oxford Open Economics, indicates that, while digital financial services are often proposed as a vehicle to lower inequality, the cost and infrastructure barriers to accessing mobile phones may amplify economic disparities among women in developing countries. Previous research has suggested that digital financial services have the potential to improve access to money...
Transmission of respiratory viruses depends partly on the rate of close social contacts in a population. A study publishing March 1st in PLOS Medicine by Amy Gimma at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and colleagues suggests that during the most restrictive period of lockdown in the United Kingdom, the number of reported contacts decreased by...
