Researchers from the University of Missouri and University of Essex in the United Kingdom say a new way of measuring gender inequality is fairer to both men and women, and presents a simplified but more accurate picture of peoples’ well-being than previous calculations. The new Basic Index of Gender Inequality (BIGI) focuses on three factors...
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What Does ‘Dead’ Mean?
Should death be defined in strictly biological terms — as the body’s failure to maintain integrated functioning of respiration, blood circulation, and neurological activity? Should death be declared on the basis of severe neurological injury even when biological functions remain intact? Or is it essentially a social construct that should be defined in different ways?...
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Why People Reject City Trees
Trees are a hallmark of vibrant neighborhoods. So why did nearly one-quarter of eligible residents in Detroit, Michigan, turn down free street trees? That’s the mystery University of Vermont researcher Christine Carmichael solves in one of the first studies to explore opposition to city tree planting programs. As cities from New York to L.A. embark...
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U.S. Health Care Spending Highest Among Developed Countries
The United States, on a per capita basis, spends much more on health care than other developed countries; the chief reason is not greater health care utilization, but higher prices, according to a study from a team led by a Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researcher. The paper will appear in the January...
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Dropping Individual Mandate Penalty Could Reduce Coverage Enrollment, Increase Premiums
The individual mandate that requires most Americans to purchase some level of health insurance continues to be one of the most controversial aspects of the Affordable Care Act, even though, beginning in 2019, there is no longer a penalty for noncompliance in most states. A new study conducted by investigators at the Mongan Institute Health Policy...
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Stock Options Worth More for Women, Senior Managers, Study Finds
A novel new way of determining the value of employee stock options has yielded some surprising insights: Options granted to woman and senior managers are worth more because they hold them longer. And options that vest annually rather than monthly are worth more for the same reason. The new valuation method, which combines standard option...
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Should Researchers Engineer a Spicy Tomato?
The chili pepper, from an evolutionary perspective, is the tomato’s long-lost spitfire cousin. They split off from a common ancestor 19 million years ago but still share some of the same DNA. While the tomato plant went on to have a fleshy, nutrient-rich fruit yielding bountiful harvests, the more agriculturally difficult chili plant went defensive,...
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Our Social Judgments Reveal a Tension Between Morals and Statistics
People make statistically-informed judgments about who is more likely to hold particular professions even though they criticize others for the same behavior, according to findings published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. “People don’t like it when someone uses group averages to make judgments about individuals from different social groups who are otherwise...
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Work-Family Conflict Hits Home
Researchers have long known that sick children can affect a company’s bottom line, as employees are distracted or have to take time off to care for their children. Far less is known about the impact a parent’s work life has on their children’s health. In a paper published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, researchers report that...
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NBA Teams That Come from Behind Don’t Garner More Overtime Wins
Teams that come from behind do not have a greater chance of winning in overtime, according to Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers in a study published in the Journal of Economic Psychology, debunking theories of how psychological momentum in sports and in life lead to success. “People talk about momentum as an indicator for...
