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What Kinds of Seismic Signals Did Swifties Send at LA Concert?
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What Kinds of Seismic Signals Did Swifties Send at LA Concert?

Seattle may have experienced its own Swift Quake last July, but at an August 2023 concert Taylor Swift’s fans in Los Angeles gave scientists a lot of shaking to ponder. After some debate, a research team led by Gabrielle Tepp of Caltech concluded that it was likely the dancing and jumping motions of the audience at SoFi...

The Role of History in How Efficient Color Names Evolve
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The Role of History in How Efficient Color Names Evolve

Suppose two speakers of the same language are playing a guessing game where each has the same color swatches, and Player 1 tries to get Player 2 to guess a hue by naming the color. If the second player consistently guesses correctly as often as possible, that indicates their language has an efficient color naming...

Unveiling the Sustainability Landscape in Cultural Organizations: a Global Benchmark
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Unveiling the Sustainability Landscape in Cultural Organizations: a Global Benchmark

Are museums, theaters, and opera houses truly walking the talk when it comes to social and environmental sustainability? The University of Lausanne (UNIL) delved into this pressing question, conducting an international survey with over 200 major cultural organizations. The verdict? While there’s significant room for improvement across the spectrum, Anglophone countries lead the charge. Cultural...

Community Culture Shapes Ceramics
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Community Culture Shapes Ceramics

Archeologists have long used the shapes and styles of pottery as a proxy for ancient cultures. But how does the cultural alignment of ceramic forms arise? To explore this question, Tetsushi Nonaka and colleagues asked 21 potters in three different communities—one in France in Bourgogne and two in India in Bulandshahar district, Uttar Pradesh—to throw...

Many Reported Gender Differences May Actually Be Power Differences
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Many Reported Gender Differences May Actually Be Power Differences

Why do men and women seem so different? According to a study, a wide range of gender differences that have been attributed to biological sex may actually be due to differences in power. Psychological differences between men and women have multiple possible explanations, including natural selection for sex-specific adaptations on the one hand and socialization...

Live Music Emotionally Moves Us More Than Streamed Music
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Live Music Emotionally Moves Us More Than Streamed Music

How does listening to live music affect the emotional center of our brain? A study carried out at the University of Zurich has found that live performances trigger a stronger emotional response than listening to music from a device. Concerts connect performers with their audience, which may also have to with evolutionary factors. Music can...

Why We Hate to Wait
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Why We Hate to Wait

Back in 1981, Tom Petty sang that the waiting is the hardest part. New research from The University of Texas helps to explain why. In two recent papers, Annabelle Roberts, Texas McCombs assistant marketing professor, explores the internal negotiations that happen when people feel impatient: whether they’re standing in a long queue or awaiting an important...

Sustainable Practices Can Save Mexico’s Blue Agave, Tequila and Bats
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Sustainable Practices Can Save Mexico’s Blue Agave, Tequila and Bats

Many associate tequila with lime wedges, salt, and parties. But the popular drink also has a negative impact on biodiversity, both on the blue agave from which it is made and, perhaps more unexpectedly, on bats. Both are threatened by one-sided cultivation. Researchers at the University of Gothenburg, together with colleagues in Mexico and the...

Jealousy – We Understand Our Own Sex Best
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Jealousy – We Understand Our Own Sex Best

Do you really know why your partner gets jealous? We understand a surprising amount about other people’s jealousy, but we understand our own sex best. We may not always fully understand why our partners get jealous, and women and men often get jealous for completely different reasons. Two researchers from the Norwegian University of Science...

Mom Talk:’ Immigrant Bilingual Latina Mothers Have Dual-Language Personalities
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Mom Talk:’ Immigrant Bilingual Latina Mothers Have Dual-Language Personalities

Children who hear a language other than English at home currently make up more than 25 percent of the school-aged population in the United States. A large majority of those children hear Spanish because that is the native language of their parents. When their parents came to the U.S., they brought not only their language,...