Cultural differences play a pivotal role in how people in different parts of the world perceive when it is acceptable to sacrifice one person to save a larger group, new research has shown. An innovative new research, led by Edmond Awad from the University of Exeter’s Business School, looked at how people on different continents...
Culture
Clubs and Bars Must Support Women by Cracking Down on Sexual Aggression
Nightclubs and bars must create a supportive environment that cracks down on unwanted sexual attention and allows women to enjoy their nights out, according to a new study. Increasing numbers of women are prepared to speak back to sexual harassment whilst enjoying a night out with female friends by confronting the men responsible and telling...
Brewing a Better Espresso, with a Shot of Math
Mathematicians, physicists, and materials experts might not spring to mind as the first people to consult about whether you are brewing your coffee right. But a team of such researchers from around the globe–the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, and Switzerland–are challenging common espresso wisdom, finding that fewer coffee beans, ground more coarsely,...
For Linguists, It Was the Decade of the Pronoun
On Jan. 3, the American Dialect Society held its 30th annual “Word of the Year” vote, which this year also included a vote for “Word of the Decade.” It was the year – and the decade – of the pronoun. In a nod to shifting attitudes about gender identities that are nonbinary – meaning they...
‘She’ Goes Missing from Presidential Language
Throughout most of 2016, a significant percentage of the American public believed that the winner of the November 2016 presidential election would be a woman — Hillary Clinton. Strikingly, a new study from cognitive scientists and linguists at MIT, the University of Potsdam, and the University of California at San Diego shows that despite those...
AI for #MeToo: Training Algorithms to Spot Online Trolls
Researchers at Caltech have demonstrated that machine-learning algorithms can monitor online social media conversations as they evolve, which could one day lead to an effective and automated way to spot online trolling. The project unites the labs of artificial intelligence (AI) researcher Anima Anandkumar, Bren Professor of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, and Michael Alvarez, professor...
Forget Fast Cars and Shiny Rolexes – Rich People Used to Show Off Their Wealth with Pineapples and Celery
A stack of pancakes ladened with syrup, a frothy latte posed next to a white MacBook, a deep pan pizza oozing with cheese. Instagram has made “food porn” – images that portray food in an appetising or aesthetically appealing way – commonplace. Food is now the most photographed subject on the platform, and #food, #foodporn,...
Luxury Consumption Can Fuel ‘Impostor Syndrome’ Among Some Buyers
Purchasing luxury goods can affirm buyers’ sense of status and enjoyment of items like fancy cars or fine jewelry. However, for many consumers, luxury purchases can fail to ring true, sparking feelings of inauthenticity that fuel what researchers have labeled the “impostor syndrome” among luxury consumers. “Luxury can be a double-edged sword,” write Boston College...
Scandinavians’ Little Linguistic Hat Trick
Linguist Dave Kush at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology’s Department of Language and Literature has been studying a phenomenon in which Norwegian, Swedish and Danish stand out. This language peculiarity has to do with the order of words, or the syntax. The basic point of the study is to better understand the grammatical...
How Humans Learnt to Dance; from the Chimpanzee Conga
The evolution of human dance has been studied by psychologists in chimpanzees Researchers from the University of Warwick, Durham University and Free University of Brussels found two chimpanzees performed a duo dance-like behaviour, similar to a conga-line Behaviours displayed by the chimpanzees forces an interest in the evolution of dance as humans are no longer...