IN OTHER NEWS

Why You Feel Better When Waking Yourself Instead Of Relying On An Alarm

14Mar

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

HEALTH & WELLNESS, IN OTHER NEWS, VIDEO REELS

Why You Feel Better When Waking Yourself Instead Of Relying On An Alarm

Why do I feel better when I wake myself up instead of relying on an alarm? A neurologist explains the science of a restful night’s sleep. Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskidsus@theconversation.com. Why do I feel better rested when I wake myself up than I do if my alarm or another person wakes me up? – Calleigh H., age 11, Oklahoma We’ve all experienced this: You’re in the middle of a lovely dream. Perhaps you’re flying. As you’re soaring through the air, you meet an eagle. The eagle looks at you, opens its beak and – BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! Your alarm goes off. Dream over, time to get up. Many people – kids and adults alike – notice that when they wake up naturally from sl...

A Growing Health Risk — Long-Term Exposure To LA Wildfire Smoke

30Jan

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR

A Growing Health Risk — Long-Term Exposure To LA Wildfire Smoke

LA fires: Long-term exposure to wildfire smoke is a growing health risk, and not well understood. Millions of people across the Los Angeles area are being exposed to wildfire smoke as fires burn through homes and vehicles. The fires in January 2025 have burned thousands of structures, along with the building materials, furniture, paints, plastics and electronics inside them. When materials like these burn, they can release toxic chemicals with the potential to harm people breathing the air downwind. A 2023 study of smoke from fires in the wildland-urban interface – areas where urban neighborhoods bleed into the wildlands – found it contained a vast array of chemicals harmful to humans. They include hydrogen chloride, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, dioxins and a range of toxic organ...

Fewer Prescriptions Filled For Anxiety Medications In States With Medicinal Cannabis

12Jan

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR, VIDEO REELS

Fewer Prescriptions Filled For Anxiety Medications In States With Medicinal Cannabis

With more Americans able to access legalized marijuana, fewer are picking up prescriptions for anti-anxiety medications – new research. In states where both medical and recreational marijuana are legal, fewer patients are filling prescriptions for medications used to treat anxiety. That is the key finding of my recent study, published in the journal JAMA Network Open. I am an applied policy researcher who studies the economics of risky behaviors and substance use within the United States. My collaborators and I wanted to understand how medical and recreational marijuana laws and marijuana dispensary openings have affected the rate at which patients fill prescriptions for anti-anxiety medications among people who have private medical insurance. These include: Benzodiazep...

9Oct

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR, WHAT'S GOOD

Pumpkin Seeds And Their Health Benefits

Pumpkins were one of the foods the Spanish and Portuguese explorers of the 15th century discovered in the Americas, which they transported back to Europe. The pumpkin fared better than the tomato and potato as regards the suspicions of the Europeans and it was widely cultivated. Most people are unaware of the health benefits of pumpkin seeds and generally remove them and throw them away. However they can be used in soups and sauces as well as a healthy snack. You can roast them yourself after drying them with or without salt and in their shells. Some pumpkin seeds are not surrounded by a husk but mostly you have to take off the ivory-coloured outer husk to get at the dark-green seed inside. In Greece people eat these as snacks and they are called passé tempo. They contain monounsaturated ...

In The Political Spotlight — Voters Without Kids — But They’re Not All The Same

30Sep

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

CULTURE, IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR

In The Political Spotlight — Voters Without Kids — But They’re Not All The Same

Voters without kids are in the political spotlight – but they’re not all the same. In the 2024 election cycle, voters without children are under the microscope. Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance has said that “childless cat ladies” and older adults without kids are “sociopaths” who “don’t have a direct stake in this country.” So it was notable that when pop star Taylor Swift endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, she didn’t simply express her support and leave it at that. She also called herself a “childless cat lady.” Politicians and others often use the word “childless” as an umbrella term for people who do not have children. But as social scientists who study people without children, we know that this doesn’t capture some important nuances. Usin...

23Sep

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR, WORK

Work And Your Personal Life

Responding to work emails after hours contributes to burnout, hostility. Image it’s Friday evening. You’re about to watch a new Netflix drama, trying to unwind after a long week. Suddenly, your phone pings with a work email marked “urgent.” Your heart sinks; your stress levels rise. Even if you choose not to respond immediately, the damage is done. Work has again encroached on your personal life. The intrusion of work into home life, helped along by smartphones and other technologies, might seem like a triumph of efficiency. But this constant connectivity comes at a cost to employees and employers alike, research suggests. As a professor of communications, I wanted to understand what happens when people feel compelled to dash off work emails after dinner and before breakfast. So a col...

Home Among The Ghosts Of Shuttered Steel Mills

29Aug

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, TOP FOUR

Home Among The Ghosts Of Shuttered Steel Mills

Why people stay after local economies collapse − a story of home among the ghosts of shuttered steel mills. It was midday on a Saturday, and Simonetta led me from the open front door of her home in southeast Chicago to her sitting room and settled next to her husband, Christopher, on the couch. In the 1980s, Christopher had worked a few blocks away at U.S. Steel South Works, earning three times the minimum wage with a high school diploma – more than enough to buy a house near Simonetta’s parents before their first baby arrived. Like their neighbors in southeast Chicago, Simonetta and Christopher’s expectations for work and home were set by the steel industry. Between 1875 and 1990, the employment offered here by eight steel mills created a dense network of working-class neighborhoods ...

22Aug

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS

Dog Thefts Are On The Rise In The U.S.

Inside the dark world of dognapping. It’s late at night, and a stranger walking down an alley sees your family dog sleeping on the porch inside your fenced yard. The stranger softly calls the dog over and begins to pet him. While checking to see if anyone is watching, he opens the gate, clips a leash to your dog’s collar and leads him away, never to be seen again. The next morning, your family is distraught; when a neighbor’s video surveillance reveals that your dog was stolen, you feel deeply violated. While the emotions described are implied, the circumstances are not: Reports suggest that dog thefts are on the rise in the U.S.. Losing a pet can be devastating, and it’s a crime that has repercussions that go far beyond the animal’s financial value. Many dog owners view their dogs ...

A Big Boost To The US Economy This Back-To-School Season — International Students

15Aug

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS

A Big Boost To The US Economy This Back-To-School Season — International Students

International students will offer a big boost to the US economy this back-to-school season. Of the millions of young adults heading off to college this fall, many will be international students. If trends continue, about 1 million students from around the world will come to the U.S. to pursue higher education this year. These young scholars make a big economic impact. Altogether, they pump more than US$40 billion into the U.S. economy and support over 368,000 jobs. That’s not just paying professors and buying textbooks – it includes everything from renting apartments to late-night DoorDash and Grubhub deliveries. And it’s near a record high. In fact, higher education is the 10th-leading export of the United States, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis – except the exp...

Heritage, Trump And Project 2025 aka “Institutionalizing Trumpism”

27Jul

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, POLITICS, TOP FOUR

Heritage, Trump And Project 2025 aka “Institutionalizing Trumpism”

Heritage Foundation’s ‘Project 2025’ is just the latest action plan from a group with an over 50-year history of steering GOP lawmaking. As the 2024 presidential election heats up, some people are hearing about the Heritage Foundation for the first time. The conservative think tank has a new, ambitious and controversial policy plan, Project 2025, which calls for an overhaul of American public policy and government. Project 2025 lays out many standard conservative ideas – like prioritizing energy production over environmental and climate-change concerns, and rejecting the idea of abortion as health care – along with some much more extreme ones, like criminalizing pornography. And it proposes to eliminate or restructure countless government agencies in line with conservative ideology. ...