toxic

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

A Toxic, Dog-Eat-Dog Workplace Atmosphere That Discourages Women Brought On By An Emphasis On Brilliance

Workplaces that emphasize brilliance are perceived to have a masculine work culture that undermines gender diversity, according to a new investigation I conducted with colleagues Andrei Cimpian, Melis Muradoglu and George Newman. We wanted to understand why women are underrepresented in fields that prize raw intellectual talent – what some people call “brilliance.” This includes many academic disciplines, such as philosophy, mathematics and economics, and industries like information technology. Despite the stereotype equating brilliance with men, women’s continued underrepresentation in these fields is not due to gender differences in intellectual ability. For instance, girls are about half of the gifted student population in the U.S. Why do fewer women go on to enter these professions? ...

Wildfire Smoke Is Laced With Toxic Chemicals – Here’s How They Got There

When you breathe in smoke from a wildfire, you’re probably inhaling more toxic chemicals than you realize. Pollution from power plants and vehicles, pesticides, fertilizers and chemicals in waste can all make their way into trees and plants. When those trees and plants burn, chemicals are released along with health-harming particulate matter in the smoke, gas and ash. Millions of people have been breathing that smoky air this year as the western U.S. experiences another extreme fire year. More than 4 million acres had burned in the West by Oct. 1, California had nearly doubled its previous record for acreage burned, and several weeks of wildfire risk were still ahead. As an engineer and scientist who studies air pollution, I have been looking into how those chemicals compound the health...

Here’s what it’ll take to clean up esports’ toxic culture

In day-to-day life, you probably haven’t had someone yell at you, “Get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich!” If you’re a woman who plays online video games, though, statements like this, and worse, are all too common. As COVID-19 has driven much of life online and fueled a boom in online gaming, harassment in these and other internet spaces has increased. Forty-one percent of computer and videogame players are female, down from 46% in 2019. Despite its digital nature, online harassment can have real-world consequences for victims, including emotional and physical distress. This has left online gaming companies and players scrambling for better community management techniques to prevent harassment. As a researcher who studies gaming, I’ve found that the right cultural norms can res...