May 2018

With obesity now a global epidemic, there is increased focus on risk factors that contribute to weight gain, especially in postmenopausal women. Although many women may blame genetics for their expanding waistlines, a new study shows that as women age they are more likely to overcome genetic predisposition to obesity through exercise. Study results are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society (NAMS). Previous studies have suggested that the...

In her recent interview on Dateline, Olympic gold medalist McKayla Maroney disclosed that she was abused “hundreds of times” by Team USA’s former doctor Larry Nassar. For years, her cry for help went unheard. Maroney’s story isn’t uncommon. Thousands of children across America share the anxiety, fear, and confusion that come with experiencing sexual abuse. And like her, many are left without the power to recognize or report it. A theatre program in Virginia called Hugs and Kisses is now...

Children growing up in America today are likely to end up less well-off than their parents. And those of us living in the self-proclaimed land of opportunity are also less likely than most Europeans to move up the economic ladder. Thanks largely to the pioneering studies of economist Raj Chetty and his collaborators, there is a large and growing body of research on how the places where we live affect our ability to achieve the American Dream. Chetty and company’s research shows that our...

School officials have issued warnings to parents ahead of the second season of the Netflix drama "13 Reasons Why," which premieres this week. The first season, which centered on the suicide of a high school student, triggered cautions from the National Association of School Psychologists. Netflix has responded to concerns by adding PSA-style messages filmed by the cast and putting up a web site with links to resources. The national attention comes at a time when, new research suggests, one...

Donald Trump's presidency has rattled young LGBTQ people. In the immediate aftermath of the election, calls to queer youth suicide prevention hotlines spiked. "[Young] people are very anxious about what happened," said Steve Mendelsohn of The Trevor Project. "People are likely scared that their rights are going to be taken away." The months that followed provided no solace. Trump stacked his administration with anti-LGBTQ leaders and has implemented myriad policy changes that harm queer...

Vital Village leaders listened to what community members had to say. After a 40-hour training—lecture-style, with daily homework and a final exam—for people who wanted to become lactation counselors, participants pushed back; they said the training was arduous and inflexible for volunteers who were also juggling jobs and family responsibilities. So the leaders of Vital Village Community Engagement Network , located in Boston , tried again. They found a new partner, Reaching Our Sisters...

Denise Goodman has been trying to figure out how to recruit foster parents for a long time. “I once recruited a foster home for Moses,” she joked in an interview with The Chronicle of Social Change. She’s actually been working in child welfare for more than 40 years, including 32 years understanding the art and science of foster parent recruitment and retention. (She’s also served as a foster parent herself.) Since 1992, she has worked as a consultant for the Annie E. Casey Foundation. [For...

Bababababa, dadadadada, ahgagaga. Got that? Babies are speaking to us all the time, but most of us have no clue what they're saying. To us non-babies, it all sounds like charming, mysterious, gobbleydegook. To researchers, though, babbling is knowable, predictable, and best of all, teachable. This week, we'll find out how to decipher the vocabulary, and the behavior, of the newest members of the human family. First, we explore the wordless conversation of synchronous movement, and the...

Thirteen minutes into Taylor Sheridan’s feature film Wind River, the body of a young Native woman from the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming is discovered by the protagonist, a white hunter who works for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. That spurs a multi-agency investigation, and within days, officers from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and local and tribal law enforcement face off in a bloody, Tarantino-style shootout with the bad guys: oil workers living in the company-owned...

Trauma-informed care should be like universal precautions – in the same way you wouldn’t clean up a blood spill without wearing gloves, you should always assume that someone has experienced trauma and treat them accordingly. Only it doesn’t happen that way. Once our indignation or any other parts of our wounded selves come into play, that usually goes out of the window unless you have been conditioned to wear a trauma-informed lens. And even then, there will be times we fail. Let me give you...

Understanding trauma and its impact on the developing brain and body is one thing. Reshaping public serving systems to mitigate the impact of trauma is quite another. Many trauma-informed change agents find themselves overwhelmed with the daunting task of infusing trauma-informed knowledge into every facet (policy, procedures, practice, culture) of their public serving system. In this “one of a kind” two-day offering, participants will begin to view trauma-informed change through the lens of...

A teenage brain is a fascinating, still-changing place. There's a lot going on: social awareness, risk-taking, peer pressure; all are heightened during this period. Until relatively recently, it was thought that the brain was only actively developing during childhood, but in the last two decades, researchers have confirmed that the brain continues to develop during adolescence — a period of time that can stretch from the middle school years into early adulthood. "We were always under the...