Choice is a central tenet of a free society. From the brand of cereal we eat for breakfast, to the answers we give on a survey, or the people we select to be our leaders, we frequently define ourselves by the choices we make. Yet a recent study appearing in the journal Applied Cognitive Psychology suggests that there are factors that can significantly influence our free will without us even knowing it. In their article 'Preferring the One in the Middle: Further Evidence for the Centre-stage Effect', researchers Paul Rodway, Astrid Schepman and Jordana Lambert of the ...

"A major intent of the ACA is to control health care spending and increase access to necessary services for those who need it most," said Alliance Director Christine Ferguson, J.D. "With America's rising obesity rates leading to worsening health outcomes and equally alarming cost projections, leaving obesity unaddressed is both unsustainable and unacceptable." At the core of the Task Force's recommendations is the tenet that obesity and weight-related interventions should receive the same consideration as any other health condition. The Task Force noted that while more ...

Efforts to build larger wind turbines able to capture more energy from the air are stymied by the weight of blades. A Case Western Reserve University researcher has built a prototype blade that is substantially lighter and eight times tougher and more durable than currently used blade materials. Marcio Loos, a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, works with colleagues at Case Western Reserve, and investigators from Bayer MaterialScience in Pittsburgh, and Molded Fiber Glass Co. in Ashtabula, Ohio, comparing the properties ...

One of the world's strangest animals – a unique fish that lives on land and can leap large distances despite having no legs – has a rich and complex social life, a new study has found. The odd lifestyle of the Pacific leaping blenny (Alticus arnoldorum) has been detailed for the first time in research findings that throw new light on how animal life first evolved to colonise the land. The Pacific leaping blenny is a marine fish yet is terrestrial in all aspects of its daily adult life, eking out a precarious existence in the intertidal zone of rocky shores in Micronesia, ...

Women who commit suicide are more likely than men to avoid facial disfiguration, but not necessarily in the name of vanity. Valerie Callanan from the University of Akron and Mark Davis from the Criminal Justice Research Center at the Ohio State University, USA, show that there are marked gender differences in the use of suicide methods that disfigure the face or head. While firearms are the preferred method for both men and women, women are less likely to shoot themselves in the head. The study is published online in Springer's journal Sex Roles. Although a number of ...

University of Cincinnati research finds that college students could be undermining their own education, simply because they're not practicing proper sleep habits. The study, led by Adam Knowlden, a UC doctoral student in UC's Health Promotion and Education Program, also holds recommendations for students to form better sleep habits that will ultimately enhance their learning. The study evaluated the sleep habits of nearly 200 undergraduate college students between the ages of 18 and 24 who were not living with a parent or legal guardian. The study included 130 females ...

This release is available in French. Montreal, August 30, 2011 — Fathers who actively engage in raising their children can help make their offspring smarter and better behaved, according to new research from Concordia University. Published in the Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, the long-term study examined how fathers can positively influence the development of their kids through hands-on parenting. "Fathers make important contributions in the development of their children's behaviour and intelligence," says Erin Pougnet, a PhD candidate in the Concordia ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. - Mayo Clinic has identified a new benefit of social media and online networking: a novel way to study rare diseases. Through patient-run websites dedicated to heart conditions and women's heart health, a team of cardiologists led by Sharonne Hayes, M.D., is reaching out to survivors of spontaneous coronary artery dissection, also known as SCAD, a poorly understood heart condition that affects just a few thousand Americans every year. Study recruitment through social media and online networks could help researchers assemble large and demographically diverse ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — It's not how old but how frail patients are that can predict how well they will fare after a melanoma diagnosis. In fact, young patients in poor health may have worse outcomes than older patients in good shape. A new study from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center finds that patients with decreased core muscle density were more likely to see their cancer spread to distant parts of the body. These findings may also support the idea that the patient's biological response to a tumor is important in controlling the spread of melanoma. ...

DETROIT – Relationships between mothers and their sons change during childhood and adolescence, however, not all relationships change in the same way. A Wayne State University-led study has found that how the relationships change may affect boys' behavior when they become teens. The research team, led by Christopher Trentacosta, Ph.D., assistant professor of psychology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wayne State University, looked at 265 mother-son pairs from low-income families in Pittsburgh, starting when the boys were 5 through adolescence. The families ...

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- New research from MIT suggests that there are parts of our brain dedicated to language and only language, a finding that marks a major advance in the search for brain regions specialized for sophisticated mental functions. Functional specificity, as it's known to cognitive scientists, refers to the idea that discrete parts of the brain handle distinct tasks. Scientists have long known that functional specificity exists in certain domains: In the motor system, for example, there is one patch of neurons that controls the fingers of your left hand, and ...

Soy has recently been reviewed and supported for introduction into general medical practice as a treatment for distressing vasomotor symptoms of menopause, such as hot flashes, but its use in other medical areas, such as heart health, requires further research, according to a new report reviewing the risks and benefits of soy protein, isoflavones and metabolites in menopausal health from The North American Menopause Society (NAMS)/Wulf H. Utian Translational Science Symposium, published in the July Menopause, the peer-reviewed NAMS journal. "Although a significant amount ...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 30—To serve remote areas of the world, doctors, nurses and field workers need equipment that is portable, versatile, and relatively inexpensive. Now researchers at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) have built a compact, light-weight, dual-mode microscope that uses holograms instead of lenses. The team describes the new device in a paper published today in the Optical Society's (OSA) open-access journal Biomedical Optics Express. Their prototype weighs about as much as a medium-sized banana and fits in the palm of a hand. And, since it ...

INDIANAPOLIS – Analysis by Indiana University School of Medicine researchers of ten years of scientific studies has resulted in changes in American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations for how initial urinary tract infection in infants and toddlers is diagnosed and treated. This change will affect thousands of children every year. The findings of the IU School of Medicine investigators argue against exposing all young children who are diagnosed with an initial urinary tract infection (UTI) to a painful radiologic test and against prescribing prophylactic antibiotic treatment ...

The Great Recession could have lingering impacts on the children of the unemployed, according to researchers at the University of Chicago. "There is growing evidence that parental job loss has adverse consequences on children's behavior, academic achievement and later employment outcomes, particularly in economically disadvantaged families," said Heather Hill, assistant professor in the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration. The material hardship and stress associated with unemployment appears to reduce the quality of the home environment and ...

Mount Sinai School of Medicine researchers have found that climate change may lead to more asthma-related health problems in children, and more emergency room (ER) visits in the next decade. The data, published in the current issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, found that changing levels of ozone could lead to a 7.3 percent increase in asthma-related emergency room visits by children, ages 0-17. The research team, led by Perry Sheffield, MD, Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, used regional and atmospheric ...

More and more, patients show up to appointments with hypertension expert John Bisognano, M.D., Ph.D. carrying bags full of "natural" products that they hope will help lower their blood pressure. And like most physicians, Bisognano doesn't always know if these products will do any good, or if they will cause any harm. "Right now we're seeing a cultural shift where an increasing number of people want to avoid standard pharmaceuticals," said Bisognano, professor of Medicine and director of Outpatient Cardiology at the University of Rochester Medical Center. "We're also ...

New Rochelle, NY, August 30, 2011—Despite recent concerns that changes in atmospheric pressure during airplane travel may affect the amount of insulin delivered via pump devices, the current evidence is limited and it would be unwise to overreact until more data are available, according to an insightful editorial in Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. The editorial is available free online. Irl B. Hirsch, MD, Professor of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine (Seattle), and Senior Editor of Diabetes ...

This press release is available in German. It may not be much use to hitchhikers through the galaxy, but it is extremely valuable to astronomers: the new radio atlas of the Milky Way. After almost ten years of work, researchers at the Max Planck Society and the Chinese Academy of Sciences have completed their investigation into the polarised radio emission in the galactic plane. The atlas is based on observations undertaken with the 25-metre radio telescope in the Chinese city of Urumqi and shows an area of 2,200 square degrees of the sky. The radio survey covers ...

Facebook marketing is an essential component of any complex social media marketing promotion campaign. An increasing number of business owners realize this, but they do not have the relevant knowledge or skills to set up an attractive business page or group that will attract customers. There is a huge amount of money to be made on the site, and that is why many of them are asking for help from a professional Facebook advertising consultant. If you have heard success stories about Facebook already, you will know that it is worth the try. Still, you will need to face ...

A star that changes into a diamond planet? What sounds like science fiction is apparently reality. The discovery was made by an international team of scientists from Australia, Italy, Great Britain, the USA and Germany, including Michael Kramer from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn. The researchers found the diamond planet with the help of the 64-metre Parkes radio telescope in Australia. The planet apparently orbits around an unusual, very dense star, a pulsar. Pulsars represent the very last stages of star formation. They are rapidly rotating neutron ...

Red Wing Software, Inc. announces the addition of free accounting software resources to their Web site for customers and prospects alike. Customers can now learn about their software in a wide variety of methods, and prospects can use available tools to find the accounting program that suits their needs more easily, whether it's a Red Wing Software program or not. Customers can now find a variety of accounting software training tools available at the Red Wing Software University page: www.redwingsoftware.com/rwsu. Customers can join online 'Getting Started' Web learning ...

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ROCHESTER, Minn. -- More than 150 cases of measles have been reported in the United States already this year and there have been similar outbreaks in Europe, a sign the disease is making an alarming comeback. The reappearance of the potentially deadly virus is the result of unfounded fears about a link between the measles shot and autism that have turned some parents against childhood vaccination, says Gregory Poland, M.D. (http://www.mayoclinic.org/bio/10966366.html), of Mayo Clinic. In the September issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings (http://www.mayoclinicproceedings.com), ...

An Indiana University study that compared strategies used by extroverted college students and their less socially inclined peers found that happy people who are less outgoing relied less on partying and drinking to be happy and more on connections with family and friends or cognitive strategies, such as positive thinking. "You don't have to go out and party to be happy. That's the thing students feel they need to do, particularly when they're new to campus," said Bernardo J. Carducci, director of the Shyness Research Institute at Indiana University Southeast. "But, it's ...