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Arts, Humanities, & Social Sciences
Anti-racism and reproductive justice
Anti-racism and reproductive justice
PIK Professor Dorothy Roberts joined Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood, in the 21st annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Lecture in Social Justice. They addressed the intersectional nature of anti-racism and reproductive freedom.
Want to reduce political polarization? Start by looking beyond politics
Want to reduce political polarization? Start by looking beyond politics
New research from PIK University Professor Duncan Watts sheds light on how even hardliners can be swayed when coming in contact with opposing viewpoints.
A novel theory on how conspiracy theories take shape
A novel theory on how conspiracy theories take shape
In a new book, Dolores Albarracín, Kathleen Hall Jamieson, and colleagues show that two factors—the conservative media and societal fear and anxiety—have driven recent widespread conspiracies, from Pizzagate to those around COVID-19 vaccines.
Justin McDaniel on life, death, religion, and his latest book
Justin McDaniel on life, death, religion, and his latest book
In his new book, “Wayward Distractions,” the School of Arts & Sciences’ Justin McDaniel compiles articles on art and material culture spanning his 20-plus years of scholarship.
From the archives, a class on different communities of Jews in China
From the archives, a class on different communities of Jews in China
Kathryn Hellerstein created an opportunity for her first-year seminar students to study archival material from a collection donated to the Penn Libraries by her mentor, Israeli scholar Irene Eber.
Who’s at greatest risk to encounter the criminal legal system in the U.S.?
Who’s at greatest risk to encounter the criminal legal system in the U.S.?
New work from Penn, Princeton, and Washington University in St. Louis finds that for young people of color, contact with the system begins early and is incredibly widespread.
Mask-wearing and moral values
Mask-wearing and moral values
Tiffany Tieu led a study on the psychology of mask-wearing and its relationship with a person’s moral values, using Penn undergraduates as the subjects.
Climate change and the problem with time
Episode 7 of “In These Times” brings together an oceanographer, a geophysicist, and a historian about the challenges to understanding the Earth’s 4.6 billion year history, and how our actions in the present impact a future we can only imagine.
Kazakhstan unrest, explained
Kazakhstan unrest, explained
Philip M. Nichols of the Wharton School and the Russia and East European Studies program in the School of Arts & Sciences offers some background on the protests and violence and why what happens in Kazakhstan matters to the region and the world.
What can be done to prevent and resist image-based abuse?
What can be done to prevent and resist image-based abuse?
A virtual symposium held by Annenberg’s Center for Media at Risk and the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative brought together experts from around the world to analyze the abuse commonly referred to as “revenge porn.”
In the News
The New York Times
Cash aid to poor mothers increases brain activity in babies, study finds
Martha J. Farah of the School of Arts & Sciences commented on a study that found alleviating maternal poverty with cash assistance increased brain activity in babies. “It’s proof that just giving the families more money, even a modest amount of more money, leads to better brain development,” she said.
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WHYY (Philadelphia)
Unusual pets
James Serpell of the School of Veterinary Medicine was interviewed about the relationships between humans and animals. “At least with dogs, the evidence suggests that when they’re with people, they experience exactly the same kind of neurochemical changes in the brain that we experience when we’re with them,” he said.
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NJ.com
How we tracked the pay of 24,000 cops
Aaron Chalfin of the School of Arts & Sciences said a new project documenting police pay in New Jersey contains “some pretty incredible data.”
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The Wall Street Journal
Is the secret to happiness having a gratitude practice?
Martin E.P. Seligman of the School of Arts & Sciences spoke about the benefits of gratitude practices: “Humans are built to attend to the things that go badly in our lives. A lot of the exercises in positive psychology are ways of teaching people to savor and pay attention to what goes well.”
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The New York Times
How $1,000 a month in guaranteed income is helping NYC mothers
Amy Castro of the School of Social Policy & Practice said “time scarcity” keeps many poor families trapped in poverty. “If you’re struggling to make ends meet and you’re knitting together two or three part-time jobs,” she said, “you don’t have time to plan for the future or even to think.”
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