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Arts, Humanities, & Social Sciences
Journalist and activist Maria Ressa on ‘facts, truth, trust’
In the annual Annenberg Lecture, the Nobel Peace Prize winner discussed being the target of online attacks and what it will take to ensure that truth prevails.
Five election takeaways
Stephanie Perry, executive director of the Penn Program on Opinion Research and Election Studies and manager for exit polls at NBC News, shares her team’s top five exit-poll analyses to help explain what happened.
Despite lower crime rates in 2020, risk of victimization grew
Research out of Penn and the Naval Postgraduate School found that early in the pandemic the possibility of getting robbed or assaulted in a public place in the U.S. jumped by 15% to 30%, a rate that has stayed elevated since.
Want a good read? Check out these award-winning stories
From the opening of the Penn Medicine Pavilion to the intricacies of broadband expansion—read some recent Penn Today stories that won district awards from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education.
Brazil’s presidential election
Three experts share their thoughts on Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva’s defeat of right-wing incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, and what it means for Latin America’s largest democracy.
At risk of persecution, scholars continue research at Penn
The recently launched At-Risk Scholars Program has enabled two people—an art historian and economist—to escape persecution and danger with a period of residence at the University.
Election Day 2022
In what is sure to be an historic election, Penn Today looks back at the stories it published in the months and days leading to the midterms.
Thinking ‘beyond the hospital’ for Black men recovering from traumatic injury
Research from Penn Nursing and Penn Medicine found that where these patients live and return post-hospitalization affects whether they’ll experience symptoms of depression or PTSD as they heal.
Why the Federal Reserve Bank is relevant in times of financial crisis
Harold Cole, the James Joo-Jin Kim Professor of Economics, sheds light on the Fed’s structure, objectives, and capabilities.
From ‘the United States are’ to ‘the United States is’
Political scientist Melissa M. Lee on how the linguistic shift from plural to singular demonstrates the evolution of sovereign authority in the U.S.
In the News
What did you do at work last week? Monitoring performance doesn’t improve it, expert says
Adam Grant of the Wharton School says that people do their best work when they’re given a chance to pursue autonomy, mastery, belonging, and purpose.
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‘Marry or be fired’ and other global efforts to boost fertility
Jesús Fernández-Villaverde of the School of Arts & Sciences says that the world population will peak in 2055, followed by a systematic decline at a rapid rate.
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These two personality traits make you instantly more attractive, say studies of over 4,000 people
A study by postdoc Natalia Kononov of the Wharton School suggests that kindness and helpfulness can make someone more attractive, regardless of the situation or relationship.
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After years of anti-vaccine advocacy, RFK Jr. said vaccines protect children. But experts say he must go further amid measles outbreak
Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg Public Policy Center and Jessica McDonald of APPC’s Factcheck.org comment on the need to debunk vaccine misinformation in public health messaging.
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Formerly anti-vax parents on how they changed their minds: ‘I really made a mistake’
According to surveys from the Annenberg Public Policy Center, the proportion of respondents who believe vaccines are unsafe grew from 9% in April 2021 to 16% in the fall of 2023.
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