Culture

Changes in pension and employment policies are making it increasingly necessary for older people in the UK to work beyond the age of 65. However, new research from the University of Surrey finds significant differences in the likelihood of employment and income levels of people beyond 65, depending on their gender and health.

In the past decade, the H1N1 virus and Ebola are just two of the diseases whose spread was spurred by international airline travel. Screening passengers at airports, therefore, could be one key method for slowing the global spread of infectious diseases.

New research has found some teachers mark boys' primary (elementary) school maths tests more favourably than girls, impacting girls' uptake of advanced mathematics and science subjects in high school. Entrance rates into maths and science degrees at university level can also be traced back to the impacts of teachers' gender bias in primary school.

The push to boost food production in East Africa that is accelerating the conversion of natural lands into croplands may be significantly increasing the risk of plague according to a new study in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

A doctor's recommendation and a patient's race may influence flu vaccination rates, according to researchers at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. Researchers found that 90 percent of patients received vaccination if their physician advocated for it compared to 58 percent of patients whose physician did not.

Vaccination rates were also higher in whites (93 percent) and Asians (84 percent) than African Americans (62 percent), researchers say, theorizing that African Americans might not trust the vaccination's benefit.

Alexandria, Va. - February 23, 2015 - Majorities across the political spectrum say it is important that the new 114th Congress takes action on assuring the discovery, development and delivery of treatments and cures for diseases in the first 100 days of the legislative session (75% Democrats, 64% Republicans and 60% Independents), according to America Speaks, Volume 15, a compilation of public opinion polls commissioned by Research!America.

Although there is insufficient evidence to draw firm conclusions about how the U.S. illicit tobacco market would respond to any new regulations that modify cigarettes--for example, by lowering nicotine content--limited evidence suggests that demand for illicit versions of conventional cigarettes would be modest, says a new congressionally mandated report from the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine.

Maybe you should take a good look at your partner's fingers before putting a ring on one. Men with short index fingers and long ring fingers are on average nicer towards women, and this unexpected phenomenon stems from the hormones these men have been exposed to in their mother's womb, according to a new study by researchers at McGill University. The findings might help explain why these men tend to have more children. The study, showing a link between a biological event in fetal life and adult behaviour, was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.

A new film, Surviving Terminal Cancer (www.survivingterminalcancer.com) by director/writer Dominic Hill, had its premiere at Lincoln Center February 18, 2015. Through the personal stories of Ben Williams and a remarkable wave of other long-term glioblastoma survivors following in his path, the film offers for the first time some hope for an alternative to the certain death offered by the current medical establishment for what is ordinarily considered to be an invariably fatal disease.

If you didn't believe that business school offers much in the way of practical value, a new series of papers will only make you believe in academic negotiating advice even less: in school you are advised that making a range offer, such as asking for a "15 to 20%" discount rather than proposing a single number, would be a bad move because the best result is harmless and the worse is a damaged result.

Gender and personality matter in how people cope with physical and mental illness, according to a paper by a Washington State University scientist and colleagues at the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce.

In light of the current 18:1 sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine possession in the United States, researchers from New York University's Center for Drug Use and HIV Research examined socioeconomic correlates of use of each, and relations between use and arrest, to determine who may be at highest risk for arrest and imprisonment.

Although several studies have shown an association between intelligence and various health-related outcomes, the research on cognitive abilities and alcohol-related problems has been inconsistent. A new study of the association between IQ-test results and drinking, measured as both total intake and pattern of use, has found that a lower IQ is clearly associated with greater and riskier drinking among young adult men, although their poor performance on the IQ-test may also be linked to other disadvantages.

A résumé highlighting stellar professional credentials and experience could pique the interest of a prospective employer, but it's your voice that may actually help you land the job.

Despite notable differences in appearance and governance, ancient human settlements function in much the same way as modern cities, according to new findings by researchers at the Santa Fe Institute and the University of Colorado Boulder.