Social and Behavioural
Explore Social and Behavioural
Hope Walks: Early Clubfoot Treatment Transforms Children’s Lives
In many low- and middle-income countries, children born with physical disabilities face lifelong barriers that limit their ability to learn, play, and participate in their communities. One such condition is clubfoot, a congenital deformity that twists a baby’s feet downward and inward. While it is routinely corrected in wealthier nations, lack of access to treatment in poorer regions often leaves children disabled for life. In research funded by the University of Notre Dame, Bruce Wydick, Gianna Camacho, and Patrizio Piraino reveal how early, affordable treatment for clubfoot can transform not only a child’s mobility but nearly every aspect of their well-being.
Dr. Khuthala Mabetha | How Social Support Shapes Pregnancy for Young Women in South Africa
Pregnancy can be a time of excitement and hope, but it can also bring uncertainty, stress and emotional upheaval, especially for young women navigating major life changes. A study led by Dr. Khuthala Mabetha and colleagues sheds light on how social support shapes the pregnancy experiences of young women in Soweto, South Africa, revealing just how powerful everyday relationships can be during this pivotal period.
Dr Susanna Bairoh | Equal Degrees, Unequal Incomes: New Evidence from Finland’s STEM Workforce
Even in countries celebrated for gender equality, women still earn less than men – and moving into science and technology does not magically solve the problem. New research by Susanna Bairoh, Satu Pyöriä and Niklas Mäkinen takes a close look at this puzzle by following the incomes of women and men working in STEM fields in Finland, a Nordic welfare state often seen as a global role model for equality. Drawing on exceptionally rich national register data, the study asks a deceptively simple question: if women and men have the same level of education, work in the same broad fields, and live in a country with strong family policies, do their incomes finally converge?
Dr Sriram Iyengar | Resilience Informatics
Pandemics! Heatwaves! Floods! Droughts! We live in an age of overlapping crises. Climate change is intensifying. Acute, short-term stressors and chronic, long-term stressors damage physical and mental health. Such stressors are not going away. We need to develop resilience to these stressors. But what IS resilience?
Dr Aminath Sudha | Beyond the Pay Rise: Rethinking Motivation in Public Service
When governments want public services to run better, one common solution is simple: pay people more. But new research led by Dr Aminath Sudha suggests the reality is far more complicated. Her study of civil servants in the Maldives offers a timely reminder that motivation in public service doesn’t always follow private-sector logic.
Professor Magnus S. Magnusson | The Surprising Similarities Between Human Cells and Societies
For most of history, humans lived in small groups. Then, almost overnight in evolutionary terms, billions of us began cooperating in vast, complex societies, something unmatched in the animal kingdom. How did this happen? Professor Magnus S. Magnusson of the University of Iceland believes the answer lies in an unexpected place: inside our cells. His research shows striking parallels between the way that DNA segments (called genes), form specialized proteins, and the way that text segments, called curricula, form specialized individuals.
Dr Charlotte Parham – Dr Louis Nadelson | Lessons in Connection: What School Desegregation Meant for Black Students in the American South
Intrauterine adhesion is a common gynecological condition – one of the main diseases of the reproductive system. This uterine disorder is characterized by a partial or complete adhesion between the anterior and posterior walls of the uterine cavity and/or the cervical canal. It has a debilitating impact on the quality of life for women of childbearing age. Intrauterine adhesion can form when the lining of the uterus becomes damaged, leading to scarring or even obliteration of the uterine cavity. It can result from intrauterine infections and from operations such as dilatation and curettage after miscarriage or termination of pregnancy.
Dr Ori Soltes | The War Within: How Our Search for Meaning Can Unite or Divide Us
Religion has long helped people make sense of the world, but as Dr Ori Soltes argues in a recent paper, this guidance comes with deep complications. Even the word religion contains a puzzle. It stems from the Latin religio, meaning ‘to bind back’, which immediately raises the question of what we are trying to reconnect with in the first place. That act of binding back is ultimately tied to a search for meaning – a deep human need to understand our place in the world and how we relate to everything around us. Across history, people have turned to religion to navigate existence, mortality, and uncertainty. But trying to understand that source of meaning, and then expressing it through the limitations of human language, is where the real trouble begins.
Dr Luca Nitschke | A Social-Ecological Model of How Daily Routines Intertwine with Nature
Everyday activities such as gardening or commuting might not seem like they have much to do with global environmental crises – but a new study led by Luca Nitschke argues otherwise. He and his colleagues, Lukas Sattlegger and Immanuel Stieß at the Institute for Social-Ecological Research (ISOE), introduced the idea of ‘social-ecological practices’ to show how our daily routines are deeply connected to the integrity of the natural world.
Dr Sunny Sui-Kwong Lam | Running Together Apart: How a Runners’ Group Stayed Connected During Lockdown
When Hong Kong went into pandemic lockdown, the city’s bustling harbourfront became relatively quiet, with only lone runners wearing masks. However, one local running group refused to let social isolation stop them. The Hong Kong Harbour Runners – a community of recreational joggers who met weekly for “harbour runs” – found creative ways to stay active and connected, even as restrictions shut down public gatherings. In a new study, Dr Sunny Sui-Kwong Lam of Hong Kong Metropolitan University explored how this community-led recreational running group kept its members motivated and emotionally supported.
How Chinese Words Transform When They Enter Mongolic Languages
When languages come into contact, they often borrow words from each other. But what happens if the donor-recipient language pairs are similar but set in different sociolinguistic contexts? Do they develop the same strategies, or do they find their own unique paths? Dr Julie Lefort of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice examines how Chinese adjectives are integrated into two Mongolic languages spoken in China: the Dörbed Mongolian Community Language (or ‘DMCL’ for short), spoken in Heilongjiang, and the Dongxiang language, spoken in Gansu.
Dr Tim Wharton | Understanding the Role of Emotions in Human Communication
Emotional communication is fundamental to human interaction, and plays a key role in the way humans connect with each another. However, precisely what emotions communicate and how they do so remains little understood. Dr Tim Wharton, a linguist based at the University of Brighton, is leading an ambitious research project that aims to change that. Drawing together insights from pragmatics – the study of utterance interpretation – linguistics, psychology, and neuroscience, his team’s work seeks to better understand the role of emotions in human communication.
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