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Autism and the Social Mind
Since the modern era of research on autism began in the 1980s, questions about social cognition and social brain development have been of central interest to researchers. This year marks the 20th anniversary of the first annual meeting of the International Society for Autism Research (INSAR), and it is evident in this year’s meeting that the growth of social-cognitive neuroscience over the past two decades has significantly enriched autism science. For those unfamiliar with the term, social-cognitive neuroscience is the study of the brain systems that are involved in the causes and effects of social behaviors and social interaction.
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Police Reports Are Biased. What Can Journalists Do To Better Cover Policing?
The way the Minneapolis Police first described George Floyd's murder — "Man Dies After Medical Incident During Police Interaction" — didn't mention that an officer held his knee on George Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes. It did mention that Floyd physically resisted officers, a detail which former officer Derek Chauvin's defense team leaned on during the murder trial — although Chauvin was ultimately found guilty. For decades, journalists have treated official police reports and statements as trusted primary sources. Now, some are questioning the reports' reliability and objectivity as part of a reckoning in the media spurred by George Floyd's murder.
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Teens, Tech and Mental Health: Oxford Study Finds No Link
There remains "little association" between technology use and mental-health problems, a study of more than 430,000 10 to 15-year-olds suggests. The Oxford Internet Institute compared TV viewing, social-media and device use with feelings of depression, suicidal tendencies and behavioural problems. It found a small drop in association between depression and social-media use and TV viewing, from 1991 to 2019, There was a small rise in that between emotional issues and social-media use. Happy people "We couldn't tell the difference between social-media impact and mental health in 2010 and 2019," study co-author Prof Andrew Przybylski. said.
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New Research in Psychological Science
A sample of research on the development of liking gaps, memory for similar events, personality traits and health, empathy bias, context and risky choice, forecasting of relationship support, gender stereotypes of sexual behavior, and happiness and social interactions.
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New Research From Clinical Psychological Science
A sample of research on alcohol-facilitated aggression, burnout and depression, therapy components, and symptoms and models of psychopathology.
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Top Learning Apps for Kids May Not Live Up To Their Promise
A new study analyzed some of the most downloaded educational apps for kids, using a set of four criteria designed to evaluate whether an app provides a high-quality educational experience for children. The findings show that most of the apps scored low, with free apps scoring even lower than their paid counterparts on some criteria. The results suggest apps shouldn’t replace human interaction nor do they guarantee learning, says Jennifer Zosh, associate professor of human development and family studies at Penn State Brandywine. “Parents shouldn’t automatically trust that something marked ‘educational’ in an app store is actually educational,” Zosh says.
