October 4, 2007, 9:34 PM CT

Can thinking about shopping change the route you take?

Previous research has shown that exposure to business-related objects makes people act more competitively, even though they do not realize it. A fascinating new study by scientists at Stanford extends this research by investigating how different consumers are affected by the same stimuli. The study reveals significant differences between the way men and women subconsciously react after exposure to certain objects.

Across two experiments, we demonstrated strong differences in choice behaviors resulting from the same prime, write S. Christian Wheeler and Jonah Berger (Stanford University). As a result, the same stimulus can lead to divergent behaviors among identifiable groups that occur without their intention or awareness.

In the first experiment, the scientists examined how clothes shopping influences subsequent choices. They observed that men who were exposed to the idea of shopping for a new wardrobe became much more focused on the end result in a subsequent (ostensibly unrelated) task of plotting a route for a cross-country trip, tending to choose the most direct route. In contrast, women exposed to clothes shopping were far more willing to take the scenic route.

As the scientists explain: These findings are consistent with the pretested personal associations men and women generally have with clothes shopping and support the account that the primes affected behavior by activating their different personal associations......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

Wed, 03 Oct 2007 11:39:23 GMT

Fall is the Season for Falling in Love

I've always been an independent girl who is as comfortable in a relationship as I am out of one. But I have to admit that fall is the one season that always makes me long for a partner when I'm not with one. There's just something about the changing of seasons and the briskness in the air that makes me want to cuddle up with someone else. Many people say that it's the winter holidays that they don't like being alone for but those don't phase me because I'm so busy with friends and family that I don't feel like anything's lacking. In springtime, I may get a bit of spring fever but it's a better time for flirting than being in a partnership. And for me, the summer months are filled with travel. But fall comes along and I start getting that urge to be with someone. I want to take long walks in fall foliage. I want to use the beautiful autumn light as the background for pictures of my partner and me. Then I want to go home, slip into some cozy pajamas and warm myself in the arms of someone else. What season do you think is best for partnering up?
Learn about some fall foliage getaways at BnB Finder. Posted by: Kathryn Vercillo      Read more     Source

October 2, 2007, 8:56 PM CT

Technology To Quickly Find Leaks In Spacecraft

Tiny meteors flash through space. There's spacecraft debris flying around, too. And so there's a risk that objects just a few millimeters across could pierce the thin aluminum skin of spacecraft such as the International Space Station orbiting 220 miles above Earth.

A tiny hole means a tiny leak of pressurized air.

"NASA wants to be able to find these leaks," said Dale Chimenti, an Iowa State University professor of aerospace engineering. "Fixing them is easy. But the question is, 'Where is the leak?"'.

Leaks are hard to find because spacecraft are full of life-support systems, computers, controls, gear and research equipment. All those things can hide a leak. Leaks are also hard to find because astronauts can't hear the telltale hiss of escaping air. That hiss is blowing outside the spacecraft and away from searching ears.

But astronauts had better find that leak as quickly as they can, Chimenti said. A spacecraft can only produce so much oxygen. NASA can't afford for it to slowly and steadily blow into the cold vacuum of space.

And so the National Aeronautics and Space Administration asked an Iowa State research team led by Chimenti to develop a sensor that can find leaks by detecting the small vibrations in a spacecraft's skin caused by escaping air. NASA has so far supported the work with $600,000. The Iowa State engineers are working with Invocon Inc. of Conroe, Texas, to use their sensor with the company's wireless electronics......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

October 2, 2007, 8:54 PM CT

Menace in a bottle

After the plot to blow up trans-Atlantic airlines with liquid explosives was uncovered in London in August 2006, there has been pressure on the airline industry, and Homeland Security, to find new ways to not only detect liquids in baggage and on airline passengers, but also to figure out what they are. Now, the DHS Science & Technology Directorate (S&T) is teaming with researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory to find a possible solution.

Having to place your consumable liquids through the baggy routine when going through airport security may one day be history, says S&T Program Manager on the project, Mr. Brian Tait, and thats going to make a lot of people very happy. This is a new screening prototype that definitely shows promise.

In late June, Los Alamos National Laboratory team successfully completed proof of concept of an extremely sensitive future screening technology. The new technology scans the magnetic changes of individual materials at the molecular level and stores them in a database, which then allows the differentiation and identification of a number of materials that may be packaged together or separately as they go through the screening process. It uses the same technology that brain scans are performed with, and is based on ultra-low field magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) which is already being used in medical field for advanced brain imaging. The end goal is to eventually put it next to the current x-ray screener......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

October 1, 2007, 10:24 PM CT

Race and police force size

Empirical studies have long shown that crime rate and budget alone do not account for the size of an areas police force. Police forces tend to be larger in areas where blacks comprise a larger percentage, and a number of sociologists have attributed this to racial attitudes, specifically the white populations perceptions of threat. A thought-provoking new study is the first to empirically examine this premise. It finds that while direct measures of antiblack prejudice are not corcorrelation to police size, whites fear of crime and perceived economic threat account for more than one-third of the effect of the proportion of black residents on police force size.

No research has examined directly whether levels of whites perceived minority threat mediate the effects of racial composition and racial segregation on police force size or other indicators of crime control, explain Brian J. Stults (Florida State University) and Eric P. Baumer (University of Missouri, St. Louis) in the current issue of the American Journal of Sociology. Our analysis contributes to the literature by examining some of the most usually mentioned mechanisms believed to explain the link between the size and distribution of racial groups and the capacity for crime control.

To test possible variables including political threat, economic threat, and fear of crime Stults and Baumer used data from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies General Social Survey. For example, a measure of the level of fear expressed by whites in a sample area was constructed by aggregating responses to a question about whether or not the respondent was afraid to walk in the neighborhood alone at night......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

October 1, 2007, 9:04 PM CT

Social Mobility in the United States

As per numerous studies, the United States has the highest level of income inequality among all rich nations. For example, low-income households, or those at the 10th percentile of the income distribution, spend approximately $8,900 per year per child, while high-income families, or those at the 90th percentile, spend $50,000 per child.

"People like to think of America as the land of opportunities," says Dr. Kathryn Wilson, associate professor of economics at Kent State University. "The irony is that our country actually has less social mobility and more inequality than most developed countries".

In a recent study funded by the Russell Sage Foundation, Wilson and his colleagues Dr. Timothy Smeeding at Syracuse University and Dr. Robert Haveman at University of Wisconsin-Madison, examined social mobility, or the ability to move up or down the economic ladder, in the United States. Specifically, they investigated the relationship between parental socioeconomic status and offspring socioeconomic status by studying three variables: family income, education and occupation class.

Their research observed that parental income seems to have a large effect on offspring income. A primary reason for less mobility for those from lower income families is less educational attainment; however Wilson suggests that lack of money to pay for education is not the primary reason for less educational attainment but rather factors such as parental expectations or knowledge of the higher education system result in less education for those from lower income backgrounds. In addition, parental education and occupational class were found to be stronger predictors of offspring educational attainment than parental income......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

September 27, 2007, 9:14 PM CT

Catch-and-release in less than 4 minutes

Recreational fishing that involves catch-and-release may seem like just good fun, and that released fish go on to live happily ever after, but a recent study at the University of Illinois shows that improper handling techniques by anglers can increase the likelihood of released fish being caught by predators.

After the stress of the catch and lack of oxygen from being out of water, the fish is in a weakened state. When it eventually gets released back into the water, if fish havent been handled properly, they are more likely to be caught by a predator.

A study on the effects of catch-and-release angling on bonefish which was conducted by a team led by University of Illinois researcher Cory Suski. The article is available online in the journal Comparative Biochemical and Physiology Part A and will be published in an upcoming issue.

"Whenever a fish is caught and reeled in, it expends a lot of energy so that's one stressor," said Suski. Depending upon the skill of the angler, the catching can last a long time and put additional stress on the fish. When the fish is brought up on the deck or in the boat to measure and take a picture, it faces an additional challenge and cannot obtain enough oxygen, and the fish continues to accumulate physiological disturbances. "Our recommendation to catch-and-release sport anglers is that they minimize the time it takes to actually land the fish and take a picture, and then get it back into the water as soon as possible"......... Posted by: Jim      Read more         Source

September 26, 2007, 8:13 PM CT

Recruiting Minorities to Science and Engineering

The Model Institutions for Excellence Program (MIE) funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has developed a body of work over the past 11 years demonstrating successful strategies for recruiting underrepresented minority students to science and engineering fields and supporting their successful completion of science degrees.

Five minority-serving institutions--Bowie State University in Maryland, Spelman College in Atlanta, Universidad Metropolitana in Puerto Rico, the University of Texas at El Paso, and Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans--plus the Oyate Consortium, representing three tribal colleges in the Midwest, are MIE's participating institutions.

Their collective results show that underrepresented minority students' enrolling in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) coursework increased at a higher rate than total STEM enrollment. Meanwhile, the total number of bachelor's STEM degrees conferred increased by 44 percent, from 691 in the 1994-1995 academic year to 994 in 2004-2005.

These results are noteworthy in light of the fact that over nearly 40 years, the percentage of bachelor's degrees awarded in science and engineering (out of all fields of study) has remained static at about 32-35 percent. MIE helps address a national concern about maintaining a pipeline of trained researchers that are needed to make the discoveries that will spark innovations in national security, healthcare and industry--supporting the quality of life of all citizens......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

September 25, 2007, 7:30 PM CT

Bill O'Reilly Under Fire for Racist Comments

After all that chaos happened with the infamous the Don Imus "Nappy headed hoes" comment, now Bill O'Reilly is in the middle of a controversy. He recently made several comments, which many of the African Americans thought were insensitive. Here are some of his comments.

"I think black Americans are starting to think more and more for themselves".

"And we went to Sylvia's, a very famous restaurant in Harlem. I had a great time, and all the people up there are tremendously respectful".

"And I couldn't get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia's restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it's run by blacks, primarily black patronship".

"There wasn't one person in Sylvia's who was screaming, "M-Fer, I want more iced tea".

"You know, I mean, everybody was - it was like going into an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb in the sense of people were sitting there, and they were ordering and having fun. And there wasn't any kind of craziness at all".

Does he not think that Blacks are human just like everyone else?

Listen to the comments here........ Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source

September 24, 2007, 9:49 PM CT

Fairness leads to better profits

It has long been shown that fairness between business partners yields a better relationship. Now, research from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota shows that for manufacturers and retailers, thinking about what is best for the entire channel has higher payoffs than just looking out for one firm's best interests.

In the paper Fairness and Channel Coordination, published in Management Science, Tony Haitao Cui, assistant professor of marketing, finds that in a marketing channel consisting of a manufacturer and a retailer, a consistent wholesale price throughout can maximize the profits for both the manufacturer and the retailer. In short, looking beyond initial monetary payoffs will benefit both firms in a marketing channel.

Traditionally manufacturers and retailers set prices that were best for each of them, without regard to the other firm in the channel, said Cui. What this study shows is that when the channel members think about fairness and set a constant wholesale price, both partners benefit by getting a better price in the market place.

Cui and co-authors Jagmohan Raju, and Z. John Zhang, of the Wharton School of Business, started by looking at the relationship between a manufacturer and a retailer to see how the concept of fairness affected channel coordination......... Posted by: Tom      Read more         Source