McDonald's. Dell. Chrysler. Rolls-Royce. Sears. Trump. All are companies that bear the names of their founders. Does that matter? One would think not, but new research from Duke University claims that eponymous companies are more successful than others.
Mental Health & Society
Too much, too little, and just the right amount of sleep have been linked to death. Sorry.
The Centers for Disease Control calculated that, on an average day, 103 Americans die in car accidents, 121 commit suicide and 49 are homicide fatalities. But that's the average day. As it turns out people die differently on Monday than they do on Saturday.
There's no barrier to chess training, so anybody can pick up a book or watch YouTube videos to learn the game. A group of researchers examined people who do and do not play chess, to learn whether innate intelligence is linked to being an effective player. The results were interesting – and a bit controversial.
Happy 80th Birthday, Golden Gate Bridge. Over the last eight decades, the iconic suspension bridge has become famous for more than just its engineering. Sadly, it's become a destination for those seeking to commit suicide.
In a field like gender studies, what constitutes a respectable outlet? We can make progress toward answering that question by utilizing SCImago's ranking of academic journals.
NYU physicist Alan Sokal thought very little of the research performed by his colleagues in the social sciences. To prove his point, he wrote a paper that used plenty of trendy buzz words but made absolutely no sense. As he later explained, Dr. Sokal wanted to find out if a humanities journal would "publish an article liberally salted with nonsense if (a) it sounded good and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions."
It would. His paper, "Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity," was published in the journal Social Text in 1996, and his hoax has earned him a place in scientific history.
In 2015, 7 percent of Americans report being bullied in the workplace. That's a slight improvement from 2010, and it's certainly much lower than the 20 percent figure reported from high school students. Still, there's much room for improvement.
English researchers have "found a new group of cells in the retina that directly affect the biological clock." It's a finding that could lead to eye medication to improve sleep patterns, providing solutions for jet-lag sufferers and drowsy, night-shift workers alike.
Depression and anxiety, as well as severe mental disorders such as schizophrenia, have become more openly discussed. Yet, one aspect of mental health remains largely in the shadows: Nightmares. A new study builds on previous data and examines their relationship to suicide.
Is science political? Around climate change, yes it is. But regarding oxidative phosphorylation, not so much. A new paper uses the market to describe the politics of science.
Cats are independent, untrainable and don't really bond with people — at least that's their generally-accepted reputation. But a recent study suggests that cats actually like interacting with people — maybe even more than they like food. Who knew?