Researchers found that voters were more likely to cast their ballots for candidates with lower-pitched voices, and tended to rate them as more dominant and more trustworthy.
To help prevent overtesting and overtreatment of older patients — or undertreatment for those who remain robust at advanced ages — medical guidelines increasingly call for doctors to consider life expectancy as a factor in their decision-making. But clinicians, research has shown, are notoriously poor at predicting how many years their patients have left. Now,…
The notion of the speed of light as the cosmic speed limit is based on the assumption that particles of light, called photons, have no mass. But astrophysical observations cannot rule out the slim chance that photons do have a tiny bit of mass—a prospect with wide ramifications in physics. For instance, if photons weigh…
Although the world produces enough food to feed everyone, two million children die of malnutrition every year. Food insecurity has become a symbol of inequity and remains the most crippling consequence of poverty. Campaigners for food security must include science in their goals — and in return scientists need to heed wider concerns around solutions….
One of the world’s oldest scientific societies has weighed in on one of the planet’s most vexing future challenges: How to support a growing human population without undermining ecological and economic systems. The Royal Society in the United Kingdom unveiled its first major report on population issues, which includes eight recommendations for policy action and…
From April 2013, science papers must be made free to access within six months of publication if they come from work paid for by one of the UK’s seven government-funded grant agencies, the research councils, which together spend about £2.8 billion each year on research. The policy, announced by the agencies’ umbrella body Research Councils…
Religiosity is on the decline in the U.S. and atheism is on the rise, according to a new worldwide poll. The poll, called “The Global Index of Religiosity and Atheism,” found that the number of Americans who say they are “religious” dropped from 73% in 2005 (the last time the poll was conducted) to 60%….