Mild cognitive impairment—lapses such as missing appointments, losing things, and having trouble finding the words to describe something—affects millions of older adults across the United States. Yet because it’s so common in later life, many people ignore or brush aside the condition. [Read more…]

About 10% of the U.S. population has been diagnosed with an insomnia disorder, and another 20% experience occasional insomnia symptoms. There are a myriad of causes: stress, a schedule that disrupts your body’s natural sleep rhythm, poor sleep habits, mental health disorders, and other medical conditions such as sleep apnea or restless leg syndrome. [Read more…]

If you spend time on YouTube or TikTok, you may have come across videos of someone whispering into a microphone, carefully slicing stacks of slime, or slowly ripping strips of paper. These videos are designed to trigger an autonomous sensory meridian response, or ASMR, a tingly feeling that travels from the top of the scalp down the back of the neck to the upper spine. [Read more…]

More than 10 years ago, an organization in the United Kingdom called Alcohol Change U.K. kicked off a Dry January campaign to encourage U.K. residents to abstain from drinking alcohol for January.

Fast forward to today, the initiative has become a global trend. This year, some 11 million U.K. residents will participate, and surveys find more than 200 million Americans attempt to give up alcohol for January.

[Read more…]

It’s been more than 100 years since Dr. Maria Montessori first developed the Montessori method of education, which focuses on building children’s resourcefulness and natural abilities through practical play. [Read more…]

We often think of engaging in leisure activities as an important component of a well-balanced life. Now, a new systematic review finds that leisure activities of all kinds reduce your risk of developing dementia later in life. [Read more…]

An Asian female board member speaks up in a meeting about an important issue, only to be interrupted by her white male colleagues. A security guard follows a Black man around a store at the mall to make sure he doesn’t steal anything. A teacher compliments a Latino student on her English, even though she was raised in the U.S. with English as her first language. [Read more…]

Today, many Americans observe Juneteenth, a long-celebrated holiday in the Black community that commemorates when the news that slavery had been abolished reached Galveston, Texas in 1965, two years after Abraham Lincoln first issued the Emancipation Proclamation.

This year’s Juneteenth celebration comes at a time when race occupies the forefront of our national consciousness. Scholars are working to help us understand how racism has come to dominate our society and what we can do to change it. [Read more…]

Homelessness is a tough issue to quantify and study. The most recent tally by the U.S. government estimates there are nearly 600,000 homeless people in the U.S. And if you add in homeless people in other developed nations, that number reaches more than 1 million. [Read more…]

We have all woken up grumpy after tossing and turning all night, so it’s not surprising that research demonstrates you are more likely to be in a bad mood after a restless night and a good mood after sleeping well. [Read more…]