Depression in young people strongly predicts how aggressive and violent they may be or may become, but exposure to violence in video games or on television is not related to serious acts of youth aggression or violence, at least among Hispanics in the U.S. according to new research by Dr. Christopher Ferguson from Texas A&M International University. 

Violence in media and the potential negative effects on adolescent antisocial behavior, and youth violence in particular, is a highly debated issue, both in academic circles and among the general public and policy makers but the research is inconclusive largely due to methodological problems.

Some metaphors are difficult to explain - if you have a child and use one and get asked what it means, and then get asked what the definition means, you know what we...mean...see how hard it can be to communicate?

They're even more difficult in sign language and a recent study on the use of metaphors in spoken language and various sign languages looks into the issue.  The recent paper by Irit Meir of the University of Haifa examines the interrelations between two notions that play an important role in language and communication, iconicity and metaphor.

Colors are not constant, they are relative and relatively speaking, bees see much differently than we do.

Researchers at Queen Mary, University of London and Imperial College London have developed what they call FReD – the Floral Reflectance Database – that holds data on what colors flowers appear to be, to bees.    Records of flower colors don't take the visual systems of pollinator insects into account and bees have evolved completely different color detection mechanisms from humans so they see colors outside our own capabilities in the ultra-violet range.

It sounds like a tough choice but a new strategy to prevent asthma may be going back to the way our parents did things - less super-hygiene and more viruses.  

A new study reports that influenza virus infection in young mice protected the mice as adults against the development of allergic asthma. The same protective effect was achieved by treating young mice with compound isolated from the bacterium Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori), a bacterium that colonizes the stomach and is best known for causing ulcers and increasing the risk of gastric cancers. 

While the average lifespan of those who reach adulthood has continued to rise those years spent living without health issues have not kept pace.

From 1970 to 2005, the probability of a 65-year-old surviving to age 85 doubled, from about a 20 percent chance to a 40 percent chance and the presumption was that the same changes allowing people to live longer, including medical advances, would delay the onset of disease and allow people to spend fewer years of their lives with debilitating illness.

Instead, a 20-year-old today can expect to live one less healthy year over his or her life span than a 20-year-old a decade ago.

What gives?

The Bering Sea, northward extension of the Pacific Ocean between Siberia and Alaska, was ice-free and full of life during the last major warm period, a new study has shown.