March 2017

As the bestsellers started piling up, from 2008’s Predictably Irrational and Nudge to 2011’s Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow, the buzz around behavioral economics — the science and practice of nudging people toward a particular decision — could be heard from the classroom to the board room. Many dismissed it as a passing fad. Some balked at its paternalism. Others considered it “kinda creepy.” We at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation were cautiously optimistic. Could behavioral economics, a...

Gerald Chinchar isn’t quite at the end of life, but the end is not far away. The 77-year-old fell twice last year, shattering his hip and femur, and now gets around his San Diego home in a wheelchair. His medications fill a dresser drawer, and congestive heart failure puts him at high risk of emergency room visits and long hospital stays. Chinchar, a Navy veteran who loves TV Westerns, said that’s the last thing he wants. He still likes to go watch his grandchildren’s sporting events and...

As a child, many of us are taught that it’s important to put yourself in another person’s shoes, to feel what they’re feeling. “How would you like it if Joey took your toy and smashed it?” This is an attempt to understand that our behaviors can have a negative impact in another person’s life — that our actions can hurt others. So it’s no surprise that as we age, we tend to believe that it’s important to keep empathy in our lives when thinking about other groups of people — like the poor or...

“Settle down,” you say above the screaming. It sounds more like a threat than a caring suggestion. “I don’t know how!” your child jeers back. You shake your head, sighing. How many times do you need to remind her to take a deep breath when she’s upset? Obviously, something’s missing here. BIG FEELINGS. BIG CONFUSION. Big feelings like anger , frustration , jealousy, anxiety , sadness, and stress can be overwhelming to kids. Without warning, their body is flooded with physical sensations –...

Nortasha Stingley doesn't remember a lot about the weeks after her 19-year-old daughter was shot and killed nearly four years ago. All she could do was cry. All she wanted to do was scream. After Stingley lost 40 pounds in a matter of weeks, her sister finally took her to see a doctor, and she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. [For more of this story, written by Grace Wong, go to http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-ptsd-black-women-met-20170322-story.html]

Standing at center stage Saturday in Oak Park’s Guild Theater, Sacramento teen Alex Cuevas pulled out a piece of paper and, with a full, booming voice, recited a poem he had written. The rosary that hung from his neck bounced back and forth against his blue hoodie as his character told the audience the struggles that he had faced in his short life. “So what if my mother didn’t want me?” he asked. “My grandma didn’t have to die.” Playing a teen named Christian who had been abandoned by his...

Just Released: Findings from the 2016 Pulse Check Multi-sector partnerships play an increasingly significant role in the movement to improve heath, equity, and economic prosperity. These partnerships recognize that many of our most pressing challenges defy sector boundaries, and cannot be effectively addressed by any one institution alone. Progress Along the Pathway to Health System Transformation: A Pulse Check on Multi-Sector Partnerships is the only survey of its kind to ask leaders...

Jane Stevens posted a descriptive blurb about this title, How Your Survival Instinct Is Killing You , back in January, and I thought, “Why the heck not?” After all, I read everything I can get my hands on, searching for that magic elixir that will fix the feeling that I’ve called by many names over the years: Despair. Fear. Hole in the soul. Nameless dread. Whatever you want to call it, some of you with a high ACE score might know what I’m talking about. (I also experienced a very traumatic...

Many family courts across the nation routinely fail the most vulnerable in our society: mothers and their children in crisis seeking a life free from abuse. In 2012, the U.S. Department of Justice released the Saunders Report , a study that found the standard and required domestic violence training received by judges, lawyers, and custody evaluators, does not adequately prepare them to handle abuse cases. Inadequately trained professionals tend to believe the myth that mothers frequently...

U.S. teens with autism are four times more likely to visit an emergency room than those without the disorder, a new report says. The Penn State College of Medicine researchers said the likelihood of an ER visit for a teen with autism increased five-fold from 2005 to 2013. The findings suggest that young people with autism may require better access to primary and specialist care, the researchers said. "We believe if their regular medical and behavioral specialist services served them better,...

Brett Merfish had a list of reasons why Texas should raise the age of criminal responsibility to 18. She pointed to research showing that states that had already adopted the practice saw crime and recidivism reduced and better outcomes for the juveniles and their families. She also noted that short-term expenses associated with the change were far less than forecast, and that, over the long term, spending on treatment and intervention is far more cost effective than throwing teens behind...

It's been a long time since I was in school but I still remember the free breakfast, lunch, snack and milk I got for many years. It made school a place I loved going. Kids can't focus or succeed as well when hungry, which I think most of us know even without a study. But, here's an excerpt from a recent study on how early hunger impacts early education. The new study, published in the latest issue of the journal Child Development , suggests that such early experience of hunger in the family...