Kids are more gender-biased
Children believe the world is far more segregated by gender than it actually is, implies a new study led by a Michigan State University scholar. Jennifer Watling Neal examined classroom friendships in five US elementary schools. Their findings found boys and girls had no problems being friends together but for some reason had a perception that only boys played with boys and girls played with girls. “Kids believe gender plays a larger role in friendship that it actually does,” said Neal, assistant professor of psychology. “Children who have more accurate perceptions of the social relationships around them may be better able to avoid conflict and have more positive interactions with their peers,” he added.
loving Touch Critical for Premature Infants
The benefit that premature infants gain from skin-to-skin contact with their mothers is measurable even 10 years after birth, reports a new study in Biological Psychiatry. Physical contact with babies is essential for their physical and psychological development. This lesson has been learned the hard way, as infants neglected in hospitals and orphanages developed many problems, ranging from depression to a more global failure to thrive. But, what types of contact are necessary and what are the beneficial effects of enriching physical contactIJ In a new study, Dr Ruth Feldman, a professor at Bar-Ilan University, and her colleagues studied the impact of different levels of physical contact on prematurely born infants. “In this decade-long study, we show for the first time that providing maternal-newborn skin-to-skin contact to premature infants in the neonatal period improves children's functioning ten years later in systems shown to be sensitive to early maternal deprivation in animal research,” said Feldman.
What leads to domestic violenceIJ
Intimate partner violence in women (sometimes referred to as domestic violence) is linked to termination of pregnancy, according to a study by UK researchers. The study found that intimate partner violence was linked to a women's partner not knowing about the termination of pregnancy. They also found that worldwide, intimate partner violence rates among women undergoing termination of pregnancy ranged from 2.5 to 30 per cent in the preceding year and from 14 to 40 per cent over their lifetime. When combining relevant information from a selection of appropriate studies, the authors found that in women seeking a termination of pregnancy, the lifetime rate of intimate partner violence was 25 per cent. Furthermore, the authors found that this violence was associated with single and repeat termination of pregnancy.
Concussions lead to depression
Teens with a history of concussions are more than three times as likely to suffer from depression as teens who have never had a concussion, finds a new study in the Journal of Adolescent Health. “What this study suggests is that teens who have had a concussion should be screened for depression,” said lead study author Sara Chrisman, MD, a pediatrician at Seattle Children's Hospital. Concussion, considered a mild traumatic brain injury, can also have serious psychological effects. Most prior research on these psychological effects has focused on adults. However, many teens experience concussions through sports injuries or accidents, and less is known about long-term complications in adolescents.
Religion helps cope with stress
New psychological research suggests that employees with high levels of religiosity feel better and are more likely to report that their lives have meaning. These are the key findings of a study concluded that employees who are more actively religious are more likely to report low levels of anxiety, depression and fatigue and also higher presence of meaning in life, that is feeling that their lives have meaning. The workers responded that attending religious services connects them to a higher being as well as makes them feel better about themselves.