The Conversation - How fishing bycatch ravages the oceans

Meditation and mindfulness offer an abundance of health benefits and may be as effective as medication for treating certain conditions

Hilary A. Marusak, Wayne State University

Mindfulness, one of the most common forms of meditation, is a skill that must be cultivated and practiced. With some training and discipline, it can help anyone live more fully in the moment.

US birth rates are at record lows – even though the number of kids most Americans say they want has held steady

Sarah Hayford, The Ohio State University; Karen Benjamin Guzzo, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Childbearing goals have remained remarkably consistent over the decades. What has changed is when people start their families and how many kids they end up having.

Reunions can be nostalgic and painful as well as happy – as the ancient Greek heroes Achilles and Odysseus show us

Joel Christensen, Brandeis University

A classics scholar reflects on Greek myths and what they can help us understand about recreating relationships – as a bridge from our past to present selves.

ChatGPT, DALL-E 2 and the collapse of the creative process

Nir Eisikovits, UMass Boston; Alec Stubbs, UMass Boston

The technology’s focus on the framing of the artistic task amounts to the fetishization of the creative moment – and devalues the journey that waters the seed of an idea to its fruition.

Trump is facing various criminal charges – here’s what we can learn from legal cases against Nixon and Clinton

Kirsten Matoy Carlson, Wayne State University

Trump isn’t the first modern president with legal problems, but he would be the first former president to be indicted for alleged crimes.

Congress investigates presidents, the military, baseball and whatever it wants – a brief modern history of oversight

Claire Leavitt, Smith College

The House GOP has announced a slew of investigations, including a review of the conduct of the Department of Justice and its investigations of Donald Trump.

China looms large as President Biden and Japan’s PM Kishida sit down to discuss defense shift, regional tensions

Mary M. McCarthy, Drake University

The meeting is the first between the leaders since Japan outlined a more assertive defense strategy in December.

How does a child become a shooter? Research suggests easy access to guns and exposure to screen violence increase the risk

Brad Bushman, The Ohio State University; Dan Romer, University of Pennsylvania

Watching gun violence on screen can desensitize children to the harm caused by firearms.

NASA’s busiest year in decades – an astronomer sums up the dizzying array of missions in 2022

Chris Impey, University of Arizona

NASA has been gaining momentum in recent years as investment into space has ramped up in the US. In 2022, missions dealt with the farthest, closest, hottest and coldest conditions in the universe.

Dead billionaires whose foundations are thriving today can thank Henry VIII and Elizabeth I

Nuri Heckler, University of Nebraska Omaha

The hefty sums many billionaires give away place them in an age-old debate about wealth and charity – and whether it’s appropriate for donors to have a say over their wealth from the grave.

Consumers often can’t detect fake reviews – and underestimate how many negative reviews might be fakes

Shabnam Azimi, Loyola University Chicago

Online reviews have a big impact on buying decisions – but how can shoppers sort the real ones from the fakes?

Alcohol use is widely accepted in the US, but even moderate consumption is associated with many harmful effects

How California could save up its rain to ease future droughts — instead of watching epic atmospheric river rainfall drain into the Pacific

Islamic paintings of the Prophet Muhammad are an important piece of history – here’s why art historians teach them