Health & WellnessS


Family

Divorce increases chances for chronic health problems, even after remarrying

Leah Chernikoff
Daily News
Sun, 02 Aug 2009 06:13 UTC
Divorce can be emotionally devastating. But a new study suggests it may be physically damaging, too.

The study, to be published in the September issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, analyzed data from close to 9,000 people aged 51 to 61 and found that divorced or widowed people have 20 percent more chronic health conditions than married people (such as heart disease, diabetes, and cancer), and 23 percent had more mobility limitations (such as climbing stairs).

"Among the currently married, those who have ever been divorced show worse health on all dimensions," University of Chicago sociologist Linda Waite, who co-authored the study, told LiveScience.
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Family

Trustful Parenting: Its Downfall and Potential Renaissance

Peter Gray
Psychology Today
Sun, 02 Aug 2009 04:00 UTC
Can we complete a historical circle by reviving trustful parenting?

Parenting, like essentially all human behaviors, must be understood in the context of the culture in which it is embedded. Parenting styles derive from broader cultural values, and they help to perpetuate those values.

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In my last post, I talked about hunter-gatherers' playful style of parenting. That essay was part of a series on hunter-gatherers' playful approach to all of social life. I used the term playful there to refer to an attitude of treating others as equals rather than as superiors or subordinates. In the series I contrasted hunter-gatherers' playful approaches to government, religion, productive work, and parenting to the more dominance-based approaches that have held sway in all subsequent cultures.
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Magnify

Is Agribusiness Making Food Less Nutritious?

Cheryl Long and Lynn Keiley
Mother Earth News
Sun, 02 Aug 2009 03:46 UTC
We need a more holistic approach to our food system. We need to be sure that high yields and maximum profits for producers don't come with hidden price tags to consumers in terms of nutritional decline or environmental damage.

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© Matthew T. Stallbaumer
American agribusiness is producing more food than ever before, but the evidence is building that the vitamins and minerals in that food are declining. For example, take the two eggs shown at right. The one with the bright orange yolk is from a free-range chicken raised by Mother Earth News managing editor Nancy Smith, while the pale one is a supermarket egg from a hen raised indoors on a "factory farm." Eggs from free-range hens contain up to 30 percent more vitamin E, 50 percent more folic acid and 30 percent more vitamin B-12 than factory eggs. And the bright orange color of the yolk shows higher levels of antioxidant carotenes. (Many factory-farm eggs are so pale that producers feed the hens expensive marigold flowers to make the yolks brighter in color.)
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Alarm Clock

The Nightmare of GM Foods

Melanie Segala
Total Health Breakthroughs
Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:57 UTC
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"You have to know where your food is coming from." These words of warning were spoken by biologist and plant expert, Arpad Puszati at a gathering of concerned citizens in St. Catherine's, Ontario earlier this year.(1)

As far back as 1998, Dr. Puszati's research at the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen, Scotland showed that genetically modified potatoes caused health problems in rats, including a weakened immune system and abnormal growth. For blowing the whistle on Big Agra, he was dismissed from his job.
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Bulb

State of Science Review 'New Evidence Confirms the Nutritional Superiority of Plant-Based Organic Foods'


The Organic Center
Sat, 01 Mar 2008 23:20 UTC
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This is the first major, in depth review of the published scientific literature on the nutritional benefits of organic food completed since 2003.

Over 40 new studies have come out since the last review was carried out -- studies that dramatically improve our ability to answer a basic question -- are organic foods generally more nutritious than conventional foods?
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Family

Poor sleep in children may have prenatal origins

Kelly Wagner
Eurek Alert
Sat, 01 Aug 2009 20:13 UTC
Westchester, Illinois - A study in the Aug.1 issue of the journal Sleep found that alcohol consumption during pregnancy and small body size at birth predict poorer sleep and higher risk of sleep disturbances in 8-year-old children born at term.

Findings are clinically significant, as poor sleep and sleep disturbances in children are associated with obesity, depressive symptoms, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and poor neurobehavioral functioning.
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Magnify

Meditation Increases Concentration

Rajiv Mani
Times of India
Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:53 UTC
Parents struggling with the problem of their children lacking concentration have an effective remedy at their disposal. The magic relief comes from the field of meditation, especially practised through sudarshan kriya, mudra pranayam and sahaj samadhi which helps in enhancing the process of attention and concentration in human mind.

The study regarding positive application of these yogic practices is being carried out by Prof Narayanan Srinivasan, head, Centre for Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences (CBCS) of Allahabad University and his student, Shruti Baijal.

Srinivasan while talking to TOI explained that Tibetan Buddhist meditators were found to show large increases in duration of perceptual dominance compared to non-meditators. For the purpose of studying the effects of concentrative meditation on MMN, (mismatch negativity, a paradigm), sudarshan kriya yoga was chosen which is associated with mudra pranayam and sahaj samadhi. These forms of yogic meditation focus on specific body rhythms as well as a mantra that brings the mind to a peaceful centred state, he explained.

Comment: One of the most effective breathing techniques to aid in these results can be found here.

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Family

How Children View and Treat Their Peers with Undesirable Characteristics

Mark Barnett
Medical News Today
Fri, 31 Jul 2009 19:00 UTC
A study by Kansas State University researchers is looking at how children perceive and interact with peers who have various undesirable characteristics, such as being overweight or aggressive.

The researchers' study explored children's perceptions of the ability of the peer to control or change such traits.

The K-State research team included Mark Barnett, professor of psychology; Rachel Witham, graduate student in counseling and student development, Hutchinson; and Jennifer Livengood, Wamego, Natalie (Brown) Barlett, Ames, Iowa, and Tammy Sonnentag, Edgar, Wis., all graduate students in psychology. Their research was presented in May at the Association for Psychological Science annual convention in San Francisco, Calif.
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Butterfly

Testing Times for Wikipedia After Doctor Posts Secrets of the Rorschach Inkblots


Guardian
Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:41 UTC
Rorschach inblot
One of the 10 inkblot images patients are asked to describe by psychologists who endorse the ­Rorschach test.
The online encyclopedia Wikipedia has become embroiled in a bitter row with psychologists after a Canadian doctor posted answers to controversial tests on the site.

The Rorschach test is designed to give psychologists a window into the unconscious mind, but many now fear their patients will try to outwit them by memorising the "right" answers.

The test, developed in 1921 by the Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach, comprises 10 inkblot images, which patients must look at and describe what they see. In some cases, focusing on tiny details around the edges of the images is seen as evidence of obsessive behaviour.
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Syringe

Vaccinations: Deadly Immunity

Robert F. Kennedy, jr.
Global Research
Thu, 23 Jul 2009 14:52 UTC
In June 2000, a group of top government scientists and health officials gathered for a meeting at the isolated Simpsonwood conference center in Norcross, Georgia. Convened by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the meeting was held at this Methodist retreat center, nestled in wooded farmland next to the Chattahoochee River, to ensure complete secrecy. The agency had issued no public announcement of the session - only private invitations to fifty-two attendees. There were high-level officials from the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration, the top vaccine specialist from the World Health Organization in Geneva and representatives of every major vaccine manufacturer, including GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, Wyeth and Aventis Pasteur. All of the scientific data under discussion, CDC officials repeatedly reminded the participants, was strictly "embargoed." There would be no making photocopies of documents, no taking papers with them when they left.
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