Humanities & Society

A test developed by physician-scientists at the School of Medicine may help assess more quickly the ability of Alzheimer’s drugs to affect one of the possible underlying causes of Alzheimer’s disease in humans, accelerating the development of new treatments.

SawyerEven as the United States faces the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, businesses are spending more money on innovation, according to a recent Wall Street Journal report. Keith Sawyer, Ph.D., assistant professor of education and psychology in Arts & Sciences and one of the country’s leading experts on the science of creativity, says that investing in innovation is one of the best ways to beat the recession.

“Financing University Education” is the focus of a free public conference to be held at 6 p.m. Tuesday, April 14, in the Bryan Cave Moot Court Room of Anheuser Busch Hall.

As America considers major healthcare reforms, it may have lessons to learn from Seguro Popular, Mexico’s ambitious plan to improve healthcare for its estimated 50 million uninsured citizens, suggests Ryan Moore, co-author of a new evaluation of the program. Conducted through a partnership of Mexican health officials and researchers from leading American universities, the study offers a model U.S. policymakers might use to scientifically explore solutions to America’s own looming healthcare crisis.

The Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging is hosting the 2009 Friedman Conference April 21 at the Eric P. Newman Education Center from 8:30 a.m.-1 p.m. The conference, titled “In the Words of the Artist: The Influence of Age on Creativity and Expression,” focuses on the ways artists experience the aging process and how it affects creativity and expression.

“Financing University Education” is the focus of a free public conference to be held 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. April 14 in the Bryan Cave Moot Court Room. Anheuser-Busch Hall, Danforth Campus, Washington University in St. Louis.

Tutoring children in and after school isn’t new, but how much does it really help in critical areas like reading? Rigorous new research from Washington University in St. Louis shows significant gains from a national service program that trains experienced Americans to help low-income children one-on-one in urban public schools. The central finding: Over a single school year, students with Experience Corps tutors made over 60 percent more progress in learning two critical reading skills — sounding out new words and reading comprehension — than similar students not served by the program.

“‘Meetings on the Move’ is an inexpensive, easy way to improve health and productivity,” says Tim McBride, Ph.D., associate dean for public health at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. Meetings on the Move (MOTM) get employees on their feet and out of the office environment. “Forty percent of the population are absolute couch potatoes,” says Debra Haire-Joshu, Ph.D, and professor of social work at Washington University. “That’s almost a learned behavior. You learn to sit at school; you learn to sit at work. What ‘Meetings on the Move’ really does is get us active like we used to be when we were kids. We can learn then to bring activity back into our daily life, just like we learned to take it out.” Haire-Joshu also is the director of the Obesity Prevention and Policy Research Center at the Brown School. Video available.

Richard Martin, Ph.D., the 2009 John and Penelope Biggs Resident in the Classics, will deliver the Assembly Series’ annual Biggs Lecture at 4 p.m. April 9 in Steinberg Auditorium. His talk will center on his approach to Homeric poetry and how it is so much more than an abstract study of language. Folklore, social anthropology, […]

Stanford classics professor Richard Martin discusses Homeric poetry as performance art in Ancient Greece, in the annual Assembly Series Biggs Lecture 4 p.m. April 9 in Steinberg Hall.