ScienceDaily: Living Well News

---

• Kissing helps us find the right partner – and keep them
• Analysis of herbal products shows contamination is common
• One in five persons seeking pre-travel advice are high-risk travelers
• Sticks and stones: Brain releases natural painkillers during social rejection
• Hybrid cars are status symbol of sorts for seniors
• City of Providence is taking on big tobacco – and winning
• Genes predispose some people to focus on the negative
• Osteoporosis a major threat to women's future independence
• Several top websites use device fingerprinting to secretly track users
• How to determine whether a patient is safe to drive
• Organ donor promotion brings increase in registrations
• Physician job satisfaction driven by quality of patient care
• How does your whisky taste?
• Household chaos may be hazardous to a child’s health
• Childbirth not significant contributor to later sexual dysfunction
• New details about brain anatomy, language in young children
• Public health does not 'lose out' when merged with medicaid programs
• Calling in sick, from America to Zimbabwe
• Where in the world are young people using the Internet?

Kissing helps us find the right partner – and keep them Posted: 10 Oct 2013 05:51 PM PDT What's in a kiss? A new study suggests kissing helps us size up potential partners and, once in a relationship, may be a way of getting a partner to stick around. 'Kissing in human sexual relationships is incredibly prevalent in various forms across just about every society and culture,' says one of the researchers. 'Kissing is seen in our closest primate relatives, chimps and bonobos, but it is much less intense and less commonly used.

Analysis of herbal products shows contamination is common Posted: 10 Oct 2013 05:51 PM PDT Most herbal products, available to buy as alternative medicines, may be contaminated. Researchers demonstrate the presence of contamination and substitution of plant species in a selection of herbal products using DNA barcoding.

One in five persons seeking pre-travel advice are high-risk travelers Posted: 10 Oct 2013 11:27 AM PDT Researchers have found that high-risk travelers account for nearly 20 percent of patients using the five clinics of the Boston Area Travel Medicine Network. The study also found that these travelers often visited destinations with malaria and typhoid risk.

Sticks and stones: Brain releases natural painkillers during social rejection Posted: 10 Oct 2013 10:22 AM PDT "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me," goes the playground rhyme that's supposed to help children endure taunts. But a new study suggests that there's more going on inside our brains when someone snubs us -- and that the brain may have its own way of easing social pain.

Hybrid cars are status symbol of sorts for seniors Posted: 10 Oct 2013 09:48 AM PDT Paying extra bucks to "go green" in a hybrid car may pay off in self-esteem and image for older drivers, as well as give a healthy boost to the environment.

City of Providence is taking on big tobacco – and winning Posted: 10 Oct 2013 09:43 AM PDT The city of Providence, R.I., is taking the fight against Big Tobacco to a new level with innovative tobacco control policies in the retail environment. A new study details Providence's efforts and provides a road map for other municipalities to follow.

Genes predispose some people to focus on the negative Posted: 10 Oct 2013 07:50 AM PDT Some people are genetically predisposed to see the world darkly, new research finds. According to researchers, a previously known gene variant can cause individuals to perceive emotional events -- especially negative ones -- more vividly than others.

Osteoporosis a major threat to women's future independence Posted: 10 Oct 2013 06:16 AM PDT A new report shows that women may expect to live longer, but their quality of life will be seriously jeopardized if action to protect their bone health is not taken. The report provides solutions for fracture prevention and osteoporosis management.

Several top websites use device fingerprinting to secretly track users Posted: 10 Oct 2013 06:14 AM PDT A new study has uncovered that 145 of the Internet's 10,000 top websites track users without their knowledge or consent. The websites use hidden scripts to extract a device fingerprint from users' browsers. Device fingerprinting circumvents legal restrictions imposed on the use of cookies and ignores the Do Not Track HTTP header. The findings suggest that secret tracking is more widespread than previously thought.

How to determine whether a patient is safe to drive Posted: 10 Oct 2013 06:11 AM PDT Driver rehabilitation provides a comprehensive evaluation on whether a patient can safely drive a car. It is intended for elderly patients and patients with stroke, brain injury, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, low vision, etc.

Organ donor promotion brings increase in registrations Posted: 09 Oct 2013 06:39 PM PDT More than 90 percent of the public supports organ donation, yet less than half the population registers as donors, surveys show. What if registration was better promoted to those who had previously turned it down?

Physician job satisfaction driven by quality of patient care Posted: 09 Oct 2013 07:02 AM PDT An in-depth study about doctors' job satisfaction has found physicians are motivated primarily by their ability to provide quality health care to their patients. Obstacles that interfere with those efforts are a source of stress for doctors.

How does your whisky taste? Posted: 09 Oct 2013 07:01 AM PDT Manipulating people's senses with environmental triggers can have a significant effect on the taste of whisky. An experiment reveals that participants' ratings of the smell, taste and flavour of a whisky changed by ten to twenty percent depending on the environment they were drinking it in. These results have implications on the environments where people consume food and drink.

Household chaos may be hazardous to a child’s health Posted: 09 Oct 2013 06:57 AM PDT Kindergarten-age children have poorer health if their home life is marked by disorder, noise and a lack of routine and they have a mother who has a chaotic work life, new research suggests.

Childbirth not significant contributor to later sexual dysfunction Posted: 09 Oct 2013 06:57 AM PDT Childbirth is not a major contributor to sexual dysfunction in women later in life, according to a new study.

New details about brain anatomy, language in young children Posted: 08 Oct 2013 03:23 PM PDT Researchers have uncovered new details about how brain anatomy influences language development in young kids. Using advanced MRI, they find that different parts of the brain appear to be important for language development at different ages. Surprisingly, anatomy did not predict language very well between the ages of 2 and 4, when language ability increases quickly. That underscores the importance of environment during this critical period.

Public health does not 'lose out' when merged with medicaid programs Posted: 08 Oct 2013 01:52 PM PDT State public health departments do not necessarily lose funding when merged with larger Medicaid programs, according to a just-released study.

Calling in sick, from America to Zimbabwe Posted: 08 Oct 2013 10:29 AM PDT There are considerable differences in attitudes towards workplace absences across nations. Analysis of responses from 1,535 participants in Mexico, Pakistan, Ghana, India, the USA, Canada, Japan, Trinidad and Nigeria demonstrates that absenteeism is more influenced by cultural stance than individual attitude.

Where in the world are young people using the Internet? Posted: 07 Oct 2013 09:24 AM PDT According to a new study, only 30 percent of the world's youth population between the ages of 15 and 24 years old has been active online for at least five years. In South Korea, 99.6 percent of young people are active, the highest percentage in the world. The least? The Asian island of Timor Leste with less than 1 percent.

You are subscribed to email updates from ScienceDaily: Living Well News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610