Here are the stories on Living Lab Radio for August 25 and 26, 2019.
An American convicted of a federal crime is seven percent more likely to be sentenced to jail time if they are black than if they are white. That jail time is likely to be eight months longer if the person is black.
That’s a major disparity, but it’s a major improvement over where we were twenty years ago. That’s the conclusion of a new analysis presented at the American Sociological Association earlier this month.
Ryan King is professor and chair of sociology at The Ohio State University, and one of the lead authors on this work.
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It’s been just over two years since Hurricane Harvey devastated the Houston area – dumping up to five feet of rain in some places, and causing unprecedented flooding. Tens of thousands of people were displaced, hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses were destroyed. Now, researchers have gathered at Baylor College of Medicine to share what they’ve learned about the public health impacts of Hurricane Harvey. Melissa Bondy is professor and head of epidemiology and population sciences at Baylor College of Medicine, and she organized the event.
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An artificial intelligence developer races against time to create a computer program that can save his son from the mysterious illness that seems to be killing him.
It sounds like the premise for a science fiction novel. But it’s a true story. We talk to Matthew Might, director of the Hugh Kaul Precision Medicine Institute at University of Alabama, Birmingham. His son, Buddy, has a rare genetic disease. This past May, he became extremely ill and Might put an experimental algorithm into action to come up with possible causes and treatments. It’s a story that hints at how artificial intelligence could transform medical care.
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How an issue is portrayed in the media can have a huge effect on how it is perceived by the public. When it comes to climate change, a lot of attention has been dedicated to how much the issue is covered. And whether that coverage is scientifically accurate.
A new analysis of more than 37,000 articles from 45 countries around the globe suggests that a key factor in HOW climate change is covered is economics -- the country’s per capita GDP. Wealthier countries are more likely to emphasize domestic politics and scientific evidence of climate change, while media in poorer nations tend to focus on the impacts of climate change and the need for international policy solutions. We speak to Hong Vu, assistant professor of journalism at University of Kansas and that study's lead author.
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