Category: UW Experts in the News

Quoted: Catalina Toma, a psychologist and assistant professor in the department of communication arts at the University of Wisconsin-Madison says, when we’re talking addiction, much depends on the personality of the user.

Quoted: “We had a mass exodus of seasoned, senior people going to the private sector,” said Steven Deller, a University of Wisconsin professor who has worked extensively on economic-development projects in the state. “So the state’s economic development arm was out of commission for a long time.”

Quoted: Within the Fourth Estate, the Williams case is “a weird different kind of animal,” says Robert Drechsel, the director of the Center for Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin.

Quoted: Uh … no, says Joanne Cantor, the director for the Center for Communications Research at University of Wisconsin in Madison. First of all, kids under about 8 years old don’t have the cognitive ability to rely on past information — such as our parental media literacy speeches — when later watching a commercial for a juicy burger meal that comes with a fun toy, she says. Young kids operate in the immediate moment and typically believe everything they’re told. They can’t yet separate fantasy from reality until they’re older, says Cantor.

Quoted: In the U.S., opposition to vaccines was most intense in the late 1800s and early 1900s, said Susan Lederer, chair of medical history and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin.

Quoted: However, Dominique Brossard, chair of the department of life sciences communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, pointed out that because the poll surveyed members of AAAS, an advocacy group, they do not represent scientists as a whole.

Quoted: Dominique Brossard, a professor of life sciences communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has studied commenting, cautioned against drawing too many conclusions about sexism from Dr. Moss-Racusin’s study. She noted that the authors looked at comments from only three sources, and were able to assign gender to only about half the comments.

Noted: “Even if a judgment were obtained in France, it would be impossible under American law to enforce it here,” said Robert Drechsel, a journalism professor who teaches media law at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

Quoted: Often during debates over renaming campus buildings, people worry it will have a domino effect, said Stephen Kantrowitz, a history professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They ask, where does it stop?

Quoted: In the 1950s and early 1960s, the CIA spent billions developing psychological interrogation techniques and employing a half-dozen leading psychology departments, according to Alfred McCoy, history professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, from the Cold War to the War on Terror.

Quoted: “If you go back historically, when you thought of small businesses, you probably thought of a more traditional shop like a restaurant or a small retail store,” said Dan Olszewski, director of the Weinert Center for Entrepreneurship at the Wisconsin School of Business. “Now, I think people are more likely to think of an entrepreneur. They’re thinking of Mark Zuckerberg before Facebook got big.”

Ross Reynolds interviews John Ahlquist, co-author of the book, “In the Interest of Others: Organizations and Social Activism,” which looks at the history of the longshoremen and the union’s involvement in politics. Ahlquist is a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Noted: Wheeler is pushing the “strongest open Internet protections ever proposed” by the federal agency. So said Barry Orton, professor of telecommunications at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: “The ability to get that close to birds that cheaply has a lot of potential to revolutionize bird censuses,” said Kristoffer Whitney, a researcher at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who looks at the history and ethics of wildlife biology.

Noted: “Pearson has been the most creative and the most aggressive at [taking over] all those things we used to take as part of the public sector’s responsibility,” said Michael Apple, a professor of education policy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Noted: Barry C. Burden, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said, “He’s really latched onto two or three Washington issues to focus on. … When he arrived, it was about the healthcare law and wanting to repeal that, and then moving on to Benghazi and other foreign policy issues. To his credit, he hasn’t relented on any of those things. They’re still his focus, even though we’re a year and a half from the election.”

Quoted: Laura Kiessling at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, who studies ways to draw natural antibodies to tumor cells, comments on the benefits of Spiegel’s approach: “It can be tailored to selectively recruit specific types of immune cells to kill tumor cells. The smaller size of the compounds could also be an asset in eliminating tumors, but the benefits would need to be looked at in vivo,” Kiessling says.

Quoted: Pilar Ossorio, a professor of law and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, believes the potential medical benefits outweigh most of those concerns.

A new study on autism has researchers taking a second look at the genetics behind the condition.

Noted: While GW, Pomona and GMU can exempt both the caller and the person who needs help, the University of Wisconsin-Madison grants amnesty only to the caller. According to Marc Lovicott, public information officer for the UW-Madison police department, the university’s “Responsible Action Guidelines” are on a case-by-case basis and there are no guarantees for amnesty,

Quoted: Barry Orton is a professor of telecommunications at UW-Madison. “The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission Tom Wheeler has announced he going to go for a very robust net neutrality regulation under what’s called Title II, which means he’s treating the Internet as a public utility.”

Quoted: “Parents didn’t want to role model dishonest behavior to girls,” said co-author Anya Savikhin Samek, an economist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. “Maybe that’s because dishonest behavior is considered more socially acceptable for boys… It’s not a causal relationship, but the gender finding gives us something to think about how societies form and about the origins of dishonesty.”

Noted: But don’t expect the findings to get the food industry excited just yet. Not many food manufacturers need this refolding technique right now, says Srinivasan Damodaran, a food scientist at the University of Wisconsin. The method is more relevant for cancer researchers, who make proteins that may need to be refolded for research, says Weiss.

With increasing talk about the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math education in universities, some experts argue the necessity of changing the way science is taught, especially for non-science majors.

Noted: The odds of the same numbers occurring twice are the same odds as winning, said Jordan Ellenberg, a math professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: As long as he isn’t formally a candidate for president, it allows them to promote him and his ideas without being subject to contribution limits or source restrictions, said Ken Mayer, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an expert in campaign finance.

Quoted: J. Michael Collins, director of the Center for Financial Security at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, advises automating savings by having a fixed amount — even if it’s a very small amount — regularly transferred from your checking account to a savings account. “If it’s up to you to decide every month if you want to do it and how much,” he said, “it won’t happen.”

Quoted: “The recession taught legislators that families will bear the cost of higher tuition, so that sent a signal to the state that it is possible to transfer the buck,” said Sara Goldrick-Rab, a professor of education policy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “Now there is little incentive to reinvest.”

A British company plans to release millions of genetically modified mosquitoes into neighborhoods in the Florida Keys. Prof. Susan Paskewitz of the Medical Entomology Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Entomology says in a phone interview that even more than the mutant dinosaurs, the public still remembers that in the 1950s domestic cats were dropped into Borneo by parachute to kill rodents.

Noted: The proposals, which were floated recently by the White House and Senate DFL leaders in Minnesota, are both designed to lower the barrier to college, says Sara Goldrick-Rab, a University of Wisconsin professor who is credited with inspiring President Obama’s plan, estimated to cost $6 billion a year.

Noted: But some scholars questioned any claims of censorship. Yoshiko M. Herrera, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said that submitting the gift to board review was part of a necessary democratic process.

Quoted: Wash scarves and gloves at least once a week, says Nasia Safdar, medical director of infection control for University of Wisconsin Hospital in Madison.

Quoted: “I don’t think the test measures what is most important for students to learn,” said Diana Hess, a professor of education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and senior vice president of the Spencer Foundation, which gives grants in support of education causes. “If all we’re asking students to do is answer very simple questions, we’re not going to be working on the complex understanding that I think students need in order to participate well.”

It can be magical to see a landscape transformed by a layer of pure, white snow. It’s even more enchanting when a weather phenomenon called snow sparkle occurs. Larry Meiller talks to Steve Ackerman, a professor of atmospheric sciences and director of the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, to learn why.

As support for right-to-work laws seems to be dwindling in the state Legislature, a study by the Economic Policy Institute has found that states enforcing the laws have lower standards of living in comparison to Wisconsin.

Noted: Shobe suggested we query University of Wisconsin economist Menzie Chinn who told us by email that he considers such critiques of the rate to be “specious;” Chinn pointed us to his October 2012 blog post taking to task a similar statement by business executive Jack Welch.

Quoted: Mike Wagner, a professor of journalism and political science at UW-Madison, says Walker can also use successes at the State Capitol to ensure he stays relevant and visible to voters in Wisconsin while exploring a presidential campaign.

Quoted: Janet Hyde, a professor of psychology and gender studies at UW Madison, has been doing research in the area of work, life balance. She says it’s hard to say if 80 years would be the accurate measurement of time to close the gender gap, but there are some ways to accelerate the pace of change. One of those would be on employers to help alter the work, life balance. Hyde says they could do so, by offering on-site, affordable child care and three to six months of paid parental leave.

Daniel Scheidell’s defense is led by UW-Madison law professor Carrie Sperling, co-director of the Wisconsin Innocence Project.