Category: UW Experts in the News

Noted: None of this means it?s easy in America for someone from a lower economic class to find and marry someone from a higher class. “Assortative mating”?the human urge to pair up with someone who is similar to you?is on the increase in the U.S., according to research by sociologists Robert Mare of UCLA and Christine Schwartz of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They found that those with college degrees are marrying people with college degrees at higher rates than at any time in the last half-century.

The University of Colorado?s Leaf Van Boven has shown that experiences make us happier than material items, since they can?t be compared to anyone else?s experiences and form the positive memories that tell us we like our lives. Thomas DeLeire, at the University of Wisconsin, found that only one of the nine categories of consumption he measured was linked to an increase in happiness: leisure purchases. Recreation is so good at “re-creating” mindsets that there is a whole field of health devoted to it: recreation therapy, which builds self-worth and positive mood for people with disabilities, through activities such as horseback riding or wheelchair basketball.

(This article first appeared in the Sunday Wisconsin State Journal.)

She opened at a scream.

“Pull a gun on me and it?s the last (expletive) thing you?ll do!”

Defense lawyer Jessa Nicholson stood inches from jurors as she quoted the man her client killed, trying to convey the fear and chaos that led to the shooting, which also injured the man?s brother.

Quoted: UW law professor Michele Lavigne

Quoted: People who want to refuse life-sustaining treatment have years of legal precedent behind them, Norm Fost, a bioethicist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said.

Noted: So what?s the best way to stave off that weight gain? Chad Cook and colleagues at the University of Wisconsin have done research suggesting that it might not be exercise. Their study of 443 adults ages 40 to 60, presented at a recent meeting of the Obesity Society, found that even those people who habitually burn more daily calories than predicted for their age and body weight are not protected against holiday weight gain. Cook notes that 75 percent of participants gained at least some weight and nearly a fifth put on 4.4 pounds or more.

It will be a year-round middle school. And an urban farm. And a cafe with indoor and outdoor seating. And a neighborhood center. And an office space. And a home for small business.

Planners of the Resilience Research Center development have firmed up their vision and timeline for the nearly 4-acre parcel planned to start taking shape in January on the South Side, near the intersection of East Badger and Rimrock roads.

….The school would emphasize “culturally relevant” teaching, designed to bridge the achievement gap between white and minority students by helping teachers better understand their students’ home culture. The concept is promoted by UW-Madison education professor Gloria Ladson-Billings, who along with other university faculty is working on developing the charter school.

Another free legal clinic for struggling homeowners will be held Thursday, as part of the resources offered by the Dane County Foreclosure Prevention Taskforce. The answer clinics are an effort of the taskforce, the Dane County Bar Association and the UW Law Foundation, with grant funding provided by the State Bar of Wisconsin, plus county support.

Quoted: Jim Johannes, UW-Madison School of Business professor and director of the Puelicher Center for Banking Education.

Quoted: Jim Steele, a UW-Madison professor of food science and an expert on food fermentations.

Noted: UW-Madison education professor Gloria Ladson-Billings.

Kathleen Horning is having a few close friends over for the holidays, some of the same characters who might show up in anyone?s home over the next four weeks. They include Truman Capote, an angel or three, a donkey, a carpenter, a couple of guys on skis and some freezing soldiers, even a snow lady. Horning directs the Cooperative Children?s Book Center located on the fourth floor of the Helen C. White building on the UW-Madison campus. It is a treasury of lore, content and advice effusively doled out to the state?s and the nation?s librarians, teachers, parents and anyone else interested in all that touches children literature. She was asked about unheralded or forgotten children?s books about the holidays, the sort of books that a family keeps together in one place and might bring out just for the season, the sort that make good gift books that are opened time and again, that might be read starting Dec. 1 a chapter per night, book in hand, child in lap.

Quoted: Joan Houston Hall, chief editor of the Dictionary of American Regional English at UW-Madison.

Noted: The nonprofit Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism, which collaborates with its partners, including the UW-Madison School of Journalism & Mass Communication.

Noted: Bob Norton, professor emeritus from the University of Wisconsin and author of “The Hunter: Developmental Stages and Ethics.”

Over the six-and-a-half years she?s been teaching at UW-Madison, Amy Barber has developed a following for her classes on gender and women?s studies. In the past year-and-a-half, Barber, 31, has amassed another following as a Thursday night DJ for the 18-and- over crowd at Madison?s Plan B nightclub, where she?s known as Professor Shame.

Noted: Holidays don?t cause domestic violence, but family gatherings and increased financial problems can lead to abusers feeling like they?ve lost control, said Darald Hanusa, who has a Ph.D. in clinical social work, is employed at the Midwest Domestic Violence Resource Center in Madison and lectures part time at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: Inflammation, which produces that good kind of soreness weekend warriors are familiar with, ?also damages a lot of healthy tissue around it,? notes Li Li Ji, an exercise physiologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. ?That?s why I usually discourage older people from being too ambitious.?

Quoted: What you touch: Signs encouraging customers to touch the merchandise are far less common in stores than signs imploring them not to. But research shows that retailers may be missing a rather lucrative boat. “There are three ways that touching an object can make you willing to pay more for it,” says Joann Peck, an associate professor of marketing at the Wisconsin School of Business in Madison who has conducted a number of studies analyzing the role of touch in shopping behaviors.

Quoted: There is such a thing as holiday sales fatigue, said Cynthia Jasper, a professor of consumer science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Quoted: Deborah Mitchell, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business, said this latest marketing tactic is catching on, and more stores are opting to open their doors when they?re traditionally closed for business. The point is to drive customers in during this very important time of year when there?s minimal competition.

Interest in sustainable foods continues to increase and some Wisconsinites will be filling Thanksgiving tables with them. Sean Cash, a professor of Consumer Science at UW-Madison, says some shoppers like to support local farmers and producers. Others look to these alternatives believing the food is healthier or the animals used are treated more humane.

Quoted: By making followers and friends feel they?re getting a deal that?s not widely available, stores increase the likelihood that customers will bite, says Deborah Mitchell, executive director of the Center for Brand and Product Management at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. ?This time of year, it?s almost a sport to brag about the deals you got,? she says. ?They?re playing on that feeling.?

Quoted: Alphonso Morales, professor of  urban and regional planning at UW-Madison.

It?s last call for Timothy Allen, professor of UW-Madison?s “beer course.” Allen ? flamboyant, colorful, and beloved by students ? is retiring when this semester ends after 40 years of teaching at the university. The course that made him a legend is technically called Botany 240: Plants and Man, but it?s known as the “beer course” because one of the optional assignments is to brew beer.

Isthmus editor Bill Lueders made a splash the other day first by quoting famous UW-Madison political scientists Charles Franklin as saying the election proves that voters are ?pretty damn stupid.?

It got noticed nationally, as well it might: Franklin often gets quoted by national media, and now his known contempt for you can usefully attenuate whatever credence the country might lend him.

Quoted: Russ Castronovo, a UW-Madison English professor who mainly deals in 18th and 19th century American literature but happily admits he?s read all the Potter books.

CALLER:  Thank you.  You talked about the professor from the University of Wisconsin, and he wrote a whole paper on voter stupidity. RUSH:  Right. (Transcript making reference to Charles Franklin, professor of political science.)

Program assessment information from Joanne Cantor, speaker and workshop presenter at Your Mind on Media in Madison, Wisc., indicates a possible emerging trend away from multitasking. Cantor, who is professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and continues as Outreach director, Center for Communication Research, finds that some young adults are willing to reduce the cyber-overload in their lives.

Letter from Francis Schrag, professor emeritus, Educational Policy Studies, UW-Madison.

Quoted: Ronnie Carda, coordinator of UW-Madison?s physical education activity program.

Quoted: Madeline Hafner, executive director of the Minority Student Achievement Network at UW-Madison.

Quoted: “Everybody?s memory is different, so you have to use your own as a baseline to notice changes that are worrisome,” says University of Wisconsin geriatric psychiatrist Ken Robbins. “But certain signs are more strongly associated with a problem like Alzheimer?s.”

Quoted: “Within the last 30 to 40 years, there?s been a shift from regulated industries where competition was structured and limited by government rule,” says Shubha Ghosh, a professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School specializing in antitrust and intellectual property. “Now that we?ve moved from that time frame to a more deregulated environment, the question is ?Do we have a realm into which antitrust can expand??”

Political reporters often rely on University of Wisconsin political scientist Charles Franklin for expertise.  In just the past few months, his insights have appeared in articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Associated Press, Politico, Boston Globe, Christian Science Monitor, and many other publications.  He?s also a co-founder of the influential website Pollster.com, as well as co-director of the Big Ten Battleground Poll.

Quoted: “It?s the ravens calling, seeing fishers, porcupines, black bears, hearing wolves howl and of course the traditions,” said Larry Meiller, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor and Wisconsin Public Radio host, who started hunting deer in Bayfield County in 1965.

Quoted: Richard Monette, an associate professor of law at University of Wisconsin and an expert in laws involving native people, puts it this way: “They had societies where they had their own norms, their own values, they had customs and traditions … all of which kept their life in balance with their community, with their individuality, their families. They lost all that, and not voluntarily.”

Quoted: “It?s a real Pandora?s box. It sounds better than in fact it turns out to be,” said Dennis Dresang, a political science scholar and professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: The success of the pediatric diet seems to have made it easier for keto scientists to get money for this basic research. ?Before Helen?s study, we all had a clear sense that keto worked,? says Carl Stafstrom, the head of pediatric neurology at the University of Wisconsin, ?but we couldn?t say in a grant proposal that the diet has been proven to be effective. Now we can.? There are recently financed studies, for example, exploring why the body resists ketosis and exploring compounds that might trigger the antiepileptic mechanism.

UW-Madison soil science professor Teri Balser was one of four professors given the U.S. Professor of the Year Award in Washington, D.C., Thursday.

The University of Wisconsin is known for its world-class faculty and groundbreaking research, but thanks to one UW professor, it is also the home to a Professor of the Year.

A Dane County judge will allow DNA tests of evidence for a man convicted of killing his wife in 1990, but it will be at his own expense and he?ll have another significant hurdle to leap if the tests reveal anything useful. Steven J. McConnell-Luer was convicted of strangling his estranged wife, Kimberly, in 1990 and attempting to kill their children by sparking a natural gas explosion in the rural Stoughton trailer home where the three of them lived. McConnell-Luer?s case has been taken on by the Innocence Project at UW-Madison, which in its legal briefs questioned the credibility of witness reports that placed McConnell-Luer at the trailer park.

The Hunters? Network of Wisconsin (HNW) aims to increase recuritement and retention of hunters. On Tuesday, Nov. 15, a joint effort from among UW-Extension, the University of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, with support from BW Communications, announced new hunter recruitment and retention development efforts surrounding Mentored Hunting and Learn to Hunt events, including the availability of Learn to Hunt (LTH) insurance and the commitment of four outdoors groups to conduct eight new LTH events each by Nov. 1, 2011.