Surface air temperature change (2050s average minus 1971-2000 average), NOAA GFDL CM2.1 Climate Model, SRES A1B scenario. This world map shows the projected change in annual mean surface air temperature from the late 20th century (1971-2000 average) to the middle 21st century (2051-2060 average). The change is in response to increasing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases and aerosols based on a “middle of the road” estimate of future emissions. Warming is larger over continents than oceans, and is largest at high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. These results are from the GFDL CM2.1 model, but are consistent with a broad consensus of modeling results.
By Elaine S. Povich, Stateline
With all the attention focused on California’s water woes, an observer might conclude that the Golden State’s drought is the exception. It isn’t. Forty states expect to see water shortages in at least some areas in the next decade, according to a government watchdog agency.
In a 2013 survey by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), state water managers from around the country said they expect freshwater shortages to continue into the next decade, even under what they described as “average” conditions. If those conditions change — whether because of rapid population growth, unusually low snowfall or rainfall, or accelerated economic growth — the situation could worsen.
“As far as other states, if they haven’t seen it in the past, it’s something they will see in the future,” said Ben Chou, a water policy analyst in the Los Angeles office of the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group.
Late last month, Democratic California Gov. Jerry Brown implemented mandatory water conservation rules. The rules ban all restaurants, bars and hotels from serving water unless customers ask for it, ban the watering of lawns and landscaping within 48 hours of measurable rain, and require municipalities and private companies to limit lawn watering to two days a week.
The lawn-watering limits are likely to have the most impact, since outdoor irrigation makes up 44 percent of water use in the state’s urban and suburban communities, according to the state water board. The past three years have been the driest three years in California history dating to the 1849 Gold Rush, the board said. Low snowpack, combined with 2014 being the hottest year in history in the state, exacerbated the situation.
Residents of other states should take a lesson from California, Chou said. “Attention on California is due to the size of the state and the fact that we grow about half of the nation’s produce,” he said. “Other states have started looking at it, especially where water supplies are at a premium.”
Montana, for example, was listed in the GAO report as the state most likely to have a statewide water shortage in the next decade. Many other western states are in a similar predicament.
Tim Davis, Montana Water Resources Division administrator, said his department told the GAO that in any given year, any part of the state could have a water shortage. He said that last year, most of the state was fine, but the southwest corner was dry. Entering this irrigation season for farmers, Davis said the southwest region remains dry as is “much more of the state.”
Under direction from the Montana Legislature, Davis said his department has begun to plan for water shortages.
“Drought is one of those disasters that you have to plan for,” he said. “You can’t just immediately go out there and change how you’re using water on the ground or invest in efficiencies unless you have been doing it all along.” He said the state is making plans to share water between communities during times of drought, along with changing field irrigation methods to save water.
Working in Your Best Interest: A Proposal to Protect Consumers From Conflicts of Interest in Retirement Advice
The US Department of Labor has released a proposed rule that will protect 401(k) and IRA investors by mitigating the effect of conflicts of interest in the retirement investment marketplace. A White House Council of Economic Advisers analysis found that these conflicts of interest result in annual losses of about 1 percentage point for affected investors — or about $17 billion per year in total.
Under the proposals, retirement advisers will be required to put their clients’ best interests before their own profits. Those who wish to receive payments from companies selling products they recommend and forms of compensation that create conflicts of interest will need to rely on one of several proposed prohibited transaction exemptions.
“An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.” Photograph of the Benjamin Franklin National Memorial, The Franklin Institute, Philadelphia. Wikimedia Commons
“This boils down to a very simple concept: if someone is paid to give you retirement investment advice, that person should be working in your best interest,” said Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez. “As commonsense as this may be, laws to protect consumers and ensure that financial advisers are giving the best advice in a complex market have not kept pace. Our proposed rule would change that. Under the proposed rule, retirement advisers can be paid in various ways, as long as they are willing to put their customers’ best interest first.”
The announcement includes a proposed rule that would update and close loopholes in a nearly 40-year-old regulation. The proposal would expand the number of persons who are subject to fiduciary best interest standards when they provide retirement investment advice. It also includes a package of proposed exemptions allowing advisers to continue to receive payments that could create conflicts of interest if the conditions of the exemption are met. In addition, the announcement includes a comprehensive economic analysis of the proposals’ expected gains to investors and costs.
The proposed “best interest contract exemption” represents a new approach to exemptions that is broad, flexible, principles-based and can adapt to evolving business practices. It would be available to advisers who make investment recommendations to individual plan participants, IRA investors and small plans. It would require retirement investment advisers and their firms to formally acknowledge fiduciary status* and enter into a contract with their customers in which they commit to fundamental standards of impartial conduct. These include giving advice that is in the customer’s best interest and making truthful statements about investments and their compensation.
If fiduciary advisers and their firms enter into and comply with such a contract, clearly explain investment fees and costs, have appropriate policies and procedures to mitigate the harmful effects of conflicts of interest, and retain certain data on their performance, they can receive common types of fees that fiduciary advisers could otherwise not receive under the law. These include commissions, revenue sharing, and 12b-1 fees**. If they do not, they generally must refrain from recommending investments for which they receive conflicted compensation, unless the payments fall under the scope of another exemption.
In addition to the new best interest contract exemption, the proposal also includes other new exemptions and updates some exemptions previously available for investment advice to plan sponsors and participants. For example, the proposal includes a new exemption for principal transactions. In addition, the proposal asks for comment on a new “low-fee exemption” that would allow firms to accept conflicted payments when recommending the lowest-fee products in a given product class, with even fewer requirements than the best interest contract exemption.
Finally, the proposal carves out general investment education from fiduciary status. Sales pitches to large plan fiduciaries who are financial experts, and appraisals or valuations of the stock held by employee-stock ownership plans, are also carved out.
Links to the proposed fiduciary rule, prohibited transaction exemptions, economic impact analysis and other materials are available at www.dol.gov/ProtectYourSavings/, and will be published for public comment in an upcoming edition of the Federal Register.
*Editor’s Note — WSJ Article: What Exactly Are 12b-1 Fees, Anyway? Regulators fret that too many investors don’t understand what they’re paying. Here’s where your dollars are going
“Mutual-fund investors paid about $9.5 billion last year in 12b-1 fees — and if you don’t know what that is, you’re not alone. The Securities and Exchange Commission worries that many people are unaware of or don’t really understand these charges, which are subtracted from fund assets to pay for ‘distribution’ and/or ‘services.’ “
** Defines a plan fiduciary to include anyone who gives investment advice for a fee or other compensation with respect to any moneys or other property of a plan, or has any authority or responsibility to do so. http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/newsroom/fsfiduciary.html
At Springfield, Museums: A Little Seen Winslow Homer Painting On View, The New Novel, As Well As Whistler’s European Etchings
Winslow Homer (1836 – 1910), The New Novel, 1877. Watercolor on paper, Michele & Donald D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, MA. Art Inconnu, Wikimedia Commons
The Springfield Museums, located in the heart of downtown Springfield, Massachusetts, is comprised of five world-class museums; the Michele & Donald D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts., the George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum, the Springfield Science Museum, and the Lyman & Merrie Wood Museum of Springfield History. The Museums’ Association is also home to the Dr. Seuss National Memorial Sculpture Garden, a series of full–scale bronze sculptures of Dr. Seuss’s whimsical creations, honoring the birthplace of Theodor Geisel, a.k.a. Dr. Seuss.
The painting, one of the most recognizable and important paintings in the combined collections of the Springfield Museums, will be on display as part of a new exhibit titled American Master: Winslow Homer in the Starr Gallery of the Michele and Donald D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts until September 27, 2015. The Homer exhibit runs concurrently with a display of etchings by James Abbott McNeill Whistler from the D’Amour Museum’s extensive holdings of nineteenth century American art, giving visitors an opportunity to view works by two of America’s most influential artists.
Watercolors are subject to fading when exposed to light. For that reason, The New Novel is only displayed periodically for short periods of time. The painting of young woman reclining on the grass, completely engrossed in a book, was first displayed in the 1877 exhibition of the American Watercolor Society. The woman’s identity or connection to the artist is not known, though many have suggested that the artist had a romantic interest in the subject. The work marks the emergence of Homer’s mature style, a period when he used his mastery of oil painting and his emerging skill with watercolors to capture scenes of rural and seaside life in post-Civil War America.
In addition, nine wood engravings by Homer will also be on display, including Skating on the Ladies Skating Pond in Central Park New York, Homeward Bound, and Trapping in the Adirondacks. The engravings date from early in Homer’s career when he captured scenes of country life and leisure for publications like Harper’s Weekly.
Currently, the D’Amour Museum has also placed eleven etchings by James Abbott McNeill Whistler on view in the Collins Print Gallery. On view through June 7, Whistler’s World: Etchings by James Abbott McNeill Whistler features etchings from series of works inspired by Whistler’s earliest years in Europe as young artist. These groupings are known as The Venice Set (or Twelve Etchings from Nature), The French Set, and The Thames Set. In addition, several reproduction photographs that demonstrate the Whistler family’s connection to Springfield will also be on display. These include a photo of the family residence when Whistler lived in Springfield as a young boy between 1840 and 1842. Coincidently, the building stood at the corner of Chestnut and Edwards Street, on the site currently occupied by the Lyman and Merrie Wood Museum of Springfield History and just a few steps from the D’Amour Museum itself.
One of the most original and influential artists of his time, James Abbott McNeill Whistler spent his early years in New England, living in Lowell and in Springfield, Massachusetts. His leadership in the aesthetic movement had a profound impact on both American and European artists working in the late nineteenth century.
Deciding to become an artist, Whistler moved to Europe in 1855. He settled in Paris and took up a bohemian life, associating with a group of young English artists and becoming close friends with French painters Henri Fantin-Latour (1836-1904) and Alphonse Legros (1837-1911). French Realist painter Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) was the most significant influence on his early career.
Book Review — Belva Lockwood: The Woman Who Would Be President
Belva Lockwood: The Woman Who Would Be President
by Jill Norgren
Published by New York University Press, © 2007
Reviewed by Jo Freeman
Belva Lockwood was an ambitious women, and Belva Lockwood is an ambitious book.
Famous in her day for many firsts, the US Postal service put her face on a stamp in 1986. Because her papers were largely destroyed by her grandson after her death in 1917, to write this biography Norgren had to track Lockwood’s footprints through newspapers, legal archives, and letters sent to others that found their way into family files. This took a prodigious amount of work over many years. The result is worth the wait.
Although best known for running for President in 1884 and 1888, Lockwood was one of the pioneers who broke the barriers to women practicing law. She was the second woman admitted to the bar in the District of Columbia and the first admitted to practice before the US Supreme Court. Active for suffrage, peace, temperance and other causes, she was constantly pushing the boundaries of the possible.
Born on October 24, 1830, in upper New York state, Belva Ann Bennett had an early appetite for education. At the age of 14 she taught in a rural school, chafing that she was paid half the salary of her male counterpart. She would eventually get a degree from a Methodist seminary for women and a law degree from National University Law School but each of these required surmounting obstacles created by her sex and her need to support herself.
Her seminary education and early career as a teacher — a common but poorly paid position for a woman — might not have been possible had she not been widowed at age 22. Teaching sharpened her ambition. Shortly after the end of the Civil War, Belva sent her 16-year-old daughter to be educated at her own alma mater and set off to Washington DC in search of opportunity. She found it as “Washington’s Lady Lawyer” after a long and rocky trek to her law degree and admission to various bars. In the meantime she earned her living as a rental agent, newspaper correspondent and sales representative, and lecturer.
Drawn to politics, Belva traveled the South in 1872 as a paid campaigner for Horace Greeley. In May of that year the notorious had herself nominated for President at a convention she called for that purpose, but did little more. How Lockwood came to run for President in 1884 on the same Equal Rights Party ticket are “colored by ego and memory.” Suffice it to say that men ridiculed her and some prominent Suffrage leaders strongly disapproved. But Lockwood did what Woodhull did not do and ran a full campaign.
Lockwood was very pleased with her efforts. Her campaign generated enormous publicity, opportunities to travel, large audiences who paid to hear her speak, and almost five thousand votes. She even made a small profit. Success prompted her to try again in 1888 but this campaign produced more disapproval and less satisfaction.
Norgren repeatedly points out Lockwood’s flair for self-promotion, of which her Presidential campaign was just one example. That talent not only made her a prominent figure in her lifetime but left the newspaper stories which made her biography possible. Lockwood’s love of publicity was merged with genuine devotion to several causes, making it difficult to identify her motivations.
Despite her ardor for universal suffrage, she never found a niche for herself in the Suffrage Movement. Instead she became a fixture in the peace movement and a spokeswoman for the Universal Peace Union. She was a frequent delegate to conferences urging peace and arbitration as the solution to conflict. She spoke up for popular causes such as temperance and unpopular causes such as the Mormons.
Belva married twice, but spent most of her life as a widow — the best situation for an educated woman during an era when wives were subject to their husbands and spinsters seen as less than full women. Her first husband died four and a half years after their marriage, leaving behind the daughter who would remain Belva’s companion until an early death at age 44. In 1868 she married Ezekiel Lockwood, an elderly dentist, becoming a widow for the second time nine years later. Their only child died at 18 months.
Family was very important to Belva. In 1877 she bought a large house on F St. where she housed her law practice, her daughter, and various members of her extended household. Spare rooms were rented out. The day-to-day law practice of mostly pension and land claims was handled by her daughter and other relatives. Belva was the ‘rainmaker’ for the family firm, attracting clients through her travels and lectures. She wrote the briefs and conducted the trials for the occasional high profile case. After her daughter died, her law practice disintegrated.
By the time she died at age 86, Lockwood’s star had long since faded. Her house was sold to pay her debts. Her only heir shipped her papers to a pulp mill. She had lived through a vast transformation of her society but her fondest goals were yet to be realized. She still could not vote. Her country had just voted to go to war and the prohibition amendment had not yet passed. Much more time would pass before her life and her dreams would be celebrated.
This book is a good read. It provides an enjoyable and enlightening narration of US history and women’s history as well as the history of a life.
©Jo Freeman for SeniorWomen.com
Links: HerHatWasInTheRing; Thousands of Women Ran For Office Before They Could Vote;
SeniorWomen.com’s Interview with Beauty Makeup Artist Maia Moura
A few years ago, I was in Saks Fifth Avenue in New York City attending to my quest for the most expensive item obtained at the least expensive price. While waiting for one of my bargains to be rung up, a very attractive woman makeup artist offered to freshen my makeup, now almost nonexistent. Since at the time I was 63 years old and looked a bit wan from my day job a couple of blocks away, I welcomed the invitation.
After Maia had finished, I actually did look fresher and, for once, not ‘made up.’ Usually, after a professional makeup session, I’d run back home or to the ladies room to remove a large portion of what had been applied. Shockingly, Maia didn’t even take my elbow and try to steer me to those products that would be ‘for me only’ at a ‘special price,’ perhaps expecting that I would splurge on a specific brand of cosmetics. I went back to the office feeling quite pleased with the way I looked: fresher and rested.
I’ve asked Maia Moura (also known as Maya) to impart a few tips about what the older woman encounters as her skin ages and what can be done to mask and correct some of those conditions. Too late we’ve realized that since we didn’t use a high SPF on our face to protect it from the sun, we have to pay the price. We belonged to the generations that put baby oil on our skin to increase the reflection of the sun’s dangerous rays to achieve a requisite summertime bronzing.
Mary Cassatt, (1844 – 1906) Antoinette at Her Dressing Table, oil on canvas, 1909. Collection of Mrs. Samuel E. Johnson, Chicago. Wikipedia
Q: What are the common skin types that you encounter with a woman over fifty?
Maia: There are six categories of skin that we see: normal, normal-to-dry, or very dry complexions; oily, normal-to-oily or very oily complexions.Q: What are the common skin types that you encounter with a woman over fifty?
Q: What kind of skin problems are common in the older woman?
Maia: Some are common to women of any age. Most problems that women encounter with aging skin consists of dry skin, dehydration, fine lines, augmented pigmentation, age spots, sun spots and other damage from the sun.
Q: How would you advise a woman who has dry, sun damaged skin?
Maia: The best treatment to use to help this a condition of mottled or hyper-pigmented skin is to use the following types of products before applying makeup or just before retiring in the evening:
- a gentle cleanser
- a good eye cream and
- a rich moisturizer with a sun-block protection during the daylight hours
- a creamy concealer and a foundation with moisturizer for daytime.
Remember, you don’t have to use heavy overall coverage to hide blemishes. If you have dark spots (commonly called ‘age spots’) or blemishes, they can be covered with an undercover concealer after using a light foundation … then tap it gently to blend in.
Q. What about the more average skin conditions?
Maia: If someone has normal to oily skin, especially in the t-zone, I’d recommend a good cleanser and toner, a moisturizer for combination skin, and a creamy concealer. I’d also recommend an oil-free moisturizing foundation. You can, in addition to the above steps, dust your face with translucent powder in order to set the oily area and dull any shine.
Q: What do you suggest for someone with Rosacea?
Maia: First, it’s important to use the correct moisturizer for a dry or oily skin type, but a foundation with a yellow-tinted base is very helpful in toning down a reddish coloration. Several companies have developed specific products to help the condition known as Rosacea.
Q: What are some of the important factors when considering skin products?
Maia: I recommend a creamy concealer for all kinds of skin types because the area around the eyes is the driest, usually. Mixing this with a eye cream is helpful in covering heavier lines around the eyes.
The use of skin cleansers, toners, eye creams and moisturizers are both necessary and important to maintaining good, healthy skin. Select the ones that best suit your condition but do use them daily before going out and each night before going to bed. An older woman’s individual facial skin condition will dictate the choice of the right foundation, the right concealer and/or the right powder. All three products are not necessary for everyone but any combination of the three can contribute to a fresher, more rested look.
There are many reasonably priced products made for different skin types that will give the older woman a clean, healthy appearance and a natural, radiant look. Next time, we’ll focus on makeup tips.
Maia’s email is NMMBRUS@aol.com
A Small Town Feel and The Santa Fe Effect: Returning to the Exurbs as Rural Counties Are Fastest Growing
© iStock
The Great Recession stalled population growth in the exurbs. But new census data show that the far suburbs are enjoying a renaissance. They are now the fastest growing areas in the country.
Winding up Route 400, a good 40 minutes’ north of Atlanta’s traffic-snarled freeways, are miles of farmhouses, interspersed with mobile homes, McMansions and thrift shops. Here, too, is Dawson County’s biggest draw: The North Georgia Premium Outlets, where tourists hunt for bargains at Burberry, Armani and Restoration Hardware.
Despite the designer outlets, the vibe is decidedly rural Americana. Tractors chug the roads. Masonic symbols emblazon the county government building. It’s a “small town feel” that Ginny Tarver says drew her to the area from Naples, Florida, to get married and work as an executive assistant in the county building.
Dawson is one of the fastest growing counties in Georgia and reflects a demographic shift in the nation: a return to exurbia. New census data show that for the first time since 2010, the outermost suburban counties are growing faster than urban counties and close-in suburbs, according to analysis by the Brookings Institution. People are moving back to the exurbs, some for jobs, others for bigger and more affordable homes in a more wide-open space.
“Once the economy improved, exurbs started growing,” said Joel Kotkin, presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University. “Basically, the recession did not revolutionize human beings. As they get older, they want to own something and they want to do it with some degree of privacy. If they can do it closer to work, they do it, but the vast majority of jobs aren’t in the cities.”
A decade ago, the exurbs were the hot thing in real estate. Between 2005 and 2006, the peak growth period for exurbs, urban counties lost over 1.3 million people as people left for the far reaches in surrounding counties.
Young professionals in search of more affordable housing gravitated there, lured by sprawling subdivisions. Exurbs gained about 146,000 new residents through domestic migration, according to William Frey, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, who analyzed the new Census Bureau population estimates for counties and metro areas, which were released on March 26.
But when the housing bubble popped, so did the population growth in the outer ring suburbs. Easy credit disappeared while gasoline prices skyrocketed, making lengthy commutes unattractive. People, particularly young people, couldn’t afford to move, and so they didn’t, Frey said.
“There was overbuilding in the suburbs and exurbs” before the housing bubble collapsed, Frey said. “That was one extreme. Then we saw the other extreme, when everything stopped in the exurbs.”
But now, exurbia is showing signs of rejuvenation, Frey said. “People are able to qualify for (mortgage loans for) homes; they’re willing to take on the risk of a mortgage. Developers see that. It’s a matter of supply and demand.”
The US has always been a nation of movers. For decades, about one in five people moved over a one year period, according to the US Census Bureau. Today, about one in nine moves each year.
Typically, young adults age 18 to 34 are the ones loading the U-Haul trucks, according to the census. But the Great Recession, which technically ended in 2009, stalled life transitions for many millennials who found themselves shut out of the job market and stuck in their parents’ basements, Frey said. Without stable job prospects and saddled with student loans, many young adults delayed marriage and parenthood. Buying a house became a dream deferred.
In the immediate aftermath of the recession, the number of young adults packing up and moving declined, according to the Census.
Balance and Driving Skills: Boosting Older Adults’ Vision Through Training
Researchers associated with the lab of psychology professor G. John Andersen have found that older adults whose vision is affected by declining contrast sensitivity can improve their ability to see with perceptual learning training.
Just a weeks’ worth of training can improve vision in older adults, according to new research in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The findings show that training boosted older adults’ sensitivity to contrast and also their ability to see things clearly at close distances.
“Our research indicates that the visual system of older adults maintains a high degree of plasticity and demonstrates that training methods can be used to improve visual function,” explains psychological scientist G. John Andersen of the University of California, Riverside who co-authored the study with graduate student Denton DeLoss and colleague Takeo Watanabe of Brown University.
Age-related declines in vision and visual processing are common and they can have serious negative consequences for the health and well-being of older adults. Older adults are particularly likely to show declines in their ability to process low-contrast visual stimuli — for example, images that are grainy or not clearly defined. This decline hampers their ability to see visual detail, and can hinder their ability to process information that is important for both balance and driving.
While some age-related declines in vision can be traced to the eye itself, research suggests that decline in other aspects of vision are the result of changes in brain function, and DeLoss and colleagues wondered whether a training program that involved repeated exposure to specific stimuli might counteract these changes in brain function.
The researchers recruited 16 young adults (on average, about 22 years old) and 16 older adults (on average, about 71 years old) to participate in the study, all of whom were screened to ensure that they didn’t show signs of cognitive decline or eye disease.
The participants came to the lab for 1.5-hour sessions over the course of 7 days. In general, each trial of the experiment involved looking at a striped visual stimulus and determining whether it was rotated clockwise or counterclockwise from its original orientation. The researchers varied the contrast of the stimulus across trials, altering how grainy or clear the image was.
Each day, the contrast threshold of the trials was calibrated to the participants’ previous performance so that they were training near the limit of what they could reliably detect. Participants were exposed to 750 trials on each training day, for a total of 3,750 training trials over the course of the study.
The data showed that visual training effectively eliminated the age deficit in contrast sensitivity. At the beginning of the experiment, younger adults outperformed older adults on the task; but the older adults improved with training, showing performance similar to that of their younger peers by the end of the 7 days.
Further analyses confirmed that these improvements stemmed from changes in visual processing in the brain and not changes in the eye. “We found that the training effect was not due to factors such as dilating the pupils to let in more light to the retina,” explains Andersen.
Even more remarkable, both younger and older adults showed improvements in visual acuity when they were tested using an eye chart similar to the one at your doctor’s office. At the end of training, older adults showed improvement in near acuity, or the ability to see things clearly when they are near; younger adults, on the other hand, showed improved ability to see things clearly when they are far.
“Given the short training period, the degree of improvement is quite impressive, particularly in the cases of near and far acuity, in which subjects were able to read an average of two to three additional letters on acuity charts after training,” the researchers write.
It’s important to note that these findings don’t shed light on visual function among adults suffering from age-related eye diseases, such as glaucoma or macular degeneration. Nonetheless, the findings could have broad relevance for the many millions of adults who experience age-related decline in visual processing.
The researchers hope to further explore the mechanisms involved in perceptual learning and whether the effects of visual training carry over to real-world tasks, such as driving. This research was funded by an National Institute on Aging Grant.
Teens, Social Media and Technology Overview 2015: Some 68% Go Online at Least Daily; The Platforms Are Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat
April 9, 2015
24% of teens go online “almost constantly,” facilitated by the widespread availability of smartphones.
Aided by the convenience and constant access provided by mobile devices, especially smartphones, 92% of teens report going online daily — including 24% who say they go online “almost constantly,” according to a new study from Pew Research Center. More than half (56%) of teens — defined in this report as those ages 13 to 17 — go online several times a day, and 12% report once-a-day use. Just 6% of teens report going online weekly, and 2% go online less often.
The Snapchat Logo. Wikimedia Commons
Much of this frenzy of access is facilitated by mobile devices. Nearly three-quarters of teens have or have access1 to a smartphone and 30% have a basic phone, while just 12% of teens 13 to 17 say they have no cell phone of any type. African-American teens are the most likely of any group of teens to have a smartphone, with 85% having access to one, compared with 71% of both white and Hispanic teens. These phones and other mobile devices have become a primary driver of teen internet use: Fully 91% of teens go online from mobile devices at least occasionally. Among these “mobile teens,” 94% go online daily or more often. By comparison, teens who don’t access the internet via mobile devices tend to go online less frequently. Some 68% go online at least daily.
African-American and Hispanic youth report more frequent internet use than white teens. Among African-American teens, 34% report going online “almost constantly” as do 32% of Hispanic teens, while 19% of white teens go online that often.
Facebook is the most popular and frequently used social media platform among teens; half of teens use Instagram, and nearly as many use Snapchat
Facebook remains the most used social media site among American teens ages 13 to 17 with 71% of all teens using the site, even as half of teens use Instagram and four-in-ten use Snapchat.
71% of teens use more than one social network site
Teens are diversifying their social network site use. A majority of teens — 71% — report using more than one social network site out of the seven platform options they were asked about. Among the 22% of teens who only use one site, 66% use Facebook, 13% use Google+, 13% use Instagram and 3% use Snapchat.
This study uses a somewhat different method than Pew Research Center’s previous reports on teens. While both are probability-based, nationally representative samples of American teens, the current survey was administered online, while our previous work involved surveying teens by phone. A great deal of previous research has found that the mode of interview — telephone vs. online self-administration — can affect the results. The magnitude and direction of these effects are difficult to predict, though for most kinds of questions, the fundamental conclusions one would draw from the data will be similar regardless of mode. Accordingly, we will not compare specific percentages from previous research with results from the current survey. But we believe that the broad contours and patterns evident in this web-based survey are comparable to those seen in previous telephone surveys.
Culture Watch Book Reviews — Against All Odds: Resisting Oppressive Cultures, Political Violence and Natural Catastrophe
Editor’s Note: Nicholas Kristof’s column of April 12, 2015 … Smart Girls vs. Bombs
“So instead of pummeling each other on foreign policy, let’s look for lessons learned. Surely one of them is that to counter terrorists, sometimes a girl with a book is more powerful than a drone in the sky.”
— Reviewed by Serena Nanda
Wadjda, a Saudi Arabian and German film
Written and Directed by Haifaa al-Mansour
On DVD, Razor Film Produktion, 2012
Hold Tight, Don’t Let Go: A Novel of Haiti.
By Laura Rose Wagner
Published by Amulet Books; 272 pages. 2015
I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban
By Malala Yousafzai with Christina Lamb
Published by Little Brown/Hachette; 289 pages. 2013. (Young Readers Edition, with Patricia McCormick, 2014)
Lost Kingdom: Hawaii’s Last Queen, the Sugar Kings, and America’s First Imperial Adventure
By Julia Flynn Siler
Published by Grove Press; 296 pp, text with added Notes and Sources, 2012
The stories reviewed feature young girls and women who demonstrate persistence and courage in fighting against extraordinarily difficult circumstances in four very different societies. Each narrative is deeply engaging and furthers our understanding of how the subtext of politics and culture impacts individual lives.
Wadjda is the story of a quietly but ingeniously, rebellious 11 year old girl in contemporary Saudi Arabia, determined to buy and ride a bicycle, one of many activities restricted for women. It is no mean directorial feat that this simple tale, which has its roots in the deeply misogynist and rigid Wahabi Islamist Saudi culture, evokes smiles and laughter. Saudi Arabian women cannot leave home unaccompanied by a male relative, are not permitted to drive, are publicly policed for immodest dress, are sex segregated even in elementary school and are subjected to many other culturally based restrictions. It is the subtle revealing of this restrictive culture, and its many contradictions, that makes close viewing of Wadjda so important and demonstrates the courage and perceptiveness of its (female) director.
Pay close attention to the details of the film to grasp the serious story beneath the great charm of its characters and the inventiveness of the central plot. For example, Wadjda’s repressive school principal forbids her rebellious act of wearing high top sneakers, but a close look reveals that the principal herself wears fashionable Western style high heeled shoes underneath her chador. 
Hold Tight Don’t Let Go immediately compels attention by its colorful cover which reminds us of contemporary Haitian art. The book is subtitled A Novel of Haiti but to anyone at all familiar with that country, the deep authenticity of the story and its characters shines through. This should not surprise us; its author, Laura Wagner is a cultural anthropologist who has lived in Haiti for three years and was there when the disastrous earthquake of 2010 hit the island. As cultural anthropologists do, she learned the language (which she seamlessly inserts into the novel), formed close friendships on the island, and clearly understands both the context of its politics and the nuances of its culture.
The opening chapter details the devastating impact of the earthquake on its central character, a 17 year old girl, Magdalie, whose whole life changes as her home collapses, killing Manman, the woman who became her beloved mother when her real mother died in her infancy. Manman brought her up in Port-Au-Prince with her own daughter, Nadine, and the girls are as close as twins, a closeness that becomes her emotional lifeline in the earthquake’s aftermath. Magdalie and Nadine move in with her uncle in a camp established by a Western NGO for earthquake survivors, but another emotional disaster strikes when Nadine is granted a visa to America, where she goes to live with her father. Now Magdalie is truly on her own, surviving only on the illusion that someday Nadine will send for her to come to Miami.
Forced now by her poverty to leave school, Magdalie desperately makes one unsuccessful effort after another to survive. We are in awe of her courage, especially her decision to refuse to sink to selling sex, which for many young girls and women is the only way of feeding themselves and their families. Most of us reading this novel will, thankfully, never experience the extreme disaster of an earthquake or the dire poverty of Haiti: it is to the author’s great credit that in spite of this distance we are moved to complete empathy and identification with the novel’s main character.
Violence of a different kind opens the memoir, I Am Malala, in which we encounter bravery that defies belief as Malala Yousafzai recounts her experiences as she and her father, against all odds, actively fight the Taliban for the right of girls to go to school in Swat, the tribal area of Pakistan in which they live. The memoir opens with a horrific incident: Taliban terrorists stop a school bus, peer inside and ask: “Who is Malala?” and then shoots her in the face. With the aid of Western doctors and, ambivalently, the Pakistani government, Malala survived and is now, of course, universally known as the youngest (14 year old) winner of the Nobel Peace prize.
My 11-year-old granddaughter, Charlotte, who read the young adult version of Malala’s memoir, recommended I read the book and I am so glad I did. In spite of her incredible bravery, Malala describes her life as an ordinary girl, with a teenager’s concerns about clothes, school cliques, and getting good grades. In her somewhat matter of fact, and even humble style, she reminds us of Magdalie in Haiti, who also sees herself as ordinary and who shares Malala’s view that education for girls is their best hope.
I Am Malala is most engrossing when Malala writes in her own words about her family, her friends, her everyday life, and especially her relationship with her father, but the descriptions of Pakistani history and politics, presumably written by the co-author, are clearly an essential context for her story. The Swat Pushtun were more vulnerable to Taliban repression and violence because their culture, while patriarchal and even misyogynst, was less restrictive for women than the dominant culture of Pakistan today. Many Pakistanis do not share the admiration for Malala she so clearly deserves but her activism, and her survival, against all odds, makes her memoir a compelling read for both adults and young adults throughout the world.
Using the Drug: Women Twice as Likely to See Pot as Risky
A study on the perceived risk of regularly using cannabis and the characteristics associated with these perceptions found that non-white, low-income women over the age of 50 were most likely to perceive a risk in using the drug. Least likely were those 12 to 25 years old, with a high school diploma or more, and a total family income above $75,000. The study by researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health with colleagues at Johns Hopkins University is the first to describe changes across time in perceived risk of regular cannabis use in the US population 12 years and older. Results are published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence.
Data from 614,579 individuals who took part in the 2002-2012 National Survey on Drug Use showed that past-year daily cannabis use has increased significantly between 2002 and 2012. The results also show that in 2002 participants were significantly more likely to associate risk with regular cannabis use compared to individuals interviewed in the years 2008 through 2012. In 2002, 51 percent of all survey participants believed there was a great risk associated with regular cannabis use versus 40 percent of participants in 2012. Findings were adjusted for sex, age, race/ethnicity, education, total family income, past year cannabis use status, and survey year. Regular use of marijuana was defined as once or twice a week.
“The changing perception about marijuana risk may at least partially be explained by the increasing number of states that legalized medical marijuana during 2008 and after,” said Silvia Martins, MD, PhD, associate professor of Epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health, and senior author.
Females were nearly two times more likely to perceive risk in regular marijuana use compared with males, yet the perceived risk among women decreased from 59 percent in 2002 to 47 percent in 2012. The number of female users remained stable in 2012 compared to 2002, however the number of female regular users slightly increased in the same time period.
Non-daily cannabis use in the past year varied between 2002 and 2012, but did not change dramatically when comparing the years 2002 and 2012 directly (9.7 percent vs. 10.2 percent, respectively).
Users in the past year were less likely to perceive a risk from regular cannabis use. Daily users were 96 percent less likely than non-users, and non-daily users were 89 percent less likely than past year non-users to have this perception.
“The sex differences in perceived risk of regular cannabis use observed in our study are consistent with reports from others showing male-female differences in perceived risk of substance use in general,” said Dr. Martins. “In addition, interestingly, individuals with a high school education or greater were significantly less likely to perceive great risk of regular cannabis use than those with less than a high school education, findings partially corroborated by results from Gallup polls indicating that adults with a college education compared to those without are more likely to support legalization of cannabis.”
Regular cannabis use has been associated with financial difficulties, low energy levels, dissatisfaction with productivity levels, sleep and memory issues, and relationship and family problems. Most individuals receiving treatment for cannabis use disorder — defined as clinically significant impairment — report difficulty quitting, and experience a withdrawal syndrome after cessation.
“Perceived risk is an important factor in deciding whether or not individuals will engage in health-related behaviors, such as cigarette smoking or binge drinking, for example,” noted Dr. Martins. “Continually evolving regulations in the US have the potential to impact perceived risk of cannabis use, which may influence individuals’ decisions to first try or use cannabis.”
A 2012 Mailman School study led by Dr. Magdalena Cerda showed that adults living in states with medical cannabis laws until 2004 had higher odds of cannabis use than residents of states without such laws. Prior to 2008, 11 states had legalized medical marijuana; today, an additional 12 states and Washington DC passed legislation regarding medical marijuana.