August | 2016 | CAS in the Media | Washington State University

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Outside groups behind negative ad influx

August 31, 2016 adriana

Polls of Ohio residents found an overwhelming disgust this election season over negative campaigning.

Negativity in moderation in fact can be useful, said Travis Ridout, WSU professor of political science and co-director of the Wesleyan Media Project, which has tracked advertising in federal elections since 2010. “It helps voters draw a contrast between candidates. [But] for other people,” he said, “it can be demobilizing.”

Ridout, whose courses at WSU cover the use of media in political campaigns, said the crush of attack ads from outside groups forces candidates to fire back or risk losing ground. “You’re kind of in a vicious cycle of attack, attack, attack, which makes it even more negative,” he said.

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WHIO

Tasmanian devils evolve to resist deadly cancer

August 30, 2016 will.ferguson

Tasmanian devils are evolving in response to a highly lethal and contagious form of cancer, a Washington State University researcher has found.

Andrew Storfer, WSU professor of biology, and an international team of scientists discovered that two regions in the genomes of Australia’s iconic marsupials are changing in response to the rapid spread of devil facial tumor disease (DFTD), a nearly 100 percent fatal and transmissible cancer first detected in 1996.

The work, published today in Nature Communications, suggests some Tasmanian devil populations are evolving genetic resistance to DFTD that could help the species avoid extinction.

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Discover Magazine Blog

Why Clinton Is Hitting Trump on Outsourcing

August 26, 2016 adriana

It’s about something bigger than white working-class votes.

Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign has chosen a central line of attack for its commercials, recently flooding the airwaves with ads focused on her opponent’s outsourcing jobs to overseas countries.

“Some people might say that Donald Trump is looking out for the average guy,” says Travis Ridout, a political science professor who studies campaign advertising at Washington State University. “These ads make you stop and think. Is that really the case?”

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New Republic

Why These U.S. College Students Are Carrying Sex Toys On Campus

August 26, 2016 adriana

University of Texas students protesting the state’s new gun law—which allows anyone over 21 with a state-issued handgun license to carry a concealed gun on public school campuses—are using sex toys to make their point.

TV Reed, a WSU professor of English and American Studies who has studied culture in protest movements, said that while the protest effort “will be ridiculed by some,” it’s important to remember that “now-revered figures like Gandhi and Martin Luther King were also ridiculed for their symbolic protests.” And the approach is creating an easy entry point for students to get involved, he said.

“The protest is already successful because the amusing, theatrical plan has drawn far more attention to the issue of open carry than any letter to the editor or more conventional demonstration ever would,” Reed said.

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Refinery 29

PNNL gives students hands-on experience

August 26, 2016 will.ferguson

Many of us remember writing that dreaded essay about how we spent our summer vacation — often struggling to recall what we did or make it sound interesting.

That won’t be a problem for the almost 800 students at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory this summer.

Tenisha Meadows, a graduate student in chemistry at WSU, is working to understand conditions that affect the processing of legacy tank waste at places like Hanford. She is using a scientific measurement technique called spectroscopy to observe what is happening inside the tank. This data will improve predictions of when certain solids will form, which in turn helps us understand the correlation between material characteristics and process history.

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Tri-City Herald