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Ancient baby boom offers lessons in over-population

July 1, 2014

WSU scientists have sketched out one of the greatest baby booms in North American history, a centuries-long “growth blip” among southwestern Native Americans between 500 and 1300 A.D.

It was a time when the early features of civilization—including farming and food storage—had matured to a level where birth rates likely “exceeded the highest in the world today,” the researchers report in this week’s issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Then a crash followed, offering a warning sign to the modern world about the dangers of overpopulation, says Tim Kohler, professor of anthropology.

“We can learn lessons from these people,” says Kohler, who co-authored the paper with WSU researcher Kelsey Reese.

Representation in video games still falls short

June 14, 2014

When it comes to women, the video game industry still hasn’t quite figured it out.

This year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo or “E3,” the annual video game industry trade show, just wrapped up with its fair share of controversy. Ubisoft’s creative director, Alex Amancio, drew harsh criticism after stating that their latest “Assassin’s Creed” title’s co-op mode would not feature female assassins.

This is but one example of a much bigger problem in the industry as a whole.

A study of video games referenced by David Leonard, professor and chair of the Department of Critical Culture, Gender, and Race Studies at WSU, found that 64 percent of game characters were male, while 17 percent were female, fewer than even non-human characters, who came in at 19 percent. The majority of characters were white, and, of the black men seen, more than 80 percent of them showed up as competitors in sports-oriented games. Leonard found black women had an even narrower role: 90 percent of black female characters were props, bystanders or victims.

Some may argue that games are overwhelmingly white and male because studios are simply appealing to their target demographics; white males buy their games, so they need to target white male gamers. Except the demographics aren’t nearly as skewed in one particular direction.

Learn more about video game imbalance

A call for civility by candidates and supporters

June 13, 2014

Former Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed embodied the term “civility;” it is even included in the title of a professorship in Reed’s honor at Washington State University. Reed’s alma mater created an endowment to fund the Sam Reed Distinguished Professorship in Civic Education and Public Civility to honor Reed’s 12 years in statewide office, which came after stints as Thurston County auditor and assistant secretary of state.

Reed is a Republican who repeatedly won elections in Democratic-leaning Washington through moderate views and a fair, even-handed approach to his job. He concluded his tenure in 2012 with a statewide trek that he dubbed the “civility tour.” His message to local community leaders: When supporting candidates through endorsements or financial contributions, do so on the condition that they practice the values of civility, respect and bipartisanship. What was good advice in 2012 still stands in 2014.

A Booming Business: Using Jailed Migrants as a Pool of Cheap Labor

May 27, 2014

As the federal government cracks down on immigrants in the country illegally and forbids businesses to hire them, it is relying on tens of thousands of those immigrants each year to provide essential labor — usually for $1 a day or less — at the detention centers where they are held when caught by the authorities.

This work program is facing increasing resistance from detainees and criticism from immigrant advocates. In April, a lawsuit accused immigration authorities in Tacoma, Wash., of putting detainees in solitary confinement after they staged a work stoppage and hunger strike.

Detention centers are low-margin businesses, where every cent counts, said Clayton J. Mosher, professor of sociology at WSU Vancouver, who specializes in the economics of prisons. Two private prison companies, the Corrections Corporation of America and the GEO Group, control most of the immigrant detention market. Many such companies struggled in the late 1990s amid a glut of private prison construction, with more facilities built than could be filled, but a spike in immigrant detention after Sept. 11 helped revitalize the industry.

A new target for alcoholism treatment: Kappa opioid receptors

May 23, 2014

The list of brain receptor targets for opiates reads like a fraternity: Mu Delta Kappa. Until now, the mu opioid receptor received the most attention in alcoholism research.

A new study in Biological Psychiatry, led by Brendan Walker, WSU associate professor of psychology, used a rat model of alcohol dependence to directly investigate the kappa opioid receptor (KOR) system following chronic alcohol exposure and withdrawal. These findings provide researchers with a potentially successful path to developing new drugs for the treatment of alcoholism.