Scientists have found new evidence that prenatal exposure to air pollution may cause congenital heart defects. However, inconsistencies with past results make the finding less than definitive, the researchers say.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Epidemiologist Pauline Mendola of the Environmental Protection Agency in Research Triangle Park, N.C., and her collaborators compared pollution statistics and records of births between 1997 and 2000 in seven Texas counties. The researchers focused on the quality of the air that women were breathing during their first 2 months of pregnancy, which a 2002 study in California had linked to certain congenital defects of the heart, lip, and palate.http://ljsheehan.livejournal.com
In Texas, women who'd been exposed early in their pregnancies to relatively high concentrations of carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, or particulate matter were more likely than other women to have babies with certain heart defects. As the California study had, the new report identified a tentative link between ozone exposure and defects in the pulmonary arteries, which connect the heart and lungs.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
By and large, however, the new study correlates different pollutants and heart defects than the California study did. Furthermore, pollutants don't appear to be associated with cleft lip or cleft palate, Mendola's team reports in the Aug. 1 American Journal of Epidemiology. "We did not find the same [associations] that they did in California, but we found other things," Mendola says.
Discrepancies aside, the new study strengthens the hypothesis that pollution and birth defects are linked, comments epidemiologist Gary M. Shaw of the California Birth Defects Monitoring Program in Berkeley, who participated in the earlier California study.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
marriage 5.mar.99 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. Marriage in 15th-century Florence was not about love. It was about money, property, class, political affiliations and family prestige. Marriages of the rich and powerful were celebrated by public displays of such opulence that sumptuary laws were enacted in the 1460s to ban their morally troubling excesses.
We learn this from “The Triumph of Marriage: Painted Cassoni of the Renaissance,” a beautiful, compact exhibition, accompanied by an excellent catalog, at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. The show displays 15 panels from 15th-century Florentine cassoni: elaborately painted and decorated marriage chests in which a bride’s trousseau was stowed and transported to her new home in an ostentatious nuptial parade.
Detached from their original housings by premodern art dealers and collectors, these long, horizontal panels are not the works of mere decorative arts craftsmen. Though not the greatest of Renaissance masterpieces, they are fully realized paintings by accomplished fine artists, qualities that tell you something about how much elite society invested in its matrimonial rituals.
Looking back at the cassone painting fad, the 16th-century art historian Giorgio Vasari said, “even the most excellent painters exercised themselves in such labors, without being ashamed, as many would be today, to paint and gild such things.” Botticelli and Uccello painted cassoni, though examples of their paintings are not included in this show, which was organized by Cristelle Baskins, an art historian at Tufts University, and Alan Chong, curator of the Gardner collection.
Cassone painters usually looked to antique literary and historical sources for their themes, and their works depicted allegorical processions recalling the triumphal parades of ancient Roman victors.
Cassone imagery was loaded with moral import, serving ostensibly to educate newlyweds — especially the bride — in their proper roles and behavior. Chastity, a frequent theme, is the subject of one of the show’s most beguiling works, “The Triumph of Venus.” Painted by a Florentine known as the Pseudo-Granacci in a sweet, pre-Raphaelite style, it shows Venus in a white dress enthroned on a parade float with Cupid, a blindfolded little boy with his arms tied behind his back, kneeling on a pedestal in front of her.
A pair of big white swans pulls the float leftward along a dirt road past rolling green hills as the three graces, symbolizing the wifely virtues of beauty, mirth and good cheer, assume their traditional nude poses to the right. With Cupid thus chastised, Venus ensures the rule of monogamous restraint.
Equally striking, though painted in a more primitive style, are a pair of panels by Francesco Pesellino representing the triumphs of love, chastity, death, fame, time and eternity in a sequence of crisp, glowingly hued allegorical visions. Based on a long poem by Petrarch, they show all the major issues with which the soul must contend on its earthly journey.
While narratives and symbols relating to love, chastity and the soul’s progress are obviously relevant to marriage, it is more puzzling that many cassone paintings depict triumphal military processions or historical battles. A painting in the show executed by an unknown Florentine in a Ucelloesque style portrays the army of Alfonso V of Aragon laying siege to Naples. With horses, soldiers, spears and ladders pointing every which way against the neatly constructed stone wall encircling the city, it is a wonderfully complicated and lively picture.
But why would such a scene decorate a marriage chest? Because, for the groom, securing a well-endowed wife was a kind of victory. In her informative, well-written catalog essay, Ms. Baskins quotes the art historian Brucia Witthoft: “The groom’s triumph is that of a war party, who succeeded in carrying off a bride and her possessions. The family’s triumph is the display of their wealth and power.” http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
From today’s perspective it is easy to feel indignant about this treatment of the bride as a pawn in dynastic power games. But there is a bigger picture, not taken up in the catalog. As Europe emerged from the medieval era, the main collective drive was to create order out of chaos. Passions and conflicts of all sorts had to be subdued in the interest of achieving a stable civilization. We may regret that the means were domineeringly and too often violently patriarchal, but marriage was a comparatively peaceful way to extend social and political stability.http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
Today militaristic triumphalism is not so popular. Given the giant consolidations of power brought to us by modernity, we tend to celebrate revolutions — preferably peaceful — by which repressive political, social and cultural regimes are overturned, and new freedoms are created. Under the aegis of romantic individualism, modern marriage (heterosexual, to be sure) favors the desires of the bride and groom over the interests of family and state. Love, as long as it lasts, conquers all. http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
We learn this from “The Triumph of Marriage: Painted Cassoni of the Renaissance,” a beautiful, compact exhibition, accompanied by an excellent catalog, at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. The show displays 15 panels from 15th-century Florentine cassoni: elaborately painted and decorated marriage chests in which a bride’s trousseau was stowed and transported to her new home in an ostentatious nuptial parade.
Detached from their original housings by premodern art dealers and collectors, these long, horizontal panels are not the works of mere decorative arts craftsmen. Though not the greatest of Renaissance masterpieces, they are fully realized paintings by accomplished fine artists, qualities that tell you something about how much elite society invested in its matrimonial rituals.
Looking back at the cassone painting fad, the 16th-century art historian Giorgio Vasari said, “even the most excellent painters exercised themselves in such labors, without being ashamed, as many would be today, to paint and gild such things.” Botticelli and Uccello painted cassoni, though examples of their paintings are not included in this show, which was organized by Cristelle Baskins, an art historian at Tufts University, and Alan Chong, curator of the Gardner collection.
Cassone painters usually looked to antique literary and historical sources for their themes, and their works depicted allegorical processions recalling the triumphal parades of ancient Roman victors.
Cassone imagery was loaded with moral import, serving ostensibly to educate newlyweds — especially the bride — in their proper roles and behavior. Chastity, a frequent theme, is the subject of one of the show’s most beguiling works, “The Triumph of Venus.” Painted by a Florentine known as the Pseudo-Granacci in a sweet, pre-Raphaelite style, it shows Venus in a white dress enthroned on a parade float with Cupid, a blindfolded little boy with his arms tied behind his back, kneeling on a pedestal in front of her.
A pair of big white swans pulls the float leftward along a dirt road past rolling green hills as the three graces, symbolizing the wifely virtues of beauty, mirth and good cheer, assume their traditional nude poses to the right. With Cupid thus chastised, Venus ensures the rule of monogamous restraint.
Equally striking, though painted in a more primitive style, are a pair of panels by Francesco Pesellino representing the triumphs of love, chastity, death, fame, time and eternity in a sequence of crisp, glowingly hued allegorical visions. Based on a long poem by Petrarch, they show all the major issues with which the soul must contend on its earthly journey.
While narratives and symbols relating to love, chastity and the soul’s progress are obviously relevant to marriage, it is more puzzling that many cassone paintings depict triumphal military processions or historical battles. A painting in the show executed by an unknown Florentine in a Ucelloesque style portrays the army of Alfonso V of Aragon laying siege to Naples. With horses, soldiers, spears and ladders pointing every which way against the neatly constructed stone wall encircling the city, it is a wonderfully complicated and lively picture.
But why would such a scene decorate a marriage chest? Because, for the groom, securing a well-endowed wife was a kind of victory. In her informative, well-written catalog essay, Ms. Baskins quotes the art historian Brucia Witthoft: “The groom’s triumph is that of a war party, who succeeded in carrying off a bride and her possessions. The family’s triumph is the display of their wealth and power.” http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
From today’s perspective it is easy to feel indignant about this treatment of the bride as a pawn in dynastic power games. But there is a bigger picture, not taken up in the catalog. As Europe emerged from the medieval era, the main collective drive was to create order out of chaos. Passions and conflicts of all sorts had to be subdued in the interest of achieving a stable civilization. We may regret that the means were domineeringly and too often violently patriarchal, but marriage was a comparatively peaceful way to extend social and political stability.http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
Today militaristic triumphalism is not so popular. Given the giant consolidations of power brought to us by modernity, we tend to celebrate revolutions — preferably peaceful — by which repressive political, social and cultural regimes are overturned, and new freedoms are created. Under the aegis of romantic individualism, modern marriage (heterosexual, to be sure) favors the desires of the bride and groom over the interests of family and state. Love, as long as it lasts, conquers all. http://Louis-j-sheehan.com
Thursday, December 25, 2008
neural 4.00 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The amygdala, an almond-shaped brain structure that plays an important role in evaluating the emotional significance of daily events, malfunctions in children with severe symptoms of either anxiety or depression, according to preliminary brain-scan data.http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
Compared with children who have no psychiatric ailments, youngsters with anxiety disorders display an exaggerated amygdala response to fearful faces, whereas depressed kids show a blunted amygdala reaction to the same faces, reports a team led by psychologist Kathleen M. Thomas of Weill Medical College of Cornell University in New York City.
These findings, which appear in the November Archives of General Psychiatry, follow reports of unusual amygdala activity in adults with anxiety or depression.
For instance, heightened amygdala activity occurs in people with post-traumatic stress disorder when they view upsetting images. Other reports find elevated amygdala activity in depressed adults at rest.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Some anxious and depressed kids may display different types of altered amygdala activity than their adult counterparts do, Thomas' group says.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
The researchers studied seven boys and five girls with severe anxiety or panic disorder, seven boys and five girls with no psychiatric disorder, and five girls with major depression. Participants, ages 8 to 16, underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging of their brains as they viewed pictures of scared-looking and neutral adult faces. This technology tracks changes in blood flow, an indirect reflection of brain-cell activity.
It's not clear whether the unusual amygdala responses reflect a biological vulnerability to childhood emotional disorders or instead develop as a consequence of severe anxiety or depression.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .
Compared with children who have no psychiatric ailments, youngsters with anxiety disorders display an exaggerated amygdala response to fearful faces, whereas depressed kids show a blunted amygdala reaction to the same faces, reports a team led by psychologist Kathleen M. Thomas of Weill Medical College of Cornell University in New York City.
These findings, which appear in the November Archives of General Psychiatry, follow reports of unusual amygdala activity in adults with anxiety or depression.
For instance, heightened amygdala activity occurs in people with post-traumatic stress disorder when they view upsetting images. Other reports find elevated amygdala activity in depressed adults at rest.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Some anxious and depressed kids may display different types of altered amygdala activity than their adult counterparts do, Thomas' group says.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
The researchers studied seven boys and five girls with severe anxiety or panic disorder, seven boys and five girls with no psychiatric disorder, and five girls with major depression. Participants, ages 8 to 16, underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging of their brains as they viewed pictures of scared-looking and neutral adult faces. This technology tracks changes in blood flow, an indirect reflection of brain-cell activity.
It's not clear whether the unusual amygdala responses reflect a biological vulnerability to childhood emotional disorders or instead develop as a consequence of severe anxiety or depression.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .
Monday, December 22, 2008
trek 5.tre.0030 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . Majel Barrett Roddenberry, an actress who was the widow of the “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry but who is probably best remembered as Nurse Chapel in the original “Star Trek” series, died Thursday at her home in Bel-Air. She was 76. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com
The cause was leukemia, a family spokesman, Sean Rossall, said.
Ms. Roddenberry was involved in the “Star Trek” universe for more than four decades. She played the dark-haired Number One in the original pilot then metamorphosed into the blond, miniskirted Nurse Christine Chapel in the original show, which ran from 1966 to 1969. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com
The character had abandoned a career in bio-research to join the starship Enterprise under the command of Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) in the hope of reuniting with a fiancé who had gone missing in deep space. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com She served as the loyal head nurse under the chief medical officer, Dr. Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley) and harbored an unrequited infatuation with the first science officer, Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy).
Ms. Roddenberry had smaller roles in all five television successors of the original series and in many of the “Star Trek” movie incarnations.
She was frequently the voice of the ship’s computer, and about two weeks ago she completed the same role for the forthcoming J.J. Abrams movie “Star Trek,” Mr. Rossall said. She was a regular participant at “Star Trek” conventions for fans.
Ms. Roddenberry was also the executive producer for two other television science fiction series, “Andromeda” and “Earth: Final Conflict.”
Majel Lee Hudec was born on Feb. 23, 1932, in Cleveland. After a number of stage roles she earned small parts during the late 1950s and ’60s in movies and in television series like “Leave It to Beaver” and “Bonanza.”
She met her husband in 1964 during a guest role for a Marine Corps drama he produced called “The Lieutenant.” They married in Japan in 1969 after “Star Trek” was canceled. Mr. Roddenberry died in 1991.
Ms. Roddenberry’s survivors include her son, Eugene Jr.
The cause was leukemia, a family spokesman, Sean Rossall, said.
Ms. Roddenberry was involved in the “Star Trek” universe for more than four decades. She played the dark-haired Number One in the original pilot then metamorphosed into the blond, miniskirted Nurse Christine Chapel in the original show, which ran from 1966 to 1969. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com
The character had abandoned a career in bio-research to join the starship Enterprise under the command of Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) in the hope of reuniting with a fiancé who had gone missing in deep space. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com She served as the loyal head nurse under the chief medical officer, Dr. Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley) and harbored an unrequited infatuation with the first science officer, Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy).
Ms. Roddenberry had smaller roles in all five television successors of the original series and in many of the “Star Trek” movie incarnations.
She was frequently the voice of the ship’s computer, and about two weeks ago she completed the same role for the forthcoming J.J. Abrams movie “Star Trek,” Mr. Rossall said. She was a regular participant at “Star Trek” conventions for fans.
Ms. Roddenberry was also the executive producer for two other television science fiction series, “Andromeda” and “Earth: Final Conflict.”
Majel Lee Hudec was born on Feb. 23, 1932, in Cleveland. After a number of stage roles she earned small parts during the late 1950s and ’60s in movies and in television series like “Leave It to Beaver” and “Bonanza.”
She met her husband in 1964 during a guest role for a Marine Corps drama he produced called “The Lieutenant.” They married in Japan in 1969 after “Star Trek” was canceled. Mr. Roddenberry died in 1991.
Ms. Roddenberry’s survivors include her son, Eugene Jr.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
killer 6.kil.0002 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. Earth's rising temperatures may be a precipitating factor in the extinctions of dozens of tropical frog species, according to new research.http://louis4j4sheehan4.blogspot.com
At least 110 species of harlequin frogs once lived in Central and South America, but two-thirds of them went extinct in the past 2 decades. Scientists have puzzled over these and other amphibian disappearances in seemingly pristine areas. http://louis5j5sheehan5.blogspot.com
Years ago, scientists found that chytrid fungus (Batrachozchytrium dendrobatidis) had infected many dead frogs found in tropical regions (SN: 2/26/00, p. 133: http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20000226/fob3.asp). In a new study, J. Alan Pounds of the Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve in Costa Rica and his colleagues propose that global warming could be promoting the fungus' growth. http://louis4j4sheehan4.blogspot.com
Pounds' team matched records of air and sea-surface temperatures with data on frog disappearances. The researchers found that species tended to vanish during years with the warmest average temperatures.
Warm periods enhance cloud formation over the tropics, which makes days cooler and nights warmer. Temperatures thus stay in the narrow range in which the fungus thrives, which could explain massive amphibian die-offs, says Pounds.
At least 110 species of harlequin frogs once lived in Central and South America, but two-thirds of them went extinct in the past 2 decades. Scientists have puzzled over these and other amphibian disappearances in seemingly pristine areas. http://louis5j5sheehan5.blogspot.com
Years ago, scientists found that chytrid fungus (Batrachozchytrium dendrobatidis) had infected many dead frogs found in tropical regions (SN: 2/26/00, p. 133: http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20000226/fob3.asp). In a new study, J. Alan Pounds of the Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve in Costa Rica and his colleagues propose that global warming could be promoting the fungus' growth. http://louis4j4sheehan4.blogspot.com
Pounds' team matched records of air and sea-surface temperatures with data on frog disappearances. The researchers found that species tended to vanish during years with the warmest average temperatures.
Warm periods enhance cloud formation over the tropics, which makes days cooler and nights warmer. Temperatures thus stay in the narrow range in which the fungus thrives, which could explain massive amphibian die-offs, says Pounds.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
penguin 77.pen.10009 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The eating habits of Adélie penguins in Antarctica changed significantly about 200 years ago, according to chemical analyses of the birds' eggshells. Scientists attribute the shift in diet to whaling and other hunting in the region.
The ratios of carbon and nitrogen isotopes in an animal's tissues—including bones and eggshells—can provide a wealth of information about its eating habits, says Steven D. Emslie, a paleontologist at the University of North Carolina in Wilmington. Recently, he and William P. Patterson, a geochemist at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, looked at the chemical composition of Adélie penguin eggshells laid during the past 38,000 years to see whether the birds' dietary habits had changed.http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Surprisingly, says Emslie, climate change 10,000 years ago, at the end of the latest ice age, didn't significantly affect the birds' diet. In the past 200 years, however, the chemical composition of the penguins' eggshells made a dramatic shift to lighter isotopes of carbon and nitrogen. Because animals higher in a food chain hold greater concentrations of heavy isotopes, the change is clear evidence that the penguins' diet shifted from primarily fish to prey such as krill.
The dietary change boils down to the availability of prey, Emslie and Patterson speculate in the July 10 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. During the 19th century, the population of krill in southern seas exploded after Antarctic fur seals, prodigious consumers of krill, were hunted nearly to extinction. That slaughter, followed by widespread killing of krill-eating whales during the 20th century, enabled the tiny crustaceans to proliferate nearly unchecked, says Emslie.
"It's rare to see such catastrophic changes [in diet] in such a short period," says Keith A. Hobson, an ecologist at Environment Canada in Saskatoon. The changes "point to a large shift in the ecosystem," he notes. Even so, Hobson adds, it's not clear why abundant krill would cause penguins to suddenly shift from fish to what had previously been a secondary food source. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
The team's results are "very compelling evidence of a terrific change" in penguin diet, says Charles H. Peterson, a marine ecologist at the University of North Carolina's Institute of Marine Sciences at Morehead City. "It's a cosmic irony of food-web ecology that a rare species is only rare because it's kept in check by predators," he adds. "Maybe krill was one of [the penguins'] favorite foods all along."
Modern-day fishing around Antarctica has depleted fish stocks there. Meanwhile, krill populations have declined as much as 80 percent in the past 2 decades. Understanding why penguin diets changed 2 centuries ago may be vital for their future survival, says Emslie. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The ratios of carbon and nitrogen isotopes in an animal's tissues—including bones and eggshells—can provide a wealth of information about its eating habits, says Steven D. Emslie, a paleontologist at the University of North Carolina in Wilmington. Recently, he and William P. Patterson, a geochemist at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, looked at the chemical composition of Adélie penguin eggshells laid during the past 38,000 years to see whether the birds' dietary habits had changed.http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Surprisingly, says Emslie, climate change 10,000 years ago, at the end of the latest ice age, didn't significantly affect the birds' diet. In the past 200 years, however, the chemical composition of the penguins' eggshells made a dramatic shift to lighter isotopes of carbon and nitrogen. Because animals higher in a food chain hold greater concentrations of heavy isotopes, the change is clear evidence that the penguins' diet shifted from primarily fish to prey such as krill.
The dietary change boils down to the availability of prey, Emslie and Patterson speculate in the July 10 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. During the 19th century, the population of krill in southern seas exploded after Antarctic fur seals, prodigious consumers of krill, were hunted nearly to extinction. That slaughter, followed by widespread killing of krill-eating whales during the 20th century, enabled the tiny crustaceans to proliferate nearly unchecked, says Emslie.
"It's rare to see such catastrophic changes [in diet] in such a short period," says Keith A. Hobson, an ecologist at Environment Canada in Saskatoon. The changes "point to a large shift in the ecosystem," he notes. Even so, Hobson adds, it's not clear why abundant krill would cause penguins to suddenly shift from fish to what had previously been a secondary food source. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
The team's results are "very compelling evidence of a terrific change" in penguin diet, says Charles H. Peterson, a marine ecologist at the University of North Carolina's Institute of Marine Sciences at Morehead City. "It's a cosmic irony of food-web ecology that a rare species is only rare because it's kept in check by predators," he adds. "Maybe krill was one of [the penguins'] favorite foods all along."
Modern-day fishing around Antarctica has depleted fish stocks there. Meanwhile, krill populations have declined as much as 80 percent in the past 2 decades. Understanding why penguin diets changed 2 centuries ago may be vital for their future survival, says Emslie. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
isolated 9.iso.009 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Boot up, log on, and tune out. That's the mantra of a small but rapidly growing number of Internet users, according to a controversial national survey released last week. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
People who spend 10 or more hours per week on the Internet substantially cut down the amount of time they devote to talking with friends and family, both in person and by telephone, say two Stanford University political scientists.
"The more hours people use the Internet, the less time they spend with real human beings," contends Norman H. Nie, who directed the survey with his colleague Lutz Erbring. "The Internet could be the ultimate isolating technology that reduces our participation in communities even more than television did." http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Only 15 percent of people surveyed qualified as heavy Internet users, roaming the Web at least 10 hours per week. However, the proportion of heavy users is steadily growing, Nie asserts.
About 55 percent of the population now has access to the Internet, the survey finds. Regular Internet users, who log on for at least 5 hours per week, accounted for 36 percent of people surveyed.
Other findings include:
* One-quarter of regular Internet users say that Web activities had reduced their time talking with friends and family, as well as time spent attending events outside the home.
* One-quarter of the regular Internet users who are employed say that the Web had increased the amount of time they worked at home, without diminishing their office work.
* Sixty percent of regular Internet users say that they had reduced their television viewing, and one-third allot less time to reading newspapers.
* The lowest rates of Internet use occur among the least educated and oldest people, although those with Internet access use the Web much as others do.
* The most common Internet activities are sending and receiving electronic mail and searching for information. About one-quarter of Internet users say that they have made an online purchase. Only 10 percent participate in online stock trading, banking, or auctions.
The survey consisted of a representative national sample of 4,113 adults in 2,689 households. It was conducted by the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society and InterSurvey, a company cofounded by Nie and partly funded by Stanford. Survey data are available at http://www.stanford.edu/group/siqss/.
The researchers provided free Web TVs to people who agreed to answer the surveys, which they received and returned through the devices supplied.
Nie's emphasis on social isolation recalls an earlier study in which depression and loneliness rose among new Internet users (SN: 9/12/98, p. 168). Other data, however, suggest that membership in online groups benefits some people (SN: 10/17/98, p. 245: http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc98/10_17_98/fob4.htm). http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Social isolation may have escalated in the small proportion of heavy Internet users surveyed, but that doesn't mean that future heavy users will respond in the same way, comments sociologist Lee Sproull of New York University.
Those currently employing the Internet for more than 10 hours per week are—as the new survey finds—highly educated and relatively affluent, and they often use the Web at home to do projects for their work, Sproull holds. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Nie and Erbring didn't examine whether employers have exploited the Web to extract more labor from their employees, she says. Hours spent working at home may promote isolation more than inherent qualities of Internet use, she asserts.
Changes in computer technology over the next decade will affect social interaction in ways that no one can foretell, Sproull says.
People who spend 10 or more hours per week on the Internet substantially cut down the amount of time they devote to talking with friends and family, both in person and by telephone, say two Stanford University political scientists.
"The more hours people use the Internet, the less time they spend with real human beings," contends Norman H. Nie, who directed the survey with his colleague Lutz Erbring. "The Internet could be the ultimate isolating technology that reduces our participation in communities even more than television did." http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Only 15 percent of people surveyed qualified as heavy Internet users, roaming the Web at least 10 hours per week. However, the proportion of heavy users is steadily growing, Nie asserts.
About 55 percent of the population now has access to the Internet, the survey finds. Regular Internet users, who log on for at least 5 hours per week, accounted for 36 percent of people surveyed.
Other findings include:
* One-quarter of regular Internet users say that Web activities had reduced their time talking with friends and family, as well as time spent attending events outside the home.
* One-quarter of the regular Internet users who are employed say that the Web had increased the amount of time they worked at home, without diminishing their office work.
* Sixty percent of regular Internet users say that they had reduced their television viewing, and one-third allot less time to reading newspapers.
* The lowest rates of Internet use occur among the least educated and oldest people, although those with Internet access use the Web much as others do.
* The most common Internet activities are sending and receiving electronic mail and searching for information. About one-quarter of Internet users say that they have made an online purchase. Only 10 percent participate in online stock trading, banking, or auctions.
The survey consisted of a representative national sample of 4,113 adults in 2,689 households. It was conducted by the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society and InterSurvey, a company cofounded by Nie and partly funded by Stanford. Survey data are available at http://www.stanford.edu/group/siqss/.
The researchers provided free Web TVs to people who agreed to answer the surveys, which they received and returned through the devices supplied.
Nie's emphasis on social isolation recalls an earlier study in which depression and loneliness rose among new Internet users (SN: 9/12/98, p. 168). Other data, however, suggest that membership in online groups benefits some people (SN: 10/17/98, p. 245: http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc98/10_17_98/fob4.htm). http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Social isolation may have escalated in the small proportion of heavy Internet users surveyed, but that doesn't mean that future heavy users will respond in the same way, comments sociologist Lee Sproull of New York University.
Those currently employing the Internet for more than 10 hours per week are—as the new survey finds—highly educated and relatively affluent, and they often use the Web at home to do projects for their work, Sproull holds. http://louis_j_sheehan.today.com/
Nie and Erbring didn't examine whether employers have exploited the Web to extract more labor from their employees, she says. Hours spent working at home may promote isolation more than inherent qualities of Internet use, she asserts.
Changes in computer technology over the next decade will affect social interaction in ways that no one can foretell, Sproull says.
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