The Open University

Female doctors show more empathy, but at a cost to their mental well-being

24 April 2018

Female doctors show more empathy than male doctors. They ask their patients more questions, including questions about emotions and feelings, and they spend more time talking to patients than their male colleagues do. Some have suggested that this might make women better doctors. It may also take a terrible toll on their mental health. Studies […]

Sexual violence may be in the Hollywood spotlight, but there are limits to speaking out

3 March 2018

The entertainment award season hits its peak with the 90th Academy Awards – the Oscars – on March 4 2018. Since the public outing of Harvey Weinstein as a serial sexual abuser, award ceremonies have become spotlights to display solidarity and declare time on sexual harassment and gender inequalities in and beyond the film industry. […]

Why nutritional psychiatry is the future of mental health treatment

2 March 2018

A lack of essential nutrients is known to contribute to the onset of poor mental health in people suffering from anxiety and depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and ADHD. Nutritional psychiatry is a growing discipline that focuses on the use of food and supplements to provide these essential nutrients as part of an integrated or alternative […]

How gender equality can help fix the construction industry

26 January 2018

The government-commissioned Farmer Review warned in 2016 that the UK construction industry was “facing challenges that have not been seen before”. In no uncertain terms, it called for major industry-wide change. The “overwhelming risks” foreseen in the review sadly seem to have come to pass. Major contractor Carillion’s collapse comes shortly after an autumn in […]

A huge asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs, but what danger do smaller ones pose?

19 January 2018

A small asteroid passed relatively close to Earth this month, having been discovered just six days earlier. This might sound scary, but it’s unusual that such an object would actually collide with the Earth. Each year about 50,000 tonnes of extraterrestrial material (rocks and dust) hits our planet. This comes as tiny pieces – even […]

The biological reason why it’s so hard for teenagers to wake up early for school

15 January 2018

In societies the world over, teenagers are blamed for staying up late, then struggling to wake up in the morning. While it’s true that plenty of teenagers (like many adults) do have bad bedtime habits, researchers have long since proven that this global problem has a biological cause. In 2004, researchers at the University of […]

A glass of whisky could help you get your head around deep time

11 December 2017

The Scottish geologist James Hutton made a proposal in 1788 that, at the time, was extraordinarily controversial. He described Earth as a “beautiful machine”, constantly subjected to long-term decay and regeneration, that could only be understood over many millions of years. This may not sound that contentious, but the challenge this posed to humanity’s sense […]

Is Iceland’s tallest volcano awakening?

13 November 2017

Two women and a boy took refuge on the roof … but it was carried away by the deluge of water, and as far as the eye could reach, the three unfortunate persons were seen clinging to the roof. One of the women was afterwards found among the mud of the jökulhlaup [Icelandic term for […]

Blue Planet II academic consultants on the message that humanity cannot afford to ignore

31 October 2017

As expected, the first episode of Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet II has been greeted with rapturous applause. But alongside the gasps of delight at the beauty of the natural world, the programme came with an urgent message for viewers which we can no longer afford to ignore. Produced by the BBC’s Natural History Unit […]

Private companies are launching a new space race – here’s what to expect

4 October 2017

The space race between the USA and Russia started with a beep from the Sputnik satellite exactly 60 years ago (October 4, 1957) and ended with a handshake in space just 18 years later. The handshake was the start of many decades of international collaboration in space. But over the past decade there has been […]

OU News