It didn’t take long for Katie Carlson’s sisterly instincts to kick in. It was the first preseason practice for the Northeastern University field hockey squad, and players were in the middle of an annual conditioning test that amounted to about 11 minutes of shuttling quickly back and forth across the new turf field at the […]

I floated my idea past several cycling advocates, who predictably agreed that more public awareness would be better. But Northeastern University professor Peter Furth, a specialist in urban transportation, offered another compelling suggestion. When Furth lived in the Netherlands, he had to obtain a Dutch driver’s license. Driver training is far more extensive there, costing the average […]

THE BOSTON mayoral hopefuls are busy attending forums on the issues that will face them if elected. Some have exhorted the candidates to direct attention to Boston’s supposed major problems — the lack of late-night commerce and access to liquor licenses, a limited innovation economy, and too stringent parking and housing space requirements. But many city residents […]

As the beginning of the semester rapidly approaches, the ProfHacker crew is busy polishing syllabi, hurriedly wrapping up summer research, and perhaps even taking some time to mentally recharge in preparation for students’ arrival. Here are some links selected with the new academic year in mind. If you teach in the humanities (or perhaps even […]

Noting that it’s difficult for businesses to generate buzz using social media merely by asking people to “like” their Facebook page, or follow them on Twitter, Victor Dweck saw an open opportunity to introduce a product that he says could change the way customers interact with establishments, while rewarding everyone involved. Using the app Dweck […]

This is something that generally gets overlooked when people whose names are synonymous with a company run into trouble. Their careers may be in tatters, but it’s the people who make and sell the products they’ve licensed that end up getting hurt. “If General Motors lays off 10,000 people everybody talks about the ripple effect,” […]

A series of educational programs for children sponsored by the town, the Northeastern University Marine Science Center, and Nahant Swim Inc. (Safer Waters in Massachusetts) kicked off an initiative aimed at encouraging and educating residents about recycling. “People don’t know what they can recycle,” said Vi Patek, Nahant Swim president, who said the organization plans […]

College students have more empathy for battered dogs than they do for battered human adults, according to a recent study. Puppies and human children, meanwhile, evoke equal levels of empathy. In a study of 240 students, most of whom were white and between the ages of 18 and 25, Northeastern University sociology professors Jack Levin […]

Led by the late Republican campaign operative Lee Atwater, Bush’s campaign seized on the case of Willie Horton, a convicted murder who was allowed out of prison on a weekend furlough designed to aid the reintegration process. While out, Horton raped a woman. The highlighting of the crime by Bush and his allies proved devastating […]

“The government has understood in the past that the airline industry may have been too competitive, resulting in a bankruptcy by almost every single major carrier, and so the government permitted some mergers,” said Harlan Platt, a finance professor at Northeastern University who specializes in airlines and corporate governance. “But eventually you get to the […]

A 2003 study by Northeastern University researchers James Alan Fox and Jack Levin found that only 3 to 4 percent of all acts of homicide involve multiple victims. It’s impossible to rule out that an ordinary person might someday commit extreme, irrational violence. But in most cases, a seemingly normal killer probably isn’t really as […]

News just in, guaranteed to stir smug nods from non-believers and incite irritation among the devout: intelligence correlates negatively with religious belief. You may have seen similar – or contradictory — reports in the past. That’s because scores of studies have asked if religiosity is associated with intelligence. But a just-published meta-analysis in Personality and Social Psychology Review considered […]