This piece was initially published on Storybench, a cookbook for digital storytelling. Storybench is a collaboration between Northeastern University’s Media Innovation program, a new graduate degree in digital journalism, and Esquire magazine. Since the latest wunderkind app Periscope, which allows anyone with a smartphone to easily live-stream video to followers, hit smartphones in March, media […]

Mass shootings appear to be on the rise across the country, according to researchers at Harvard University and Northeastern University, who found that such an incident — with four or more victims — occurred on average every 64 days in the two years leading up to September 2013. In the 29 years before that, they […]

According to F.B.I. statistics, only a small minority of the people who commit hate crimes are affiliated with an intolerant group. Jack McDevitt, a criminologist at Northeastern University who studies hate crimes, thinks that Hicks’s act should be classified as one. “With hate crimes, it’s not always an either/or,” he said. “You can decide you […]

As with many others who commit massacres, it is not a matter of psychotic thinking and a sudden eruption of rage at victims, this time six women and three men, chosen randomly, but a deliberate, methodical design to exact revenge on a class of people whom the shooter sees as responsible for his own disappointments. […]

“What we could be seeing are some copycats being inspired by each other. There are certainly some similarities in these cases,” said terror expert and Northeastern University professor Max Abrahms, referring to the recent alleged plot in Boston to behead cops. Usaamah Rahim of Roslindale was shot dead after authorities say he lunged at police […]

Only the gunman knows for sure why he chose Emanuel for the deadly outburst. Jack Levin, co-director of Northeastern University’s Brudnick Center on Violence and Conflict, and the author of several books on hate crimes and mass murder, speculated that the shooter knew that a black church would be a place that offered a large […]

Massachusetts employers, meanwhile, added 7,400 jobs in May, the ninth consecutive month of payroll gains for the state. During the past year, the state’s economy has created more than 70,000 jobs, the strongest job growth since the dot-com boom at the beginning of the century. “Another month, another good employment report,” said Alan Clayton-Matthews, a […]

Jef Aérosol’s stay at Northeastern University has been full of pleasant surprises. In addition to the large mural he was commissioned to spray paint on the side of Cargill Hall facing Huntington Avenue, small renditions of the French artist’s signature stencil graffiti have been popping up all over campus, to be uncovered by passersby in chance […]

Behavioral studies have shown similar findings. For example, in a study conducted by Paul Condon and Dave DeSteno of Northeastern University, and Gaelle Desbordes of Massachusetts General Hospital, the research team sent a group of people to an eight-week mindfulness training course. Afterwards, they tested the people who received the mindfulness training versus people who […]

WGBH Legal Analyst Daniel Medwed, a Northeastern University Law Professor, discusses juvenile murder suspects being charged as adults in Massachusetts with WGBH Morning Edition host Bob Seay.

Veteran business journalist Jonathan Kaufman will be the next director of Northeastern University’s School of Journalism, the college announced Tuesday. Kaufman, the Bloomberg News executive editor, will begin July 13. He will oversee a team of faculty who teach 225 undergraduate journalism students as well as growing graduate programs. He succeeds associate professor Dan Kennedy, […]

Interestingly, research by Northeastern University scholars Jack McDevitt and Jack Levin, show that most perpetrators are young males with shallow prejudices out for a thrill, rather than hardened bigots like Cobb.