News by Subject Social & Behavior

A global study has found a paradox: our water supplies are shrinking at the same time as climate change is generating more intense rain. And the culprit is the drying of soils, say researchers, pointing to a world where drought-like conditions will become the new normal, especially in regions that are already dry.

Excess body weight accounted for approximately 3.9 percent of all cancers worldwide in 2012, a figure that is expected to rise in the coming decades given current trends.

While nearly all neighborhoods in Chicago benefited from reductions in homicide, relative inequality in crime between the city's safest and most dangerous neighborhoods actually increased by 10 percent over recent years, according to a new Northwestern University study.

The future of the US Interstate Highway System is threatened by a persistent and growing backlog of structural and operational deficiencies and by various looming challenges, such as the progress of automated vehicles, developments in electric vehicles, and vulnerabilities due to climate change.

Laws to ban or curb drivers' use of cell phones and other handheld devices have greatly reduced the rate of fatalities for motorcyclists, according to a new study from Florida Atlantic University and the University of Miami. Results show that states with moderate to strong bans have motorcycle fatality rates that differ by as much as 11 percent compared to states with no bans.

Human habitat modification is favoring the same species everywhere, while unique species are disappearing, finds a study publishing on Dec. 4 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology, led by Tim Newbold at University College London and Andy Purvis at the Natural History Museum in London.