It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, October 25, 2026
Has a US anti-poverty program negatively affected some children’s development?
As part of US welfare reforms in the 1990s to provide adequate financial support to low-income families while avoiding disincentivizing work, policymakers expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). This change encouraged people to work more by giving greater benefits with greater earned income, and single mothers faced stronger incentives to enter the workforce than married mothers. An analysis in Contemporary Economic Policy indicates that the EITC expansion may have had unintended negative effects on the development of single mothers' children.
Based on mother–child survey data from 1990–1996, the study found that following the EITC expansion, children of single mothers experienced a decline of 0.14 standard deviations in combined math and reading test scores relative to children of married mothers, as well as a decline of 0.68 standard deviations in early motor and social development among young children, although this latter estimate is based on a smaller sample and should be interpreted with caution.
Increased employment among single mothers was accompanied by reduced cognitive stimulation at home and fewer time-intensive parental interactions for their children, relative to children of married mothers, suggesting that reduced caregiver–child connections may have contributed to these effects.
"For low-income single mothers, a key group targeted by pro-work welfare programs, the effects of reduced time with their children as they work more may outweigh the benefits of increased income for children's development, at least in the short run," said author Jeehyun Ko, PhD, of the Korea Institute of Public Finance. "Pairing work incentives with affordable, high-quality childcare could help these families strike a better balance between work and time with their children.”
Additional Information NOTE: The information contained in this release is protected by copyright. Please include journal attribution in all coverage. For more information or to obtain a PDF of any study, please contact: Sara Henning-Stout, newsroom@wiley.com.
About the Journal First published in 1982, Contemporary Economic Policy publishes scholarly research and analysis on important policy issues facing society. The journal provides insight into the complexity of policy decisions and communicates evidence-based solutions in a form accessible to economists and policy makers. Contemporary Economic Policy provides a forum for debate by enhancing our understanding of key issues and methods used for policy analysis.
About Wiley Wiley is a global leader in authoritative content and research intelligence for the advancement of scientific discovery, innovation, and learning. With more than 200 years at the center of the scholarly ecosystem, Wiley combines trusted publishing heritage with AI-powered platforms to transform how knowledge is discovered, accessed, and applied. From individual researchers and students to Fortune 500 R&D teams, Wiley enables the transformation of scientific breakthroughs into real-world impact. From knowledge to impact—Wiley is redefining what's possible in science and learning. Visit us at Wiley.com and Investors.Wiley.com. Follow us on Facebook, X, LinkedIn and Instagram.
Women with postpartum psychosis are making repeated pleas for help before receiving a diagnosis, with the first Australian study of their help-seeking experiences finding many contacted health services an average of seven times before getting the care they needed.
As global attention continues to focus on the Lindsay Clancy case and broader conversations about maternal mental health, researchers from Flinders University say their findings reveal a critical gap between women recognising something is seriously wrong and the healthcare system recognising they were suffering from postpartum psychosis, a psychiatric emergency.
Researchers interviewed 15 Australian women diagnosed with postpartum psychosis and found many felt their concerns were dismissed, misunderstood or attributed to more common post-birth experiences such as exhaustion, sleep deprivation, anxiety, or the "baby blues".
Although rare, postpartum psychosis is the most severe mental illness associated with childbirth and can develop suddenly in the days or weeks after birth. Symptoms may include hallucinations, delusions, mania, depression, paranoia and severe sleep disturbance, requiring urgent treatment. An estimated 300 to 600 Australian women experience the condition each year.
Women in the study often recognised that something was seriously wrong and actively sought help, yet many experienced lengthy delays before receiving an accurate diagnosis. Participants reported a median of seven contacts with healthcare services while seeking support.
Lead author and Flinders University PhD candidate Donna McMahon says one of the study's most important findings was that women were not concealing their symptoms.
"One of the strongest messages from this study is that these women are asking for help, and many know something is profoundly wrong, even when they cannot find the words to explain it," says Ms McMahon from Flinders University's College of Human Sciences and Culture.
"They were not avoiding care. They were actively seeking it."
Many participants described feeling unheard, with hallucinations, manic behaviour and severe sleep disturbance sometimes overlooked or not fully investigated.
Ms McMahon, whose doctoral research focuses on improving the detection and identification of postpartum psychosis, says the findings highlight opportunities for earlier recognition across maternity, primary care and emergency settings.
"While postpartum psychosis is treatable and many women make a full recovery, early recognition is critical, as delays in diagnosis can have serious consequences for mothers and their families," she says.
"When women tell us something is not right, particularly in the days and weeks after birth, we need to listen carefully and investigate thoroughly. Their own insight may be one of the earliest warning signs."
The study also highlights the emotional toll of delayed diagnosis. Women described losing confidence in their own judgement, feeling disconnected from the healthcare system and, in some cases, becoming reluctant to seek further help after their concerns were dismissed.
"The findings highlight the need for greater professional awareness of postpartum psychosis, timely and thorough assessment, and healthcare responses that recognise and validate women's lived realities," Ms McMahon says.
"Improving outcomes requires professionals who listen to women's accounts, respond appropriately, and see women as experts in their own experiences."
She says the consequences of delayed recognition can extend beyond the mother.
"When postpartum psychosis is not recognised quickly, the impacts can affect the entire family and their communities.
"It can increase distress for mothers, place enormous strain on partners and loved ones, disrupt the important early bonding period between mother and baby, and in severe cases, contribute to an increased risk of suicide and infanticide"
"Our research shows there is a critical period where women are reaching out for help but are too often not being heard. Healthcare providers need to be actively listening and responding to mothers at that time," says Ms McMahon.
"By recognising and validating those experiences, we have an opportunity to improve outcomes for mothers, babies and families."
If you or someone you know is experiencing severe mental health symptoms during pregnancy or after childbirth, including thoughts of self-harm, suicide or harm to a baby, seek urgent medical attention. Contact a healthcare professional, local mental health crisis service or emergency services in your country immediately.
In an interview-based study in the Journal of Advanced Nursingincluding 15 Australian women diagnosed with postpartum psychosis over the past 10 years, women reported that they made multiple attempts to seek medical help and support, yet they encountered delayed recognition, inadequate assessment and, at times, dismissal or minimization of their concerns.
Postpartum psychosis, which typically arises within the first 2 weeks after childbirth, can cause various symptoms, but episodes commonly present with acute mania, depression, and delusions and/or hallucinations, as well as sleep disturbances, abnormal thought content, irritability, mood swings, paranoia, restlessness, and catatonia.
The women’s negative experiences with obtaining care were particularly significant during the critical early period of illness, when they were actively seeking help, but their symptoms were often dismissed and/or misattributed to more common postpartum experiences such as anxiety, sleep deprivation, or the “baby blues.”
“The findings highlight the need for greater professional awareness of postpartum psychosis, timely and thorough assessment, and healthcare responses that recognize and validate women’s lived realities,” said corresponding author Donna McMahon, a PhD candidate at Flinders University. “Improving outcomes requires professionals who listen to women’s accounts, respond appropriately, and see women as experts in their own experiences.”
Additional Information NOTE: The information contained in this release is protected by copyright. Please include journal attribution in all coverage. For more information or to obtain a PDF of any study, please contact: Sara Henning-Stout, newsroom@wiley.com.
About the Journal TheJournal of Advanced Nursing is a world-leading nursing journal that contributes to the advancement of evidence-based nursing, midwifery and healthcare by disseminating research scholarship of contemporary relevance and with potential to advance knowledge for practice, education, management or policy.
About Wiley Wiley is a global leader in authoritative content and research intelligence for the advancement of scientific discovery, innovation, and learning. With more than 200 years at the center of the scholarly ecosystem, Wiley combines trusted publishing heritage with AI-powered platforms to transform how knowledge is discovered, accessed, and applied. From individual researchers and students to Fortune 500 R&D teams, Wiley enables the transformation of scientific breakthroughs into real-world impact. From knowledge to impact—Wiley is redefining what's possible in science and learning. Visit us at Wiley.com and Investors.Wiley.com. Follow us on Facebook, X, LinkedIn and Instagram.
Reindeer grazing changes the vegetation of northern pine forests below ground as well as above it. In a recent study in Finland, trees and understorey vegetation in grazed forests had nearly 30% less shallow-root biomass than those in ungrazed areas. Root structure also changed, which may affect the ability of plants to take up water and nutrients.
Changes in pine-forest root systems associated with reindeer grazing may affect forest carbon and nutrient cycling. The impacts could be significant across reindeer-grazed boreal forests worldwide, which store around one third of the Earth’s carbon, with more than half of that carbon located in soils.
The researchers collected and compared soil samples from dry pine forests in Angeli, Raja-Jooseppi and Kätkäsuvantoin Finland. The sites were either grazed by reindeer or had been fenced to exclude reindeer grazing for 50–100 years.
The study showed that reindeer grazing reduces the quantity of tree and understorey roots particularly in the uppermost 0–5 cm of soil, where most root biomass is found.
Root abundance is influenced by the quantity and composition of vegetation as well as soil temperature. In the pine forests studied, reindeer grazing had thinned the insulating lichen cover, exposing the soil to greater temperature fluctuations. In reindeer-grazed areas, winter soil temperatures were well below freezing, reaching as low as -10°C, compared with ungrazed areas, where the minimum temperature only rarely reached -5°C.
“Winter cold and frost damage in particular may help explain the reduced amount of roots in reindeer-grazed areas. Mechanical disturbance caused by reindeer, such as trampling, may also contribute to the reduction in roots,” says Postdoctoral Researcher Maria Väisänen of the Water, Energy and Environmental Engineering Research Unit at the University of Oulu, Finland.
The study also found that reindeer grazing changes roots, making them shorter, thicker and less branched. “The changes indicate reduced exploration for nutrients and water, as the roots became structurally less exploratory,” Väisänen says. The change may result either from root plasticity or from shifts in plant species composition. Reindeer grazing reduced both crowberry and lingonberry, which have thin and highly branched roots.
Roots take up nutrients and water and contribute carbon-rich root litter and root exudates to the soil. The amount, structure and location of roots in the soil play a central role in soil nutrient and carbon cycling.
In northern coniferous forests, roots are an essential pathway for transferring carbon from plants into the soil. Roots are estimated to account for 50–70% of the carbon entering the soil. Living roots release carbon compounds into the soil, which can stimulate microbial decomposition and the release of carbon into the atmosphere. Dead roots, in turn, form root litter in which carbon can be stored in the soil for long periods.
How was the study conducted?
The soil samples were divided into five-centimetre sections down to a depth of 25 cm. Fine and coarse roots were separated from the samples by washing, and their total amount was weighed. Fine roots were also classified according to root length, diameter and branching. The researchers also measured lichen-layer thickness, dwarf-shrub abundance, and soil temperature and moisture at the study sites.
The project was led by a research group at Umeå University, Sweden, and forms part of Johannes Cunow’s doctoral research. The University of Oulu, Finland participated in the project as a research partner.
Over the past 30 years, Swiss barn owls have become more reddish-brown and more heavily spotted. By analysing the genomes of more than 3,000 birds, scientists at the University of Lausanne identified the genetic variants linked to these changes in plumage and revealed natural selection at work. Their findings, published in Nature Communications, show that evolution can happen rapidly in the wild.
From pure white to deep reddish-brown through all variations of golden brown, barn owl plumage varies remarkably from one bird to another. Some owls have only a few faint dark spots on their chest, while others display many more, much bolder markings.
Research at the University of Lausanne (Unil) has shown that these features are more than cosmetic. Plumage colour is linked to fertility and hunting strategies, and therefore to diet. White barn owls, for example, use moonlight to their advantage when attacking prey (see this news, in French). Spotting, meanwhile, is associated with immunity and the ability to cope with stress. Birds with large black spots appear to withstand certain stressful conditions, such as food shortages or parasites, more successfully.
Plumage is evolving
This diversity is not fixed. A study led by Tristan Cumer, a research fellow in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at Unil’s Faculty of Biology and Medicine, in the team of ProfessorJérôme Goudet, shows that Swiss barn owls have gradually become more reddish-brown and more heavily spotted over the past 30 years. The findings were recently published in Nature Communications.
“Drawing on the exceptional volume of data collected by Alexandre Roulin and his group, who have monitored these birds of prey in the field for decades, we were able to sequence the complete genomes of more than 3,000 owls and identify the DNA variants associated with colour and spotting. This is one of the most in-depth genetic analyses ever conducted on a wild population,” says Jérôme Goudet, last author of the study, also affiliated with the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics.
The scientists pinpointed genetic regions that play a major role in the birds’ appearance. These include MC1R, a gene already known to affect pigmentation, and a region on a sex chromosome whose contribution to colour and spotting the researchers were able to clarify.
“This is one of the most in-depth genetic analyses ever conducted on a wild population.” Prof. Jérôme Goudet, Department of Ecology and Evolution, Unil
Natural selection in action
The move towards redder, more heavily spotted plumage is not simply due to chance. By examining how genetic variants associated with colour and spotting became more or less common over time, the Unil biologists detected the effects of natural selection. “We compared the changes observed in the population with simulations in which evolution was entirely random. A genetic variant associated with reddish-brown plumage became far more common than chance alone could explain. Only simulations that included natural selection reproduced the changes we observed,” explains Tristan Cumer, first author of the paper. “Conducted in collaboration with the Swiss Ornithological Institute in Sempach, this study is one of the rare cases in which the genetic basis of recent evolution has been traced with such precision in the wild. This kind of demonstration is much harder in animals living in their natural environment than in a laboratory,” adds Jérôme Goudet.
“A genetic variant associated with reddish-brown plumage became far more common than chance alone could explain. Only simulations that included natural selection reproduced the changes we observed.” Dr Tristan Cumer, Department of Ecology and Evolution, Unil
One essential question remains: why are barn owls becoming redder and more heavily spotted? Although the study clarifies the genetic basis of this evolution, the factors driving it have yet to be identified. Alexandre Roulin, professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution and a co-author of the study, suggests several possibilities: “A change in prey availability may have favoured reddish-brown barn owls, which eat more voles, whereas white owls tend to feed more on wood mice. The increase in spotting could be linked to greater environmental stress. Despite the striking differences in colour between individuals, it remains extremely difficult to determine which ecological factors explain these variations.”
“We also do not know whether plumage colour is itself the trait directly favoured by natural selection,” says Jérôme Goudet. “MC1R plays a role in pigmentation, but it is part of the melanocortin system, which has also been linked to other traits, including stress responses and aggression. Selection may therefore be acting on one of these traits, with the change in the owls’ appearance simply arising as a consequence.”
A long-term collective effort
The findings are part of a research programme led by Jérôme Goudet and his team for almost a decade. Their goal is to decode the barn owl genome and establish the species as a model for studying evolution in the wild. The researchers have sequenced and assembled the species’ reference genome, reconstructed its evolutionary history across Europe and the Mediterranean, investigated genetic recombination, which reshuffles DNA from one generation to the next, and studied how mutations arise and are passed on within populations. “Research on this scale is possible because field teams, genomics specialists and members of the Faculty of Biology and Medicine’s core facilities work together,” says Professor Goudet.
The work is continuing. Computer analysis of photographs will allow the team to measure colour and spotting more precisely. The researchers also plan to use genetic data to reconstruct the plumage colour of birds that died very young and determine whether particular plumage features are associated with better chances of survival.
Understanding evolution is essential in a changing climate
Beyond the case of barn owls, the Nature Communications study reminds us that evolution does not take place only over millions of years. Major genetic changes can also occur within a few decades. In this case, 30 years, around ten generations, were enough for the effects of natural selection to become detectable. “The study carries an encouraging message: it shows that species living in the wild can evolve over a short period. This capacity for rapid adaptation could help them cope with environmental change, including climate change,” concludes Tristan Cumer.
