Newsmakers

(Every week faculty and staff from across campus are featured or cited in newspapers, magazines, broadcasts and other media from around the country. The listings that follow represent a small selection of the many stories that spotlight UW–Madison and its people. More newsmaker listings)

Widows face poverty trap
Women who lose their spouses are overturning history and folklore by finding new and often enriching experiences following their loss. One area of concern that still remains, however, is in their economic prospects. Karen Holden, an economist with the School of Human Ecology, tells U.S. News and World Report (Sept. 11) that two-fifths of widowed women fall into poverty within five years of the death of their spouse, and most never escape. Losing pension income and health-insurance coverage are the prime obstacles, as well as a significant loss of Social Security income.

Brains react to race
Scientists are beginning to look to the chemistry of the brain to help answer questions about human behavior that have long been the domain of social psychologists. Most recently, two teams of neuroscientists examined the chemical changes in the brain that occur when people encounter others of different race. The scientists are careful to point out that their work is not about finding scientific basis for racial differences as much as they are looking at how different parts of the brain influence our thoughts and emotions. Much work centers around study of the amygdala, a cluster of nerves that lies deep inside each brain hemisphere. “It’s a learning area,” Paul Whalen, a neurobiologist at UW–Madison, tells the New York Times (Sept. 5). He says the amygdala is active when people encounter new situations, such as when volunteers were asked to look at pictures of people they had never met. But, after a time, some pictures produced little amygdala activity, while pictures of members of other races continued to produce activity.

The changing working class
Presidential candidates have long made overtures to the “working people” of America. But demographic data show that the American working class is much different than it was when Franklin Roosevelt won support from a heavily unionized work force to roll out the New Deal. “They’re not your father’s working class,” Joel Rogers, a professor of sociology, tells the Philadelphia Inquirer (Sept. 5). “They tend not to work in factories. They’re clerical moms, technician dads, in the service sector. They live in suburbs, spend a lot of time commuting.” He says that these workers are less affiliated with political parties and less interested in politics in general than previous working-class voters. “These people are not Archie Bunker. They’re more like Roseanne,” he says. “Their values are hard work, responsibility, rewards for hard work, giving something back. Equal opportunity.”

Attack ads deploy humor
Political analysts are split on the strategic wisdom of George W. Bush’s first move into direct-attack advertising. The ad, which began airing during the last week in August, uses clips and quotes from contender Al Gore to portray him as a chameleon. An unseen viewer of the clips responds to what she is seeing with a heavy dose of sarcasm about Gore’s honesty. While Gore and Democrats hope the ad backfires as “going negative,” some analysts say that Bush is hitting a perceived area of vulnerability by attacking Gore’s character, especially at a time when Gore seems to be doing well with voters. Ken Goldstein, a political science professor who specializes in critiquing candidate advertising, tells the New York Times (Sept. 1) that the ad’s humorous touch may make its negative message more palatable to voters. “This ad gets at what Al Gore’s weaknesses are, but it doesn’t do it in what I think some people would consider an unfair way,” Goldstein says.