James Hamblin

People whose faces are perceived to look more “competent” are more likely to be CEOs of large, successful companies. Having a face that people deem “dominant” is a predictor of rank advancement in the military. People are more likely to invest money with people who look “trustworthy.” These sorts of findings go on and on in recent studies that claim people can accurately guess a variety of personality traits and behavioral tendencies from portraits alone. The findings seem to elucidate either canny human intuition or absurd, misguided bias.

Mental exercises to build (or rebuild) attention span have shown promise recently as adjuncts or alternatives to amphetamines in addressing symptoms common to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Building cognitive control, to be better able to focus on just one thing, or single-task, might involve regular practice with a specialized video game that reinforces “top-down” cognitive modulation, as was the case in a popular paper in Nature last year. Cool but still notional. More insipid but also more clearly critical to addressing what’s being called the ADHD epidemic is plain old physical activity.

Nutritional disparities between America’s rich and poor are growing, despite efforts to provide higher-quality food to people who most need it. So says a large study just released from the Harvard School of Public Health that examined eating habits of 29,124 Americans over the past decade. Diet quality has improved among people of high socioeconomic status but deteriorated among those at the other end of the spectrum. The gap between the two groups doubled between 2000 and 2010. That will be costly for everyone.

This week another large study added to the body of known cardiovascular benefits of eating almonds. Every ounce eaten daily was associated with a 3.5% decreased risk of heart disease ten years later. Almonds are already known to help with weight loss and satiety, help prevent diabetes, and potentially ameliorate arthritis, inhibit cancer-cell growth, and decrease Alzheimer’s risk. A strong case could be made that almonds are, nutritionally, the best single food a person could eat.

“You didn’t eat breakfast? Don’t you know it’s the most important meal of the day?”

Have you ever considered undergoing brain-thickening surgery, only to find that such a thing does not exist? And that the guy in the van was probably not actually a surgeon? Well, consider fish.

In one illustrious study of love (“human sexual selection”) in 1986, psychologists David Buss and Michael Barnes asked people to rank 76 characteristics: What do you value most in a potential mate?

Here is a pretty harrowing/empowering case for choosing chicken instead of beef when you can.

“Coca-Cola is taking on obesity,” read the AP coverage of the company’s new commercial this week, “with an online video showing how [much] fun it could be to burn off the 140 calories in a can of its soda.”

One of the most horrific tales of mass violence ever began just 20 years ago. During the 100 days after Easter 1994, ethnic Hutu extremists killed 1 million fellow Rwandans. The surviving 80% of the population reeled from health crises.

In its 157 years of publication, The Atlantic Monthly has been home to some ad campaigns that, in hindsight, were not exactly in the interest of public health. This page from the Feb. 1922 issue is at once not excepted and also striking in its prescience. It’s for Fleischmann’s yeast. Now, I know what you’re thinking: Everyone knows Fleischmann’s makes a very fine yeast. Beyond that, what the copywriter is saying about food and health portends how we think about the relationship today. Before we went through a century of highly processed, infinite-shelf-life food-like creations, there was a movement that linked fresh food to health in a comprehensive way.

“Let me be clear about this. A low carbohydrate diet is quackery,” Dr. Neal Barnard told me over the phone. “It is popular, bad science, it’s a mistake, it’s a fad. At some point we have to stand back and look at evidence.”

“We believe that the case is closed— supplementing the diet of well-nourished adults with (most) mineral or vitamin supplements has no clear benefit and might even be harmful. These vitamins should not be used for chronic disease prevention. Enough is enough.”

Yesterday the Center for Science in the Public Interest released a “report card” on US eating habits, entitled “The Changing American Diet.” (pdf) In The New York Times, Jane Brody called our performance therein a disappointment. That depends how you feel about D-pluses, I suppose, and cheese.

Some say Sherlock Holmes’ regular use of cocaine was Doyle’s vehicle to illustrate the character’s moral weakness. It likely began more simply as a window into the culture of the time, when hard stimulants weren’t the taboo they are today. W.H. Auden apparently did believe his own dependence on the stimulant Benzedrine to be a sign of weak character, but he still took it every working morning and endorsed its creative influences effusively. Jack Kerouac and Jean-Paul Sartre offer similar testaments. Sir Elton John sang “Bennie and the Jets” … which may be in praise of Benzedrine, but is open to interpretation, depending where you stand on mohair suits.

The active drug in Tylenol, acetaminophen, is one of the best medications we have for helping people in pain. It’s also one the most commonly overdosed substances in the world and puts about 60,000 Americans in the hospital every year. Several hundred people in the U.S. will die in 2013 from liver failure after acetaminophen overdose.

In 1998, the United States averaged 54 gallons of soda consumed per person, to only 42 gallons of water. That’s according to AP reporter Candice Choi‘s numbers from Beverage Digest. That is disgusting, I add. Though, I was leading that pack in 1998.