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Gender gap shows no sign of closing over the past five years MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (08/11/2011) —Computer science researchers in the University of Minnesota's College of Science and Engineering are leading a team that has confirmed a substantial gender gap among editors of Wikipedia and a corresponding gender-oriented disparity in the content.

Study shows that low-information voters are most likely to be swayed by candidates' appearances. CAMBRIDGE, Mass. The looks of political candidates are a key factor influencing voters, a phenomenon identified by a number of scholars in recent years. Now, a new study by MIT political scientists adds to this body of research by detailing which types of citizens are most influenced by candidate appearances, and why: The tendency is most prevalent among low-information voters who watch a lot of television.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.—Though pundits and candidates suggest there is too much anger in politics, the emotion does have a potential benefit—it significantly motivates citizens to vote, according to a University of Michigan study. "Anger in politics can play a particularly vital role, motivating some people to participate in ways they might ordinarily not," said Nicholas Valentino, the study's lead author and a professor of communication studies and political science.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. "One person, one vote" is often the rallying cry for democratic reform, suggesting everyone should get an equal say in their government. Yet in some of the oldest and largest democracies, some votes are worth far more than others by design. A Wyoming voter, for instance, is significantly over-represented compared with a California voter.

The difficulties and dangers faced by journalists reporting conflict will be explored by a panel of war correspondents in an event for the Centre for Advanced Journalism at the University of Melbourne tomorrow, Wednesday 11 May. In addition to the dangers posed to journalists, the nature of conflicts has changed, said Dr Fay Anderson, historian and author of a recent book about the Australian experience of conflict reporting.

For the first time, a study shows that the aerial bombing of Vietnamese civilians by U.S. and allied forces was an ineffective, wrongheaded strategy that drove neutral citizens into the arms of the Viet Cong. The study combines two sets of data to reconstruct the Vietnam War late in 1969 - a point at which U.S. forces appeared to have the upper hand in the conflict - to map where bombing occurred and then determine how territory was held or lost.

"Mirror, mirror on the wall/Who in the land is fairest of all?" But unlike Snow White's Queen, many people don't feel better after gazing at their wall mirror. Facebook walls, on the other hand, can have a positive influence on the self-esteem of college students, report social media researchers at Cornell.

Switzerland is not the democracy par excellence as thought, but only a mediocre one and ranks fourteenth when compared with twenty-nine established democracies.

Director of the Centre for Advanced Journalism at the University of Melbourne, Michael Gawenda said The New York Times and The Guardian were given first access to the 250,000 cables that were leaked to WikiLeaks and that will be posted on the WikiLeaks website. 'These papers stressed that they have checked the material they have published and have redacted names of people who might be considered in danger as a result of these leaks,' he said.

Media coverage of the UN's Copenhagen summit on climate change in 2009 'under-reported' the climate science, according to a new study published by Oxford University's Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ). It finds that most journalists reported extensively on 'the drama and minutiae of the negotiations' but that in the balance between capturing the drama and explaining the essential background to climate change, the science received scant coverage.

Liberals may owe their political outlook partly to their genetic make-up, according to new research from the University of California, San Diego, and Harvard University. Ideology is affected not just by social factors, but also by a dopamine receptor gene called DRD4. The study's authors say this is the first research to identify a specific gene that predisposes people to certain political views.

Knight fellows are pursuing ideas that may aid journalists and change the path of journalism – new ways to merge war reporting with social media, for example. BY ADAM GORLICK The Knight Fellowships program is one of the best-known havens for journalists. For four decades, it has allowed mid-career reporters, editors and broadcasters to take a step back from the pressures of daily deadlines and spend a year on Stanford's campus studying, interacting with faculty and honing an expertise meant to make them better journalists.

When it comes to Saturday's federal election, Twitter users are clear: politicians who spend time in conversation get most out of the platform, and the Greens are exploiting this better than the major parties, according to a new  ANU study. The study, led by Dr Will Grant of the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science at ANU, analysed the Twitter feeds of 152 Australian politicians to measure their influence on the social networking site and how they are using it to connect with voters.

When you vote in an election, your choice is surely not influenced by anything as superficial as a candidate's looks, right' Right? New research from MIT political scientists shows that the appearances of politicians do indeed strongly influence voters - and that people around the world have similar ideas about what a good politician looks like.

by Stacy Forster The results of the University of Wisconsin-Madison's 30th Badger Poll will be released this week. The findings of the Badger Poll conducted by the UW Survey Center will be posted at 10 a.m. over two days at http://www.uwsc.wisc.edu/bpoll.php.

A new Oxford study shows methods of electioneering and political reporting have changed for good because of Facebook and Twitter. It concludes lessons were learned by journalists and politicians in how to harness the power of social networking sites, which contributed to 'unprecedented levels of participation' and voter turnout at the 2010 election - particularly among voters aged between 18-24 years old.

As the world media continues to cover the aftermath of Haiti's earthquake, the country's own journalists are confronting the challenges of reporting on a disaster that has affected them both as survivors as well as witnesses. For one week in March, The Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma , based at Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism , and its partner, CECOSIDA, conducted workshops with local journalists in Haiti to foster awareness about the impacts of trauma on them, their families and their audiences.

Mit dem Übergangsmetall Molybdän in Sedimentgesteinen ist nachweisbar, warum es vor rund 540 Millionen Jahren auf der Erde zu einem grossen Massenaussterben der ersten Mehrzeller kam.

ETHZ Zürich - 12. Drahtlose Netzwerke können theoretisch nur eine begrenzte Menge an Informationen übermitteln.