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65 news posts in Humanities

Humanities

08 Aug 2025

'One child called the robot "my little brother"': can assistance tech become part of the family?

In a new article published in Frontiers in Robotics and AI, Dr Zhao Zhao and her colleagues investigate the long-term lifespan of a social robot given to 20 families in 2021 to see whether it could help their children learn to read. Four years after their previous study, the robot was no longer needed for its primary purpose, but that didn’t mean it was no longer wanted. In this guest editorial, Zhao explores the new roles the robot that stayed took on — as keepsake, pet, and companion — and how our relationships to technology can change over time.

Humanities

05 Jun 2025

Survival of the greenest: why world’s oldest organizations are surpassing young upstarts in environmental sustainability

In a new article published in Frontiers in Organizational Psychology, Daria Haner, Dr Yilei Wang, Dr Deniz Ones, Dr Stephan Dilchert, Dr Yagizhan Yazar, and Karn Kaura unveil surprising new findings: the world’s most sustainable businesses are the world’s most long-lived businesses, too. In this guest editorial, they explain their results, discuss the potential underlying reasons for their findings, and underline the importance of sustainability to the future of business.

Humanities

05 Jul 2024

Desert-loving fungi and lichens pose deadly threat to 5,000-year-old rock art

Researchers sampled microflora from the rocks bearing unique, millennia-old petroglyphs in the Negev desert. The diversity and abundance of species found on these rocks was low, suggesting that few can survive the harsh conditions. Most identified species from the petroglyphs were specialized microcolonial fungi and lichens, known to damage rock art through mechanical and chemical means. The authors cautioned that these natural deterioration processes can’t be stopped, making it necessary to monitor and document this important cultural heritage.

Humanities

30 Oct 2023

Study of 1,000 selfies helps explain how we use them to communicate

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image/Shutterstock.com From a painting on the wall to a photo on your phone, selfies have always been a form of communication. But what are we trying to communicate with them and how are we doing it? To develop semantic profiles of this visual language, scientists asked people to look at a thousand selfies and describe their first impressions. People have used self-portraits to communicate information about themselves for centuries — and digital cameras make it easier to share a self-portrait than ever before. But even though selfies are now almost ubiquitous, we don’t understand how people use them to communicate. So scientists from the University of Bamberg set out to investigate the semantics of selfies. “Although the term ‘selfies’ is now celebrating its 21st birthday, and although selfies are known in art history for nearly 200 years in photography and more than 500 years in paintings, we still lack a clear classification of the different types of selfies,” said Tobias Schneider, lead author of the study in Frontiers in Communication and PhD student at the Bamberg Graduate School of Affective and Cognitive Sciences. Snapshots of selfhood Previous studies have established that people taking […]

Humanities

23 Oct 2023

Do people everywhere care less about their cats than their dogs?

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image/Shutterstock.com Previous studies have suggested that owners care more about dogs than cats — maybe because dogs are generally considered more affectionate and require more hands-on care. But these studies have used convenience samples and are only based in one country. Scientists surveyed representative samples from Denmark, Austria, and the UK, and found that people generally invest more emotionally and financially in their dogs than their cats, but that the difference is biggest in Denmark and smallest in the UK. This suggests that there is no universal preference for dogs based on their behavior. Do canines get more care? Some studies have suggested pet owners are less emotionally attached to and less willing to finance care for cats than dogs, possibly because of cats’ behavior: cats may be perceived as caring less about humans and needing less care in return. But these studies are often conducted on non-representative samples and don’t consider possible cultural differences in attitudes to pets. A team of scientists led by Dr Peter Sandøe of the University of Copenhagen decided to investigate further. “We and others have found that people are willing to spend much less on their cats […]

Humanities

25 Sep 2023

Holidays back to the home country could help bilingual children hold on to their family’s original language

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image/Shutterstock.com Holding on to a heritage language which isn’t widely spoken in the country of residence is difficult. Scientists find that using the heritage language at home, in daily life, is important to retaining it, but that some of the language skills which are most vulnerable — like vocabulary — are improved by visits to the country of origin. It’s hard to keep a language in the family. Many people who migrate to different countries find that their language of origin has become a heritage language, passed on to future generations with varying degrees of success. These languages come under pressure from the dominant language in a country as well as the lack of opportunities to practice and fluent speakers to practice with. So how do kids use or retain heritage languages? And can visits to their parents’ countries of origin help them increase their fluency? “The role of parental language use in the country of residence is well-established,” said Prof Vicky Chondrogianni of the University of Edinburgh and Dr Evangelia Daskalaki of the University of Alberta, authors of the study in Frontiers in Language Science. “Here we show how the opportunities to […]

Humanities

22 Jun 2023

Breaking down invisible barriers for LGBTQIA+ in STEM

By Dr Aswathi K Sivan and Dr Andrew L Miller June is the month of the year dedicated to LGBTQIA+ pride. In a previous post, we interviewed Dr Alfredo Carpineti (chair of the association Pride in STEM) and we talked about the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in science and research. As we mentioned, Frontiers is proud to offer a platform for the empowerment of openly-LGBTQIA+ editors. Specifically, the journal Frontiers in Nanotechnology recently launched a special issue with an editorial team composed fully of openly queer researchers in nanotechnology. We asked this editorial team to share with us their point of view, so as to be able to focus the attention on relevant themes and really offer an empowering platform to the community we wish to represent. The following opinion piece is from Dr Aswathi K Sivan (University of Basel), in collaboration with Dr Andrew L Miller (Dutch National Institute for Subatomic Physics). LGBTQIA+ scientists have made significant contributions to their respective fields, despite the myriad of barriers they face. The pioneering works of several scientists such as Alan Turing, Lynn Conway, and Ben Barres have paved the way for a greater acceptance and inclusivity of LGBTQIA+ people in the scientific community. Despite all the […]

Humanities

03 Mar 2023

Scientists find that people use emojis to hide, as well as show, their feelings

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image: Shutterstock.com Scientists asked 1,289 people who use emojis to respond to internet chat messages and report their feelings and emoji use. They found that more emojis were used between closer friends, that using positive emojis to express positive feelings correlated with personal wellbeing, and that positive emojis could be used to mask the expression of negative feelings. Have you ever received an unwanted gift and still said ‘thank you’? This choice to hide a negative emotion is a display rule — one of many which define socially appropriate responses to emotions. Although display rules can promote interpersonal harmony, they can also have negative consequences for the person choosing to change how they express emotions. As more social interaction goes online, scientists are investigating how emojis are used to reflect our emotions in different contexts. Are there display rules that apply to emojis, and how do those affect people’s wellbeing? “As online socializing becomes more prevalent, people have become accustomed to embellishing their expressions and scrutinizing the appropriateness of their communication,” said Moyu Liu of the University of Tokyo, who investigated this question in a study published in Frontiers in Psychology. “However, I […]

Humanities

07 Feb 2023

Proof that Neanderthals ate crabs is another ‘nail in the coffin’ for primitive cave dweller stereotypes

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image: Tomasz Ochocki/Shutterstock.com Scientists studying archaeological remains at Gruta da Figueira Brava, Portugal, discovered that Neanderthals were harvesting shellfish to eat – including brown crabs, where they preferred larger specimens and cooked them in fires. Archeologists say this disproves the idea that eating marine foods gave early modern humans’ brains the competitive advantage. In a cave just south of Lisbon, archeological deposits conceal a Paleolithic dinner menu. As well as stone tools and charcoal, the site of Gruta de Figueira Brava contains rich deposits of shells and bones with much to tell us about the Neanderthals that lived there – especially about their meals. A study published in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology shows that 90,000 years ago, these Neanderthals were cooking and eating crabs. “At the end of the Last Interglacial, Neanderthals regularly harvested large brown crabs,” said Dr Mariana Nabais of the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution (IPHES-CERCA), lead author of the study. “They were taking them in pools of the nearby rocky coast, targeting adult animals with an average carapace width of 16cm. The animals were brought whole to the cave, where they were roasted on coals and […]

Humanities

26 Oct 2022

‘Virtual autopsy’ identifies a 17th century mummified toddler hidden from the sun

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image: Riderfoot/Shutterstock.com Scientists used a ‘virtual autopsy’ to examine the mummy of a child found in an aristocratic family crypt, revealing him most probably as Reichard Wilhelm (1625-1626). Despite his wealthy background, the child experienced extreme nutritional deficiency and a tragically early death from pneumonia. A team of scientists based in Germany have examined a 17th century child mummy, using cutting-edge science alongside historical records to shed new light on Renaissance childhood. The child was found in an aristocratic Austrian family crypt, where the conditions allowed for natural mummification, preserving soft tissue that contained critical information about his life and death. Curiously, this was the only unidentified body in the crypt, buried in an unmarked wooden coffin instead of the elaborate metal coffins reserved for the other members of the family buried there. The team, led by Dr Andreas Nerlich of the Academic Clinic Munich-Bogenhausen, carried out a virtual autopsy and radiocarbon testing, and examined family records and key material clues from the burial, to try to understand who the child was and what his short life looked like. “This is only one case,” said Nerlich, lead author of the paper published today […]