Have you heard of doomscrolling? It was coined during the COVID-19 pandemic to describe the phenomenon of the rise in negative feelings  after viewing pandemic-related media. 

In this episode Professor Matthew Prices discusses his research on the negative association between daily social media consumption and mental health symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. His study found that regularly viewing pandemic-related social media was associated with an increase in psychopathology, particularly for those with already had existing vulnerabilities.

Matthew Price is the George W. Albee Green and Gold Professor at the University of Vermont. He is a clinical psychologist who studies how technology can be integrated into mental healthcare. His work has focused primarily on helping those with histories of trauma and how to extend care to underserved groups. 

Tune in to learn more about what this doomscrolling research from the pandemic tells us about social media consumption today. 

Most young adults use Instagram and Facebook frequently. Social media use is associated with increased negative social comparisons. Negative social comparisons on social media are related to suicidal ideation.

In this episode Professor Elizabeth Spitzer discusses her research on the negative social comparison, suicidal ideation, thwarted belongingness and social media use. In her survey of 456 college students she found a positive relationship between negative social comparison on social media and suicidal ideation.

Elizabeth Spitzer earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from Auburn University. She has over fifteen publication from her research in suicide prevention and posttraumatic stress disorder. Her focus in suicide prevention has focused on young adults, veterans, and veterinarians. Her paper on the mental health effects of negative social comparison on social media was one of the top ten most downloaded papers from and American Psychological Association Journal in 2022. 

Website: https://www.lizspitzerphd.com/
ESPN Article on Madison Holleran

Canada- https://talksuicide.ca/
1-888-456-4566
Text: 45645
US- https://www.crisistextline.org/
Text 741741

Podcast Recommendations:
The Ezra Klein Show
The Teen Mental Health Crisis, Part 1
The Teen Mental Health Crisis, Part 2

Performing random acts of kindness increases the happiness in both the givers and receivers. However, people underestimate the positive value performing a random act of kindness may have. 

In this episode Professor Kumar discusses his recent paper "A Little Good Goes an Unexpectedly Long Way: Underestimating the Positive Impact of Kindness on Recipients" published in August of 2022 in the Journal of Experimental Psychology

Professor Amit Kumar is currently an Asst. Professor of Marketing and Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining the Mc Combs faculty, he completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. He received his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Cornell University and his A.B. in Psychology and Economics from Harvard University. 

Professor Kumar’s research focuses on the scientific study of happiness and has been featured in popular media outlets such as The Atlantic, Bloomberg, Business Insider, CNBC, CNN, Forbes, Fortune Magazine, Harvard Business Review, The Huffington Post, National Geographic, The New York Times, NPR, Oprah Daily, Scientific American, Time Magazine, U.S. News and World Report, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. 

His scholarly work has been published in many journals including Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, Current Opinion in Psychology, Emotion, The Journal of Consumer Psychology, The Journal of Experimental Psychology: General and the list goes on.

w: http://www.kumar-amit.com/ 

Understanding patient sociodemographic factors is necessary to quantify equity and inclusion in healthcare. The World Health Organization recommends all countries integrate health inequality monitoring into their information systems and develop practices that promote health equity. Dr. Murdoch Leeies explains the findings of his recent publication on collecting sociodemographic data in Emergency Departments.  This conversation includes recommendations for Emergency Departments to implement equity-focused collection of sociodemographic variables. 

Dr. Murdoch Leeies works clinically in Manitoba as an emergency medicine, critical care medicine and organ donation specialist physician.  Dr. Leeies is trained in clinical epidemiology and is the Research Director for the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Manitoba.  Dr. Leeies is leading a collaborative program of research with a focus on the promotion of equity, diversity, decolonization and inclusion (EDDI) in emergency medicine, critical care medicine and organ and tissue donation and transplantation in Canada.  

The paper discussed in this episode is titled "Equity-relevant sociodemographic variable collection in emergency medicine: A systematic review, qualitative evidence synthesis, and recommendations for practice"and was published in November 2022 in the American Emergency Medicine Journal. 

You can read the paper here 
Click here to learn more about Murdoch's work

Drug checking is a harm reduction response to help prevent people who use drugs from consuming substances they did not intend to purchase and to provide the opportunity to make informed decisions about drug use. 

 Substance use stigma prevents people from engaging in harm reduction practices. 

 In this podcast episode, Samantha Davis discusses her recent paper “Substance Use Stigma and Community Drug Checking: A Qualitative Study Examining Barriers and Possible Responses” published within the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 

 Samantha Davis has her Master of Social Work from the University of Victoria and a Bachelors of Arts from the University of Toronto in Criminology. Samantha is also the Virtual Legal Advocate at Rise Women's Legal Centre where she works with clients around BC who need help with their family law matters. 

William K. Black is a professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri – Kansas City (UMKC) and the Distinguished Scholar in Residence for Financial Regulation at the University of Minnesota Law School.  He is a white-collar criminologist.  He was the Executive Director of the Institute for Fraud Prevention from 2005-2007.  He was a senior financial regulator instrumental in ‘reregulating’ the savings and loan industry to counter the debacle and aiding the successful prosecution of over 1,000 elite white-collar criminals.  He is a serial whistleblower and co-founder of Bank Whistleblowers United.  He authored The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One.

In this episode, William Black speaks about the article he co-authored with June Carbone  "The Problem with Predators" published in the Seattle University Law Review in 2020.  Black sheds light on how dysfunctional corporate culture, filled with toxic masculinity, leads to unethical and illegal corporate behaviour. These toxic workplace cultures tend to increase workplace bullying, sexual harassment, and discrimination.

Ted Talk: How to Rob a Bank
Bill Moyers Interviews: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz1b__MdtHY
Kilkeconomics: The World's First Economics & Comedy Festival
Twitter: @WilliamKBlack

Julie Segal is Senior Manager, Climate Finance at Environmental Defence, where she advances climate-related financial policy and regulation. In this episode, Julie discusses her paper, "Justice and Sustainability: Pricing in Physical Climate Risks" which won First Prize Paper in the Ethics & Trust in Finance Global Prize. The paper discusses how pricing in physical climate risk is inconsistent with environmental justice. Why are countries vulnerable to climate change having to pay higher rates to access financing, while these same countries are the least responsible for climate change? The impact of this, is that the countries who need access to financing to respond to climate change and mitigate future risks, are paying more. Pricing in climate risks is individualistic and short-sighted, and instead investment decisions and policies should be guided by principles of global environmental justice.  

Twitter: @JulieESegal 

Professor June Carbone Professor holds the Robina Chair in Law, Science and Technology at the University of Minnesota Law School. Prior to beginning this position in 2013, she was the Edward A. Smith/Missouri Chair of Law, the Constitution and Society at the University of Missouri at Kansas City (UMKC). She is an expert in family law, assisted reproduction, property, medicine and bioethics, and also has taught contracts, remedies, financial institutions, civil procedure, and feminist jurisprudence.

In this episode, Professor Carbone discusses a chapter that she co-authored with Naomi Cahn, “Family Law and Emotion” in Bandes, Susan A, et al. Research Handbook on Law and Emotion. 2021.

Professor Carbone describes: 

•  how family law influences people's behaviour and understanding of their emotions
• the research surrounding the physiological responses to sexual desire, romantic love, and attachment and the ways the law influences  emotional constructions
• the emotions behind the recent abortion case in the US 

Twitter: @carbonej

In this episode, Aleah Fontaine and Katherine Starzyk discuss their paper, "Attitudes Toward Reconciliation in Canada: Relationships With Connectedness to Nature, Animal–Human Continuity, and Moral Expansiveness"  published in the Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science in 2021. 

In this paper they surveyed 233 non-Indigenous undergraduate students in Canada to investigate the relationships among connectedness to nature, animal–human continuity, moral expansiveness, and support for reconciliation. Participants who felt more connected to nature had more positive attitudes toward reconciliation. They discuss how this implies that strengthening peoples’ connection to nature, and consequently extending peoples’ circles of moral concern, may increase support for reconciliation.

Aleah Fontaine is a Winnipegger of Anishinaabe and mixed-European heritage, and a proud urban band member of Sagkeeng First Nation. She is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Manitoba. Currently, she is examining how gender and ethnic/racial background relate to intergroup solidarity, with a focus on people’s emotional responses to social injustice and their experiences of collective harm.

Katherine Starzyk, Ph.D., is a Professor in Social and Personality Psychology at the University of Manitoba and Director of the Social Justice Laboratory. She is also a Founding Member of the Centre for Human Rights Research as well as the Centre for Social Science Research & Policy. Presently, alongside a dedicated team of Indigenous and non-Indigenous partners and collaborators, Katherine is spending much of her time on the Canadian Reconciliation Barometer.

Read a summary article on the paper here within The Conversation

Canadian Reconciliation Barometer 

Dr. Anna Sheftel is internationally recognized for many of her publications, including the article she discusses in this episode: “Talking and Not Talking about Violence: Challenges in Interviewing Survivors of Atrocity as Whole People,” which won the Oral History Association’s 2019 Article Award.
 
Dr. Sheftel is Principal and Associate Professor in the School of Community and Public Affairs at Concordia. Her field of expertise is oral history of genocide and atrocity, and she has done research projects on wartime memory in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the public testimonial practices of Holocaust survivors in Montreal. 

Refugee Boulevard: https://www.refugeeboulevard.ca/