Society And Culture

Vanderbilt researchers found a place where early Americans paused on their migrations south and "settled in for a good long while," suggesting a slower pace of settlement than originally believed. Read More

According to the latest national assessment, 85 percent of the people in Bangladesh have access to safe drinking water. However, a new study raises serious questions about the nation's water security. Read More

New research shows being surrounded by high-status people may help you stay slim – but only if you're a woman. Read More

A new study shows that access to health insurance can help hold a community together socially, and lack of it can contribute to the fraying of neighborhood cohesion. The study, Beyond Health Effects? Examining the Social Consequences of Community Levels of Uninsurance Pre-ACA, published by the… Read More

Internet posts by white supremacists websites have spiked in concert with the presidential campaign. Read More

There is historical precedent for Donald Trump's refusal to confirm he will accept the results of the presidential election. It happened in 1860 and resulted in the Civil War. Read More

Psychiatrists usually treat marriage troubles by prescribing drugs meant for depression, a new study from Vanderbilt University shows. Read More

There’s a stark and troubling way that incarceration may diminish the ability of a former inmate to empathize with a loved one behind bars, but existing sociological theories fail to capture it. Read More

A new study from Vanderbilt's LAPOP researchers shows that a high percentage of men in the Americas approve of or 'understand' a man striking his wife if she neglects household chores Read More

Public opinion date gathered by Vanderbilt University's Latin American Public Opinion Project shows that the people of Brazil have lost confidence in their political institutions. Read More

Christoph Zeller, associate professor of German, writes: "Looking back at the protest movement in Germany reveals parallels that help to understand the present." Read More

Jonathan Metzl, director of the Center for Medicine, Health, and Society, writes: "Again and again, people with whom I spoke raised concerns, not just about the lethal potential of firearms, but about the ways that allowing guns into previously gun-free communal spaces might impact a host of commonplace civic encounters as well." Read More

A computer model has been developed that provides new insights into the food-energy-water nexus and can help resource managers around the world do a better job of weighing food and energy tradeoffs when water is scarce. Read More

A majority of Guatemalans believe it is understandable, and sometimes even acceptable, for women who cheat on their husbands to be subjected to violence in return, the results of a new survey indicate. Read More

The U.S. federal government is preparing to launch a set of sweeping new regulations that will have a major impact on how biomedical researchers and social scientists work. It will require researchers to change how they get ethics approval, how they collect informed consent from participants, and more. Read More

Paul Kramer explains why history is repeating itself in the battle over immigration. Kramer has written about immigration and border issues for the New Yorker and Slate, and been featured on National Public Radio. He has spent the last decade studying U.S. immigration history, and he’s working on a book about the forces that push people into leaving their home countries and immigrating, including the United States’ influence. Read More

How depressed you are may have something to do with who you know—and where you come from. Read More

Calling the notion of an immense wall between Mexico and the United States “nonsense,” a Vanderbilt professor in his new book makes the case for open borders between the two countries. Read More

The AmericasBarometer survey is the only scientifically rigorous comparative survey that covers all of North, Central, and South America, as well as a significant number of countries in the Caribbean. Read More

More people than surveyors expected think protection of the environment should be a priority in Latin America and the Caribbean. Read More