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Social & Behavior

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 25-Oct-2026 15:15 ET (25-Oct-2026 19:15 GMT/UTC)

Do animal behavior experiments give us a distorted view of cooperation?

Utrecht University, Faculty of Science
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Animals behave differently when they have more opportunities to cooperate. The findings raise an important question: are scientists seeing only part of the picture in standard behavioural experiments?

Journal: Animal Behaviour

How YouTube shapes public understanding of avian influenza

University of Calgary
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Online discussions intensified as avian influenza expanded from a veterinary concern into broader debates over interspecies transmission, public trust, and geopolitics.

Japan’s small cities may face higher care burdens under the compact city policy

Osaka Metropolitan University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

An Osaka Metropolitan University researcher evaluated Japan’s Location Optimization Plan, a national compact city policy, using a quasi-experimental analysis across 1,595 SMCs from 2008 to 2022. The findings caution against one-size-fits-all compact city policies and suggest that small cities may need more selective, context-sensitive approaches, including smart-decline principles.

Journal: Sustainable Cities and Society
Funder: Japan Society for the Promotion of Science

Participating in heavy-contact youth sports, dropping out of sports linked to acts of violence

Ohio State University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Contrary to popular belief, simply playing organized youth sports does not reduce the likelihood of committing violence in one’s lifetime, and in some cases, may increase it, according to a new study.

Journal: Sociology of Sport Journal

UNC study: Peer-driven social media messages may help counter youth loneliness epidemic by encouraging real-world connection

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A new study from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill explores how social media can be used to address loneliness.

Journal: Journal of Adolescent Health

Foreign funds help make housing unaffordable

University of Texas at Austin
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New research from the McCombs School of Business identifies a novel factor in rising home prices: foreign investment. An influx of foreign money during the 2010s drove up housing costs in the areas with the greatest concentrations of purchasers from outside the U.S., finds Caitlin Gorback, assistant professor of finance.

But her findings have broader implications for affordability, she says. Even in markets where foreign investors weren’t plentiful, prices rose much faster than supply did from 2009 to 2018.

Journal: Review of Financial Studies

Supporting ecosystem monitoring: SELINA publishes two new policy briefs on ecosystem pressures and condition

Pensoft Publishers
Reports and Proceedings

Two new policy briefs were developed within the SELINA project, a product of the “Derive a minimum set of key ecosystem condition indicators per ecosystem type” task, providing a framework for monitoring ecosystem pressures and recovery across the European Union.