Laughter is the best medicine — at least that’s the case for some anxiety sufferers trying improvisation training at The Second City.  The Panic/Anxiety/Recovery Center in Chicago is partnering with The Second City to use improv to help people overcome their fears.

The Second City improv coaches who instruct these aspiring comedians work with another group of students (not shown) - people with social anxiety who turn to improv for treatment. p>

“It’s just a space where nothing you could say was wrong, so you didn’t even have to worry about making a fool of yourself or saying the wrong thing,” something that is a major relief for people with social anxiety, said Chicago college student Danny Chacon. He suffered from social anxiety for years before he found the program, he said.

So far, some 36 people have used improv to pave the way beyond their panic, said Mark Pfeffer, a licensed Illinois psychotherapist and director of the Panic/Anxiety/Recovery Center. 

He kicked off this collaboration with The Second City in 2010 when he met the president of The Second City Training Centers and Educational Programs on set of a phobia documentary.

“We’ve partnered up with The Second City here in Chicago to develop more of a unique approach to helping people face their fear,” Pfeffer said. 

Pfeffer uses improv as an option of cognitive behavioral therapy to enable patients to deal with their anxiety. 

“Cognitive behavioral therapy really just means that we deal more in the here and now and focus more on thinking and behavior,” Pfeffer said. “We put people in the feared situation, we evoke a response, a fear response, and try to get the person not to do the very thing that they would typically do in the situation.” 

But before diving into the theatrics of improv, participants of this program first receive some one-on-one counseling with Pfeffer. They then join a group of others with anxiety disorders, where they learn the art of improv from a Second City coach.

Anyone who has watched The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC is well aware that Ms. Maddow is an articulate, insightful commentator on the news of the day, whether or not you agree with the position she has taken on an event. Her academic qualifications are first-rate: in addition to a degree in public policy from Stanford University, she holds a doctorate in politics from Oxford, where she was a Rhodes Scholar.

Ms. Maddow does not flaunt her impressive scholarly credentials, however, as she definitely has a lighter side. In fact, she is actually a bit of a goof at times, given to cracking herself up, and even to face-making (those raised eyebrows, judiciously used, are worthy of Lucille Ball). She makes use of odd objects or graphics to make a point, and she is given to comic asides and/or ironic comments which are rarely mean-spirited, but are definitely designed to underline her point and deftly expose absurdities in the arguments of others.

Given her star-status as a television news commentator, it is not surprising to discover that she is also an excellent writer, albeit given to occasional, sarcastic, one-word editorial comments, like an occasional “Oops!” or “Barf!” at the end of a paragraph. While I wish she hadn’t felt obliged to make those (let the reader supply them for herself!), Maddow is so smart and thorough and logical that one can overlook the wise-apple stuff, and concentrate on the intent of her message.

Make no mistake: for all her high entertainment value the woman is a meticulous scholar and an eminently fair-minded individual. On her television show, when she interviews someone, she carefully spells out the sequence of events that have led to the interview, and then asks: “Is this a fair description?” Invariably, the interviewee agrees with her stated recounting of the facts, even if he or she disagrees with Maddow’s evaluation of those facts.

Drift is Ms. Maddow’s first book, and it is an enlightening and demanding read. It is also a detailed and stunning examination of what the author calls “The Unmooring of American Military Power.” She reaches back as far as our founding fathers to support her claim that early-on, our military served pretty much as a reactive, not aggressing, force, and was supported by a public that honored them.

She reminds us that the Constitution explicitly vested in Congress the sole power to declare war, on the theory that no one person (i.e. the President) should have that ability. By that theory, deciding to make war should be a complicated, thoroughly examined and argued matter, affecting as it does every single citizen.

Leading off with a two-paragraph quote from President James Madison that pretty much defines her topic, Maddow launches into a detailed exposition of how our military involvements have escalated and swallowed up not only America’s treasure, but also her psyche.

She recounts the steps that have led to the miasma of today’s involvements in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to the mismanagement of tangential matters like post-9/11 funding of a number of inefficient and/or inexplicable projects, starting with her small hometown’s share of the post-9/11 Homeland Security funds. After receiving a new fire truck which “turned out to be a few feet longer than the garage where the town kept our old fire truck” more funds had to be provided to build a new garage.

H.R. 5646---Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-MI)/Energy and Commerce, Judiciary (5/8/12) --- A bill to prohibit funds appropriated for the Department of Homeland Security from being used to pay for an abortion, and for other purposes.

H.R. 5650----*Rep. Robert Dold (R-IL)/Energy and Commerce (5/9/12) --- A bill to amend title X of the Public Health Service Act to prohibit discrimination under the family planning program under such title on the basis of separate provision of abortion.

H.R. 5731----Rep. Steve King (R-IA)/Judiciary, Agriculture, Energy and Commerce, Natural Resources (5/10/12) --- A bill to prohibit federal assistance for telemedicine abortions and to ban interstate abortions using telemedicine technology.

Child Protection

S. Res. 449----Sen. John Kerry (D-MA)/Foreign Relations (5/9/12) --- A resolution calling on all governments to assist in the safe return of children abducted from or wrongfully retained outside the country of their habitual residence.

H. Res. 649----Rep. John Barrow (D-GA)/Judiciary (5/10/12) --- A resolution expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that Congress should work to eliminate the facilitated sexual exploitation and trafficking of minors over the Internet.

Employment

H.R. 5647----Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY)/Education and the Workforce; House Administration, Oversight, and Government Reform; Judiciary (5/8/12) --- A bill to eliminate discrimination and promote women's health and economic security by ensuring reasonable workplace accommodations for workers whose ability to perform the functions of a job are limited by pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition.

Bills introduced information from Women's Policy Inc.

Editor's Note — The following is from a press release from Rep. Robert Dold's website.  Dold has declared himself to be a pro-choice Republican from Illinois:
US Congressman Robert J. Dold (R-IL-10) introduced H.R. 5650, the Protecting Women’s Access to Health Care Act. He was joined at a press conference with Darlee Crocket of Planned Parenthood and Candy Straight and Susan Bevan with Republican Majority for Choice.

“As a pro-choice Republican, I believe that this legislation is critical because it ensures nondiscrimination within the federal Title X family planning program,” said Dold. “We have seen several attempts to block funds and exclude health care providers from participating in the Title X program simply because they separately offer services beyond the scope of Title X.  We should not discriminate against hospitals and organizations that provide access to basic, preventative, and in some cases life-saving services for so many underprivileged women through Title X.”

Photo: Joan Walsh of Salon and MSNBC at Planned Parenthood of Illinois Generations Gala

The study involved a diverse sample of couples and found that men’s and women’s perceptions of their significant other’s empathy, and their abilities to tell when the other is happy or upset, are linked to relationship satisfaction in distinctive ways, according to the article published online in the Journal of Family Psychology.

Related

• Eye of the Beholder (PDF, 122KB)

"It could be that for women, seeing that their male partner is upset reflects some degree of the man’s investment and emotional engagement in the relationship, even during difficult times. This is consistent with what is known about the dissatisfaction women often experience when their male partner becomes emotionally withdrawn and disengaged in response to conflict,” said the study’s lead author, Shiri Cohen, PhD, of Harvard Medical School.

Researchers recruited 156 heterosexual couples for the experiment. Of those, 102 came from the Boston area and were younger, urban, ethnically and economically diverse and in a committed but not necessarily married relationship. In an effort to find couples who varied in the ways they resolved conflicts and controlled their emotions, they also looked for couples with a history of domestic violence and/or childhood sexual abuse. The remaining participants, from Bryn Mawr, Pa., were older, suburban and middle-class married couples with strong ties to the community. In all, 71 percent of couples were white, 56 percent were married and their average length of relationship was three-and-a-half years. 

Each participant was asked to describe an incident with his or her partner over the past couple of months that was particularly frustrating, disappointing or upsetting. The researchers’ audio recorded the participant making a one- to two-sentence statement summarizing the incident and reaction and then brought the couples together and played each participant’s statements. The couples were told to try to come to a better understanding together of what had happened and were given approximately 10 minutes to discuss it while the researchers videotaped them. Following the discussions, the participants viewed the videotape and simultaneously rated their negative and positive emotions throughout, using an electronic rating device. The device had a knob that moved across an 11-point scale that ranged from "very negative" to "neutral" to "very positive."

Using these ratings, the researchers selected six 30-second clips from the videotape that had the highest rated negative or positive emotions by each partner. The researchers showed the clips to the participants and had them complete questionnaires about their feelings during each segment as well as their perceptions of their partner’s feelings and effort to understand them during the discussion. They also measured the participants' overall satisfaction with their relationships and whether each partner considered his or her partner’s efforts to be empathetic.

Relationship satisfaction was directly related to men’s ability to read their female partner’s positive emotions correctly. However, contrary to the researchers’ expectations, women who correctly understood that their partners were upset during the videotaped incident were much more likely to be satisfied with their relationship than if they correctly understood that their partner was happy. Also, when men understood that their female partner was angry or upset, the women reported being happier, though the men were not. The authors suggest that being empathetic to a partner’s negative emotions may feel threatening to the relationship for men but not for women.

The findings also show that the more men and women try to be empathetic to their partner’s feelings, the happier they are. The authors suggest that this research should encourage couples to better appreciate and communicate one another’s efforts to be empathetic.  

Article: “Eye of the Beholder: The Individual and Dyadic Contributions of Empathic Accuracy and Perceived Empathic Effort to Relationship Satisfaction,” Shiri Cohen, PhD, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital; Marc S. Schulz, PhD, and Emily Weiss, Bryn Mawr College; and Robert J. Waldinger, PhD, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital;   Journal of Family Psychology, Vol. 26, No. 2.

Dr. Shiri Cohen can be contacted at (617) 643-7404 or by email.

Girls in Santa Barbara, CA take a break from learning about oceanography during a visit with Dr. Jane Lubchenco, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (Photo Courtesy of NOAA)

At the release of the White House Girls in STEM video, some of the nation’s top women scientists and engineers took a break from their daily responsibilities at the heights of Federal, private, and academic science and technology enterprises to urge girls to open their minds to careers in these fields. Their voices joined a chorus of women who are making it part of their mission to inspire students in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).

Over the past few months, students from Santa Barbara, California to Miami, Florida have played hosts to some unusual substitute teachers, as senior women scientists and engineers from the highest levels of the Obama Administration hit the road as part of the Women in STEM Speakers Bureau roundtable series.

Designed to spark the interest of middle and high-school girls in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) subjects, the Women in STEM Speakers Bureau was launched by the White House Council on Women and Girls and Office of Science and Technology Policy in September, 2011. Outstanding STEM role models from nine Federal agencies participated in the program, inspiring girls and boys alike with their own personal stories and insights.

In Santa Barbara this past March, Dr. Jane Lubchenco, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, inspired Girls, Inc students with not only her tales of becoming the first woman to serve in that post, but also with props and squid.

Dr. Jane Lubchenco demonstrates an ocean explorer’s toolkit to students in Santa Barbara, CA. (Photo courtesy of NOAA)

Similarly, Dr. Karina Edmonds, Technology Transfer Coordinator at the US Deparment of Energy, traveled to both Austin, TX and San Francisco, CA to share her story of how, as an immigrant from the Dominican Republic, she pursued her interest in mechanical engineering to become the first full-time staffer ever appointed to her current position.

Karina Edmonds, Technology Transfer Coordinator for the Department of Energy, meets with girls from the University of San Francisco Upward Bound Math and Science Program. (Photo courtesy of USF Upward Bound Math and Science Program)

These recent appearances complemented previous roundtables, such as  Dr. Elisabeth Hagen’s (Undersecretary for Food Safety at the US Department of Agriculture) visit to Harrisburg, PA in January — a trip that began a groundswell of enthusiasm ending in a modest grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Education to fund Saturday Girls STEM Academies in the area — or that of Dr. Cora Marrett, Deputy Director of the National Science Foundation’s events in St. Louis and Jackson, MS.

Collectively, these roundtables open up possibilities to students that may have never considered critical careers in science, technology, engineering, and math.

But these women are not lone sources of inspiration — parents, teachers, professionals, researchers, and other enthusiasts can encourage girls to stretch their interests and pursue paths in which today, they are sorely underrepresented. Sites like MentorNet and FabFems aim to make being a STEM role model easy. Let’s maintain momentum and ring in next year’s women’s history month, with a year of inspiring girls in these exciting fields.

For more information on the Women in STEM Roundtable, or other Administration efforts to increase the participation of women and girls in STEM, visit www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/women.

Dr. Cora Marrett, Deputy Director of the National Science Foundation, learns about a student’s project in St. Louis. (Photo courtesy of Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri)

*Lauren Andersen is a Policy Advisor in the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Every book has a life of its own: the flash of insight that inspired its creator; the negotiations among authors, publishers and printers to produce it; and the readers who cherish and critique it. Curated from the Rosenbach’s vast collection of works by the acclaimed author and illustrator, Pen to Publisher displays original Sendak artwork alongside production materials like color separations, layouts, press proofs and publicity materials to answer the simple question: How does an idea become a book?

The exhibition delves into the working relationships between Sendak and his revolving crew of authors, publishers, printers, calligraphers and designers, as they compromised, cooperated and sometimes conceded in order to produce a beautiful — and marketable — finished product.

In the Sendak Gallery on the Rosenbach’s first floor, viewers can investigate Sendak’s earliest creative impulses with each book through hastily scribbled notes and manuscripts to dummy books and sketches. In the second floor’s Gallery 1, the artist’s final work — and materials that detail how it was reproduced, corrected, printed, bound and publicized — will be on display. The Rosenbach invites visitors to follow each of the three books, from Sendak’s first expressions of a story, character or idea to the final signoff at the press.

About the books

The Sign on Rosie’s Door (1960) features the everyday adventures of Rosie, a character Sendak based on a real girl who lived in his Brooklyn neighborhood in the late 1940s. Sendak’s process for creating The Sign on Rosie’s Door involved more dummy books, or sets of pages used to approximate the size and appearance of a finished book, than any other project (four of these hand-made creations will be on display). In addition, Sendak’s color separations — in which he isolated images into single-color layers — are a fascinating example of full-color book production methods that seem antiquated by today’s standards. What stands out through every sketch, dummy book or separation is the brash, dramatic personality of Rosie herself.

Photo: Sendak at the Rosenbach in 1985 by Frank Armstrong

An online exhibit from the Claude Moore Library, titled Patients’ Voices in Early 19th Century Virginia, presents 700 letters from the patients of Dr. James Carmichael, a Scottish physician whose practice was based in Fredericksburg, Virginia. The collection of correspondence, written between 1819 and 1830 and placed in the new Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, gives a unique view into the physician-patient relationship.

The letters can be seen online in their original, handwritten form, side by side with a typed version. The 19th-century patients’ terms for complaints, diseases, and treatments have been matched to their 21st-century equivalents. The letters are deeply descriptive and reveal familiar emotions. A father in 1820 pleads for his sick daughter, “Pray send out Dr. Carmichael to me immediately — as I consider her to be in great danger. Delay not a moment, for her life and my happiness depend on it.”

“There are only a few collections of letters to antebellum southern physicians,” said Todd L. Savitt, Professor of Medical Humanities at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University and noted author on Southern medical history. “They’re invaluable because they give us insight into the physician-patient relationship, and tell us about the role of physicians in the society where they practiced. UVa has given us a wonderful gift in making the Carmichael collection so readily available.”

“One of the more challenging aspects of the project faced by the Historical Collections team was to read and transcribe the handwriting of nearly 700 different individuals, who possessed varying degrees of literacy,” project director Joan Echtenkamp Klein said.

In addition to the correspondence, the web site also includes a photo essay of the landscape of the Carmichael letters, newspaper articles, book excerpts, court records, maps, WPA reports, and extensive listings of “Who’s Who” and “Places Mentioned” in the letters, with links to related sources of information.

Navigating the Exhibit

• Site Map — See how the site is organized.
• Final Report — Read the project summary report.
• Photo Essay — Survey the present day landscape of the Carmichael Letters.
• Credits & Acknowledgements — Find out who was behind the project.

In a further analysis, female characters were found to be twice as likely to be seen in explicit sexual scenes as males, while male characters were more likely to be seen as violent. Nevertheless, violence in films has increased over time for both male and female main characters. The study, authored by Amy Bleakley, Patrick E. Jamieson and Daniel Romer of the APPC, was published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

“We were surprised to see the same representation of women today as was prevalent in the 1950s,” said Dan Romer who co-authored the study. “With women increasingly playing major roles in all walks of life, Hollywood appears to remain in the mindset of a much earlier era.”

The final sample consisted of 20,073 5-minute segments from 855 top-grossing movies. Trained coders assessed each segment for the presence of sexual and violent content. Sexual content included kissing (on lips), nudity, sexual behavior, or sexual intercourse, implicitly or explicitly shown, but the authors differentiate between kissing on the lips and more explicit content such as complete nudity or intercourse. Violent content was defined as intentional acts (e.g., to cause harm, to coerce, or for fun) where the aggressor makes or attempts to make some physical contact that has potential to inflict injury or harm.

“It’s disheartening to see that unbalanced portrayals of men and women persist in popular films,” noted Amy Bleakley, the lead author of the paper. “Movie-going youth — the largest consumers of movies per capita — who are repeatedly exposed to portrayals of women as sexual and men as violent may internalize these portrayals.”

“One concern abouut pushing for greater inclusion of women in today’s films is that women may be put into more violent roles, a trend we observed for both men and women,” added study co-author Patrick E. Jamieson. “Such characters would not represent the many roles that women are playing in the world today compared to 1950.”

Data from the study were collected as part of The Coding of Media and Health Project at the APPC. The project evaluates media portrayal of risky health behaviors across time and advances the scholarly community’s understanding of its influence. It covers popular films, television, music and music videos, and includes sex, violence, tobacco, alcohol, drug use, and suicide. CHAMP has content analyzed more than half a century’s worth of top 30-grossing movies since 1950, for a total of 855 films.

Photo:  Scarlett Johanssen in The Avengers