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A new study published in the Journal of Advances in Nutrition looked at a systemic review of social vulnerability and child food insecurity in developed countries. “Our study focuses on identifying social vulnerability factors that may be associated with childhood food insecurity,” study author Liuwork Mitiku Dana told us. “Our aim was to understand the complex drivers of food insecurity in children living in wealthy industrialized nations like Australia and the US.” [More]

A new study explores the impact of prenatal exposure to Superstorm Sandy, a post-tropical cyclone that made landfall in New York City in 2012, and extreme ambient heat, defined as at least one day greater than 95 degrees Fahrenheit, on the brain volume of the basal ganglia in school-aged children, a critical brain region that regulates our emotions and behaviors. “We were hoping to find out whether individual and/or combined exposure to these stressors defined above would lead to discernible differences in the volume of the basal ganglia,” study author Donato DeIngeniis told us. [More]

A new review looked at play and children’s health. “This was a scoping review exploring peer reviewed literature from the past 10 years in order to examine what it can tell us about the connection between play and children’s health in healthcare settings,” review author Kelsey Grabor told us. We hoped to better understand recent and relevant evidence that might demonstrate why we should utilize and support the integration of play into a more holistic view of children’s healthcare.” [More]

A new study published in NEJM AI looked at a generative AI chatbot for mental health treatment. “We conducted the first randomized controlled trial to evaluate a therapy chatbot driven entirely by generative AI,” study author Nicholas Jacobson told us. Jacobson is an associate professor of biomedical data science and psychiatry at Dartmouth. “We developed the bot over 5.5 years and the goal of the work was to treat depression, anxiety, and eating disorders and all of their related comorbidities.” [More]

A new study published in the Journal of Child Development looked at the determinants of socioemotional and behavioral well-being among First Nations children living off-reserve in Canada. “Our study focused on positive health outcomes among young First Nations children,” study author Sawayra Owais told us. “Specifically, we examined Indigenous and non-Indigenous-specific determinants associated with positive well-being among First Nations children living off-reserve in Canada.” [More]

A new study published in JAMA Network Open looked at mental health disparities by sexual orientation and gender identity in the All of Us Research Program. “Our study examined mental health disparities between sexual and gender minority (SGM) individuals and their cisgender heterosexual peers using data from the All of Us Research Program,” study author Junjie Anderson Lu told us. [More]

A new study published in PubMed looked at guided self-help versus group treatment for children with obesity. “This study compares the intensive group-based treatment for children with obesity, called family-based treatment, with a guided self-help version which is delivered to the parent /child dyad,” study author Kerri Boutelle told us. “We were interested whether the guided self-help version would provide similar weight losses to the intensive family-based treatment.” [More]

A new study published in JAMA Network looked at a nature-based intervention and the mental health of schoolchildren. “We found that a 12-week nature-based intervention in Grades 5 and 6 did not lead to overall reductions in mental health symptoms, according to both per-protocol and intent-to-treat analyses,” study author Marie-Claude Geoffroy told us. [More]

More than 33% of people aged between 50 to 80 feel lonely. Loneliness and isolation among this group has mostly returned to pre pandemic levels, but remains high. [More]

A new study published in Human Behavior and Emerging Technologies looked at how humans mindlessly treat AI virtual agents as social beings, but how this tendency diminishes among the young. “We were interested in understanding how people relate to AI tools, for example chatbots or smart speakers,” study author Jianan Zhou told us. “Such systems are pervasive nowadays and appear to be smart and well-informed to the typical user, which makes sense from the point of usability. The question this raises, however, is whether interaction with such systems can increase feelings of liking or sympathy towards them and lead us to behave much like we do when interacting with other humans.” [More]