From $1-Million Lotteries to Free Beer: Do COVID Vaccination Incentives Work?

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June 17, 2021

Public Health From $1-Million Lotteries to Free Beer: Do COVID Vaccination Incentives Work? Doling out cash rewards and lifting mask mandates could increase vaccine uptake, some research suggests By Tanya Lewis

Natural Disasters AI Could Spot Wildfires Faster Than Humans A prediction system undergoes testing as the U.S. West braces for another potentially devastating wildfire season By Jane Braxton Little

Behavior & Society How COVID is Changing the Study of Human Behavior The pandemic is teaching us key lessons about how people respond to crisis and misinformation, and it is spurring changes in the way scientists study public health questions By Christie Aschwanden,Nature magazine

Behavior & Society The Quiet after the Storm After a year of living cautiously and more isolated, here's how to resume public routines By Andrea Gawrylewski

Space Why the Supergiant Star Betelgeuse Went Mysteriously Dim Last Year High-resolution images suggest the star spewed out so much dust that its brightness dropped by two thirds in 2020 By Davide Castelvecchi,Nature magazine

Cognition It's All in the Mix A new form of color blending produces surprising palettes By Stephen Macknik,Susana Martinez-Conde

Public Health Hidden Black Scientists Proved the Polio Vaccine Worked Tuskegee Institute researchers showed Jonas Salk's vaccine protected children by developing a key test By Ainissa Ramirez

Public Health COVAX Effort to Vaccinate the World Is Faltering The international collaboration does not have enough COVID vaccine doses to meet its goals, so wealthy countries must step up to fill the gap By Sara Reardon

Public Health The COVID Lab-Leak Hypothesis: What Scientists Do and Do Not Know An examination of the arguments that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a lab in China and the science behind them By Amy Maxmen,Smriti Mallapaty,Nature magazine

Evolution Animal Kids Listen to Their Parents Even before Birth Human children: please take note of the behavior of prebirth zebra finches By Karen Hopkin | 05:01

FROM THE STORE How to Do Anything Better When we think about the things we do every day—driving, working, parenting—we realize that even with tasks we are generally good at, there is always room for improvement. As always, science is on the case. This eBook contains a collection of columns written by Sunny Sea Gold, a health and psychology journalist whose work has appeared in O: The Oprah Magazine and Parents. These selections, published by Scientific American between 2009 – 2017, offer practical tips for acing life from nailing that job interview to giving the perfect gift.

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FROM THE ARCHIVE How to Expand Access to COVID Vaccines without Compromising the Science Emergency use authorizations by the FDA are not ideal By Peter Doshi,Donald Light | December 2020

QUOTE OF THE DAY "Other states are taking even more creative approaches to persuading the unvaccinated. West Virginia is holding a lottery with hunting rifles and shotguns as prizes. New Jersey and Connecticut are giving away free beer and other beverages. In May Alabama offered people who had been vaccinated or gotten a COVID test the chance to drive on its famous Talladega Superspeedway. And Washington State recently began allowing retailers to offer people a free cannabis joint in exchange for getting vaccinated." Tanya Lewis, Scientific American

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