health and wellness
Breathe Better with Asthma, Wherever You Are
Identify and avoid asthma triggers to breathe easier and manage your symptoms.
(Family Features) If you have asthma, you know that symptoms can come on quickly, then worsen.
The things that make them do that are called triggers. An important part of managing asthma is knowing your triggers at home, work, school or while you’re outdoors.
A health care provider can help you figure that out, then you can take steps to avoid those triggers and breathe easier.
At Home
Because asthma is usually due to allergies, triggers are often allergens, or things that cause allergic reactions. Allergens such as pet dander, dust mites, pests and smoke can make asthma symptoms worse in some people, and for others, even trigger an asthma attack.
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) suggests that it may be helpful to combine a few different strategies to help reduce exposure to triggers.
People sensitive to dust can clean with a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filtration vacuum and use mattress and pillow covers that prevent exposure to dust mites. If you’re sensitive to pests like cockroaches and rodents, consider integrated pest management, which involves removing and controlling pests through methods such as traps or poison. Avoiding tobacco smoke, including secondhand smoke, can be especially helpful for some people with asthma.
At School
Asthma is one of the leading reasons children miss school. At school, kids may be exposed to dust mites, pests and mold, which may be asthma triggers for some children.
Because children spend lots of time at school, it can be helpful for teachers, school nurses or coaches to know what to do if your child’s symptoms flare up. Team up with a health care provider to develop an asthma action plan and share it with trusted adults at your child’s school.
At Work
The workplace can have hundreds of potential triggers, like chlorine-based cleaning products, bleaches, hair dyes and metal dust. Repeated exposures in the workplace can also lead to new triggers. Report new or worsening symptoms that occur at work to your health care provider and your workplace supervisor.
Outdoors
Everyday weather like cold, dry air can set off breathing problems. Air pollution can affect asthma, too.
It may be helpful to avoid some of the worst pollution by adjusting when and where you exercise. Try to avoid exercising near busy roads or industrial areas. Visit airnow.gov to check your local air quality so you can plan to avoid outdoor activities when pollution is highest.
Managing your triggers is just one part of keeping your asthma under control. Work with a health care provider to develop an asthma treatment plan that includes taking medicines as prescribed and keeping track of your symptoms and where you are when they occur. That way, you can know what’s making your asthma worse or better.
To learn more about asthma, visit NHLBI’s Learn More Breathe Better® program at nhlbi.nih.gov/BreatheBetter.
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SOURCE:
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
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Children can be systematic problem-solvers at younger ages than psychologists had thought – new research
Child psychologists: Celeste Kidd’s research challenges long-standing ideas from Jean Piaget about children’s problem-solving abilities. Her findings show that children as young as four can independently utilize algorithmic strategies to solve complex tasks, contradicting the belief that systematic logical thinking develops only after age seven. This insight highlights the importance of nurturing algorithmic thinking in early education.
Celeste Kidd, University of California, Berkeley
I’m in a coffee shop when a young child dumps out his mother’s bag in search of fruit snacks. The contents spill onto the table, bench and floor. It’s a chaotic – but functional – solution to the problem.
Children have a penchant for unconventional thinking that, at first glance, can look disordered. This kind of apparently chaotic behavior served as the inspiration for developmental psychologist Jean Piaget’s best-known theory: that children construct their knowledge through experience and must pass through four sequential stages, the first two of which lack the ability to use structured logic.
Piaget remains the GOAT of developmental psychology. He fundamentally and forever changed the world’s view of children by showing that kids do not enter the world with the same conceptual building blocks as adults, but must construct them through experience. No one before or since has amassed such a catalog of quirky child behaviors that researchers even today can replicate within individual children.
While Piaget was certainly correct in observing that children engage in a host of unusual behaviors, my lab recently uncovered evidence that upends some long-standing assumptions about the limits of children’s logical capabilities that originated with his work. Our new paper in the journal Nature Human Behaviour describes how young children are capable of finding systematic solutions to complex problems without any instruction. https://www.youtube.com/embed/Qb4TPj1pxzQ?wmode=transparent&start=0 Jean Piaget describes how children of different ages tackle a sorting task, with varying success.
Putting things in order
Throughout the 1960s, Piaget observed that young children rely on clunky trial-and-error methods rather than systematic strategies when attempting to order objects according to some continuous quantitative dimension, like length. For instance, a 4-year-old child asked to organize sticks from shortest to longest will move them around randomly and usually not achieve the desired final order.
Psychologists have interpreted young children’s inefficient behavior in this kind of ordering task – what we call a seriation task – as an indicator that kids can’t use systematic strategies in problem-solving until at least age 7.
Somewhat counterintuitively, my colleagues and I found that increasing the difficulty and cognitive demands of the seriation task actually prompted young children to discover and use algorithmic solutions to solve it.
Piaget’s classic study asked children to put some visible items like wooden sticks in order by height. Huiwen Alex Yang, a psychology Ph.D. candidate who works on computational models of learning in my lab, cranked up the difficulty for our version of the task. With advice from our collaborator Bill Thompson, Yang designed a computer game that required children to use feedback clues to infer the height order of items hidden behind a wall, .
The game asked children to order bunnylike creatures from shortest to tallest by clicking on their sneakers to swap their places. The creatures only changed places if they were in the wrong order; otherwise they stayed put. Because they could only see the bunnies’ shoes and not their heights, children had to rely on logical inference rather than direct observation to solve the task. Yang tested 123 children between the ages of 4 and 10. https://www.youtube.com/embed/GlsbcE6nOxk?wmode=transparent&start=0 Researcher Huiwen Alex Yang tests 8-year-old Miro on the bunny sorting task. The bunnies are hidden behind a wall with only their sneakers visible. Miro’s selections exemplify use of selection sort, a classic efficient sorting algorithm from computer science. Kidd Lab at UC Berkeley.
Figuring out a strategy
We found that children independently discovered and applied at least two well-known sorting algorithms. These strategies – called selection sort and shaker sort – are typically studied in computer science.
More than half the children we tested demonstrated evidence of structured algorithmic thinking, and at ages as young as 4 years old. While older kids were more likely to use algorithmic strategies, our finding contrasts with Piaget’s belief that children were incapable of this kind of systematic strategizing before 7 years of age. He thought kids needed to reach what he called the concrete operational stage of development first.
Our results suggest that children are actually capable of spontaneous logical strategy discovery much earlier when circumstances require it. In our task, a trial-and-error strategy could not work because the objects to be ordered were not directly observable; children could not rely on perceptual feedback.
Explaining our results requires a more nuanced interpretation of Piaget’s original data. While children may still favor apparently less logical solutions to problems during the first two Piagetian stages, it’s not because they are incapable of doing otherwise if the situation requires it.
A systematic approach to life
Algorithmic thinking is crucial not only in high-level math classes, but also in everyday life. Imagine that you need to bake two dozen cookies, but your go-to recipe yields only one. You could go through all the steps of making the recipe twice, washing the bowl in between, but you’d never do that because you know that would be inefficient. Instead, you’d double the ingredients and perform each step only once. Algorithmic thinking allows you to identify a systematic way of approaching the need for twice as many cookies that improves the efficiency of your baking.
Algorithmic thinking is an important capacity that’s useful to children as they learn to move and operate in the world – and we now know they have access to these abilities far earlier than psychologists had believed.
That children can engage with algorithmic thinking before formal instruction has important implications for STEM – science, technology, engineering and math –education. Caregivers and educators now need to reconsider when and how they give children the opportunity to tackle more abstract problems and concepts. Knowing that children’s minds are ready for structured problems as early as preschool means we can nurture these abilities earlier in support of stronger math and computational skills.
And have some patience next time you encounter children interacting with the world in ways that are perhaps not super convenient. As you pick up your belongings from a café floor, remember that it’s all part of how children construct their knowledge. Those seemingly chaotic kids are on their way to more obviously logical behavior soon.
Celeste Kidd, Professor of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Child Health
Your Child’s Oral Health: A Foundation for Better Overall Health
Good oral health is essential for children, and Medicaid and CHIP provide accessible dental coverage to eligible families, covering services like cleanings and fillings. Regular dental visits starting at age one can prevent cavities and build healthy habits. Families can check eligibility and find dentists through InsureKidsNow.gov.
(Feature Impact) Good oral health sets the stage for a lifetime of healthy smiles and better overall health. Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) help eligible families access affordable and comprehensive care for their children and teens, including regular cleanings, fillings, X-rays, and more to help ensure that eligible kids have access to essential dental services. By practicing good dental habits and seeing a dentist regularly, children can avoid dental problems and maintain healthy smiles as they grow.
Dental Coverage Available Through Medicaid and CHIP
If you’re looking for affordable dental coverage, your child may qualify for free or low-cost health insurance through Medicaid and CHIP. Together these programs cover more than 36 million children nationwide.
Enrollment is open year-round, and many families qualify even if they don’t realize it. Beyond dental care, Medicaid and CHIP also cover preventive health services, emergency care, vision care, prescriptions, and mental and behavioral health services for eligible children.
To see if your family is eligible and to find dentists in your area who accept Medicaid and CHIP, visit InsureKidsNow.gov and explore the “Find a Dentist” tool.
Start Good Dental Habits Early
Regular dental visits are an important part of your child’s oral health routine. Children should see a dentist by the age of 1 and continue with visits twice a year (every six months) as they get older. Going to checkups on a regular schedule can help catch problems early or before they even start. Cavities (also known as tooth decay) are the most common preventable chronic disease among children in the United States, and more than half of all children have cavities by the time they’re 6 to 8 years old. When left untreated, cavities can cause pain and infections that may affect eating, speaking, playing, learning – and even mental health.
The dental visit will vary depending on your child’s age and milestones, but it can include cleanings, full teeth and gum exams, treatments, and guidance on caring for your child’s teeth. Dental visits also help children become comfortable with the dentist, reducing anxiety, and building a positive relationship with oral health care that will benefit them throughout their lives.
Enrolling in CHIP and Medicaid
Medicaid and CHIP provide free or low-cost health coverage to eligible families and children. You can apply online, by phone, by mail, or in person directly at your state’s Medicaid agency. Learn more at InsureKidsNow.gov.
Provided by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services at U.S. taxpayer expense.
Photos courtesy of Shutterstock
SOURCE:
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
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How to Practice Thoughtful Grief Etiquette Online
Grief experts advise caution in sharing condolences and loss-related information on social media, emphasizing the importance of prioritizing the grieving family’s needs. Thoughtful posting practices include waiting for family approval, reaching out privately first, and avoiding speculation about the cause of death. Compassionate communication is essential in these sensitive situations.
(Feature Impact) News of a death can spread online in seconds – often before families have notified close family members privately. That’s why grief experts urge people to rethink how they share condolences, tributes and loss-related information on social media, particularly during the winter months when grief can feel especially isolating.
“Grief etiquette is about putting the needs of the grieving family first, not our urge to say something publicly,” said Dr. Camelia L. Clarke, National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) spokesperson, funeral director and grief educator with nearly 30 years of experience. “Just because information can be shared instantly doesn’t mean it should be.”
Social media has become a common place for sharing condolences, tributes and memories. However, grief experts caution that, without thoughtful consideration, online posts can unintentionally cause harm. Knowing when to post, what to say and when to remain silent can make a meaningful difference for families experiencing loss.
Consider this advice from the experts at the NFDA.
Grief Etiquette in the Digital Age
Grief etiquette refers to the unspoken guidelines for how individuals acknowledge death, loss and mourning, particularly online.
According to Clarke, one of the most important principles is restraint.
“When a death is shared online too quickly, families can feel exposed and overwhelmed at a moment when they’re still processing the loss themselves,” she said. “Waiting is an act of compassion.”
Best Practices for Posting About Loss Online
As social media continues to play a role in modern mourning, grief professionals encourage users to pause before posting and consider a few key guidelines:
- Let the family lead. Don’t post about a death until the immediate family has made it public.
- Ask permission. Obtain consent before sharing photos, stories or tributes.
- Reach out privately first. A direct message, call or handwritten note can be more meaningful than a public comment.
- Avoid speculation. Don’t ask about or share details regarding the cause of death.
- Offer ongoing support. Grief extends far beyond the first days or weeks after a loss.
What to Say (and Avoid)
When expressing condolences online, experts recommend simplicity, sincerity and sensitivity. Messages that acknowledge loss without attempting to explain or minimize it are often the most supportive.
Helpful phrases include:
- “I’m sorry for your loss.”
- “Thinking of you and your family.”
- “I’m here if you want to talk or need anything.”
By contrast, well-meaning cliches can unintentionally cause harm. Phrases such as “They’re in a better place” or “Everything happens for a reason” may reflect the speaker’s beliefs, but they can feel dismissive to someone grieving.
“Grieving people don’t need answers – they need presence,” Clarke said. “Listening matters more than saying the perfect thing.”
Resources for Families and Friends
As digital spaces continue to shape how people communicate during life’s most difficult moments, experts agree empathy, patience and respect remain timeless.
“Grief is deeply personal,” Clarke said. “When we slow down and lead with compassion, we honor both the person who has died and those who are left to grieve.”
To learn more about how to support a grieving person and access free, expert-reviewed resources for navigating grief, expressing condolences and supporting loved ones before, during and after a loss, visit RememberingALife.com, an initiative of the NFDA.
Photo courtesy of Shutterstock
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<img src="https://erp.featureimpact.com/api/v1/tracking/17832/10240/track.gif" />SOURCE:
National Funeral Directors Association
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