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1. How Experts Detect Phishing Scam Emails

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3415231  

   Wash, Rick (October 2020, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction)

   Phishing scam emails are emails that pretend to be something they are not in order to get the recipient of the email to undertake some action they normally would not. While technical protections against phishing reduce the number of phishing emails received, they are not perfect and phishing remains one of the largest sources of security risk in technology and communication systems. To better understand the cognitive process that end users can use to identify phishing messages, I interviewed 21 IT experts about instances where they successfully identified emails as phishing in their own inboxes. IT experts naturally follow a three-stage process for identifying phishing emails. In the first stage, the email recipient tries to make sense of the email, and understand how it relates to other things in their life. As they do this, they notice discrepancies: little things that are off'' about the email. As the recipient notices more discrepancies, they feel a need for an alternative explanation for the email. At some point, some feature of the email --- usually, the presence of a link requesting an action --- triggers them to recognize that phishing is a possible alternative explanation. At this point, they become suspicious (stage two) and investigate the email by looking for technical details that can conclusively identify the email as phishing. Once they find such information, then they move to stage three and deal with the email by deleting it or reporting it. I discuss ways this process can fail, and implications for improving training of end users about phishing. 

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2. Conceived This Way: Innateness Defended

   Northcott, R; Piccinini, G. (September 2018, Philosophers' imprint)

   Scientists find it useful to divide biological traits into innate and acquired ones. But it is now a commonplace that biological traits result from the complex interplay of genetic and environmental factors. Therefore, they cannot be labeled innate or acquired simpliciter; a more sophisticated analysis is required. We will argue that biological traits are innate to the degree that they are caused by factors intrinsic to the organism at the time of its origin, while they are acquired to the degree that they are caused by factors extrinsic to the organism. We will ground this account in a rigorous notion of degree of causation. We will then compare it with previous accounts. After that, we will address skepticism about innateness and argue that the concept remains valuable. 

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3. Informing the Public about Microplastics through a University and Museum Partnership

   https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.3c01017  

   Milne, Safron L; Ramkumar, Malavika; Rieland, Julie M; Thurber, Henry E; Love, Brian J; McNeil, Anne J (January 2024, Journal of Chemical Education)

   Microplastics have been found in the most remote locations on Earth as well as in where we live, work, and play. Despite increasing research focus on microplastics, efforts to inform the public about their omnipresence have lagged. To bridge this gap between research and public knowledge, we developed a museum exhibit with interactive and informative displays that explain what microplastics are, how they are formed, where they are found, and what individuals can do about it. In a partnership between researchers at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) and staff at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum (Detroit), the exhibit highlights the impacts of microplastic pollution in the region. Collected survey data revealed that museum visitors were aware of microplastic pollution and are worried about it, that they felt the museum exhibit was helpful and informative, and that they are likely to take simple actions to decrease microplastic pollution. 

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4. Science Curriculum Content for Real World Application

   Birney, Lauren B.; McNamara, Denise (June 2017, International journal of education and social science)

   Much has been written in the last few decades about 21st Century skills that are needed for successful entry into today’s workforce. Educators and corporate leaders agree that these skills are achieved through a deeper learning of content and an ability to creatively respond to real-world situations. Nowhere is this more evident that in the content area known as S.T.E.M., the acronym for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. It is through the lens of STEM that many of the social, economic and environmental challenges with which we are faced will be solved. Given that the above statement rings true, it is the duty if educational leaders to provide students with the tools that will prepare them for both career opportunities and as members of the citizen science community. To spark this level of student interest, the curriculum being presented has to be timely, topical and immersive. Students must feel that they are an integral part of the learning process and that they have control in the outcome. In other words, they must feel that they have ownership and that they can collaborate in the learning process. 

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5. Gender Competition in the Production of Nonbinary ‘They’

   https://doi.org/10.5070/G60111306  

   Arnold, Jennifer E; Venkatesh, Ranjani; Vig, Zachary (February 2024, Glossa Psycholinguistics)

   Two experiments test how college students use nonbinary they to refer to a single and specific person whose pronouns are they/them, e.g., “Alex played basketball on the neighborhood court. At one point they made a basket,” compared to matched stories about characters with binary (she/her or he/him) pronouns. Experiment 1 shows that for both types of pronouns, people use pronouns more in a one-person than a two-person context. In both experiments, people produce nonbinary they at least as frequently as binary pronouns, suggesting that any difficulty does not result in pronoun avoidance in spoken language, even though it does in written language (Arnold et al., 2022). Nevertheless, there is evidence that nonbinary they is somewhat difficult, in that people made gender errors on about 9% of trials, and they used a more acoustically prominent and disfluent-sounding pronunciation for nonbinary pronouns than binary pronouns. However, exposure  to  they  in  the  context  of  the  experiment  had  no  effect  on  frequency,  accuracy,  or  pronunciation of pronouns. This provides the first evidence of how nonbinary they is used in a naturalistic storytelling context and shows that while it poses some minor difficulties, it can be used successfully in a supportive context.  

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