【推荐2】For all the talk of helicopter parents and their snowflake children, most parents I know are more concerned with whether their children’s development would be considered normal by experts than whether they are raising a prodigy (天才).

When the teen years arrive, the “Is it normal?” instinct can go into overdrive. Adolescence is marked by many changes, including ones that manifest(显示)physically and, their more challenging counterpart, ones that manifest emotionally. The moods and deep feelings are intense, and make many helicopter parents in a state of extreme panic.

But difficult feelings are often not a cause for concern, according to psychologist Lisa Damour in her new book, The Emotional Lives of Teenagers: Raising Connected, Capable, and Compassionate Adolescents. Not only are sadness and worrying healthy and natural parts of being a teenager, but the ability to experience these feelings(without a parent panicking)and to learn how to cope with them is developmentally necessary.

There is a lot of commercial marketing around wellness that can give people the impression that they are only mentally healthy or their kids are mentally healthy if they are feeling good, calm or relaxed. This is not an accurate definition of mental health. Mental distress is not only inevitable—it is part of mental health and experiencing it is part of how kids grow and mature.

There are many other healthy ways kids regulate emotions besides talking. Listening to mood-matching music is a very adaptive way to regulate as the experience of listening to the music catalyzes the emotion out of them. Teenagers also discharge emotions physically—by going through a run, jumping on a trampoline or banging on drums. Sometimes they will discharge them through creative channels like drawing or making music.

As adults, we should not diminish the value of emotional expression that brings relief, even if it doesn’t come in the verbal form to which we are most accustomed. Don’t join in because what we ultimately want is for our teens to become autonomous in dealing with their hard feelings.

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Hello! We are identical twin sisters. We started this blog because so many people are interested in twins. It appears that people never get tired of hearing about us! The news is full of stories about twins. We collect these stories and post them on our blog. We hope you will find them interesting!

Debbie and Lisa are identical twins. They are also successful businesswomen. In 1994, they opened a restaurant in New York City called Twins. All of the servers in the restaurant were identical twins. They always worked the same hours. If one of the twins was ill, the other one had to stay home, too. If one twin quit, the other twin also had to leave. Many of the restaurant’s customers were also twins. Twins all over the world heard about the restaurant and wanted to visit it. Ruth Reichl, a famous restaurant writer, wrote about the restaurant in The New York Times in 1995.

The restaurant is closed now, but Debbie and Lisa have another successful business. They own a talent agency. The agency specializes in twins. They find work for twins in movies, television commercials, advertisements, and reality shows. Child actors who are twins have a special advantage. There are laws to protect children who work. As a result, most child actors can work for only a few hours a day. But child actors who are twins can share one job. This doubles the work that they can complete in one day. Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen are a very famous example of this. At just nine months old, they began to play one character on the popular television show Full House.

【推荐3】Watching the behaviour and body language of zoo animals could be the key to understanding and improving their welfare, new research suggests. Traditionally, zoos have focused on more straightforward measures such as whether animals are eating and sleeping.

The new review, by the University of Exeter and the University of Winchester, says zoos have made great improvements in recent years, but closer observation of animal behaviour — a method called Qualitative Behavioural Assessment, developed in farming — could show even more about their state of mind.

An animal’s positioning of its body, facial movements and activity levels are among the things that might tell whether it is excited, calm, interested, nervous, relaxed, etc.

“Zookeepers are knowledgeable about their animals, and they will often recognise an animal’s state of mind by its behaviour and body language,” said Dr. Paul Rose, of the University of Exeter.

“What we are suggesting is a more scientific method of this, carried out over time.”

“Certain behaviours will show certain moods (情绪) in an animal, and we should build our knowledge of this for different animals that live in zoos. For example, lions have a lot of facial expressions, and research on these expressions could help zoos understand the animals’ state of mind. This information could then be used to improve welfare by changing diets, feeding times or any number of other aspects of the way animals are kept.”

Dr. Rose carries out much of his research at WWT Slimbridge Wetland Centre, and is now examining how the swans (天鹅) there might show their state of mind through their behavioural expression.

“We’re looking at how much time they spend exploring their habitat, which could show what they’re feeling,” he said. “When they’re unsure, they appear to move less and be more careful, and draw their feathers (羽毛) close to their bodies.”

The study suggests research opportunities for Qualitative Behavioural Assessment and practices that could be used by zoos. “Animal welfare in zoos has improved greatly in the last 10 or 20 years, and this method gives zoos another way to recognise and improve the welfare of animals,” Dr. Rose said.