【推荐1】Most people who own iPhones use them as their alarm clocks — making it very easy to check emails one last time before falling asleep and hard to ever feel away from work and social networks.

Several years ago, my boss fainted due to exhaustion after staying up late to catch up on work. She banged her head and ended up with five stitches (缝针) — and became what she calls a “sleep evangelist (传教士).” Now she leaves her phone charging in another room when she goes to bed and   encourages her friends to do the same.

“I sent all my friends the same Christmas gift — a lovely alarm clock — so they could stop using the excuse that they needed their very attractive iPhones by their beds to wake them up in the morning.” she said.

If your phone wakes you up in the morning, it may also be keeping you up at night. A 2008 study showed that people exposed to mobile radiation took longer to fall asleep and spent less time in deep sleep. “The study indicates that during laboratory exposure to 884 MHz wireless signals, components of sleep believed to be important for recovery from daily wear and tear are severely affected,” the study concluded.

A quarter of young people feel like they must be available by phone around the clock, according to a Swedish study that linked heavy cellphone use to sleeping problems, stress and depression. Unreturned messages carry more guilt when the technology to deal with them lies at our fingertips. Some teens even return text messages at midnight.

Most of us choose not to set limits on our nighttime availability. Nearly three quarters of people from the age of 18 to 44 sleep with their phones within reach, according to a 2012 Time poll. That number falls off slightly in middle age, but only people aged 65 and older are leaving the phone in another room as common as sleeping right next to it.

【推荐2】Australian cities can keep their native wildlife — but only if they can kick their habit of urban sprawl (无计划的扩展). That’s the finding of a new study by leading Australian environmental researchers Jessica Sushinsky, Professor Hugh Possingham and Dr. Richard Fuller of the University of Queensland.

“While urban development usually reduces the number of birds in a city, building more compact (紧凑的) cities and avoiding urban sprawl can slow these reductions greatly,” says lead author Jessica Sushinsky. “Compact housing development leaves birds’ homes untouched, leading to fewer losses of birds.”

The researchers surveyed native and wild birds in Brisbane’s urban areas, including living and industrial areas, public parks and gardens, major roadways and airports. They then used statistical modeling to find out what will happen to the birds as the city grows. The first setting was compact growth — where multiple homes are built on land that previously had only one house. The second setting was sprawling growth — a familiar pattern where homes are built here and there beyond the city’s current boundaries.

The team’s forecasts showed that a much greater diversity of species was lost over 20 years in the sprawling setting compared to the more compact setting. “Urban sprawl resulted in the disappearance of many urban-sensitive birds — birds that only live in areas where there is native vegetation(植被), such as parklands and woodlands,” Ms. Sushinsky says.

“On the other hand, we found the city with the compact development attracted more birds because it kept more of its parks and green areas.”

Now the Queensland Government has adopted the more compact urban growth strategy, which, Dr. Richard Fuller says, is good news for Australia’s native birds. These birds are environmental specialists — they need a particular environment to do well. “While compact development means smaller backyards, it can also make our entire cities more bio-diverse,” according to Dr. Fuller. “The study shows that we should hold on to our green spaces instead of clearing them for sprawling development.”

This is the first time science has modeled the effects of different urban growth strategies on birds, the researchers say. “Statistical models like these are important because they help us to understand the ecological consequences of a particular decision,” says Dr. Fuller.

【推荐1】Do you have a spare room in your house? Do you like to share your driveway in front of your garage with others?    1    Many people are benefiting from this new business of renting.

Perhaps the best-known example of a company in this field is Airbnb—an American web business which allows you to rent out your spare room to holidaymakers. It says it operates in 34,000 cities and it has 800,000 listings of rooms and apartments.    2    

A British company is doing something with parking spaces. Just Park’s founder, Anthony Eskinazi, says, “When I had the original idea. I spotted a driveway close to a spots stadium. It would have been so convenient if I could have just parked in that driveway rather than in a commercial car park.”    3    Around 20,000 people have advertised their spaces on the website, and he says around half a million drivers use it.

    4    They are people who run things like traditional hotels and commercial car parks. They are afraid of ending up losing money.

    5    Regulations for these new businesses are unclear. How will renting out your driveway affect your neighbor? Because this is a new business world, those rules aren’t there yet.

【推荐2】Recently I spoke to some of my students about what they wanted to do after they graduated, and what kind of job prospects they thought they had.

Given that I teach students who are trained to be doctors, I was astonished to find that most students thought that they would not be able to get the jobs they wanted without "outside help". "What kind of help is that?" I asked, expecting them to tell me that they would need a relative or family friend to help them out.

“Surgery（整形手术）”，one replied. I was pretty alarmed by that response. It seems that the graduates of today are increasingly willing to go under the knife to get ahead of others when it comes to getting a job. One girl told me that she was considering surgery to increase her height. “They break your legs, put in special extending screws, and slowly expand the gap between the two ends of the bone as it regrows. You can get at least 5 cm taller!”

At that point, I was shocked. I am short. I can't deny that, but I don't think I would put myself through months of pain just to be a few centimeters taller. I don't even bother to wear shoes with thick soles, as I'm not trying to hide the fact that I am just not tall!

It seems to me that there is a trend toward wanting “perfection”, and that is an ideal that just does not exist in reality.

No one is born perfect, yet magazines, TV shows and movies present images of thin, tall beautiful people as being the norm（标准）. Advertisements for slimming aids, beauty treatments and cosmetic surgery clinics fill the pages of newspapers, further creating an idea that “perfection” is a requirement, and that it must be purchased, no matter what the cost. In my opinion, skills, rather than appearance, should determine how successful a person is in his chosen career.

【推荐3】Lonely? You’re hardly alone. That’s the finding of a new study. And that appears throughout industrial nations across the globe. The study linked rising loneliness to a greater use of smartphones and the Internet over the same years.

Jean Twenge, a psychologist, took part in the study. Her team has found that since 2012, US teens have been spending less time together face to face.

“Smartphones can help keep us connected with friends,” says Twenge. “But they can also make people feel excluded (隔离).” Girls, especially, may feel this way. One reason may be that they like to post more photos and selfies than boys. Studies have shown that if those images don’t get a lot of “likes”, it can affect a teen’s mental health.

And there’s “phubbing”, a mixture of “phone” and “snubbing (冷落)”. It’s that moment in which a friend or family member takes out a phone and keeps looking at it，paying no attention to everybody else, including you. Phubbing is one way that technology can affect you, even when you’re not the one using it.

The new study pulled its data from a survey. Some 1 million 15-and 16-year-old students from 37 countries took this survey in 2000, 2003, 2012, 2015 and 2018. Its questions mostly dealt with education. But they also included six statements about loneliness, such as “I feel awkward and out of place in my school”. Students could strongly disagree, disagree, agree or strongly agree with each statement.

If technology causes loneliness, should we stop using it? “No, not at all,” argues Twenge. “Everybody of all ages is trying to figure out how we can best use these technologies and stay mentally healthy.” Her advice is to   “use your smartphone for what it’s good for. Then put it away.” That includes putting it away overnight—ideally in another room.

【推荐1】Everybody knows that Coca Cola is red and Starbucks is green. Most of us can name companies and their own brand colors. What we may not know about is the science behind these companies' choices of these colors. Color psychology is the study of how colors affect people's feelings, actions, and decision-making. Companies use color psychology when they develop their brands and advertisements in order to encourage us to buy. In fact studies have shown that around 90 percent of people spend money depending on color and appearance. Because of this, companies use colors to influence how we feel about their products. For example, it’s no accident that many tech products use white; it's simple and clean. At the same time, cosmetics companies prefer colors like purple, black, or pink that mean love, comfort, and romance.

Companies often choose active colors that make you buy right now. Red, for example, is a high-energy, exciting color that moves people to take action. Yellow is the color of summer, and it’s bright and remarkable. In fact, most big companies have something to do with certain specific colors. Studies show that customers prefer brands that they know. Then those with a proper color plan, such as LEGO or Facebook are likely to perform more strongly on the market. Research has also shown that men and women like different colors. Men prefer blue, green, and black while women prefer like purple and pink.