Category: The Conversation – UK

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Trudy Meehan, Lecturer, Centre for Positive Psychology and Health, RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences

When a man stabbed Jewish people in Golders Green, London, in what police declared a terrorist incident, the story spread fast – through news alerts, social media and the whispered conversations of anxious adults. When this happens, children notice.

Whether they catch a fragment of a TV bulletin, overhear a parent on the phone, or simply sense that something has shifted in the atmosphere at home, the news has a way of reaching them before they are ready. The question isn’t really whether to talk to children about violence and fear; it’s how.

First, it’s important to know that children have the resilience and capacity to process difficult topics, but bear in mind that this needs to happen in a supportive environment.

Start with safety. Ensure your child feels relaxed and secure. Safety comes from routines, keeping daily rhythms and practising rituals that remind everyone you are together and safe – for example, a nighttime story or song, a special time on the couch after dinner.

Your capacity to deal with issues like violence and fear is the most important factor in contributing to your child feeling safe during these conversations. If you feel overwhelmed or anxious, wait until you feel calmer and more grounded, or have someone to support you with the conversation.

Some families – particularly those who face racism or other forms of discrimination – will already be familiar with these conversations. But if this is new to you, the main thing to do is to be honest and clear. Be direct and specific. Avoid metaphors and euphemisms and vague ideas like “bad people”.

Adjust your language to the child’s age, but don’t overthink it. Simply pause often, ask questions, and watch their face for confusion.

Children don’t stay afraid for long. They move in and out of difficult feelings quickly, which is why short, repeated conversations work better than one big, serious talk.

Come back to them to check understanding and listen for misunderstandings. Ask them if they have any questions. And don’t be surprised if the child looks particularly bored or disinterested. Children prefer delight and joy and play rather than serious adult conversations. It doesn’t mean they are not listening or appreciating the explanation, it just means their priorities are elsewhere – and that’s a good thing.

Keeping children grounded amid fear

Limit media exposure and try to avoid talking about scary events around them – they are always listening and there’s huge room for misunderstanding when they hear rather than take part in conversations.

Research shows that if children are exposed to media and talk about fearful events, that it’s important what they hear is mediated through a supportive adult who can explain the content appropriately. They can pick up on the signs of fear and anxiety from adults, particularly in times of uncertainty, even if they can’t fully understand the words in the conversation.

Follow your child’s lead. Your job is to open the door. They decide whether to walk through it and when to leave. Don’t mistake silence for shutdown. Children often process fear through movement, play, singing, dancing, making and even breaking things.

It’s OK to say “I don’t know” to questions you can’t answer. And it’s OK to say: “I know the answer, but it’s too much information for you at your age, I’ll tell you a little bit now and explain more when I think you are old enough.”

Most important of all, for you and your child, look at your circle of safety. Remind your child they are safe here and now with you, that there is a community that you live in and link with who are there to support you and keep you safe. Focus on hope and efficacy and on what can we do right now for the future we want.

Trudy Meehan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How to talk to children when terrorist attacks and violence dominate the news – https://theconversation.com/how-to-talk-to-children-when-terrorist-attacks-and-violence-dominate-the-news-281879

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sarah Gerson, Lecturer in Developmental & Health Psychology, Cardiff University

What’s the point of play? Is it simply a way to keep children occupied, or something more? For some, it’s about learning literacy and numeracy. For others, it’s how friendships form and relationships deepen. But it can be all of these at once, and more.

Most parents recognise that play matters. But there’s less agreement on what kind of play is best. Should children be guided towards activities designed to build specific skills, like sports for coordination, or construction for maths and engineering? Or should the child’s own interests lead the way, regardless of perceived educational value?

Our research focuses on a type of play often dismissed as “just for fun” – playing with dolls. Across a series of studies, we found that doll play can help children understand other people’s thoughts and feelings. This is a skill that underpins social interaction throughout life.

There is pressure on parents to create the “right” environment for development, often filled with toys that promise clear educational outcomes. STEM-focused toys (science, technology, engineering and maths), in particular, are widely seen as beneficial for learning. Doll play, on the other hand, can be viewed as having little educational benefit.

Our findings challenge that assumption.

More than make-believe

When playing with dolls, children often play out scenes between characters. These may seem simple on the surface but could present opportunities for the child to develop social and emotional skills.

As parents, it seems obvious that playmates are important for building and learning about relationships and other people, and recognising others’ emotions (empathy). But what if children can develop these skills even when playing alone?

Previous studies have found that children who engage more in pretend play tend to have stronger social understanding and empathy. Earlier studies, however, didn’t often use controlled methods to separate out the different factors linking pretend play and social understanding.

So, we set out to test this more directly. We worked with children aged four to eight, assessing their ability to understand that others can hold different beliefs and desires to their own. This is an important milestone in social development. If children recognise that their own mental states may vary from others, this should help them better understand other people and know how to interact with them.

After that initial assessment session, children were randomly assigned either a set of dolls or a tablet with open-ended creative games. They were asked to play several times a week, with parents logging how and when play occurred. We didn’t instruct children how to play because we wanted to understand their natural behaviour.

---

Read more:
How realistic is Mattel’s new autistic Barbie?

---

After approximately six weeks, both sets of children came back and again completed the task about understanding others’ mental states. We found that the children who had been assigned dolls to play with, rather than tablets, showed a greater improvement in their understanding of others’ mental states during the intervening period.

The findings suggest that doll play can actively support the development of social understanding. This is consistent with prior research of ours showing that areas of the brain linked to social processing are activated during doll play, and that children use more language about thoughts and feelings when playing with dolls than when using tablets.

Why it matters beyond childhood

For parents, the message is reassuring – playing with dolls lets children practice skills that they can also use when playing with playmates, like understanding others, anticipating behaviour and responding appropriately.

These abilities matter far beyond childhood. They help us collaborate, resolve conflicts and navigate relationships. In a world that often feels increasingly divided, the capacity to see things from another person’s perspective is not just useful – it’s essential.

Sarah Gerson received funding for this project from Mattel Inc.

Ross E Vanderwert received funding from Mattel for this research.

Salim Hashmi received funding for this research from Mattel Inc.

– ref. Dolls beat screens for building children’s social skills, study finds – https://theconversation.com/dolls-beat-screens-for-building-childrens-social-skills-study-finds-280330

Source: The Conversation – UK – By David B Roberts, Associate Professor, School of Security Studies, King’s College London

Two months into the Iran war and the Strait of Hormuz is still mostly shut. Vessel traffic is running at a fraction of pre-war levels, with the patchwork of ceasefires, blockades and re-closures since February 28 not restoring confidence on the bridge of any tanker.

Hormuz has long been understood as one of the world’s central trade chokepoints. It normally carries around 20 million barrels of crude and oil products each day, as well as roughly a fifth of global liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports. A third of the world’s helium and a similar amount of the urea that ends up as fertiliser also pass through the strait.

Plans and projects to diversify away from Hormuz have been on drawing boards for decades, and those workarounds are now being stress-tested as never before. The bypass infrastructure is doing roughly what architects had hoped, providing around 3.5 million barrels to 5.5 million barrels a day of crude capacity.

But this is still nowhere near enough.

Hormuz workarounds

The most important pipeline on the planet right now runs across Saudi Arabia. The East-West Pipeline – also known as Petroline – was built in the 1980s during the original Tanker war, when Iran and Iraq attacked merchant vessels in the Gulf as part of their wider conflict.

The pipeline’s capacity was expanded to a 7 million barrel emergency ceiling in 2019. However, the loading terminals in the city of Yanbu on Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea coast were never designed to carry this much oil this fast, and analysts tracking tanker traffic estimate that less oil is currently flowing through the pipeline than its theoretical ceiling.

From Yanbu, oil bound for Europe still has to cross Egypt via the Sumed pipeline, which has a capacity of just 2.5 million barrels per day. Although oil flows through this pipeline have surged by 150% since the start of the war, its comparatively small capacity remains a binding constraint on European supply.

Iran noticed the geoeconomic importance of Petroline and has targeted it accordingly. An Iranian drone strike on a pumping station in April knocked 700,000 barrels a day offline. Saudi Aramco, the operator, had the line back at full capacity within three days. While the repair time is reassuring, the fact of the strike is not.

The other half of the Gulf bypass story runs through the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline (Adcop) goes from Habshan to Fujairah on the Gulf of Oman side of the country. With a capacity of just under 2 million barrels per day, Adcop is the only major bypass that exits the Gulf directly into the Indian Ocean.

But as with Petroline, it has been targeted during the war. Iranian drone strikes on Fujairah on March 3, 14 and 16 set storage tanks on fire and suspended loadings. While Adcop offers some diversification for the UAE, it does not solve the targeting problem.

The situation is worse for the Gulf region’s other big oil producers. Iraq’s 3.4 million barrels per day of pre-war crude exports went almost entirely through the southern port city of Basra and the Strait of Hormuz.

There is one northern pipeline, connecting oil fields in Kirkuk to Ceyhan in Turkey. This pipeline was reopened in September 2025 after a two-and-a-half-year halt, with flows ramped up to 250,000 barrels a day in March. But this volume pales in comparison to what Iraq has lost.

Kuwait has it worse still. Pre-war crude exports ran at around 2 million barrels per day, with every barrel exiting through Hormuz. Kuwait has no pipeline alternative. Kuwait Petroleum Corporation declared force majeure in March, temporarily allowing it to suspend its obligations to meet delivery contracts.

This was extended on April 20, with the oil company saying it could not meet contractual obligations even if Hormuz reopened. Overcoming the damage that has been inflicted on Kuwait’s production base – and then ramping up production – will take months.

Qatar’s vulnerability is a different shape. Its pre-war crude exports were smaller than its Gulf neigbours, at around 0.6 million barrels per day. These exports all left Qatar via the strait. For Qatar, the story is gas. Its 77 million tonne LNG capacity at Ras Laffan is the largest in the world, supplying about 19% of global LNG trade. There is no alternative to shipping this gas through Hormuz.

Iran itself has built a Hormuz bypass: a 1,000-kilometre pipeline from Goreh at the head of the Gulf to a terminal at Jask on the Gulf of Oman. It is designed for 1 million barrels per day. But in practice, sanctions and unfinished terminal infrastructure have kept actual throughput at a fraction of design.

The US Energy Information Administration estimated that, in summer 2024, under 70,000 barrels per day were flowing through the pipeline. Loadings stopped altogether that September. According to Kpler, which provides real-time data on global shipping movements, only a single tanker – around two million barrels – has loaded at Jask in the war so far.

A call for more pipes in the Gulf, as there have been since the war began, is understandable. But it is no answer. Replicating Hormuz in pipelines would cost hundreds of billions of US dollars and a decade of construction. And at the end of it, new pipelines and terminals at Yanbu, Fujairah and wherever else would be no harder to reach with a drone than the old ones.

David B Roberts does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What alternatives do Gulf states have to the Strait of Hormuz? – https://theconversation.com/what-alternatives-do-gulf-states-have-to-the-strait-of-hormuz-281805

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gemma Ware, Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation

Pope Leo’s words on Palm Sunday were pointed. “Jesus does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war”, he said during an address at the Vatican.

A few days later in early April, when Timothy Broglio, the archbishop for US military services, was asked on CBS’s Face the Nation if the Iran war is a “just war” in the tradition of the Catholic church, he said: “It is not. While there was a threat with nuclear arms, it’s compensating for a threat before the threat is actually realised.”

US Vice President JD Vance – a recent convert to Catholicism – and Mike Johnson, speaker of the House, pushed back, arguing that the conflict does fit within the church’s just war tradition.

Just war theory, first articulated by St Augustine in the fifth century, outlines the church’s moral guidelines for political and military leaders to consider before choosing to go to war. But it’s not static, and the church’s own position has become more restrictive in recent years.

In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, Jerry Powers, the director of Catholic Peace Building Studies at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, explains how the Catholic church’s just war tradition evolved and the influence it’s had on US military thinking. Powers was a senior advisor on international policy for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops during the Iraq war, and was involved in efforts to persuade the Bush administration not to invade.

He sets out the difficulty now facing Catholics serving in the US military, whose archbishop has now spoken out against the war they’re being asked to fight. “It puts military officers and especially soldiers in a real conundrum,” says Powers. “A soldier has no choice but to obey orders, and if you disobey orders you could very serious repercussions. The officer question is a different one because officers are more senior, and I think officers have to just resign their commission if at some point, they think this is an immoral war.”

Listen to the interview with Jerry Powers on The Conversation Weekly podcast. This episode of The Conversation Weekly was written and produced by Katie Flood and Mend Mariwany and the executive producer was Gemma Ware. Mixing by Eleanor Brezzi and theme music by Neeta Sarl.

Newsclips in this episode from CB S News, AP Archive, BBC, CBS Sunday Morning, ABC News, Rome Reports, KREM 2 News, MS NOW and WUSA 9.

Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feed or find out how else to listen here. A transcript of this episode is available via the Apple Podcasts or Spotify apps.

Gerard F. Powers received a grant from the Nuclear Threat Initiative that helped support the Catholic Peacebuilding Network’s Project on Revitalizing Catholic Engagement on Nuclear Disarmament. He is an expert consultant (unpaid) to the Holy See Mission to the UN. From 1987-2004, Powers was a senior advisor on international policy for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

– ref. What is a just war? Inside the war of words between the Trump administration and the Catholic church​ – https://theconversation.com/what-is-a-just-war-inside-the-war-of-words-between-the-trump-administration-and-the-catholic-church-281788

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Joey Baxter, PhD Candidate in Biosciences, University of Sheffield

To mark International Dawn Chorus day we’ve asked wildlife experts to make their case for why their favourite songbird deserves your vote. Cast your vote in the poll at the end of the article and let us know why in the comments. We hope their words will inspire you to step outside and soak up some birdsong this spring.

Song thrush

Championed by Cannelle Tassin de Montaigu, Research Fellow in Ecology and Evolution, University of Sussex

When people talk about the UK’s best bird songs they often go straight for the big names – loud, dramatic performers that grab your attention. But quietly in the background is the song thrush, a bird whose song is far more impressive than it first appears.

What sets the song thrush apart is not volume or flair, but structure. Its song is built from short, clear phrases, each repeated two or three times before moving on. It’s as if the bird is politely checking that its audience is paying attention. In a dawn chorus that often feels a bit chaotic, there’s something refreshingly organised about it. It’s a bird that’s actually thought things through.

It might not have the dramatic flair of the common nightingale, and it’s less showy than some of the usual favourites. There are no soaring crescendos or dramatic flourishes. But that’s part of its charm. The song is neat, rhythmic and surprisingly memorable once you start listening for it.

In the early morning soundscape, where many birds seem determined to out-sing one another, the song thrush isn’t trying to steal the spotlight. It just quietly does its thing, and does it very well. Underrated? Definitely. Worth your vote? I’d say so.

Robin

Championed by Judith Lock, Principal Teaching Fellow in Ecology and Evolution University of Southampton

The European robin is a delightfully common sight in gardens. You will very likely have heard the characteristic “tic”, followed by a tuneful verse lasting a few seconds. In noisy urban environments they sing louder, less complex songs, in order to be heard.

The male robins use their spring song (January to June) to signal their quality to females, then forming breeding pairs, and to signal competitive ability to other males. The spring song lasts one to three seconds, composed of four to six short motifs. They have an impressive repertoire of about 1,300 motifs, indicating that song is the particularly important for robins, in comparison to birds that rely more on colourful plumage or behavioural displays to communicate with each other.

Most birds sing mainly in the morning but robins sing all day. People often mistake their lovely evening song for a nightingale’s. Constant territory defence from non-migrating robins means that the robin song is a year-round soundtrack too. From July to December, both males and females sing the autumn song, of higher-pitched long, descending notes, with interspersed warbles. This song is to defend their individual winter territories. This indicates that song first evolved first in songbirds to ensure survival, before it became a signal used by males for reproduction. Each robin’s song is dynamic, constantly changing in response to the condition and age of the bird, and their rival.

Great tit

Championed by Josh Firth, Associate Professor of Behavioural Ecology, University of Leeds

Its song may not be as flashy as the nightingale or as poetically melancholy as the blackbird. But scientists have been taught so much by the great tit’s song, heard across British habitats from ancient woodlands to urban gardens. This spring marks 80 continuous years of UK-based scientists studying great tits at Wytham Woods, Oxford, the world’s longest-running study of individually-marked animals.

The unique dataset includes a family tree totaling over 100,000 great tits, with some birds’ lineages traceable back 37 generations. Early research on
Wytham’s great tits during 1970s-1980s resulted in some the first studies to inform the scientific world about how bird song can help males find mates and defend territories, how larger song repertoires can bring more reproductive success, and how young birds learn these repertoires from neighbours (not just their fathers).

And a pioneering study published in 1987 taught us how male great tit song even tracks female fertility, increasing their singing efforts as their female partner’s egg-laying period approaches, and then quietening after she starts laying. Modern technological advances are allowing insight into the hidden meaning embedded in great tits’ songs. In-depth processing of 109,000 recordings of great tit songs has revealed how each bird’s melody tells the story of their own identity as well as that of their local culture and social circles.

A great tit’s age also affects their song: older males keep singing rarer, fading song types while younger birds adopt newer ones. So, Britain’s greatest song belongs to the great tit’s “teacher-teacher” call, for all it has taught us, and for all we have left to learn.

Chaffinch

Championed by Joey Baxter, PhD Candidate in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Sheffield

Why change a winning formula? As far as I’m concerned, the chaffinch sings the biggest banger that UK birds have to offer. While the blackcap attempts to impress with ostentatious bells and whistles, the chaffinch keeps things simple with a catchy riff. Where the starling goes for quantity and novelty, with a frankly plagiaristic repertoire of mimicry, the chaffinch goes for quality, singing proudly in the knowledge that it is delivering a true earworm.

Bubbling trills accelerate before tumbling downwards, slowing to rich watery chirps and finishing with the final flourish. This jaunty lick, the real hook of the song, is often punctuated by an upward inflection at its end, the rising intonation giving it the air of an unanswered question. The chaffinch’s song has rhythm, it has melody, and it’s instantly recognisable. It possesses the wisdom that sometimes it is better not to do everything, but to do one thing well.

Joey Baxter receives funding from UK Research & Innovation (UKRI), via the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Josh Firth receives from UK Research & Innovation (UKRI), via the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

Cannelle Tassin de Montaigu and Judith Lock do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Which bird has the best song? These experts think they know – https://theconversation.com/which-bird-has-the-best-song-these-experts-think-they-know-281259

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Colin Clark, Professor of Sociology and Social Policy, University of the West of Scotland

No single issue has dominated the agenda ahead of the Scottish parliament election in May. But immigration, despite being a matter not devolved to Holyrood, has been part of campaigns. This is because some parties use it to feed wider anxieties about housing, jobs, public services and identity.

Glasgow has been a particular flashpoint because of its role as a City of Sanctuary for asylum seekers. About 6% of the UK’s asylum seekers live in Scotland, with over half in Glasgow, though data suggests this proportion is falling.

Reform UK has sought to capitalise on this. Although no small boats have landed on Scottish coastlines, Reform’s leader in Scotland, Malcolm Offord, unveiled a billboard in Glasgow with an image of migrants crowded into a dinghy. Large red text reads: “Scotland is at a breaking point.”

Polling shows that cost of living, health and the economy rank above immigration as voter priorities in Scotland. Yet these issues can be closely connected in public debate throughout the UK. If people worry about GP appointments, housing waiting lists or jobs, some politicians will blame migration – even if the underlying causes lie elsewhere.

Reform’s Scotland manifesto mentions “strangers” being “prioritised ahead of Scots” by local councils in terms of access to social housing. Offord has claimed that asylum seekers arriving in Glasgow are “jumping the queue”, and his party has promised to “prioritise local people” for such housing.

Asylum seekers are not prioritised for housing because of their immigration status. But Scottish councils are obliged to prioritise homeless people seeking temporary housing – who may be asylum seekers.

What the parties are saying

All major parties recognise that Scotland faces population and economic challenges. An ageing population, low birthrates and labour shortages are affecting sectors such as health, housing, agriculture, social care and hospitality.

Many industries understand that without immigration, parts of the Scottish economy would struggle. That reality has, for years, sustained a relatively broad pro-migration consensus across the Scottish political spectrum.

The governing Scottish National Party argues that Scotland needs a more flexible migration system tailored to Scottish demographic and economic needs. Its 2026 manifesto presents migration as both a social good and an economic necessity. The manifesto is also strong on refugee protection, and argues for a Scottish-specific visa scheme.

Reform UK, polling consistently as the second or third leading party, has spotlighted immigration in its manifesto. One of the party’s five core pledges is to “prioritise local people in communities and restore law and order”.

Like the SNP, the Scottish Liberal Democrats champion relatively pro-migration policies for Scotland. The Lib Dem manifesto states that the party “believe[s] in fairness for everyone, no matter who you are or where you come from”. The manifesto mentions making immigration policy that is “sensitive to the skills needs” of certain sectors, as well as allowing asylum seekers to work if they have waited more than three months for a decision on their application.

For Scottish Labour, the emphasis has been less on immigration and more on housing, jobs and public service reform. Its campaign focus on affordable homes, more support for teachers, improving childcare and better economic competency suggests an awareness that many Scottish voters are more concerned with delivery of key services than anti-migrant rhetoric.

The Scottish Greens approach migration through a lens of refugee protection, anti-racism and social justice, with a manifesto prioritising public services for everyone, regardless of immigration status. In addition to calling for the UK government to devolve immigration to the Scottish parliament, the party would also pilot giving asylum seekers the right to work.

The Scottish Conservative party, while aligned with UK-wide calls for firmer border control, has focused on taxation, public services, crime and policing, SNP competence and the state of the union in its manifesto. Issues of immigration and asylum are contained mainly to attacking the SNP. The Scottish Conservatives have accused the SNP of a “reckless” open-door policy on immigration that has led to “an influx of immigrants” and made Glasgow a “magnet for asylum seekers”.

Scotland’s immigration story

Scotland often tells itself a comforting political story: that it is a progressive society, more welcoming of newcomers, and less susceptible to anti-immigrant politics than other parts of Britain.

There is some truth in this. The Scottish government’s “New Scots” strategy is generally regarded as a positive statement for welcoming and integrating migrants to Scotland.

Survey data has generally shown attitudes in Scotland to be slightly more positive towards migrants and migration, while openly hostile rhetoric has been less common in mainstream politics. Yet national myths can conceal uncomfortable realities. Scotland is not immune to xenophobia, racism or populism, nor, as Reform’s rhetoric around social housing suggests, is it protected from the politics of scapegoating.

Public services are under pressure, housing shortages do exist, and trust in politics has weakened. But migrants did not create decades of underinvestment, stagnant wages or failures in social housing supply. Migrants are often caught within those same crises, even if headlines rarely acknowledge this.

Most of Scotland’s political parties are comfortable supporting the “good migrant” – NHS nurses, engineers, scientists, international students or seasonal workers. Far fewer defend asylum seekers, undocumented migrants or family reunion rights. A hierarchy of deservingness can emerge: migrants are welcomed when economically useful, yet become politically expendable when portrayed as costly or controversial.

Scotland cannot be complacent in its self-image. Years of anti-Irish prejudice, racism towards minority ethnic communities, and longstanding discrimination against Gypsy and Traveller communities tell their own story. Matters of economic insecurity and contested identities can be converted into anti-migrant rhetoric.

Immigration matters in Scotland because the country is vulnerable to the same pressures seen elsewhere. But ultimately, migrants should not be used as political cover for deeper failures of policy and governance.

Colin Clark does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How immigration is playing a role in the Scottish election, even though policy is set in Westminster – https://theconversation.com/how-immigration-is-playing-a-role-in-the-scottish-election-even-though-policy-is-set-in-westminster-280235

Source: The Conversation – UK – By James Painter, Research Associate, Journalism, Reuters Institute, University of Oxford

A glance at recent front pages of many British newspapers leaves no doubt about the stridency of their views on net zero.

On January 13, for instance, the Express said the government must “Tell truth on ‘fantasy’ cost of net zero”, while the Mail’s headline on the same day used the same idea of “fantasy figures”. A few weeks later, a Telegraph headline claimed “Labour’s net zero extremism is ripping the heart out of Britain”.

But how representative are these headlines of wider coverage? To find out, colleagues and I analysed nearly 500 articles published over four months in 2023 across nine UK newspapers (both right- and left-leaning), looking at pieces where net zero appeared in the headline.

We focused on the presence of statements which were factually inaccurate, or misleading (defined as the omission of a credible counter-argument).

Outright inaccuracies were relatively rare. We found 22 examples, partly because we used a narrow definition. But misleading claims were very common.

This was especially true in opinion and editorial pieces. In four right-wing outlets – the Telegraph, Mail, Express and Sun – more than 70% of such articles contained at least one misleading statement.

Because a single misleading statement may not be representative of an overall article – perhaps appearing in a quote – we then looked at those articles where there was a pattern, containing at least three misleading statements.

We found 50 such articles, of which 92% were published in the right-wing press, and the vast majority in editorials and opinion pieces. Of the editorials and opinion pieces we flagged at the Telegraph, Mail, Express and Sun, between 39% and 60% included at least three misleading statements.

Articles which contain at least three misleading statements:

The most common misleading statements concerned the potentially high cost of net zero, the various ways the policy was being implemented, and claims about the unfair distribution of costs. These claims were often presented without acknowledging opposing evidence or arguments – for example, that the costs of inaction were also high or possibly higher, or that experts dispute the figures presented in the article.

By contrast, left-wing publications were more likely to mention the high costs of inaction and the potential co-benefits of net zero such as improved health or better air quality.

In this context, remember that in July 2025 the UK government’s Office for Budget Responsibility found that the cost of bringing emissions down to net zero is significantly lower than the economic damages of failing to act. It also found those net zero costs will be much lower than previously expected.

Scrutiny – but fairer and better-informed

This isn’t a call for newspapers and journalists to avoid scrutinising net zero. It’s a policy that will be funded in part by British taxpayers, and may impose significant and uneven costs on different sectors of the population.

But coverage that focuses only on these costs in isolation, or that cherry picks data to support a single view, risks giving readers an incomplete picture. Fairer and better-informed coverage would mention on a regular basis the in-depth findings of a range of experts on the costs of inaction and the co-benefits of action.

The Times, for example, shows that it is possible to quote experts from two sides. In our 2023 sample we found several articles, including some in right-leaning newspapers, where the high cost of net zero is mentioned alongside the benefits of taking action, or that also added the qualification that many climate experts dispute the high costs.

A final thought: in its March 2026 report, the UK’s official advisory Climate Change Committee said that the “cost” of cutting UK emissions to net zero could be less than the cost of a single fossil-fuel price shock, while a net-zero economy would be almost completely protected from future spikes.

I looked in vain for a front-page headline in the Sun, Express or Mail screaming that reaching net zero would be cheaper for the UK than a fossil fuel crisis, such as the one triggered by the war on Iran.

James Painter receives funding from the Grantham Research Institute on climate change and the environment, London School of Economics.

– ref. How does the UK press report net zero? We studied 500 articles to find out – https://theconversation.com/how-does-the-uk-press-report-net-zero-we-studied-500-articles-to-find-out-280701

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Justin Stebbing, Professor of Biomedical Sciences, Anglia Ruskin University

Rising cancer rates in younger adults are real, worrying and still partly unexplained.

A new analysis adds important detail for England, suggesting that 11 cancers are becoming more common in people under 50, highlighting a broader shift in who gets cancer and when.

For a generation that expects to be building their lives, cancer is arriving unexpectedly early, and health services are only just beginning to adapt.

The new analysis found that rates of breast, bowel, melanoma, thyroid, multiple myeloma, liver, kidney, gallbladder, pancreatic, womb, mouth and ovarian cancer are all rising in under-50s. They also found that diagnosis rates of many of the same cancers are stable or even falling in older age groups.

This pattern isn’t unique to England. International data shows that early-onset cancers – those diagnosed before age 50 – have been increasing in many countries over the last few decades.

In the UK, the overall number of cancers in people aged roughly 25 to 49 has risen by around a quarter since the early 1990s, even after accounting for population growth.

Globally, the steepest rises in younger adults have been seen in cancers of the bowel, breast, uterus, kidney and several digestive organs, as well as melanoma of the skin.

The new English data fits this broader picture and highlights that the trend cuts across both sexes – though the exact cancers and rates differ between men and women.

Modelling studies also suggest that, without changes, early‑onset cancer rates and deaths could increase by more than 12% by 2050.

One possible explanation for this finding is that we’re simply getting better at finding cancers. This means tumours that might previously have been missed are being picked up earlier.

Earlier diagnosis is, of course, a good thing. But it cannot explain the whole story. Some of the cancers the study showed are rising in younger adults are being found at more advanced stages. This suggests they’re genuinely occurring more often rather than merely being detected earlier.

Lifestyle and cancer risk

So what else is going on?

The clearest suspect is excess body weight and the metabolic changes that accompany it.

Being overweight or obese is now the second biggest preventable cause of cancer in the UK after smoking. Excess weight is linked to more than a dozen cancers, including bowel, breast (after menopause), womb and kidney cancers.

Crucially, obesity is starting earlier in life and has become more common in children, teenagers and young adults over the last 30 to 40 years. So younger generations may have had longer exposure to the hormonal and inflammatory effects of excess body fat.

But obesity does not exist in isolation. It’s part of a wider shift in our lifestyles.

Diets higher in alcohol and ultra‑processed foods, red and processed meat and sugar‑sweetened drinks, and lower in fibre, are linked to higher risks of bowel and other digestive cancers.

---

Read more:
The role alcohol plays in new cancer cases – landmark new report

---

Many of us also spend long hours sitting each day and aren’t physically active enough. This worsens weight gain and inflammation – processes thought to influence cancer risk.

Irregular sleep patterns and night‑shift work may also disrupt our body clocks and hormones (including melatonin), which might affect how cancers develop – although this research is still emerging.

Scientists are also looking beyond lifestyle to factors we are only beginning to understand.

There’s growing interest in how environmental pollutants and carcinogens might contribute to rising cancer rates – especially if younger generations have been exposed to these factors for longer or at higher levels than their parents.

Changes in the gut microbiome, the vast community of bacteria that live in our intestines, are another candidate. Diet, antibiotic use and modern hygiene all influence which microbes we carry. This in turn can affect inflammation, immunity and how we process potential carcinogens.

Earlier puberty and hormonal changes, possibly related to nutrition and environment, may also play a part by increasing the number of years breast and reproductive tissues are exposed to hormones.

Together, these ideas point to an unsettling conclusion: cancer risk may begin much earlier than we think.

No single factor is proven to be the cause. It’s likely that multiple factors – lifestyle, environment, infections, hormones and genetics – influence risk over time. That makes prevention more complicated – but it also offers opportunity to act.

What this means for young people

For any person in their 20s, 30s or 40s, the absolute risk of developing cancer still remains relatively low. And, when cancers are diagnosed in younger people, their bodies often tolerate treatment better and survival can be higher. Nonetheless, the rise matters.

The trend also challenges assumptions in both patients and professionals. Doctors may not immediately think of cancer when a 30‑year‑old patient reports symptoms such as persistent bloating, rectal bleeding, a breast lump or unexplained weight loss. This can delay investigation and diagnosis.

Younger people themselves may dismiss or ignore symptoms because they think they’re too young to have cancer. Changing this mindset is one of the key tasks ahead.

Policies that support healthier food environments, active transport, reduced smoking and alcohol use and cleaner air are likely to pay dividends for overall population health, too.

On an individual level, steps such as not smoking, maintaining a healthy weight, being physically active, limiting alcohol, protecting skin from intense sun, keeping up to date with vaccines (such as HPV) can all lower risk of cancer.

Perhaps the most important message for younger adults is not one of fear, but of awareness. Cancer is still uncommon at a young age, but it’s no longer as rare as it once was. Seeking medical advice for persistent or unexplained symptoms can help cancers be found earlier.

Justin Stebbing does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Eleven types of cancer are on the rise in England’s under 50s – these factors might explain the trend – https://theconversation.com/eleven-types-of-cancer-are-on-the-rise-in-englands-under-50s-these-factors-might-explain-the-trend-281791

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Elisabetta Magnanti, Visiting Research Fellow, English, Trinity College Dublin

Some medieval texts have barely survived. Beowulf, the Old English masterwork, exists today because of a single manuscript – one that narrowly escaped combustion in 1731. For such texts, the single manuscript is all important. The discovery of another copy would transform our understanding.

By contrast, a work like Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical History of the English People) survives in more than 160 manuscripts. This volume of material has meant that scholars have tended to focus on just a few of the earliest copies, since these are most likely to preserve a text close to what Bede originally wrote. The result is that many later or less well-known manuscripts have received little detailed attention.

Now, however, computational methods that make it possible to analyse millions of words are changing that picture. Instead of relying on a narrow selection of manuscripts, we can begin to take the full breadth of the tradition into account. And that, in turn, has renewed the value of finding and studying additional copies.

Our own work, motivated by the potential of studying many manuscripts but – for now at least – using traditional methods to locate them, has led to some unexpected discoveries, including, in Rome, a previously overlooked early copy of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica. Remarkably, this manuscript also preserves one of the earliest versions of Cædmon’s Hymn, the earliest known poem in English.

Lost and found

The Historia Ecclesiastica was completed in 731 by the Venerable Bede, an English monk often described as the father of English history. It proved to be one of the most influential works of the western Middle Ages. Copies circulated across Europe and the British Isles from the mid-8th to the 16th century.

One of us, Magnanti, was conducting an ongoing hunt for new manuscripts of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica, and discovered in the National Central Library in Rome a copy of the text made at the Abbey of Nonantola in the north of Italy, less than a century after Bede’s death in 735. The manuscript had long been presumed lost and, as a result, had never previously been examined in detail by academics.

We have just published details of this discovery in the journal Early Medieval England and its Neighbours.

Rather than being lost, the manuscript had in fact been moved from Nonantola to the church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme in Rome by the 1650s. During the upheavals of the Napoleonic wars in the early 19th century, it was transferred again to the nearby church of San Bernardo alle Terme, from where it was subsequently stolen, along with other valuable manuscripts.

The book resurfaced in England almost two decades later, when it was acquired by Sir Thomas Phillipps, a 19th-century English book collector and self-described “velomaniac” (manuscript addict). Though Phillips died in 1872, the codex was not sold until 1948, when it entered the collection of the Swiss bibliophile Martin Bodmer. It then disappeared from view once again before being acquired by the National Central Library of Rome via the Austrian-born New York bookseller H.P. Kraus in the 1970s.

Cædmon’s Hymn

The newly rediscovered codex contains perhaps the fifth-oldest surviving complete copy of the Historia Ecclesiastica. As such, it is a hugely important witness to the transmission of Bede’s text to Europe in the century after he completed it.

Even more exciting, the manuscript proved to contain the third-oldest text of Cædmon’s Hymn. Cædmon’s story only survived thanks to Bede. He explains that Cædmon, an agricultural labourer working at Whitby Abbey in north Yorkshire, was at a feast when guests began to recite poems.

Embarrassed that he didn’t know anything suitable, Cædmon left for an early night. A figure then appeared to him in his dreams, telling him to sing about creation, which Cædmon miraculously did, producing his hymn – nine lines of intricately woven praise to God for creating the world.

Cædmon’s Hymn

Translated by Roy M. Liuzza

Now let us praise Heaven-Kingdom’s guardian,

the Maker’s might and his mind’s thoughts,

the work of the glory-father – of every wonder,

eternal Lord. He established a beginning.

He first shaped for men’s sons

Heaven as a roof, the holy Creator;

then middle-earth mankind’s guardian,

eternal Lord, afterwards prepared

the earth for men, the Lord almighty.

While admiring the hymn’s “beauty and dignity”, Bede baulked at including the original English in his Latin. Subsequent readers felt the absence, however, and supplied the original text, in the earliest cases adding it at the end of the Historia Ecclesiastica or in the margin. In the manuscript Magnanti discovered, the hymn appears in the actual text: the earliest such positioning by some 300 years.

Closer examination of the Rome Bede also revealed a major blunder: the scribes appear to have become confused and, between Books I and II of the Historia Ecclesiastica, switched to copying an entirely different text — a sermon on Christ’s descent into hell, prescribed for Easter Sunday preaching. This sermon had passed unrecorded in all the existing catalogues in which the manuscript is described, from 1166 to 2011.

Thanks to computational methods for transcription, collation and textual analysis, a fuller reconstruction of the manuscript tradition of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica may now be within reach. That makes discoveries like many the Rome manuscript has yielded just the tip of the iceberg.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. We found a lost copy of the earliest surviving English poem in a medieval manuscript in Rome – https://theconversation.com/we-found-a-lost-copy-of-the-earliest-surviving-english-poem-in-a-medieval-manuscript-in-rome-281086

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Judith Brocklehurst, Visiting Lecturer, BA Fine Art Mixed Media, University of Westminster

The term “handpicked” suggests a bouquet that has been chosen carefully, each flower selected for its colour, form or meaning and relation to the others. The curators of this new exhibition at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge have certainly achieved a complex yet complementary arrangement.

This small but rich exhibition was picked and approved with the help of The Kettle’s Yard Community Panel – a collective of Cambridge locals working alongside the gallery to help design, plan and curate exhibitions and creative projects.

The works are arranged chronologically starting with Henri Rousseau and ending with contemporary works by Chris Ofili and Lubaina Himid.

Rousseau’s Bouquet of Flowers (1910) is an array of real and imagined blooms with almost jungle-like depth. Rather than travelling abroad for inspiration, Rousseau relied on the Jardin des Plantes in Paris for the “exotic” plants taken from French colonies for his paintings.

In contrast Himid offers the viewer a collection of blooms from peonies to palm leaves, arranged as a repeating pattern, redolent of east African Kanga cloth designs.

The reference to the cloth subtly recalls the colonial slave trade but also celebrates the richness and diversity brought by migration. The title, These Are for You – that phrase often used by visitors giving a bunch of flowers on arrival – can then be understood as a wry comment.

Juxtaposed with these complex global and historical themes are some more personal, intimate scenes. Vases of flowers are often depicted in interior domestic spaces. Relationships are shown or hinted at sometimes with an undercurrent of sorrow. Flowers, often harvested to give joy, to congratulate and decorate, once picked are doomed to wilt and decay.

Eric Ravilious’s Ironbridge Interior (1941) creates an atmosphere of calm, but also melancholy. The flowers and grasses in a jug are fresh from the hedgerow. On the wall of the sun-lit room is another painting loosely pinned of a different vase with more blousy but drooping blooms, which hints at the inevitable passing of time. This mise-en-abyme (picture within a picture), creates a hollow feeling of unease.

The painting is made more poignant in the knowledge that Ravilious, a war artist at the time, died a year later in an air crash. Nearby hangs a small painting by Tirzah Garwood, Ravilious’s wife. Springtime of Flight completed only nine years later, shortly before her death from cancer, depicts an intricately painted biplane flying above a floral landscape.

It movingly shows her love for Ravilious and her love of life when faced with her own mortality. It is an imaginary world that she perhaps took comfort and refuge in.

There are many more stories to be found and pieced together in this exhibition. Some, like Jennifer Packer’s bloody Chrysanthemums (2015) return to a political subtext. This is one of the many floral paintings which Packer describes as “vessels of personal grief”. They pay tribute to people who have lost their lives through police brutality.

Packer’s work connects with Himid’s concerns. Their paintings are accompanied by Cassi Namoda’s more joyous work – a celebration of her homeland Mozambique and the birth of her son, Arafah Gaza’s Arrival (2025).

Others like Gluck’s Convolvulus (1940) reveal the sensual sometimes erotic inferences of flowers. Although a common weed, Gluck associated these flowers with their former lover the florist Constance Spry. In Gluck’s painting convolvulus or bindweed is made ornate and beautiful, imbued with sexual tension of winding limbs and lust.

Of course, throughout the exhibition lies the changing landscape of artistic tastes and styles which mirror society and the times in which they were made. Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s precise almost architectural rendering of Fritillaria (1915), points to art nouveau as well as oncoming modernism. Whereas Rory McEwan’s enlarged minimally presented and closely observed Tulip (Helen Josephine) from 1975 blends minimal hyperrealism with botanical illustration.

At the other extreme hangs Howard Hodgkin’s small abstract Red Flowers (2011) painted with emotion-laden gestures in memory of his father.

Each artist has chosen their particular flowers to paint, exerting control over nature showing a particular fascination, atmosphere, idea that they want to impart though this choice. Every visitor can handpick and arrange their own narrative journey through this show, with the clear yet eclectic, aesthetic choices of the permanent collection as a subtle background influence.

Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today is at Kettle’s Yard until September 6 2026.

Judith Brocklehurst does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A new exhibition explores empire, love and loss through paintings of flowers from 1900 – https://theconversation.com/a-new-exhibition-explores-empire-love-and-loss-through-paintings-of-flowers-from-1900-281787