These reports were met with surprise and alarm. ScienceAlert, for example, led with the headline “U.S. Fertility Rates Have Plummeted Into Uncharted Territory, and Nobody Knows Why.” However, this recent decline fits with global trends and isn’t unprecedented in U.S. history. As a demographer who studies fertility trends, what strikes me as anomalous is not the recent drop, but the previous high fertility “bubble.” Unusually High Rates The U.S. maintained surprisingly high fertility rates for a long time....

The study, which was published in the medical journal JAMA, has found that two-thirds (67 percent, to be exact) of calories that kids and teens are consuming come from ultra-processed foods. This represents a substantial jump from 61 percent and suggests that the number might only continue to increase. Of course, it’s also important to define what exactly ultra-processed foods are. Simply put, ultra-processed foods include added ingredients which usually include fats, starches, and added sugars....

“In our study, we controlled for a variety of factors, such as parent stress, depression, coparenting quality, and child screen use,” coauthor Brandon McDaniel, a family researcher at Illinois State University, told Fatherly. “This seems to suggest that there is something meaningful here, even though the data is cross-sectional.” Rather than upending the field, then, McDaniel’s work should be seen as an interesting contribution to the growing body of evidence that increased digital technology use can impact parent-child relationships....

Let’s break down just how impressive this catch is, as you really need to dive into the details to fully appreciate everything this guy manages to pull off purely off dad instincts. First, he manages to barehand catch the foul ball, which is no small feat by itself. And this was not a pop-up. This was a line drive, which adds an extra level of difficulty for the no-glove grab....

Upon its release in 2013, American audiences overlooked the modest British film and critics didn’t exactly embrace it, either. It earned just $15 million in the U.S. during a brief theatrical run. It performed better elsewhere around the world. I can understand why audiences here didn’t go. About Time is a sci-fi/fantasy comedy/drama, written and directed by Richard Curtis, who did similar double duty on Love, Actually, and wrote Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill, and Bridget Jones’s Diary....

“One hypothesis has been that at least some of this racial gap that we see is explained by economic circumstances,” says Maya Rossin-Slater, Ph.D., an associate professor of health policy at the Stanford University School of Medicine and a senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR). But individual anecdotes have long demonstrated that wealth, education, and status are not foolproof safeguards against preventable catastrophe for Black women....

We are science education researchers interested in understanding how the symbols and tools of science can promote students’ interest in studying science. This is an important topic because jobs in science, technology, engineering and math – or STEM jobs – are not only important for the economy, but are also growing faster and pay more than many other fields. Although the number of jobs in STEM fields are increasing, the number of people choosing to major in those fields remains below what is needed to fill the positions....

Really, what’s with the guy bouncing off the chain-link fence? Boing! Tell me, now, please!! We also get occasional random flips by male dancers, including the hyperactive bartender – who kinda looks like the guy bouncing off the fence. And what’s with the female dancer going full-on demonic at the 1-minute, 47-second mark? Those evil white eyes; we can’t unsee them! It all makes it painfully obvious that the original music video, shot in London in 1987 by director Simon West, who went on to helm Con Air, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and The Expendables 2, was produced on a budget the equivalent of a fish and chips dinner....

“Everybody wants to know what is causing this perceived increase in autism,” says Cathy Guttentag, Ph.D., a child psychologist and associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Texas McGovern Medical School in Houston. “There’s still some debate” about what’s driving these changes, she notes. “Are there really more children with autism, or are we just getting better at diagnosing it? And because we’ve broadened the spectrum of who gets diagnosed with autism, is that why the numbers are going up?...

Thankfully, you can easily take care of bad breath on the spot by popping a mint, and there are steps you can take to keep the stink away from your mouth for the long run. “[Bad breath] affects a lot of people, and it can be easily treated,” says Sawan Malik, D.M.D., a Florida-based periodontist, a type of dentist specializing in gum disease and mouth inflammation. But to fix morning breath and bad breath throughout the day, first you need to know what causes it....

My daughter’s third birthday party was my first encounter with the Birthday-Industrial Complex. It was a far cry from my birthdays growing up, where we played party games like ‘Kick the Can’ and ‘Put the Can on Your Head’ and ‘Throw the Can.’ After which we all fought over one small cupcake and got Tetanus shots instead of a goody bag. At 2-years-old, kids are like diaper-wearing sheep. It doesn’t matter where you have the party, everybody is happy....

I’ve lived here for ten years. Eight of those were without kids. During that time, finances were always a concern – What kind of place can we afford? What neighborhood can we live in? Are we idiots for spending so much on rent here when we could be spending so much less? Now, that we’re parents? Pfffft. It’s so much more expensive. We’re fine. But no matter what this city never makes it feel like enough, you know?...

Today, Erin is a father to two daughters, who are five and 10 years old. Along with his sister and cousin, he’s also a conservator to his father’s estate where he works to keep his father’s work alive — and to help maintain his legacy as a jazz pioneer but also as a horse lover, painter, and father. In his own words, Erin discusses touring with his dad, the misperceptions much of the world had of Miles, and what it was like to share his father with the world....

5. Go on a drive and admire holiday lights. Bundle up in your winter coats, buckle up and hit the road for a tour of your town. The houses and local businesses are all decked out in their finest lights. See what kind of wild decorations are in your town. You might see some homages to famous Christmas movies or even elaborate displays timed to music. Do a quick Google search to see if there are any locally celebrated displays in your area that your family should check out....

The place to start, according to Christi Garner, a licensed marriage and family therapist, is with the general idea that all families are different. “I talk with kids about how we all come from different kinds of families,” says Garner. “These families all have rules that are different from ours. Our family might say that ‘fat’ or ‘crap’ is not ok to say, but at school or camp those words might be heard from other kids....

Porn addiction, like sex addiction, remains controversial among professional therapists. It does not exist on the DSM because there is not a lot of research into the issue and because there has not yet been a list that conclusively defines the behaviors and symptoms of a porn addict. That doesn’t mean that therapists don’t see patients who experience that addiction. While people can have a casual relationship with porn, or even share pornography with their spouse, others have found that they cannot....

There are arguments for and against toilet training at every age, from as early as 3 months. Seriously! Plenty of cultures across the globe have been teaching ’em super young for a very long time. Hell, the Vietnamese are done with potty training by 9 months. READ MORE: The Fatherly Guide to Poop, Diapers, and Potty Training Their basic technique involves creating a kind of pavlovian response, where the parent observes signs of impending elimination then allows the kid to let loose in an appropriate place, like your neighbor’s azalea beds....

According to a report that originated with The Verge, Disney is telling Etsy shops and other indie sellers that they have to shut down their faux-Baby Yoda productions ASAP. This is slightly weird considering that on some level, Disney created the scarcity for Baby Yoda junk in the first place. In order to preserve the surprise reveal of The Child in the first episode of The Mandalorian, Disney, and Lucasfilm did not produce any Baby Yoda toys and dolls ahead of time....

“Well,” I told myself, “he did ask.” Since then, as it probably is in a lot of homes, Star Wars has always been a cultural touchstone for our family, especially when my kids were younger. Catchphrases from “I’ve got a bad feeling about this” to the ubiquitous “Do. Or do not. There is no try,” were dropped into regular conversation; when the time came to dig deep, whether it was in homework or sports, the shorthand was often “Use the Force!...

More often than not, nighttime itchiness is a nothing more than a symptom of temperature changes in the body throughout the day. We’re biologically primed to get warmer in the early evening and colder in the early morning. “Circadian regulation of sleep dictates that core temperature is maximal in the early evening and minimal in the early morning,” researchers from Temple University’s school of dermatology wrote in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences....