Preventing the Pain of Parting
Leaving home for camp or college is presented as a grand adventure, but for 20 percent of young people, homesickness makes the experience one to be endured, not enjoyed. That misery can be prevented, researchers say, by using simple coping strategies. "We were blown away that we could lower the intensity of first-year campers' homesickness by half," says Christopher Thurber, a clinical psychologist at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, and lead author of a report in the current Pediatrics. Preventive measures include sending kids on short practice trips, like a weekend at the grandparents' house. Children can learn how to make themselves feel better if they do feel homesick by reaching out to make a friend, say, or by seeking out a trusted adult. (See www.campparents.org for information on the prevention program.) Parents shouldn't share their own worries about the separation, says Thurber, who tested the prevention program in campers. "We coach parents to say that homesickness is normal, but you'll do great." - Nancy Shute
A Problem Off Campus, Too; Emotional Trauma, Physical Heartache; Forget the Magic; It'll Take Work
A Problem Off Campus, Too
Binge drinking is now a big worry in high schools. According to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 45 percent of teenagers surveyed had consumed alcohol within the previous month, and 64 percent of that group admitted to more than five drinks in a row. The more students drank, the worse they performed in school and the more likely they were to engage in sexual activity, smoke, and fight. Girls ages 12 to 14 were more apt to binge-drink than their male peers, though boys outdrank girls in other age groups.-Adam Voiland
Emotional Trauma, Physical Heartache
Heart-pounding anxiety is one hallmark of post-traumatic stress disorder. The condition may be literally heartbreaking as well: Soldiers with more PTSD symptoms have more heart attacks, a new study shows. The research, in the current Archives of General Psychiatry, followed about 1,000 former military men for 10 to 13 years after they first reported such PTSD symptoms as hyperarousal, emotional numbing, and reliving their trauma. Severity was divided into seven levels, and "every time we bumped up a level, heart risk increased 26 percent," says coauthor Laura Kubzansky, a health psychologist at Harvard School of Public Health. The hyperarousal, she suspects, leads to wear and tear on the heart-which may hold true for traumatized civilians as well.- Josh Fischman
Forget the Magic; It'll Take Work
The Federal Trade Commission announced last week that the marketers of five weight-control pills-Xenadrine EFX, CortiSlim, CortiStress, TrimSpa, and One-A-Day WeightSmart-have agreed to pay a combined $25 million in cash and assets for overhyping the products' powers and to tone down future advertising language. The deceptive ads often touted losses of 30, 50, or even 70 pounds, failed to mention that the people featured in testimonials were paid up to $20,000 and had dieted and exercised, and implied that science backed the ad claims. The settlements don't mean that the products have been found to be dangerous. But they don't offer shortcuts, says FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras. "Think about calories in and calories out."- A.V.
This story appears in the January 15, 2007 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.
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