News

In Medieval England, those who experienced and survived nutritional stress in childhood suffered from higher mortality risk in middle and later adulthood. This is according to a recent study from CU Boulder Professor of Anthropology and Institute of Behavioral Science (IBS) Faculty and Fellow, Sharon DeWitte. DeWitte will discuss her bioarchaeological research at our upcoming IBS Speaker Series on December 2.  

• Who: Sharon DeWitte, professor of anthropology and IBS faculty and fellow
• When: Monday, December 2 from 12 – 1 p.m. MT
• Where: Richard Jessor 155A or via Zoom (email ibs-contact@colorado.edu for passcode)
• Field: Developmental Origins of Health and Disease, Bioarchaeology

For her talk, DeWitte will clarify health patterns in the medieval period related to famine and nutritional stress. Her research used demographic and pathological data collected from human skeletal remains from the medieval period, combined with isotope data on diet. DeWitte’s findings reflect a potential environmental mismatch between early development and later life conditions in Medieval England. 

 “These findings suggest that the relationship between stressful childhood environments and increased risks of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and other adult health conditions that has been observed in present-day populations might have also existed in the medieval period,” – Sharon DeWitte

The IBS Speaker Series is open to all CU Boulder faculty, staff, and students as well as the public. This talk is cohosted by the Population Program, the Health and Society Program, and the CU Population Center at the Institute of Behavioral Science. 

This talk is specifically of interest for people who:

1. Want to explore the effects of developmental stress on health across the life course
2. Are interested in historical demography and mortality crises (famine and plague) in the past
3. Are interested in the kinds of information about our lives that get inscribed in our bodies

DeWitte is a leader in bioarchaeology and bioarchaeological research, specializing in the Black Death and other medieval crises. She examines various stress indicators in human skeletal remains from well-preserved, ethical excavations in England. DeWitte takes a holistic approach to her investigations, examining both the data from remains as well as people’s environment, religious and cultural context, and access to resources. It is through this multifaceted lens that DeWitte arrives at her findings, which broaden our understanding of the past and impact our understanding of health patterns today. 

You can read more about DeWitte in a recent article with CUBT: 

Abortion restrictions alone don’t increase child mistreatment or foster care entry. Katie Massey Combs, a research associate at the Institute of Behavioral Science, and team recently published an op-ed on this oversimplification, advising that some researchers are trying to draw this connection. While there is no direct increase in foster care entry or child maltreatment from parents who were denied an abortion, there is potential for those parents to face mental health and poverty stress. Massey and team advise we must look at this complex issue from a wider angle, or else risk stigmatizing parents and children further. 

Read the full op-ed on The Imprint Youth & Family News:

Distinguished Professor of Behavioral Science, Emeritus at CU Boulder and co-founder of the Institute of Behavioral Science, Richard Jessor, recently took part in a commemorative event honoring the end of World War II. Miami Beach’s New World Symphony performed two concerts in celebration of the upcoming 80th anniversary of the end of World War II and the Holocaust. Jessor was interviewed by historian James Holland at both performances, November 9 and 10.

Read more about the event from Clint Talbot and the Colorado Arts and Sciences Magazine:

The Institute of Behavioral Science (IBS) will host an Open House and Ribbon Cutting Ceremony on January 28, 2025, to officially celebrate our new building name, the Richard Jessor Building. The event will also showcase current research from all 12 Institute programs and centers. 

“We are all thrilled to welcome the CU Boulder community and beyond to the Institute of Behavioral Science to celebrate Dr. Richard Jessor and the Institute’s important research,” said Lori Hunter, director of IBS and professor of sociology at CU Boulder. “For many decades, IBS investigators have generated critical, policy-relevant insight on gun violence, health disparities, substance use, criminal behavior, disaster vulnerability, and many other challenging social problems. Join us in celebrating these impactful research contributions and the essential role played by Dr. Jessor.”

IBS is the second research institute to call the University of Colorado Boulder campus home. Programs and centers are based on faculty interest and must be both problem-focused and interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary in approach. IBS currently houses ten research programs and centers that focus on societal issues of today: 

Research Programs:

• Environment and Society 
• Health and Society 
• Population 
• Prevention Science 
• International Development

Research Centers:

• Natural Hazards Center
• Center for the Governance of Natural Resources
• CU Population Center
• Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence
• Center for Collaborative Synthesis in Archaeology
• Center for Resilience + Wellbeing
• Rocky Mountain Research Data Center

The Institute was founded in 1957 after social science faculty at CU Boulder recognized a need for interdisciplinary research to tackle pressing social issues. Distinguished Professor of Behavioral Science, Emeritus at CU Boulder, Richard “Dick” Jessor, helped found IBS and continues to be a notable leader for the Institute.

“The renaming of the Institute of Behavioral Science Building as, now, the Richard Jessor Building, is an extraordinary and unexpected honor, one that is deeply meaningful for me personally,” said Jessor. “For more than half a century, my life, my scholarship, and indeed, my identity, have been entwined with the Institute of Behavioral Science (IBS), from its very founding in the mid-1950s to its not long-ago occupancy of this very building. I take immense pride in what has been accomplished in this building by my colleagues, our students, and our staff over the decades in contributions to knowledge and to the making of a science that has reverberating implications for societal and human wellbeing. I share this honor with them all.”

With nearly six decades of research at CU Boulder, Jessor is the longest-serving faculty member at the university. Jessor is best known for his extensive work on adolescent behavior and bridging research with practical approaches to support youth development and resilience. The World War II veteran has been instrumental in advancing the field of developmental psychology on an international scale. His research has influenced public policy, education, and preventive interventions in diverse cultural contexts. 

Jessor was the director of IBS from 1980 to 2001 and was the former director of the Health and Society Program. IBS celebrates the naming of our building in honor of Jessor, who is not only a pioneer in adolescent behavior research, but also helped forge a space for behavioral and social science research. 

The current IBS building was constructed in 2010 to better serve the Institute’s interdisciplinary collaboration. The Richard Jessor Building will continue to provide a space for dedicated IBS faculty and students to address social challenges with impactful research for many years to come. 

“I see the future of IBS continuing its upward trajectory as the foci of its Programs gain even greater national and international recognition, not only for the accrual of basic social knowledge but for the relevance such knowledge has for positive societal and human development,” said Jessor.

For more information on the IBS Open House and Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, visit our event page:

Election results are at the forefront today. Here to share the pre-election pulse of Colorado is Anand Sohkey, professor of political science at CU Boulder, IBS fellow and co-author of the ninth annual Colorado Political Climate Survey. Sohkey sat down with CU Boulder Today’s Daniel Strain ahead of Election Day to shed light on the survey findings and see where Colorado voters stand.

What influences a person’s decision to vote? And can we trust data from polling projections? Ahead of the 2024 U.S. elections, Jaroslav Tir, professor of political science at CU Boulder and IBS fellow, and Shane Singh, Joshua W. Jones professor of public and international affairs and director of graduate studies in International Affairs at the University of Georgia, set out to examine American voting behavior. Specifically, they examined how recent exposure to US security threat news impacted voter’s motivation to hit the polls. Their results can be found in the London School of Economics and Political Science’s United States Politics and Policy blog.

Tir expanded on his findings with CU Boulder Today’s Bradley Worrell. He discusses how much we can trust pre-election polls and what factors to consider.

Jillian Turanovic, associate professor of sociology at CU Boulder and IBS faculty and fellow, recently wrote about the impact of Proposition KK for the Daily Camera. Ahead of the 2024 elections in Colorado, Jillian emphasized the need for tax dollars to be allocated to organizations that assist crime victims. Funding is critically low for these organizations, which provide crime victims with crucial resources like counseling and emergency funds. Read more about Proposition KK and its benefit to the Colorado community below.

Disinformation. It threatens public health systems during natural disasters, pandemics and other crises. It can be weaponized for war, as Russia has done with Ukraine. It brings new waves of conspiracy theories and gives fuel to anti-science movements. And perhaps most acutely, it undermines the very fabric of democracy. 

Visiting IBS Scholar, Kacper Gradon, knows how perilous disinformation is for democracy. The associate professor of both security and crime science at the University College London (UCL) and cybersecurity at Warsaw University of Technology, was invited by the New York Times and the Democracy & Culture Foundation to present at the Athens Democracy Forum earlier this month. Gradon presented practical actions to “de-fuse” disinformation, including an integrated focus on education, regulation and technology. 

During his talk, Gradon provided practical examples from IBS and CU Boulder initiatives. Gradon pointed to the Shakespeare and Violence Prevention Tour from the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence. The lies, slander and rumors that belie Shakespearean plays provide a concrete example of the consequences of disinformation for kids. Gradon hopes tools like these can make a meaningful impact.

“No matter how cliché or naïve it might sound, I trust that education (from a very early age) is the key to teach people critical thinking, fact checking and media literacy. Only this way can we protect society from falling prey to manipulation, meddling and brainwashing,” says Gradon.

For regulation, Gradon turned to the deliberations concerning the potential for class action lawsuits against Big Tech and discussions of the legal scholars, such as those of the CU Law School – Silicon Flatirons. Though he recognizes the difficulty in regulating disinformation, he hopes these recent debates will build a movement of accountability.  

“In my opinion, the technology that supports the creation and spread of disinformation (especially when it is monetized) must be regulated, and the developers and deployers of such tools must be held accountable for damage done,” says Gradon. “Since the technology enables and increases societal polarization and undermines democracy, it is time for a change.”

As for technology, Gradon believes tech in and of itself is not good or bad. It’s up to us to use technology to screen for disinformation. Gradon recommends three technological methods to help mitigate disinformation: 

• Application of Large Language Models to both analyze disinformation and to offer counternarratives
• Analyzing user interactions with true and false content
• Studying multiple modalities (text, images, audio and video) to offer better predictive models

When asked what we can do to prevent disinformation, Gradon advises using open-source research and fact-checking websites, reverse image searches, and most importantly, common sense.  

“Develop a healthy habit of waiting before you click “like” or “share” on social media. Sometimes just a couple of minutes allows you to think more reasonably, maybe fact-check, contemplate the opposing viewpoints,” says Gradon. “If we just share uncontrollably, we’re further feeding the algorithms, exacerbating the pace and range of disinformation, and advancing polarization even more.”

Gradon’s talk, “Tools of Democracy: Disinfo De-fused – Protecting Democracy as Truth and Trust Decay,” was well received at the forum. Gradon felt hopeful seeing so many young attendees who were passionate about democracy and hopes this will usher in a new wave of change. 

“All of us live in heavily reinforced information bubbles. The algorithms that govern the technology we use actively strengthen these bubbles. We have to realize this and know of the consequences that this brings to our understanding of the world that surrounds us,” says Gradon.

The Athens Democracy Forum was October 1-3, 2024, in Athens, Greece. You can learn more about the forum and view talks here: https://www.athensdemocracyforum.com.

The Wildfire Research (WiRē) Team will receive the Pathfinding Partnerships Award through the 2024 Governor’s Awards for High Impact Research on November 20. Institute of Behavioral Science Fellow and Associate Research Professor, Hannah Brenkert Smith, is a member of the team. Learn more about this prestigious award win and the WiRē Team’s impact on the community: