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Opposites might not attractat least when it comes to mental health. A new large-scale global study revealed that across cultures, people were more likely to marry a partner who shares the same psychiatric diagnosis. Published in Nature Human Behavior, the new research examined data from almost 15 million people in Denmark, Sweden, and Taiwan, relying on massive data sets collected in government registries. The trend didnt just prove true for a single diagnosis. The study examined married pairs across nine psychiatric disorders: bipolar disorder, depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), anorexia, and substance-use disorder. The study found that across diagnoses, if one spouse in a married couple had a psychiatric disorder, their partner was significantly more likely to share that diagnosis. The main result is that the pattern holds across countries, across cultures, and, of course, generations, study coauthor Chun Chieh Fan told Nature. In general, the study found people with any psychiatric disorder were also more likely to marry someone else with a psychiatric diagnosis than someone without one. When the study looked at diagnostic data divided by birth cohort, the likelihood of married partners sharing a diagnosis went up each decade over time from the 1930s to the 1990s. Consistent findings across the globe One of the most fascinating aspects of the study is how consistent the findings were. Across nine psychiatric disorders, there is evidence of positive correlations among spouses, independent of country and generation, for the past 90 years, the authors wrote. Despite differences in cultural contexts, patterns of spousal correlation across psychiatric disorders have limited variation between Taiwan and Nordic countries. The finding is one aspect of a well-studied phenomenon of married couples having a lot in common, which can be explained a few different ways. The first explanation, known as assortative mating, happens when people choose a partner with personality traits, behaviors, and other qualities that they share. The second explanation is convergence, or the idea that, over time, married couples become more alike by spending time together and sharing an environment. The third explanation is known as social homogamy, or the way that people tend to pair with others from a shared social background. Within the study results, OCD, anorexia and bipolar disorder trends showed some differences between Taiwan and the Nordic countries, but patterns were similar for all of the other disorders. In the Nordic countries, couples were less likely to share an OCD diagnosis than they were in Taiwan, for instance. The studys results could have interesting implications for research on the genetic underpinnings of mental health disorders. Many disorders are considered to have genetic risk factors, including autism, ADHD, bipolar disorder, major depression, and schizophrenia, but genes and the environment interact in complex ways that are difficult to tease apart. In a study published earlier this year, researchers identified genetic hot spots that could be useful for developing treatments for symptoms shared across psychiatric disorders. This area of research explores how single genes can influence multiple traitsa concept called pleiotropy. Pleiotropy was traditionally viewed as a challenge because it complicates the classification of psychiatric disorders, UNC Neuroscience Center associate professor and study lead Hyejung Won, PhD, said. However, if we can understand the genetic basis of pleiotropy, it might allow us to develop treatments targeting these shared genetic factors, which could then help treat multiple psychiatric disorders with a common therapy.
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E-Commerce
On August 28, President Trump signed a new executive order intended to help him reshape Washington D.C. in his image. The order, titled Restoring Americas Architectural Grandeur, requires federal buildings to maintain Trumps preferred variety of classical architecturei.e. the Greco-Roman style favored in the days of the founding fathers. It further mandates that builders will have to notify the President if they plan to construct any federal building that deviates from this preferred style, including where a design embraces Brutalist, Deconstructivist, or other modernist architecture. In the first months of his second term, Trump has already begun imposing his personal aesthetic on the White House. The President, who has called the look and feel of Louis XIV his favorite style, has bedecked the Oval Office in gaudy gold decorations, filled the White House with art featuring his own image, and begun renovating the Rose Garden to resemble his resort in Mar-A-Lago. Now, hes turning his attention toward reshaping Washingtonand every federal building nationwideaccording to his own design sensibilities. “Uniformity as an extension of power” Trumps fixation on classical architecture is nothing new. During his first term, he issued a 2,500-word executive order that laid out which types of federal architecture were acceptable (classical and traditional) and which were not (Brutalist and modernist). Biden revoked that original order when he took office in 2021, but Trump signaled his plan to pursue it once again almost immediately after starting his second term in late January. Now, hes one step closer to achieving his goal. In an interview with The New York Times on August 28, Justin Shubow, president of the nonprofit National Civic Art Society, which helped draft the executive order, said that its effects could begin to manifest soon. He cited the designs for new courthouses in places like Hartford, Connecticut, and Chattanooga, Tennessee, as projects that would need to follow the new directive. For too long, federal architecture has been in a dismal state, Shubow said in a statement to The Times. Recognizing the publics disdain of our more recent government buildings, [Trump] is ensuring that new edifices will be beautiful, dignified, and admired by the common person. Trumps renewed push to control the appearance of federal buildings coincides with his concerted efforts to exert greater influence over federal agencies themselves. This week, the White House moved to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cookan action that has never been made in the Feds 112-year history, given that it has traditionally been operated independently from federal control. (Cook has requested an emergency injunction to block the move in an effort to prevent the erosion of the Feds independence.) When Trump first attempted to impose his architectural style in 2020, Steven Heller, co-chair of the MFA design program at the School of Visual Arts and author of more than 100 books on graphic design history, told Fast Company that the move might be reason for alarm. Historically, he noted, such efforts have represented uniformity as an extension of power. When one design style is preferred over another, that may be construed as an aesthetic preference. But when it is linked to a presidential act or decree, especially a president that exhibits authoritarian tendencies, then there is reason for alarm,” Heller told Fast Company at the time. “We tend to ignore the nuances of power, like graphics and architecture styles, until its too late.
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E-Commerce
He may technically be toxic, but this avenger is radically improving peoples lives offscreen. The Toxic Avenger, the schlocktacular splatterfest from the 1980s, is slashing its way out of video store purgatory this week, with a reboot starring Peter Dinklage and Kevin Baconand an innovative marketing campaign. Hybrid studio-distributor Cineverse is hyping the film by working with the nonprofit Undue Medical Debt to wipe out at least $5 million in debt for families struggling to pay their medical bills. (The grand total may end up being much more as another $1 million in debt will be shredded for every million that Toxie takes in from theaters.) Its the rare benevolent marketing gesture that will have an immediate material impact on real Americans. Earlier promotions for the glossy-scuzzy throwback flick included a collaboration with Liquid Death and the reintroduction of another long-dormant entity, Moviefones phone line. However, when the time came to put together the final push in the days before the movies August 29 release date, Cineverses marketing team had originally considered moving in a much different direction than where they ended up. We were brainstorming stunts and I was leaning toward what we were calling a mop flash with dancing janitors, Lauren McCarthy, SVP of marketing at Cineverse, tells Fast Company. That concept was rooted in the fact that Dinklages titular character starts the movie working as a janitor. (The original 1984 film, from unapologetically trashy studio Troma, also centered around a custodian.) While flash mobs have previously helped promote movies like 2018s Mamma Mia: Here We Go Againand while its quite easy to imagine gyrating janitors making some kind of a splash onlinethe idea met with a bit of hesitancy in the room. Someone on my very smart team said, Um, let’s maybe do something good for the world instead, McCarthy recalls. And when this idea came up, we pivoted right away. A good cause inspired by the character’s origin story Although the core appeal of the campy gore-forward movie is watching a mutated custodian rip bad guy limbs right out of their sockets, The Toxic Avenger has a clear thematic connection to medical debt. Early in the film, a doctor diagnoses Dinklages character, Winston Gooze, with a rare life-threatening disease. He now has somewhere between six months and a year to liveunless he can afford to pay the exorbitant cost of treatment, which the health insurance from his shady employer (played by Bacon) of course does not cover. Even before a vat of toxic sludge enters the picture, our hero is doomed by the expensive complexities of Americas healthcare system. Though the punishingly high cost of medical bills is a major concern for uninsured Americans at all times, it has figured prominently in the national conversation throughout 2025. Last December, Luigi Mangione allegedly gunned down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, following a long struggle with chronic back pain. (Mangione has pleaded not guilty.) The grim spectacle of this assassination ultimately provoked an outpouring of American grievances with the health insurance industry at the years start. Then, just last month, a federal judge blocked a Biden-era rule from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) meant to ban medical debt from showing up in credit reports. With the topic still fresh in public discourse, Cineverse is wise to spotlight its presence in the moviewhile making a huge difference in peoples lives in the bargain. Beyond being a noble move, though, its a cost-effective marketing spend. Undue Medical Debt works by using donor money to purchase medical debt in large, bundled portfolios, and homing in on bills for those most in need. As John Oliver demonstrated in an illuminating, charitable episode of Last Week Tonight from 2016, the shady debt-buying business is structured in such a way that altruistic souls can sometimes scoop upand wipe outa strangers debt for less than half a cent on a dollar. No matter the precise terms of Cineverses arrangement with Unpaid Medical Debt, its clear the studios dollar is stretching a long wayand for a positive cause. Movie marketing as charity Plenty of movie promotions in the past have had a charitable component. To draw attention to the environmental undercurrent of 2007s Steve Carrell comedy Evan Almighty, Universal Studios teamed up with The Conservation Fund for the planting of 15,000 trees, for instance. Lucasfilm and Disney launched the Star Wars: Force for Change program in 2014, a year before the release of Episode 7: The Force Awakens, and raised $4.2 million for Unicef. And the 2020 release Buffaloed even embarked on a similar partnership with Undue Medical Debt to erase $1.5 million in bills. (Zoey Deutchs character in that film is a debt collector.) Cineverses push stands out, howver, for the scale of its generosity ($5 million in debt eliminated, and potentially much more), its timeliness, and its relevance to the films themes. Its a witty reminder that maybe the real toxicity in The Toxic Avenger is the medical debt that too many Americans accrued along the way.
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