Housing Vouchers, Brain Tuneup, Water Sustainability, Mindfulness

Housing Vouchers, Brain Tuneup, Water Sustainability, Mindfulness

Top of Mind with Julie Rose

  • Jan 8, 2019 11:00 pm
  • 1:42:08 mins

Families with Housing Subsidies Could Rent in Better Neighborhoods. Why Aren’t They? Guest: Alicia Mazzara, Research Analyst in the Housing Division, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities More than two million American families get monthly vouchers to help cover the rent through the nation’s Housing Choice Voucher program. The idea isn’t simply to keep families from becoming homeless. It’s also about helping them into a more stable economic situation so they won’t need government assistance anymore. The trouble is, most of these families don’t end up using their housing vouchers for apartments in the kinds of neighborhoods that make “moving up” likely. Rather, in most of America’s biggest cities, people on housing assistance end up overly-concentrated in poor, racially-segregated neighborhoods where schools struggle and good jobs are hard to come by. The real bummer here is that there are plenty of affordable apartments in higher-income neighborhoods. So why aren’t more families going there with their rental vouchers? Why Imagining Phobias May Help you Conquer Them Guest: Tor Wager, Professor of Cognitive Psychology and Director of the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory, University of Colorado Boulder “Exposure therapy” is a real thing that’s been common since the 1950s where people confront the thing they’re afraid of until the fear goes away. But what if, rather than experiencing the scary thing, you could just imagine it and still overcome the fear? Neuroscientist Tor Wager’s lab has found that works, too. Getting Rid of Brain Bubbles Guest: Kelly Lambert, Professor of Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Richmond It’s one week into the 2019 –and if your New Year’s resolutions are already on the rocks, maybe you’re suffering from “brain bubbles.” That’s what neuroscientist Kelly Lambert calls the mental traps that distort reality, throw us off track, and leave us disheartened. Battling Droughts with Recycled Water Guest: Edmund Archuleta, Director of Water Initiatives, University of Texas-El Paso From California to Texas, water is a pressing concern. El Paso, Texas was forecast to run dry next year. But more than a decade ago, under the direction of a big-thinking utilities director, the city changed its water destiny. Today it’s a model for conservation. It’s also home to one of the largest desalination plants in the world –which pumps and treats more than 20-million gallons of brackish water from the ground every day. Next, the city is looking to its sewers with plan to take all that used water and recycle it back to household taps. Healing Power of Mindfulness Guest: Jon Kabat-Zinn, Author of “The Healing Power of Mindfulness,” Professor of Medicine Emeritus and Founder of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic, University of Massachusetts If you’ve had a therapist or doctor recommend that you get some training in mindful meditation, you can probably thank Jon Kabat-Zinn. Back in the 70s, while pursuing a PhD in molecular biology at MIT, Kabat-Zinn got interested in meditation and yoga. At the time, neither of those interests had anything to do with serious science, but Kabat-Zinn started doing research on the effects of meditation on the body and brain. His findings led him to found the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts and today more than 700 medical centers and clinics around the world use his mindfulness framework to help patients improve their health. Worlds Awaiting: Read More Guest: Rachel Wadham, host, Worlds Awaiting on BYUradio, Education and Juvenile Collections Librarian, BYU

Episode Segments

Healing Power of Mindfulness

21m

Guest: Jon Kabat-Zinn, Author of “The Healing Power of Mindfulness,” Professor of Medicine Emeritus and Founder of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic, University of Massachusetts If you’ve had a therapist or doctor recommend that you get some training in mindful meditation, you can probably thank Jon Kabat-Zinn. Back in the 70s, while pursuing a PhD in molecular biology at MIT, Kabat-Zinn got interested in meditation and yoga. At the time, neither of those interests had anything to do with serious science, but Kabat-Zinn started doing research on the effects of meditation on the body and brain. His findings led him to found the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts and today more than 700 medical centers and clinics around the world use his mindfulness framework to help patients improve their health.

Guest: Jon Kabat-Zinn, Author of “The Healing Power of Mindfulness,” Professor of Medicine Emeritus and Founder of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic, University of Massachusetts If you’ve had a therapist or doctor recommend that you get some training in mindful meditation, you can probably thank Jon Kabat-Zinn. Back in the 70s, while pursuing a PhD in molecular biology at MIT, Kabat-Zinn got interested in meditation and yoga. At the time, neither of those interests had anything to do with serious science, but Kabat-Zinn started doing research on the effects of meditation on the body and brain. His findings led him to found the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts and today more than 700 medical centers and clinics around the world use his mindfulness framework to help patients improve their health.