I recently ran across a fascinating article: Why rejection hurts: A common neural alarm system for physical and social pain. According to the authors, physical pain and social pain (which happens when social relationships are threatened, damaged or lost) are both processed in the same part of the brain. It seems that the anterior cingulate […]

This post also appeared on the Good Vibrations Magazine. For years, safer sex advocates have been saying that self-esteem has a huge effect on how much people engage in risk-reduction and harm-reduction behaviors. That’s why many of the most effective intervention programs & organizations, whether online like Scarleteen.com or in-person like the StopAIDS Project, offer […]

According to the latest report from the Guttmacher Institute, publicly funded family planning services prevent 1.94 million unintended pregnancies and 810,000 abortions each year. They are also “… highly cost-effective. More than nine in 10 women receiving them would be eligible for Medicaid-funded prenatal, delivery and postpartum care services if they became pregnant. Avoiding the […]