Learn about how to avoid committing “financial infidelity;” how scientists are fighting the effects of climate change by playing sounds underwater; and the science between weird winter weather phenomena, including “sea smoke” and thundersnow. In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following story from Curiosity.com about weird winter weather phenomena: https://curiosity.com/topics/4-weird-winter-weather-phenomena-explained-curiosity Love, lies and money: Study introduces, defines and measures financial infidelity | EurekAlert! — https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-12/uond-lla120319.php Love, Lies, and Money: Financial Infidelity in Romantic Relationships | Journal of Consumer Research — https://academic.oup.com/jcr/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jcr/ucz052/5610529 Sounds of the past give new hope for coral reef restoration | University of Exeter — http://www.exeter.ac.uk/news/featurednews/title_768084_en.html One Way to Lure Fish Back to Damaged Reefs? Play the Sounds of Living Coral | Smithsonian Magazine — https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/loudspeakers-lure-communities-fish-back-degraded-coral-reefs-180973685/ Acoustic enrichment can enhance fish community development on degraded coral reef habitat | Nature Communications — https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-13186-2 Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing! Just click or tap “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Learn about how to avoid committing “financial infidelity;” how scientists are fighting the effects of climate change by playing sounds underwater; and the science between weird winter weather phenomena, including “sea smoke” and thundersnow.
In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following story from Curiosity.com about weird winter weather phenomena: https://curiosity.com/topics/4-weird-winter-weather-phenomena-explained-curiosity
Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing! Just click or tap “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/financial-infidelity-saving-coral-reefs-with-sounds-and-weird-winter-weather-phenomena-explained
CODY: Hi! You’re about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from curiosity-dot-com. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Today, you’ll learn about how to avoid committing “financial infidelity;” how scientists are fighting the effects of climate change by playing sounds underwater; and the science between three weird winter weather phenomena.
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
Financial infidelity - Kelsey Donk (Cody)
Ever heard that saying, ‘love and money don’t mix?’ Whether or not that’s true, in many committed romantic relationships, they have to. And when one person wants to buy something the other won’t approve of, that can lead to trouble. New research from the University of Notre Dame is helping us begin to understand something scientists are calling “financial infidelity.” Turns out you can “cheat” on your partner with money, and that can have huge consequences for your relationship.
The new study is the first one ever to introduce the concept of financial infidelity — and define and measure it — so we can begin to understand how it impacts romantic relationships.
Here’s the two-part definition researchers landed on. First of all, financial infidelity describes any type of financial behavior that your romantic partner dislikes — think subscriptions, impulse buys, and even donations. The second, very important part is what makes that behavior “cheating.” And that’s either intentionally lying about the spending or keeping it secret.
It’s not infidelity if those parts aren’t involved. The researchers are talking about this type of common scenario—one partner buys something that’s clearly outside of the budget, and then hides the bag, never telling their romantic partner about the purchase.
They did ten lab studies to develop a “financial infidelity scale,” or FI-scale for short, to measure how likely a given person is to engage in financial infidelity. They found that people who score higher on the FI-scale tend to prefer secretive purchasing options, concealed packaging, and shopping at low-key stores. Those people are also more likely to keep financial secrets from their partners.
It’s important to mention, though, that most people don’t tell their partners about every financial choice they make. And that’s okay. If you forget to tell them by accident, that’s not cheating. And if you’re secretly saving for a birthday gift or a surprise trip, that’s okay, too. The best policy is to keep things as transparent as possible and just be honest with one another.
Sources: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-12/uond-lla120319.php
https://academic.oup.com/jcr/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jcr/ucz052/5610529
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Sound to coral - Steffie Drucker (Ashley)
When you think of a coral reef, you probably picture the vibrant, colorful fish singing "Under the Sea" in "The Little Mermaid." Obviously, they don't actually play clamshells or saxophones, but fish do make a symphony of sounds. And researchers recently learned that those sounds can help counteract one harmful effect of climate change, known as coral bleaching.
Warmer waters cause the algae living on a coral’s tissue to shed, which turns reefs white as a ghost. They eventually fall silent, die and turn brown from decay. These events are called “coral bleaching events.” You might have heard about the one that killed off half of Australia’s famed Great Barrier Reef in 2016 and 2017 — and they’re only happening more often. Having lots of fish around can help counteract this damage, but fish aren’t that interested in hanging around sick reefs, and they usually leave for greener pastures.
So an international team of scientists wanted to see whether they could rehabilitate a reef by tricking fish into thinking it was alive. The team placed patches of dead coral in 33 spots around the Great Barrier Reef. At 22 of the sites, they set up underwater speakers that played the sounds of healthy coral communities at night. The other 11 sites stayed silent. Wanna hear what happened? Well to illustrate, let’s first listen to what those degraded coral reefs sound like:
[degraded reef snapping shrimp sound file]
And here’s the sound of a healthy reef that they played at those 22 sites:
[sounds of coral reef animals file]
After six weeks of serenades, the noisy reefs doubled their population. What’s more, the species living there were 50 percent more diverse and came from all parts of the food web.
Scientists say this is an exciting tool that can help jumpstart reef recovery on a small scale — but it won’t save the reefs on its own. We still need to do the hard work of combatting the root causes of climate change, along with reducing pollution and addressing overfishing, to truly protect these fragile ecosystems.
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4 Weird Winter Weather Phenomena, Explained — https://curiosity.com/topics/4-weird-winter-weather-phenomena-explained-curiosity (Cody)
With the weather as chilly as it is right now, you might get a chance to see some weird winter weather phenomena like sea smoke or slushy oceans. And have you ever heard of thundersnow? Well if you’re curious about what causes these winter wonders, then you’ve come to the right place. Let’s talk about a few striking events that are caused mainly by the behavior of water at very cold temperatures.
First off, why do lake and ocean waters look like they’re steaming during cold snaps? Well, what you’re seeing isn’t really steam. Steam is hot water vapor and invisible. This cloudy phenomenon happens when the water surface is warmer than the freezing air above it, since liquid water can’t be colder than freezing point. When the water evaporates as invisible steam, it only rises a tiny bit off the surface of the water before it hits the freezing air. Since the cold air can’t hold as much vapor, it condenses into microscopic droplets of liquid water in the air, which causes the wispy clouds or “sea smoke.”
For the second phenomenon, let’s talk thundersnow. Thunderstorms happen when rapidly rising “thermals” of buoyant air increases static electricity between the clouds and the ground. Air can’t rise from the cold winter ground because cold air is dense. That’s why thunder is rare in the wintertime. But when really cold Arctic air blows in from up north, that cold air is denser than the air at the surface, so it literally falls down, pushing surface air up on top of it. This creates the same kind of static charge and BOOM – thundersnow!
And to wrap up, here’s a question about a third winter phenomenon: how common is it for the oceans to freeze outside the polar regions? Well, if you’re NOT in the Polar Regions, then you’re probably not going to see a frozen ocean. That’s because salt water's freezing point is lower than freshwater, around 28 degrees Fahrenheit. But when it’s really, really cold, you might see little frozen floes bobbing around the ocean. These are formed when the water is cold enough to freeze, and ends up expelling its salt. This is why people in the Arctic can melt sea ice for drinking water.
So, if you get a chance this winter to watch the amazing sight of sea smoke above a slushy ocean, feel free to be amazed by water and all its variety of forms.
And now, let’s recap what we learned today. Today we learned that
[ad lib optional]
CODY: Today’s stories were written by Kelsey Donk and Steffie Drucker, and by Scott Denning for The Conversation. Stories were edited by Ashley Hamer, who’s the managing editor for Curiosity Daily.
ASHLEY: Scriptwriting was by Cody Gough and Sonja Hodgen. Curiosity Daily is produced and edited by Cody Gough.
CODY: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes.
ASHLEY: And until then, stay curious!