Black History Month is also known as the African-American History Month. It is celebrated all over the United States of America and Canada in the month of February, while in the United Kingdom it is celebrated in October. Each and every school and university conducts various activities to make the generation aware of the importance that African-American history holds in the nation. The electronic media is filled with themes inrelevance to the occasion, and many activities are carried out across the country to remember the contribution made by African-American citizens in the development of this nation.

    Black History Month was first started bya famous African-American historian Dr. Carter G. Woodson in the year 1926. February was chosen as the month to celebrate the African-American history because it was the birth month of two of the most highly valued people among African-Americans. These were President Abraham Lincoln, who freed the slaves, and Frederick Douglass, who was also the first vice presidential nominee (被任命者) amongAfrican-Americans. Initially, Black History Month was known as the “NegroHistory Week”. This was Dr. Woodson's attempt to encourage awareness amongcitizens about the contribution of African-Americans towards the building of the nation. It was only in the early 1970's that the name “Negro History Week”changed to “Black History Month”. And later, in the year 1976, the entire monthof February was declared to be the National African-American History Month, orthe Black History Month.

Every year, National African-AmericanHistory Month is celebrated by many activities with various ideas and themesfor the younger generation. In 2013, Black History Month celebrates the 50^th anniversary of the March on Washington at which Martin Luther King, Jr. gavehis famous speech “I have a dream”. It also marks the 150^th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation (解放黑奴宣言). The theme for Black History Month in 2014 is “Civil Rights in America” remembering the important milestones by African-Americans and others in the battle for civil rights and equaltreatment under the law.

    Few laws are so effective that you can see results just days after they take effect. But in the nine days since the federal cigarette tax more than doubled-to $1.01 per pack-smokers have jammed telephone "quit lines" across the country seeking to kick the habit.

    This is not a surprise to public health advocates. They've studied the effect of state tax increases for years, finding that smokers, especially teens, are price sensitive. Nor is it a shock to the industry, which fiercely fights every tax increase.

    The only wonder is that so many states insist on closing their ears to the message. Tobacco taxes improve public health, they raise money and most particularly, they deter people from taking up the habit as teens, which is when nearly all smokers are addicted. Yet the rate of taxation varies widely.

    In Manhattan, for instance, which has the highest tax in the nation, a pack of Marlboro Light Kings cost $10.06 at one drugstore Wednesday. In Charleston, S.C., where the 7-cent-a-pack tax is the lowest in the nation, the price was $4.78.

    The influence is obvious.

    In New York, high school smoking hit a new low in the latest surveys-13.8%, far below the national average. By comparison, 26% of high school students smoke in Kentucky. Other low-tax states have similarly depressing teen-smoking records.

    Hal Rogers, Representative from Kentucky, like those who are against high tobacco taxes, argues that the burden of the tax falls on low-income Americans "who choose to smoke".

    That's true. But there is more reason in keeping future generations of low-income workers from getting hooked in the first place. As for today's adults, if the new tax drives them to quit, they will have more to spend on their families, cut their risk of cancer and heart disease and feel better.

    Around this time a few years ago, it was common to see videos of friends on social media having a bucket of icy water thrown on them. Known as the “ice bucket challenge”, it was created as a way to raise money for the medical condition ALS. But now, there's a new challenge and this time, no water is involved.

    What is it? Well, think of a fruit that you'd never normally sink your teeth into. Perhaps you've got it: a lemon. While we enjoy using lemons to add flavor to dishes, very few of us would actually eat one as we'd eat an apple or an orange.

    But the horrible taste is the precise reason why the “lemon face challenge” is taking off. Participants bite into a lemon, taking a selfie as they do it before posting the photo online. The fun is all about expression people make as all that citric acid (柠檬酸) hits their taste buds (味蕾). Every expression seems to say, “This is worse than freezing water.”

    The serious side to this trend is the good cause it's all in aid of. The challenge aims to raise awareness of a rare brain cancer that affects young children. It was started by Aubregh Nicholas, an 11-year-old US kid. She was diagnosed with this rare brain cancer herself in September 2017, but has since raised almost $50000 to cover her medical expenses thanks to the challenge.

    If a challenge is going to raise publicity and contributions from people, it has to be something interesting and original. That way the ice bucket challenge took off in 2014 and it explains why so many people are now sharing their lemon faces. There are a lot of stories about the downside of social media these days. The charity challenges, however, show how online culture can unite the world and bring help to the people who most need it.

    Can you trust your very first childhood memories? Maybe not, a new study suggests.

    Past researches show that people's earliest memories typically form around 3 to 3. 5 years of age. But in a recent survey of more than 6,600 people, British scientists have found that 39 percent of participants claimed to have memories from age 2 or younger. These first memories are likely false, the researchers said. This was particularly the case for middle -aged and older adults.

    For the study, researchers asked participants to describe their first memory and the age at which it occurred. Participants were told they had to be sure the memory was the one that had happened. For example, it shouldn't be based on a photograph, a family story or any source other than direct experiences. Then the researchers examined the content, language and descriptive details of these earliest memories and worked out the likely reasons why people would claim to have memories from an age when memories cannot form.

    As many of these memories dated before the age of 2, this suggests they were not based on actual facts, but facts or knowledge about their babyhood or childhood from photographs or family stories. Often these false memories are fired by a part of an early experience, such as family relationships or feeling sad, the researchers explained.

    "We suggest that what a rememberer has in mind when recalling fictional early memories is …a mental representation consisting of remembered pieces of early experiences and some facts or knowledge about their own babyhood or childhood," study author Shania Kantar said in a journal news release, "Additionally, further details may be unconsciously inferred or added. Such memory-like mental representations come over time, to be collectively experienced when they come to mind, so for the individual, they quite simply are memories, which particularly point to babyhood."

    "Importantly, the person remembering them doesn't know this is fictional," study co-author Martin Conway said "In fact, when people are told that their memories are false they often don't believe it."

    Although toys packaging says it's educational, it doesn't make it so. That's the finding from a new study in JAMA Pediatrics that found some toys being marketed as language promoters got in the way of learning.

    Research shows that for kids to understand, speak and eventually read or write a language, they need to hear it - lots of it. And it's never too early for parents and to caregivers to get talking. That explains the booming industry in talking electronic toys that claim to help kids learn language.

    Professor Anna Sosa, of Northern Arizona University, led the study and says she gave families three different kinds of toys to play with: books, traditional toys like humble blocks and a shape sorter, and electronic toys. Sosa says she picked those toys because they are advertised in their packaging as language-promoters for babies between the ages of 10 and 16 months.

    "We had a talking on farm-animal names and things," Sosa says of the electronic toys. "We had a baby cell phone. And we had a baby laptop. So you open the cover and start pushing buttons, and it tells you things. The parent-child couples were asked to play separately with each type of toy over the course of three days."

    "When there's something else that's doing some talking, the parents seem to be sitting on the sidelines and letting the toy talk for them and respond for them," Sosa says. "That's bad because the best way a toy can promote language in infants and toddlers is by stimulating interaction between parent and child. There's simply no evidence that a young child can learn language directly from a toy. It isn't responsive enough. It isn't social."

    As for the other toys, traditional blocks and puzzles stimulated more conversation than the electronic toys, and books outscored them all. But don't underestimate the humble block. While traditional toys fell short of books in interaction quantity, Sosa notes, they kept pace in terms of quality.

There is increasing evidence suggesting that ultra-processed food addiction is indeed a significant issue. These foods, which are carefully manufactured in industrial factories rather than in the familiar setting of grandma's kitchen, are filled with altered ingredients that are artfully combined to enhance fat, sugar, and salt levels. Moreover, they contain a lots of flavor and sensory enhancers, which render them irresistibly appealing. Examples of ultra-processed foods range from packaged snacks to fast food and mass-produced desserts. In fact, they account for nearly 60 percent of the calories consumed in the United States.

Studies have revealed that up to 20 percent of adults and 15 percent of kids and adolescents might exhibit signs of addiction to these foods, a phenomenon that has been recognized for decades as rat studies in the 1980s demonstrated that the brain's reward system is powerfully activated when rats consume certain foods, a reaction similar to that when they self-administer cocaine.

In recent years, as the obesity rate in America has soared to 42 percent, especially among Black and Hispanic populations, scientists have been devoting increased attention to the impact of ultra-processed food addiction. These foods not only activate the brain's reward system but also may involve the gut-microbiology. Symptoms of craving and withdrawal are clearly evident with ultra-processed foods. People will go to great lengths to obtain these foods, and when they are refused, they may experience a series of discomforts such as headaches, fatigue, and irritability(易怒的). A study in 2022 found that ultra-processed foods meet the same addiction criteria as tobacco products.

High consumption of ultra-processed foods is linked to numerous health problems, including heart disease, type 2 diabetes, obesity, depression, anxiety, and an increased risk of death. Thin people can also be addicted, perhaps burning off the extra calories through exercise or having a genetic predisposition(易患病体质) not to gain weight easily. Food companies argue against denying these foods, but experts advocate for clear nutritional labels and restrictions on marketing to children. Treating food addictions remains an open question, but there is hope that people will become more aware of the dangers, just as they did with smoking.