Notes: Shariff, VonDras

Prof. Ismail Shariff, Urban and Regional Studies, Philip J. and Elizabeth B. Hendrickson professor of Business, recently published paper in World Affairs titled: “America at the Crossroads: Dilemmas of Military Ventures and Economic Policy.” The paper has received notoriety for its timely content, including by the Barack Obama presidential campaign. The campaign acknowledged it via e-mail with a note that since “Washington does not have a monopoly on good ideas, and neither does (Obama),” it will take the ideas expressed in Shariff’s paper under consideration. Abstract: “America at the Crossroads” Confronted with record unpopularity abroad, a discontented people at home and a disastrous economic situation, made worse by the runaway costs of two unwinnable wars and the upkeep of an often dysfunctional global military footprint, the U.S. Government must carry out a major and necessarily painful transformation of its domestic and foreign policies to help build a multilateral, fair and democratic world order. Shariff notes that America will have to share power with other nations if solutions are to be implemented for the most critical crises affecting the planet as a whole, some of which threaten the very survival of the United States of America.

Prof. Dean D. VonDras, Human Development, recently had an article titled, “Lay appraisal of cognitive impairment symptoms and related prevention beliefs in a community-dwelling sample of mid-life and older adults,” accepted for publication in the Journal of Applied Gerontology. This study explores how age and health-related quality-of-life may be related to the identification and appraisal of cognitive impairment symptoms as well as associated prevention beliefs. Findings indicated advancing age and poor health-related quality-of-life may be associated with greater delay in seeking care for cognitive impairment symptoms, and unrealistic optimism regarding prevention outcomes. In the article VonDras also provides a discussion of health education interventions to bolster knowledge about Alzheimer’s disease.