Research stories
The viral magic behind the Gentleminions TikTok trend
If you've taken a trip to the cinema over the school holidays, you might have been bewildered by the sight of high school boys dressed in formalwear and brandishing bananas. Well-dressed youths around the world are flocking to theatres to attend screenings of Minions: The Rise…
Electric vehicles pass the remote road test
Electric vehicles can handle the distances required to travel to essential services in remote and regional Australia, a new study from The Australian National University (ANU) has shown. According to co-author Dr Bjorn Sturmberg, the results indicate the use of electric…
Life satisfaction plummets among young Aussies during COVID
Young Australians have suffered the greatest drop in life satisfaction during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, new analysis from The Australian National University (ANU) shows. The findings come from the COVID-19 Impact Monitoring Survey, which has asked more than 3,500…
Algorithm charts moral culture in 100k dilemmas
Should we sacrifice the life of one person to save the lives of five others? For social scientists, hypothetical dilemmas with stark, life-and-death consequences play an important role in theorising about philosophical first principles, ethical norms, and moral psychology. But a…
Unpopular leaders punished at the polls in 2022 election
Scott Morrison and Barnaby Joyce were the most unpopular leaders of any party since 1987, new analysis of the 2022 federal election from The Australian National University (ANU) shows. The findings come from the joint ANUpoll/Comparative Study of Electoral Systems survey of more than 3…
Ancient DNA unearths cultural “explosion" in the Pacific
DNA analysis of ancient human remains has shed new light on an "explosion" of intermixing cultures and genetics in an island region north of Australia known as Wallacea - an imprint that is still detectable in East Indonesians today. The study was conducted by researchers from The…
Protecting Ukrainian history from the horrors of war
A historian from The Australian National University (ANU) is helping to prevent thousands of Soviet-era Ukrainian documents from becoming casualties of the Russian invasion. Dr Filip Slaveski from the School of History has acquired digitised copies of accounts and resources relating to the…