Doug Myers, an associate professor in the Department of Community and Environmental Health, published “Cancer rates not explained by smoking: a county-level analysis” last fall in the journal Environmental Health.
Myers and his coauthors from the University of Massachusetts – Polly Hoppin, Molly Jacobs, Richard Clapp and David Kriebel – studied data from 612 counties included in the National Cancer Institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) program, an authoritative source of information on cancer incidence in the U.S. They found that even if smoking were completely eliminated, many cancers known to be caused by smoking would still occur. While smoking cessation efforts have come a long way in reducing cancer incidence, other environmental causes are important and must be considered when developing cancer prevention programs.
Myers and Boise State colleague Kimberly Rauscher, an associate professor in the Department of Community and Environmental Health, also published “Exploring differences in the workplace violence experiences of young workers in middle and late adolescence in the United States” in the Journal of Safety Research. They collaborated with Brandy Brown of West Virginia University and Carri Casteel of University of Iowa. Brown, the lead author, was Rauscher’s doctoral student at West Virginia University.
Young workers, who are 15-24 years of age, are commonly employed in jobs where the risk of workplace violence is high, yet it is unknown whether the adolescents’ stage of development affects how they understand and respond to workplace violence differently. The study explored whether the experience and understanding of workplace violence for young workers varied between those in middle (ages 15-17) and late (ages 18-24) adolescence. Understanding that differences exist among young workers based on developmental stage, lack of experience, education and social awareness can provide employers, companies, policy makers and researchers the opportunity to better address the issue of workplace violence in this population.