HOUSEHOLD CHORES: When the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune reported on a study of who does the housework, they called on Sociology Professor Pepper Schwartz for a comment. Said Schwartz, “The problem is people get lazy. They have good will, but they’re busy so if they can get out of stuff they don’t notice, that’s to their advantage. It’s to men’s advantage not to notice.”

VIOLENT MEN: An article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch picked up on research by Neil Jacobson and John Gottmann relating to men who batter their wives. Batterers often come from families in which their fathers beat their mothers, Jacobson told the Post-Dispatch. “And often, everybody thinks the batterer is a nice guy except, of course, for the victim who is getting battered. Batterers often see themselves as victims, and they see their violence as justified.”

MORE VIOLENT MEN: Men who batter their wives possess the characteristics of either a cobra or a pit bull, according to an article in The Chicago News Tribune on the research of Neil Jacobson and John Gottman. Pit bulls, the psychologists say, monitor the woman’s every move. They tend to see betrayal at every turn, and it infuriates them. And when their anger explodes into violence, they seem to lose control. Cobras on the other hand, are often sociopaths. They are cold and calculating con artists relatively free of the trappings of emotional dependence but with a high incidence of criminal traits and sadistic behavior, the researchers’ found. The cobras’ violence grows out of a pathological need to have their way, to be the boss and make sure that everyone, especially their wives and girlfriends, knows it and acts accordingly.

LOST HOMEWORK: An article in USA Today that looked at how well school reforms worked—or didn’t—had this as its lead: “The current state of K-12 education research reminds University of Washington education professor Paul Hill of the way medicine was practiced during the Colonial period. Doctors embraced fads, not research, and different doctors subscribed to different fads.”

Newsmakers is a periodic column reporting on the coverage of the University of Washington by the national press and broadcasting services.¶