The research, which surveyed more than 1,500 people aged 30–70, mirrors earlier findings in younger cohorts. Both the frequency and the duration of social-media use were linked to loneliness. Checking an app dozens of times a day appears no less isolating than long scrolling sessions. Those in the heaviest quartile of use were more than twice as likely to report loneliness as those in the lightest.

Serious consequences

The consequences are not trivial. Loneliness, which is defined as a lack of satisfying social ties, is associated with poor mental health, substance abuse, and cardiovascular disease. America’s Surgeon General has compared its health toll to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Roughly half of American adults are estimated to be lonely, a trend that pre-dates COVID-19 but was exacerbated by it.

Unlike most earlier work, which focused on teenagers and students, the Oregon study looked at older adults. Such “digital immigrants” may be less adept at extracting social benefit online, which could deepen the link between screen time and solitude. Yet the study cannot prove causation: it may be that social media breeds loneliness, or simply that the lonely are drawn to social media. Either way, the remedy does not appear to lie in the feed.

A study of 125 participants over ten days tracked 945 meetings, 62% of them virtual. Subjects reported on the format, their ability to multitask or take breaks, and how tired they felt afterwards. To the researchers’ surprise, video calls proved no more exhausting than in-person gatherings. Indeed, meetings lasting less than 44 minutes were judged less tiring when held online.

The new normal

Why the reversal from earlier findings? Context matters. Previous studies collected data in the depths of the pandemic, when videoconferencing was inseparable from social isolation, monotony, and fraying work-life boundaries. What people blamed on Zoom may in fact have been the broader misery of lockdown.

The implications extend beyond academic quibbles. One common argument against remote work is that it breeds burnout through online drudgery. These findings undermine that claim. For firms and employees, the problem may not be the technology but the circumstances in which it is used.

As the authors note, the lesson for social science is the importance of replicating results under different historical conditions. The lesson for managers may be simpler: online meetings are not the enemy. Poorly managed ones, whether in person or on screen, still are.

Managers, the authors argue, typically want to do the right thing but lack confidence in how to proceed. With proper training and clear guidance, they are better able to listen, adapt, and implement changes. Normalising workplace adjustments, the report suggests, benefits not just disabled employees but organisations as a whole—boosting innovation, productivity and retention.

Quick results

Some practices are already paying dividends. Flexible and remote working, transparent office cultures, and straightforward adjustment procedures have all helped disabled and neurodivergent staff thrive. Even modest interventions—such as clearer job descriptions, providing meeting agendas in advance, or reducing sensory distractions—can yield significant results.

The report emphasizes that inclusion is not merely about “box-ticking.” The best managers, it finds, listen, trial adjustments, and adapt to context. A construction site, after all, has different needs than a laboratory or an office. Nor should employees be forced to endure lengthy medical processes before receiving help. Conditions such as endometriosis can take years to diagnose, requiring formal proof, which excludes valuable workers unnecessarily.

Employers, the researchers conclude, are making progress. The task now is to embed inclusive practices into everyday routines, ensuring they do not depend on individual managers’ enthusiasm. Making adjustments simple, and treating requests at face value, would ensure that diverse talent is not just hired but given the chance to succeed.

Rare bright spot

Refugee sponsorship has been one of the few bright spots in Britain’s migration policy. The flagship “Homes for Ukraine” (H4U) initiative has enabled more than 100,000 arrivals since 2022, dwarfing the Community Sponsorship scheme (CS), which has resettled barely 1,000 people in nearly a decade, and the newer Communities for Afghans programme (C4A). All three, despite their disparate scale, have shown sponsorship’s strengths: wraparound support, improved access to housing, health care, and work, and greater social cohesion in host communities.

Yet the fragmented, nationality-specific approach has also bred confusion and inequity. Application processes are cumbersome, housing remains scarce, and volunteers often lack the expertise to guide refugees through Britain’s welfare and education systems. Shortfalls in language provision and mental health care further hinder integration.

Simplified processes

The researchers advocate a single framework with expedited procedures, particularly for emergencies, and stronger government leadership. National strategy, clear guidance, sustainable funding for councils and lead sponsors, and lighter re-application processes for experienced groups would all help. So too would expanded training, targeted recruitment of new hosts, and mechanisms for evaluating and sharing best practices. Public interest, they note, is far higher than awareness: many Britons know little of sponsorship but like the idea when it is explained.

Refugee policy is politically fraught. Sir Keir Starmer’s government faces criticism from left and right over asylum. But if ministers are serious about safe and legal routes, they have a ready-made solution. Sponsorship has worked in Britain—even if unevenly. With a global, standardised scheme, it could work far better.

That was the question posed by recent research from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, which looked at the use of AI in various aspects of social services. These are among the most sensitive services provided by governments, and include the distribution of unemployment and housing benefits, as well as a wide range of social welfare.

A lukewarm reception

The study shows that the people depending on these services are generally cool about the role AI can play, and especially on the fairness and efficacy of automated decision tools. The researchers found that those designing and implementing these solutions seldom took into account the needs or perspectives of those affected.

The authors highlight the role out of Smart Check, an AI-based system in Amsterdam that was used to try and spot potential welfare fraud. The system was designed to trawl through a comprehensive dataset to produce a “risk score.”

Anyone whose score surpassed a certain level was assigned for further investigation. It won’t perhaps come as a great surprise that the system didn’t function quite as the developers expected, and gave disproportionate attention to vulnerable groups, such as immigrants and women. What’s more, those under suspicion were given no route to challenge this accusation.

After prolonged criticism by lawyers and advocacy groups, the program was suspended earlier this year, with a subsequent evaluation highlighting the shortcomings that were evident to so many for so long.

It’s a narrative that few observers of AI will be unfamiliar with. Vendors promise great leaps in terms of efficiency and effectiveness, but the reality sees pre-existing biases being reinforced and trust among users rapidly eroded.

The receiving end

This kind of scenario prompted the researchers to try to understand how people feel about being on the receiving end of AI-based decision-making. They quizzed around 3,200 people from the United States and the U.K.

The survey aimed to present participants with a realistic scenario, before asking them whether they would be willing to trade faster decisions for a fairly high error rate. The results suggest that there is a general willingness to tolerate a degree of unfairness in return for faster decisions, but this was not the case for those on the receiving end of these faster decisions. For them, it was far more important to get it right than risk getting it wrong, quickly.

“There is a dangerous assumption in policy-making that the average opinion represents the reality of all stakeholders,” the researchers explain.

Trust gap

Interestingly, the results show a clear trust gap between recipients and non-recipients of social welfare. Not just in terms of how much each group trusts the technology, but how much they believe the other group trusts the technology. Non-recipients consistently thought that recipients would trust AI more than they actually do.

This trust gap endured, even when participants were given a financial incentive to try to assess things as realistically as possible. The most vulnerable groups were, in fact, much better at understanding the perspectives of the majority than the majority were at understanding the perspectives of the vulnerable minority.

The trust gap wasn’t reduced when participants were told they might be able to appeal any decisions made by the AI system, with the appeal overseen by a human administrator. This perhaps reflects the lack of trust that’s evident in governments more broadly, which can often seem Kafka-esque in their inpenetrability.

Government matters

This underlines the importance of building trust in government more broadly. The study shows how trust is a fluid process, with a lack of trust in government undermining trust in the AI systems produced by the government, and vice versa, the lack of trust in AI undermining trust in the government that deploys it.

This was evident when the researchers examined the potential use of AI to support the distribution of the Universal Credit welfare payments in the UK. Many of the potential recipients of this benefit complained that they would rather have human case workers ensuring the payments were made, even if AI was faster and as accurate as the humans. This didn’t really change, even if they were told about the appeal process.

The study is a timely reminder that policymakers should be wary of deploying AI technology, especially in sensitive areas, such as social welfare. The findings also remind us that the apparent support of the majority is an insufficient reason for deploying AI, as the majority often lack the same perspective as those actually on the receiving end of these decisions.

“If the perspectives of vulnerable groups are not actively taken into account, there is a risk of wrong decisions with real consequences—such as unjustified benefit withdrawals or false accusations,” the researchers explain.

The answer is to do a much better job of co-creating solutions so that recipients of decisions are involved in the systems that make those decisions. As soon as people feel powerless, the trust in both the system and the institution making the decisions is stripped away. With governments around the world increasingly adopting an “AI-first” mindset, it’s perhaps something for them to keep in mind.

The studies, covering more than 3,000 participants, revealed a consistent pattern. Doctoral students rated their advisers’ rapid behavioural shifts as “disingenuous” and “suspicious”, while gradual changes were praised as thoughtful and evidence of genuine growth. Executives undergoing 360-degree reviews faced similar judgments: immediate adjustments were read as superficial; slower, more deliberate changes inspired confidence.

Building slowly

Authenticity, in the eyes of employees, takes time. Workers assume that real transformation requires effort, reflection, and persistence. When a change is complex—say, improving communication style or becoming more inclusive—employees are especially sceptical of quick fixes. The suspicion carries consequences: leaders seen as inauthentic are less likely to receive honest feedback in the future.

The lesson is not that managers should ignore criticism or dawdle in addressing it. Rather, they should be transparent about the process. Communicating the effort involved, setting realistic timelines, and demonstrating progress incrementally can reassure staff that improvements are sincere.

The findings point to a paradox: responsiveness without authenticity can be counterproductive. Leaders eager to build trust should resist the temptation of overnight transformations. In management, as in politics, gradual reform often appears the more genuine.

Unequal gains

The analysis uncovered three key themes that were common across the academic literature. The first, and perhaps most obvious, is that AI, much like so many other technologies before it, distributes its benefits unequally.

For instance, one study shows that new technologies boost job performance, but another highlights how technology worsens our mental health.

Like employees, firms can also benefit—or suffer—from AI’s advance. One line of research shows that digitalisation cushions companies against revenue losses after recessions. Another finds that robot adoption, far from unleashing innovation, often pushes firms to double down on scale efficiencies in narrow fields.

Taken together, the lesson is plain. Artificial intelligence, robots, and algorithms represent the latest twist in Joseph Schumpeter’s “creative destruction”. The spoils, however, are unevenly distributed: managers and firms tend to pocket most of the gains, while employees shoulder the costs. Sensible leaders, therefore, would do well to consider how to spread the benefits—and mitigate the pain—across stakeholders such as workers and local communities.

Values matter

The second key finding is that technology is never judged in isolation. It is filtered through social values and cultural priors. One study finds that listeners deem AI-composed classical music less authentic, while AI-generated techno is untroubled by such qualms: centuries of human craftsmanship are expected in one case, but not the other. Another experiment suggests that when humans make predictions slowly, they are trusted more (a sign of deliberate reasoning), whereas computers that dawdle are distrusted (a machine, after all, is supposed to be quick).

Such perceptions matter. They shape adoption across domains as varied as finance, ethics, and customer service. Stakeholders often share values—for instance, a reluctance to entrust moral choices to machines. But sometimes values diverge. Customers may prize empathy; firms, efficiency. Managers need to understand these priorities if they are to gauge the true implications of technological change.

The gap between access and use

The final finding concerns access. Even when new value is offered, it is not always taken up. A well may be dug, but locals may still prefer another water source. Similarly, firms can roll out chatbots to answer customer queries, only for many customers to queue for a human operator. Research shows that some people eagerly embrace digital tools, while others actively shun them.

Managers should resist assuming that the mere presence of technology guarantees its use. Subscriptions to the latest platforms or interfaces may languish unless nudged into everyday routines. Encouraging a small group of employees to experiment with a new system can create a contagion effect, prompting others to follow.

The world is deep into a fourth industrial revolution, and no stakeholder remains untouched. Politicians, pundits, and evangelists have each proclaimed their vision of what it means. A cooler look at the scientific literature suggests three points for managers: weigh the interests of multiple stakeholders; account for differences in stakeholder values; and remember that access to technology does not guarantee its exploitation.

Technological change is inexorable. But whether it enriches or impoverishes depends on how wisely it is managed.

That is the thrust of research from the University of Manchester, which argues that “ordinary affects”—the emotions, atmospheres, and mundane experiences of daily life—deserve more attention in understanding how political change happens.

Subtle changes

Political science usually focuses on formal events: campaigns, speeches, and clashes of ideology. But such accounts neglect the role of feelings—hope, irritation, unease—that circulate through society in less visible ways. A chance encounter in a café, an unsettling sight on a city street, or a stray remark between strangers can stir reflections that gradually alter attitudes.

For activists, this is no mere abstraction. The study examines vegan campaigners in Manchester, who use graphic street displays to provoke reactions. Some passers-by are drawn into lengthy conversations about ethics; others recoil. The responses are often fleeting, but they plant seeds that may germinate later.

The lesson is that political influence is not confined to grand speeches or mass rallies. It also seeps through small acts of kindness, gestures of dissent, and moments of unease that nudge people to reconsider assumptions. Power is reinforced, or contested, not only in legislatures but in the textures of daily life.

“Politics is lived and felt,” the researcher concludes. Change may arrive not just through dramatic upheavals, but through the ordinary atmospheres in which people sense, rather than declare, that another world is possible.

The research examines France, where the “China shock”—a surge of imports from the Middle Kingdom—has hit hardest. The most exposed are highly specialised professionals, whose skills do not transfer easily, and who are often employed in sectors governed by rigid collective-bargaining agreements. Because Spain’s labour market is structurally similar, the findings apply there, too.

Uneven impact

The team tracked more than 163,000 French private-sector workers between 1993 and 2015, blending administrative data with theoretical modelling. Unlike earlier work that focused on industries alone, this study drilled into occupations. It devised an “occupational exposure index” to show how susceptible different professions are to Chinese competition. The results were striking: technicians and engineers suffered more than generalist clerical staff. When output fell, the latter could shift jobs more readily; the former could not.

Wage losses were as large when measured by occupation as by sector, challenging the conventional wisdom that training or education explains most of the pain. A second study investigated collective bargaining. Far from shielding the vulnerable, rigid agreements sometimes made things worse, deepening wage cuts for low-paid workers.

Skilled staff in tightly regulated industries saw steeper declines in pay than peers in looser ones. For executives and engineers, the gap largely vanished. Adjustments often came not only through lower wages but also through fewer working hours, the more common mechanism.

Design matters

The authors stress this is no blanket indictment of collective agreements. Rather, it is evidence that their design matters, particularly in an era of heightened trade competition. The policy implications reach beyond France. Spain offers a near replica, while in America, tariffs that dampen exports may trigger effects not unlike a flood of Chinese imports.

Reskilling, mobility, and a rethink of bargaining frameworks all appear essential if economies are to preserve the gains of open trade without entrenching its inequities.

Epiphanies, by definition, are moments of clarity that reframe how people see themselves and their work. Sometimes they are prompted by dramatic events, such as a near-death experience; sometimes they arrive unbidden. A new line of research from Washington University in St. Louis suggests that such transformative moments are not merely a matter of chance. They may, in fact, be cultivated.

Solving problems

The study examined “problem-solving daydreaming,” a playful form of mind wandering in which the brain entertains imaginative solutions to vexing challenges. Across several experiments, encompassing MBA students, alumni, and aspiring leaders, the researchers found that those prone to such daydreaming were more likely to report powerful work-related epiphanies. The effect was especially pronounced among those with a strong compulsion to resolve difficult problems, a psychological trait that fuels curiosity and the search for knowledge.

Mind wandering, the researchers argue, can be more effective than deliberate effort, precisely because it allows assumptions to be suspended and fresh possibilities entertained. Daydreams, in other words, loosen the grip of conventional thinking.

The practical implications are considerable. Structured exercises, such as “legacy workshops” that encourage participants to reflect on mortality and meaning, or individual coaching sessions that prioritise inquiry and self-reflection, appear to strengthen the link between problem-solving daydreaming and epiphany. Participants who experienced such insights reported a heightened sense of purpose in their careers.

For business schools and professional organisations, the message is clear: cultivating environments that legitimise imaginative reflection can help foster clarity of direction and renewed motivation. Epiphanies may still feel like bolts from the blue—but with the right conditions, lightning can be encouraged to strike.