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The litter on the National Mall after the Barack Obama inauguration was incredible. Barack Obama spoke to the need for more personal responsibility. Let's start by everyone cleaning up their own trash!

The United States could be rife with Internet addicts as clinically ill as alcoholics, a study suggested. Researchers at Stanford University School of Medicine in Stanford, California, said their telephone survey indicated more than one in eight US residents showed at least one sign of "problematic Internet use." The findings backed those of previous, less rigorous studies, according to the Stanford researchers. Most disturbing was the discovery that some people hid their Internet surfing, or went online to cure foul moods in ways that mirrored the way alcoholics use booze, according to the study's lead author, Elias Aboujaoude. "In a...

Researchers using three-dimensional technology to study the "Mona Lisa" say the woman depicted in Leonardo da Vinci's 16th century masterpiece was either pregnant or had recently given birth when she sat for the painting. ADVERTISEMENT That was one of many discoveries found by French and Canadian researchers during one of the most extensive physical examinations ever carried out on the artwork. "Thanks to laser scanning, we were able to uncover the very fine gauze veil Mona Lisa was wearing on her dress. This was something typical for either soon-to-be or new mothers at the time," Michel Menu, research director of...

Men are smarter than women, according to a controversial new study that adds another cinder to the fiery debate over whether gender impacts general intelligence. "For 100 years there's been a consensus among psychologists that there is no sex difference in intelligence," said J. Philippe Rushton, a psychologist at the University of Western Ontario, Canada. Recent studies, however, have raised questions about the validity of this claim, he said. One such study showed that men have larger brains than women, a 100 gram difference after correcting for body size. Rushton found similar results in a study of gender and brain...

Men may have developed a psychology that makes them particularly able to engage in wars, a scientist said on Friday. New research has shown that men bond together and cooperate well in the face of adversity to protect their interests more than women, which could explain why war is almost exclusively a male business, according to Professor Mark van Vugt of the University of Kent in southern England. "Men respond more strongly to outward threats, we've labeled that the 'man warrior effect'," he told the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting. "Men are more likely to support a...

In case anyone needed proof, a new study supports the widely held perception: Celebrities are more in love with themselves than the average person. That's the conclusion drawn by Drew Pinsky and S. Mark Young of the University of Southern California, whose study of 200 celebrities will appear in the Journal of Research in Personality. It's not the entertainment industry that turns stars into narcissists, the study found. Rather, it suggests, the self-adoring seek jobs in show business. The study, whose subjects were all guests on Pinsky's sex-advice radio show — not a place for shrinking violets — found that...

While researchers have long shown that tall people earn more than their shorter counterparts, it's not only social discrimination that accounts for this inequality -- tall people are just smarter than their height-challenged peers, a new study finds. "As early as age three -- before schooling has had a chance to play a role -- and throughout childhood, taller children perform significantly better on cognitive tests," wrote Anne Case and Christina Paxson of Princeton University in a paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. The findings were based primarily on two British studies that followed children born in...

Although American women are increasingly better educated and likely to have careers, they're still uncertain about their financial futures, according to a study released Tuesday. When asked "How secure do you feel financially?" just 10 percent of the women respondents said they felt extremely secure, the survey found. Fifty-seven percent said they felt somewhat secure, and 33 percent said they didn't feel secure at all. "It was the most eye-opening aspect of the study," said Mark A. Zesbaugh, president and chief executive of Allianz Life, one of the sponsors of the study "Women, Money and Power." Women's feelings about money...