Sunday Morning for Sunday 19 June 2022

8:11 Why you should be investing for the long term 

Have low interest rates gone, never to return? And have a lot of people been pushed out to the edge of the risk curve by policies designed to avoid what has now arrived? 
We've probably heard or read the headlines, at least, from institutions warning about recession. Other commentators online are more shrill.
New Zealander Jeffrey Halley alternates between Jakarta and Singapore as the Senior Market Analyst/Asia Pacific for the OANDA corporation.
He joins the show to discuss interest rates and a number of other financial matters, including why New Zealanders should be putting their money in term deposits for more than 12 months. 

8:25 How road traffic noise affects children's cognitive development

Traffic noise at schools has a detrimental effect on the development and working memory and attention in primary school students, research has found. 
The new study, led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), is the first to assess the impact of traffic noise on child cognitive development over time and to determine the impact of peaks in noise. It included 2,680 children between seven and 10 years of age. 
The findings showed that the progression of working memory, complex working memory and attention was slower in students attending schools with higher levels of traffic noise. 
Researcher Maria Foraster led the study. 

8:41 It's not always your fault when you can't remember things 

We've all suffered the embarrassment of completely forgetting important things that we promised people we were going to do.
But it's not always our fault. 
New research shows that no matter how hard we try to remember plans, there is always an element of luck involved. 
Psychologists say we can't keep all these intentions active in our working memory all day, because working memory is limited both in its capacity and in the duration of time we can retain information. That's why people need long-term memory to store their intentions. 
Thor Grünbaum is an Associate Professor in Philosophy and Psychology at the University of Copenhagen. He co-authored the recent study looking at a new cognitive model of long-term memory for intentions. 

9:06 Mediawatch

Mediawatch looks at how the media responded to a ministerial reshuffle trailed as "just minor" in advance by the PM - and how claims of an unfair fight against Fair Pay Agreements flared up in the media: Also - a win for media freedom against a so-called 'Bad Boy of Brexit.' 

9:37 Shock, horror! Not all vegetables are best eaten raw

Raw food diets have been around since the 1930s, though their origins stretch back a lot further than that - to the beginnings of vegetarianism and veganism. 
However, in recent years the popularity of raw food has continued to rise dramatically, with specialty restaurants popping up all over the world, including New Zealand.  
The basic premise is that the less processed food is, the better it is for you.
But did you know there are a number of vegetables that are healthier for you when cooked? (Spoiler alert: carrots are on the list.) 
Indeed, a recent piece in The Conversation highlighted nine vegetables that were better for you when cooked. 
Registered Nutritionist and Professional Practice Fellow in the Department of Human Nutrition at the University of Otago, Dr Ali Hill joins the show to offer her analysis.

10:04 The story of the birth of Pop music 

What do you do after you've undertaken the seemingly insane task of writing a book about the entire history of Pop music, as musician and writer Bob Stanley did in 2013's Yeah Yeah Yeah? You write the prequel. 
In his new book, Let's Do It: The Birth of Pop, Stanley, who is a member of English indie/dance crossover band Saint Etienne, tells the definitive story of the birth of Pop music, from 1900 through to the 1950s - a period that is usually overlooked or forgotten in the tale of the genre's evolution. 
From its growth out of ragtime - when the term 'Pop. Music' was first used in a 1901 ad -  through Broadway and Hollywood, and into the album era, Let's Do It is the ultimate  guidebook to the birth of the most popular of all the musical genres. 
Stanley joins the show from the UK to discuss the new book, what he learned about the birth of Pop along the way, and why singles are better than albums. 

10:45 The $100 billion plan to link the US with Russia 

A grumpy 76-year-old engineer is on a mission: to connect the United States and Russia with an 85 km railroad tunnel beneath the Bering Strait. 
The 'Strait Guys' follows Czech-born mining engineer, George, and his protégé, Scott, as they join forces with Russian visionaries and dare to try the impossible by connecting the InterContinental Railway through Alaska, to the Bering Strait and onward to Russia. 
The InterContinental Railway is planned to run from Edmonton, Canada to Harbin, China and connect North America, Russia and Asia via the tunnel beneath the Bering Strait. It will be the largest development project in the world and open up the Arctic's vast natural resources for exploration. 
The 'Strait Guys' try to convince international governments, corporations, and indigenous tribes to green-light their $100-billion project. They promise that it will become the "Panama Canal of the 21st century".
Filmmaker Rick Minnich joins the show to discuss 'Strait Guys,' which is set to feature at the Doc Edge festival, and whether George's dream will ever eventuate.  

The Strait Guys is playing as part of Doc Edge Festival screening in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and online: https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/the-strait-guys/

11:05 Celebrating Matariki around the world 

New Zealand will celebrate its newest public holiday this coming Friday when Matariki - the first-ever public holiday to recognise Māori New Year - takes place. 
In celebration of Matariki, Māori astronomer Professor Rangi Matamua and journalist Miriama Kamo have come together to create a new children's book, Matariki Around the World (with illustrations by Isobel Te Aho-White), which explores the origins of the Matariki cluster through nine name whetū (stars) and includes stories about the same star cluster from the Pacific Islands to Australia, Asia, the Americas, Europe and Africa. 
Kamo is an award-winning journalist and the anchor of TVNZ's flagship current affairs programme Sunday. Her first children's book was the popular The Stolen Stars of Matariki. 

11:20 Calling Home: Emily Wolfe in Oxford 

Auckland-born artist Emily Wolfe moved to London over 20 years ago and has managed to sustain an international arts practice with regular exhibitions in both Aotearoa and the UK. 
The daughter of writer Richard Wolfe and artist Pamela Wolfe, and a graduate of the Elam School of Fine Arts, Emily received the Ryoichi Sasakawa Scholarship to study for a Masters in Fine Arts at the prestigious Slade School of Fine Arts at University College London in 1998.
These days, Emily is based in Oxford, where she lives in an old Victorian house with historian husband Professor Ian McBride (who works at the University of Oxford), daughter Iris and a cat called Ramona. 
She's Calling Home this morning. 

11:44 US correspondent on the Capitol riot hearings 

The January 6 hearings in America resumed this past week, the U.S. Congress' investigation into the storming of the Capitol 18 months ago. 
At issue is whether former US President Donald Trump's claims about the election being stolen from him led directly to what happened as his supporters gathered with a sense of grievance and then went too far.
Joining us to discuss this and a couple of the other big stories coming out of the US recently is our correspondent Karen Kasler, the Statehouse bureau chief for public radio and television in the state of Ohio.