ad: Short for advertisement. It may appear in any medium (print, online or broadcast) and has been prepared to sell someone on a product, idea or point of view.
adolescence: A transitional stage of physical and psychological development that begins at the onset of puberty, typically between the ages of 11 and 13, and ends with adulthood. People undergoing this transition are known as adolescents.
anxious: (n. anxiety) A feeling of dread over some potential or upcoming situation, usually one over which someone feels they have little control.
app: Short for application, or a computer program designed for a specific task.
bullying: (v. to bully) A group of repeated behaviors that are mean-spirited. They can include teasing, spreading rumors about someone, saying hurtful things to someone and intentionally leaving someone out of groups or activities. Sometimes bullying can include attacks using violence (such as hitting), threats of violence, yelling at someone or abusing someone with violent language. Much bullying takes place in person. But it also may occur online, through emails or via text messages. Newer examples including making fake profiles of people on websites or posting embarrassing photos or videos on social media.
chemotherapy: A chemical treatment that’s most often used to kill cancer cells in the body. Chemotherapy can have many unpleasant side effects as it kills not only cancer cells but many healthy cells as well.
curriculum: (plural: curricula) The official classroom materials (often readings) used to lead students through a course of study on a particular topic.
digital: (in computer science and engineering) An adjective indicating that something has been developed numerically on a computer or on some other electronic device, based on a binary system (where all numbers are displayed using a series of only zeros and ones).
discrimination: (in social science) An attitude of prejudice again people or things based on a bias about one or more of their attributes (such as race, sex, religion or age). It is not based on the actions of an individual but instead based on yet-unfounded expectations that are being applied broadly to a whole group.
distraction: Any event or situation that draws someone’s attention away from whatever had been his or her main focus. Distractions can be external events, such as sounds or sights; or they can be internal events, such as thoughts or emotions.
family: A taxonomic group consisting of at least one genus of organisms.
focus: (in behavior) To look or concentrate intently on some particular point or thing.
high school: A designation for grades nine through 12 in the U.S. system of compulsory public education. High-school graduates may apply to colleges for further, advanced education.
insight: The ability to gain an accurate and deep understanding of a situation just by thinking about it, instead of working out a solution through experimentation.
LGBTQ: An acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer. These are terms by which people may define their sexual orientation or gender identity.
link: A connection between two people or things.
mental health: A term for someone’s emotional, psychological and social well-being. It refers to how people behave on their own and how they interact with others. It includes how people make choices, handle stress and manage fear or anxiety. Poor mental health can be triggered by disease or merely reflect a short-term response to life’s challenges. It can occur in people of any age, from babies to the elderly.
navigate: To find one’s way through a landscape using visual cues, sensory information (like scents), magnetic information (like an internal compass) or other techniques.
network: A group of interconnected people or things. (v.) The act of connecting with other people who work in a given area or do similar thing (such as artists, business leaders or medical-support groups), often by going to gatherings where such people would be expected, and then chatting them up. (n. networking)
phishing: (v. phish) A play on the term “to fish” in which someone writes an email program, hoping to hook someone into replying and sharing private information. Someone does this by suggesting they are a friend, close acquaintance or trusted organization. They may fraudulently use another’s name, apparent email address or “story” that suggests they are trustworthy. In fact, they are seeking to extract information that can be used (such as a password, credit card number, social security number, or other information) to impersonate the person who is phished.
political: (n. politics) An adjective that refers to the activities of people charged with governing towns, states, nations or other groups of people. It can involve deliberations over whether to create or change laws, the setting of policies for governed communities, and attempts to resolve conflicts between people or groups that want to change rules or taxes or the interpretation of laws. The people who take on these tasks as a job (profession) are known as politicians.
primary: An adjective meaning major, first or most important.
psychology: (adj. psychological ) The study of the human mind, especially in relation to actions and behavior. To do this, some perform research using animals. Scientists and mental-health professionals who work in this field are known as psychologists.
risk: The chance or mathematical likelihood that some bad thing might happen. For instance, exposure to radiation poses a risk of cancer. Or the hazard — or peril — itself. (For instance: Among cancer risks that the people faced were radiation and drinking water tainted with arsenic.)
smartphone: A cell (or mobile) phone that can perform a host of functions, including search for information on the internet.
social media: Digital media that allow people to connect with each other (often anonymously) and to share information. Examples include Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and WhatsApp.
social scientist: Someone who does research investigating the values, practices, institutions and rules that guide the behaviors of a community of people or animals.
strategy: A thoughtful and clever plan for achieving some difficult or challenging goal.
survey: To view, examine, measure or evaluate something, often land or broad aspects of a landscape. (with people) To ask questions that glean data on the opinions, practices (such as dining or sleeping habits), knowledge or skills of a broad range of people. Researchers select the number and types of people questioned in hopes that the answers these individuals give will be representative of others who are their age, belong to the same ethnic group or live in the same region. (n.) The list of questions that will be offered to glean those data.
technology: The application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes, especially in industry — or the devices, processes and systems that result from those efforts.
tween: A child just approaching his or her teenage years. Tween is a term usually used for 11- to 12-year olds.
Twitter: An online social network that allows users to post messages containing no more than 280 characters. (Until November 2017, the limit had been just 140 characters.)