Moms are binge drinking more, but they’re not the only ones: According to a study released Tuesday, binge drinking rates are on the rise for nearly all groups of Americans, whether they have children or not, NBC News reported. “There had been a lot of media attention on the ‘mommy drinking phenomenon,’” said the study’s lead author Sarah McKetta, a...

Scientists have discovered a mash-up of two feared disasters — hurricanes and earthquakes — and they’re calling them “stormquakes.” The shaking of the sea floor during hurricanes and nor’easters can rumble like a magnitude 3.5 earthquake and can last for days, according to a study in this week’s journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Deep within a rainforest in Belize, scientists using lasers beamed from an airplane to peer beneath the dense foliage have discovered evidence of a vast network of ancient Maya farms that date back thousands of years, NBC News reports. The findings, part of more than 20 years of research in this part of Central America, show how the ancient Maya...

Imagine trillions of pieces of plastic debris that, if strung together end to end, would line every inch of coastline in the world at least three times over. That’s how much garbage researchers found pollutes a remote area in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. The phenomenon is known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and researchers with The...

Approximately one-in-eight sexually active high school girls have experienced reproductive coercion, a form of relationship abuse that increases the risk for unintended pregnancy and can include contraception sabotage, condom manipulation and pressure for the partner to become pregnant when they don’t want to be, according to a recent study published in the journal “Obstetrics & Gynecology,” NBC News reported. “Reproductive...

The Kaiser Permanente study examined over 250,000 women living in California before the legalization of cannabis.

An increasing number of women are using cannabis before becoming pregnant, as well as early in the pregnancy, according to a new study published Friday in the journal JAMA Network Open. The findings, from Kaiser Permanente Northern California, are based on reports from 276,991 women living in California before recreational marijuana was legalized in that state. The women were asked...

Large birds and land mammals that live long lives, like rhinos and eagles, will die out over the next century while small, insect-eating animals that die young will predominate, according to new research. NBC News reported that rodents and songbirds will win out as the climate changes, forests disappear and cities grow; large birds and land mammals are known to...

Opioid prescriptions remain common for teens and young adults, a new study finds. NBC News reported that, from 2005 to 2015, nearly 15 percent of teens and young adults received an opioid prescription during an emergency room visit, according to the study, published Tuesday in the journal Pediatrics. That’s compared with 3 percent among those who were seen in an...

People who use e-cigarettes are often inhaling high levels of nicotine, but many teenagers who vape don’t realize it, according to a new study in the journal Pediatrics. NBC News reported that 40 percent of teens who thought their e-cigarettes were free of nicotine tested positive for it. “This is one of the first studies showing the amount of nicotine...

Robert DePalma and Dr. Anton Oleinik teach paleontology at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. In their spare time, they’re making earth-shattering discoveries in North Dakota about the day 66 million years ago when an asteroid shattered the Earth, slamming into what is now the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico.

We may not know exactly how or why Stonehenge was built, but new research affords a glimpse of the people who erected England’s iconic stone monument some 5,000 years ago, NBC News reported. The study, which examined the origins of farming in Britain, shows that the people living in the region at the time Stonehenge was built were descended from...

An enormous void six miles long and 1,000 feet deep has been discovered under an Antarctic glacier, raising the prospect that the ice sheet is melting faster than scientists realized, NBC News reported. The cavity under the Thwaites Glacier was discovered through analysis of data gathered by satellites and aircraft equipped with ice-penetrating radar. It was described in a Jan....

Child abuse increases the day after school report cards are released — but only when kids get their grades on a Friday, a study in Florida suggests. The curious finding startled researchers, who had figured abuse might go up regardless of the specific day kids got their grades. But their study of reports to a child abuse hotline that included...

How many American children have autism? The U.S. government answers that question at least three different ways and says the latest estimate — 1 in 40 kids — doesn’t necessarily mean the numbers are rising.

Trick-or-treaters beware: Halloween can be deadly for pedestrians and children face the greatest danger. Research published Tuesday found a 43 percent higher risk of pedestrian deaths on Halloween night than on other nights near that date. The study was based on four decades of U.S. traffic data, including 608 pedestrian deaths on 42 Halloweens.

A sea creature nicknamed the “headless chicken monster” was seen near Antarctica on a long-line fishing company’s underwater camera system. The bizarre-looking creature is actually a sea cucumber.

Before humans can colonize Mars, we’ll need to figure out a way to make it a bit more hospitable. But a new study suggests that “terraforming” Mars into an Earthlike planet simply isn’t possible with today’s technology, NBC News reported. The study, published July 30 in the journal Nature Astronomy, seems to throw cold water on those fictional terraforming schemes...

It’s often cheaper for some Medicare patients to buy prescription drugs through Walmart’s $4 generic program than through their own health insurance, according to a study out Monday. The study’s lead author told NBC News it’s more evidence that patients can’t always rely on health insurance for reasonable prices on their prescriptions. “Twenty percent of the time, at least, we...