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Air Dates: June 9-15, 2025

It’s not unusual for friends, family members, and even good bosses to tell us, “practice some self-care.” But Nicole Karlis says that there are physical and emotional benefits to practicing care for others, too.

Karlis is an award-winning journalist and author covering health and science. Currently, she’s a regular contributor at Salon where she’s covered women’s health, science and wellness culture since 2017. Before writing for Salon, she was a contributing editor at The Bold Italic, a culture magazine based in the California-Bay Area. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times. She is the author of the book “Your Brain of Altruism: The Power of Connection and Community During Times of Crisis.”  

On this episode of “Story in the Public Square,” Karlis dove into her research on the impact that altruism and volunteering can have on improving mental and physical health. Karlis emphasized the importance of community and said, “recent research has shown that empathy is on the rise, especially with younger people, but I think it doesn’t feel that way because a lot of these big important conversations that people want to be having are actually happening online.”  

“Story in the Public Square” broadcasts each week on public television stations across the United States. In Rhode Island and southeastern New England, the show is broadcast on Rhode Island PBS on Sundays at 11:00 a.m. and is rebroadcast Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. Check your local public television listings for air times near you! An audio version of the program airs Saturdays at 8:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. ET, Sundays at 2:30 a.m. and 9:30 p.m. and Mondays at 4:30 a.m. ET on SiriusXM’s popular P.O.T.U.S. (Politics of the United States), channel 124. “Story in the Public Square” is a project of the Pell Center at ������. The initiative aims to study, celebrate and tell stories that matter.