Brain Mysteries
It is increasingly recognized that chronic psychotropic drug treatment may lead to structural remodeling of the brain. Indeed, clinical studies in humans present an intriguing picture: Antipsychotics, used for the treatment of schizophrenia and psychosis, may contribute to cortical gray matter loss in patients, whereas lithium, used for the treatment of bipolar disorder and mania, may preserve gray matter in patients.
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When you "lose yourself" inside the world of a fictional character while reading a story, you may actually end up changing your own behavior and thoughts to match that of the character, a new study suggests.
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 | A new paper by Kyle Murray, a marketing researcher with the Alberta School of Business, puts a spin on the expression "you can't please everyone." ...> Full Article |
 | Under some conditions, the brains of embryonic chicks appear to be awake well before those chicks are ready to hatch out of their eggs. That's according to an imaging study published online on May 3 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, in which researchers woke chick embryos inside their eggs by playing loud, meaningful sounds to them. Playing meaningless sounds to the embryos wasn't enough to rouse their brains. ...> Full Article |
Brain networks may avoid traffic jams at their busiest intersections by communicating on different frequencies, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, the University Medical Center at Hamburg-Eppendorf and the University of Tübingen have learned.
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 | New functional and imaging-based diagnostic tests that measure communication and signaling between different brain regions may provide valuable information about the potential for consciousness in patients unable to communicate. ...> Full Article |
A study carried out by researchers from Spain, the Netherlands and Argentina suggests that in a work environment, sexual competition affects women more than men. However, a rival's social skills provoke jealousy and professional envy equally in both sexes.
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 | Awake mental replay of past experiences is essential for making informed choices, suggests a study in rats. Without it, the animals' memory-based decision-making faltered. Scientists blocked learning from, and acting on, past experience by selectively suppressing replay -- encoded as split-second bursts of neuronal activity in the memory hubs of rats performing a maze task. Similar patterns of brain activity have been detected in humans during similar situations.
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The results of this study have been published in the prestigious journal Consciousness and Cognition. The authors remark the significant "placebo effect" that healers have on ill people.
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It's well-known that using a cell phone while driving can lead to motor vehicle crashes. New research -- to be presented Sunday, April 29, at the Pediatric Academic Societies annual meeting in Boston -- shows that even anticipating calls or messages may distract drivers, increasing the risk of a crash.
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While eating too much food can cause obesity, the fear of not having enough food may lead to the same result, according to a study to be presented Saturday, April 28, at the Pediatric Academic Societies annual meeting in Boston.
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 | In the largest imaging study of the human brain ever conducted -- involving 1,896 14-year-olds -- scientists have discovered networks that go a long way toward explaining why some teenagers start experimenting with drugs and alcohol. A team at the University of Vermont, with international colleagues, reports that differences in these brain networks make some adolescents more impulsive. These networks appear to exist prior to drug experimentation. Other separate brain networks were discovered that connect to ADHD. ...> Full Article |
When eating is motivated by pleasure, rather than hunger, endogenous rewarding chemical signals are activated which can lead to overeating, according to a recent study accepted for publication in the Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism. The phenomenon ultimately affects body mass and may be a factor in the continuing rise of obesity.
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The way we use our hands may determine how emotions are organized in our brains, according to a recent study published in PLoS ONE by psychologists Geoffrey Brookshire and Daniel Casasanto of the New School for Social Research in New York.
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People who have already sifted through online information to make sense of a subject can help strangers facing similar tasks without ever directly communicating with them, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Microsoft Research have demonstrated.
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