Brain And Consciousness Research - November 2008 Archives

Molecule shuts down food intake and turns on 'siesta mode' (11/29/2008)

Researchers have identified a molecule that tells your brain when it's time to push back from the Thanksgiving table. In studies with mice and rats, researchers found that a chemical messenger called NAPE is made in the small intestine after a greasy meal, then travels to the brain, where it quashes hunger signals. Rats treated with extra NAPE ate less and lost weight. ...> Full Article

Baffling chronic pain linked to rewiring of brain (11/28/2008)

Brain looks like inept cable guy changed the hookups ...> Full Article

Nitric oxide can alter brain function (11/28/2008)

Finding has implications for the treatment of neurodegenerative disease and dementia ...> Full Article

'Wiring' in the brain influences personality (11/26/2008)

Connections between the nerves is one factor determining whether a person welcomes a change or tends to avoid anything new ...> Full Article

Uncertainty can be more stressful than clear negative feedback (11/25/2008)

We are faced with uncertainty every day. Will our investments pay off? Will we get the promotions we are hoping for? When faced with the unknown, most people experience some degree of anxiety and discomfort. Exactly how much anxiety someone experiences during uncertain times depends on his or her personality profile. ...> Full Article

Scientists solve 200-year-old scientific debate involving visual illusions (11/24/2008)

Neuroscientists at Barrow Neurological Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center have discovered a direct link between eye motions and the perception of illusory motion that solves a 200-year-old debate. ...> Full Article

Brain reorganizes to adjust for loss of vision (11/24/2008)

A new study from Georgia Tech shows that when patients with macular degeneration focus on using another part of their retina to compensate for their loss of central vision, their brain seems to compensate by reorganizing its neural connections. Age-related macular degeneration is the leading cause of blindness in the elderly. The study appears in the December edition of the journal Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience. ...> Full Article

Scientists find facial scars increase attractiveness (11/23/2008)

Men with facial scars are more attractive to women seeking short-term relationships, scientists at the University of Liverpool have found. ...> Full Article

New tool trains athlete brains to react 53 percent faster (11/23/2008)

Universite de Montreal researchers develop cognitive workouts for sports champions ...> Full Article

Necessary lattes? People short on self-control categorize more items as necessities (11/22/2008)

Why do so many of us give up on those New Year's resolutions to lose weight orcurb luxury spending? A new study in the Journal of Consumer Research says ithas to do with the way our goals intersect with our natures. ...> Full Article

Evolution of the visual system is key to abstract art (11/21/2008)

Famous works of abstract art achieve popularity by using shapes that resonate with the neural mechanisms in the brain linked to visual information, a psychologist at the University of Liverpool has discovered. ...> Full Article

Sleep helps people learn complicated tasks (11/21/2008)

Sleep also helps people recover forgotten skills ...> Full Article

I'm sticking with my brand: Loyal customers perceive competitor ads differently (11/20/2008)

What does it take for marketers to reach customers who are already loyal to aparticular brand? A new study in the Journal of Consumer Research examinesbrand loyalty and the way it affects perceptions of advertising. ...> Full Article

Forgotten but not gone - how the brain takes care of things (11/19/2008)

Connections between nerve cells remain intact even when temporarily put out of service. ...> Full Article

Pain and itch responses regulated separately (11/19/2008)

Historically, scientists have regarded itching as a less intense version of the body's response to pain, but researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have determined that pain and itch actually are regulated by different molecular mechanisms. ...> Full Article

Unhappy people watch TV, happy people read/socialize, says study (11/17/2008)

Channeling unhappiness, in good and bad economic times ...> Full Article

'Super' aged brains reveal first secrets of sharp memory in old age (11/16/2008)

Northwestern University Researchers wondered if the brains of the elderly with still laser sharp memory were different than everyone else's. So, they took a novel approach and investigated what goes right in an aging brain that stays nimble. Scientists examined the brains of deceased people called "super aged" because they had high performance on memory tests when they were over 80. They found their brains had many fewer fiber-like tangles than the brains of elderly, non-demented individuals. ...> Full Article

Decisions, decisions: Feedback influences decision making (11/14/2008)

Numerous studies have shown that people will choose differently, depending on whether they are choosing based on experience or description. But, what is it that causes people to choose differently in the two situations? The results of a new study suggest that feedback plays a key role in decision making. The findings indicate that feedback after repeated choice may drive people towards rational decision making. ...> Full Article

Certain types of thinking are best suited to certain types of problem-solving (11/14/2008)

Geometry problems best solved using combination of verbal and spatial strategies ...> Full Article

Study sheds light on facial preferences (11/13/2008)

New study is the first to demonstrate differences in brain activity as women considered masculinized and feminized male faces and whether the person was a potential sexual partner. Researchers identified regions that responded more strongly to masculine faces and demonstrated that differences between masculinized and feminized faces appeared strongest when the women were closer to ovulating. ...> Full Article

New study finds obese women more impulsive than other females (11/12/2008)

Obese women display significantly weaker impulse control than normal weight women ...> Full Article

Simple brain mechanisms explain arbitrary human visual decisions (11/11/2008)

Scientists report that a simple decision-making task does not involve the frontal lobes, where many of the higher aspects of human cognition, including self-awareness, are thought to originate. Instead, the regions that decide are the same brain regions that receive stimuli relevant to the decision and control the body's response to it. ...> Full Article

Researchers produce 'neural fingerprint' of speech recognition (11/11/2008)

How the brain decodes human voice and speech processes ...> Full Article

Researchers unravel mystery of brain aneurysms (11/10/2008)

Researchers have taken the first critical steps in unraveling the mysteries of brain aneurysms, the often fatal rupturing of blood vessels that afflicts 500,000 people worldwide each year ...> Full Article

Surprisingly, female models have negative effect on men (11/8/2008)

Study finds unlike women, it is not the same-sex models that affect men ...> Full Article

Brain recognizes verbal 'oh dear' wave (11/6/2008)

How the brain prevents verbal errors ...> Full Article

Personality shapes perception of romance, but doesn't tell the whole story (11/4/2008)

Researchers have found that measuring the quality of romantic relationships is more complex than earlier studies suggest. ...> Full Article

Study shows difficult to read instructions decrease motivation (11/3/2008)

A new study shows that if directions for a task are presented in a difficult-to-read style, the task will be viewed as being difficult, taking a long time to complete and lead to decreased motivation for completing the task. ...> Full Article

Scientists identify machinery that helps make memories (11/2/2008)

Researchers have identified a missing-link molecule that helps to explain the process of plasticity in the brain during memory creation and that could lead to targeted therapies. ...> Full Article

The roots of the early vocabulary in infants' learning from speech (11/1/2008)

A new report describes an increasing emphasis among researchers in studying vocabulary development in infants. Recent findings have shown that infants are not only aware of the pieces that make up a word, but they are already aware of the entire word and by one year of age, children are able to recognize mispronunciations of words. In addition, there is a relationship between young children's performance in word recognition and their later language achievement. ...> Full Article

Gender biases in leadership selection during competitions within and between groups (11/1/2008)

New research has revealed that a gender bias occurs when selecting leaders during various group competition scenarios. Overall, the findings indicate that during times of intergroup conflict a male leader prototype is sought while during intragroup conflict a female leader prototype is sought. ...> Full Article