Every time we look at a face, we take in a flood of information effortlessly: age, gender, race, expression, the direction of our subject’s gaze, perhaps even their mood. Faces draw us in and help us navigate relationships and the world around us. How the brain does this is a mystery. Understanding how facial recognition …
Our brains are continuously bombarded with information from the senses, yet our level of vigilance to such input varies, allowing us to selectively focus on one conversation and not another. Professor Stephen Williams of the Queensland Brain Institute at UQ explains, “If we want to give our full concentration, something happens in the brain to …
Drs. Christine N. Smith and Larry R. Squire, both with the VA San Diego Healthcare System and the University of California, San Diego, found that declarative memory–recalling facts and events–depends on conscious knowledge of what has been learned. The finding helps explain how the hippocampus controls the process of memory. They also showed that conscious …
Cassidy McDermott, Armin Raznahan, and colleagues analyzed brain scans of the same individuals collected over time between five and 25 years of age. Comparing this data to parental education and occupation and each participants’ intelligence quotient (IQ) allowed the researchers to demonstrate positive associations between SES and the size and surface area of brain regions …
A homeless individual is one who lacks fixed and reliable housing, and approximately 553,000 people fit that description on any given night in the United States. A new retrospective cohort study led by investigators from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital examines patterns, causes and outcomes of acute hospitalizations between …
“We identified late-Gen X (38- to 45-year-olds) and early-Gen Y (27- to 37-year-olds) as age cohorts with elevated mortality patterns, particularly for non-Hispanic whites, said study co-author Emma Zang, a Ph.D. candidate at the Sanford School of Public Policy. “That is in addition to the rise among the already much-discussed Baby Boomer generation.” To study …
Monroe and his co-author, Ashby Plant, PhD, of Florida State University, focused on two specific moral values -what they called sanctity, or a strict adherence to purity rules and disgust over any acts that are considered morally contaminating, and care, which centers on disapproval of others who cause suffering without just cause – because they …
Private insurance claim lines for amphetamine use, abuse and dependence increased 3,157 percent from 2007 to 2017, according to a new behavioral health study by FAIR Health, a national, independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing transparency to healthcare costs and health insurance information. Amphetamines include medications frequently used to treat attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (e.g., Ritalin), narcolepsy …
In a study published today by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), McMaster University researchers reviewed 96 clinical trials with more than 26,000 participants and found opioids provide only small improvements in pain, physical functioning and sleep quality compared to a placebo. The opioids, however, also increase the risk of vomiting, drowsiness, constipation, …
An annual survey that tracks drug use by American teenagers found that smoking, binge drinking, and abuse of prescription drugs is way down. But teen vaping is up—and not just a little bit. Vaping is way up. The study, conducted by the University of Michigan, asked roughly 45,000 American teens about their use of substances …