Deric Bownds

LATEST ARTICLES ( 2661 )

• Origins of Narcissism in Children

  An interesting study from Brummelman et al. showing that narcissism in children is predicted by parental overvaluation, not by lack of parental warmth,... Read more

  Posted on 02 April 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Cognitive Abilities Across the Lifespan.

  

  Hartshorne and Germine do a massive analysis of changes in cognitive abilities across the life span, showing that digit symbol coding, digit span, vocabulary,... Read more

  Posted on 01 April 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Singularity—an Urban Legend?

  Clips from an interesting essay by Daniel Dennett: The Singularity—the fateful moment when AI surpasses its creators in intelligence and takes over the... Read more

  Posted on 31 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Quiet

  From my long queue of potential MindBlog post items, I pull up Judith Warner’s 2012 review of Susan Cain’s Book “Quiet”, which argues for the power of... Read more

  Posted on 30 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Altering the Oxytocin Receptor Gene Enhances Perception of Anger and Fear.

  

  Puglia et al. find that the epigenetic modification of methylating the DNA of the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) decreases the control of amygdala fear... Read more

  Posted on 27 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Information Overload is Filter Failure.

  I pass on the following brief lucid piece by Jay Rosen.You might also have a look at Peder Zane's "In the Age of Information, Specializing to Survive. Read more

  Posted on 26 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Expert Listening to Music Alters Gene transcription...So?

  I can't resist comment on a piece generated by PsyBlog, "Classical Music's Surprising Effect on Genes Vital to Memory and Learning." ... Read more

  Posted on 25 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Thought for the Day: America Devolving into a Plutocracy...

  A clip from Tom Engelhardt writing in Salon: ...let me be as clear as I can be about something that seems murky indeed: this period doesn’t represent a... Read more

  Posted on 24 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Increases Propensity to Mind-wander

  Alelrod et al. show that stimulation of the frontal lobe areas involved in our attentional network increase mind wandering associated with our default mode... Read more

  Posted on 24 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Impulse Control with Weak Currents Applied to the Head - a New Therapy?

  

  Spieser et al. apply a very small current (1 milliamp) using the electrodes shown in the figure to slightly hyperpolarize, or make less excitable, the... Read more

  Posted on 23 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Losing the Music - Aging Affects the Perception of Musical Harmony

  An open access article from Bones and Plack: When two musical notes with simple frequency ratios are played simultaneously, the resulting musical chord is... Read more

  Posted on 20 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Thomas Metzinger on (the Absence Of) Our Conscious Agency.

  The edge.org question for 2014 was “What scientific idea is ready for retirement?” I want to pass on a few clips from Metzinger’s lucid brief contribution, and... Read more

  Posted on 19 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Hunger Promotes Acquisition of Nonfood Objects

  Here is a fascinating nugget of information from Xu et al.: Hunger motivates people to consume food, for which finding and acquiring food is a prerequisite. Read more

  Posted on 18 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• What Can Music Ensembles Tell Us About Social Cognition and Interaction?

  D'Ausilio et al. note that most studies of how cognition and brain organization is shaped by social factors have used subjects in defined experimental... Read more

  Posted on 17 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Happiness Gap Between Conservatives and Liberals Debunked

  Given the number of MindBlog posts that have passed on research supporting the standard orthodoxy that conservatives are happier than liberals, I immediately... Read more

  Posted on 16 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Emotional Foundations of Cognitive Control.

  Cognitive control (self control, self regulation) allows us to restrain from temptations of the present to focus on more long term goals. Emotion is usually cas... Read more

  Posted on 13 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Observing Brain Correlates of Self Affirmation and Its Healthy Consequences

  

  From the introduction of Falk et. al. : ...according to the World Health Organization, “60% to 85% of people in the world—from both developed and developing... Read more

  Posted on 12 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Spontaneous Emergence of Shared Social Conventions.

  Centola and Baronchelli have recruited subjects from the world wide web to play a live game. They demonstate that myopic players interacting in sequential... Read more

  Posted on 11 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Predictions and the Brain: How Musical Sounds Become Rewarding

  I want to point to the review article in Trends in Cognitive Science by Salimpoor, Zatorre, and collaborators that outlines brain mechanisms underlying the... Read more

  Posted on 10 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Hugging Can Make You Less Likely to Catch a Virus Cold.

  Daily social stress is known to correlate with susceptibility to cold virus infection. Cohen et al. ask whether social support and the actual receipt of physica... Read more

  Posted on 09 March 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE