Deric Bownds

LATEST ARTICLES ( 2661 )

• Decoding Spontaneous Emotional States in Our Brains.

  

  Kragel et al. find distinctive patterns of brain activity that correspond to spontaneously experienced emotions in the absence of external emotional stimuli. Read more

  Posted on 04 October 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Science in the Age of Selfies

  

  Some clips from an interesting opinion piece by Geman and Geman in the Proceedings of the National Academy: These days, scientists spend much of their time... Read more

  Posted on 03 October 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• More Great News: Our Brains Are Polluted with Environmental Magnetite.

  From Maher et al.: Summary We identify the abundant presence in the human brain of magnetite nanoparticles that match precisely the high-temperature magnetite... Read more

  Posted on 30 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Recollecting Details Improves Future Performance

  Interesting work from Madore et al. on neural processes though which improving the quality of recalling details of the past enhances thinking about the future:... Read more

  Posted on 29 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Insight into Intergroup Conflict - Defense Trumps Aggression

  A fascinating piece from De Dreu et al. who devise a simple contest game whose results suggest that in inter-groups conflicts in-group defense is more... Read more

  Posted on 28 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Election Stress Disorder

  If not already, and certainly after last night's presidential election debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, I suspect you have joined me in sufferin... Read more

  Posted on 27 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• A Hedonism Hub in the Human Brain.

  A open source article from Zacharopoulos et al., who have found that people who rate hedonism as more important in their life have a larger globus pallidus... Read more

  Posted on 26 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Dreams and Revelations.

  I want to pass on a few clips from an engaging essay by Patrick McNamara, and suggest you read the entire piece. He begins by noting religious movements that... Read more

  Posted on 23 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Treating Trans-generational Stress with Probiotics...

  There is considerable evidence that the effects of stress can be transmitted across multiple generations in rats and also humans. Read more

  Posted on 22 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Biofeedback to Chill out Your Amygdala’s Hyper-reactivity?

  Tyler McDonald in NewAtlas points to this interesting collaboration of a group of Tel-Aviv university neuroscientists that suggests the possibility that a new... Read more

  Posted on 21 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Defining Brain Areas Involved in Music Perception.

  From Sihvonen et al: Although acquired amusia is a relatively common disorder after stroke, its precise neuroanatomical basis is still unknown. Read more

  Posted on 19 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Predicting False Memories with fMRI

  Chadwick et al. find that the the apex of the ventral processing stream in the brain's temporal pole (TP) contains partially overlapping neural representations... Read more

  Posted on 16 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Self-regulation Via Neural Simulation

  A fascinating study from Gilead et al.: Significance As Harper Lee tells us in To Kill a Mockingbird, “You never really understand a person until you consider... Read more

  Posted on 15 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• A Psychological Mechanism to Explain Why Childhood Adversity Diminishes Adult...

  A large number of studies have by now shown that harsh social and physical environments early in life are associated with a substantial increase in the risk of... Read more

  Posted on 14 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Ecstasy of Speed - Or Leisure?

  Because I so frequently feel overwhelmed by input streams of chunks of information, I wonder how readers of this blog manage to find time to attend to its... Read more

  Posted on 13 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Mind and Body - A Neural Substrate of Psychosomatic Illness

  We all have our "hot buttons" - events or issues that can trigger an acute stress response as our adrenal medulla releases adrenaline, causing heart rate... Read more

  Posted on 12 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Want to Predict a Group’s Social Standing? Get a Hormonal Profile.

  Usually the analysis of a group's social standing is attempted by determining demographic or psychological characteristics of group members. Akinola et al. Read more

  Posted on 09 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Reason is Not Required for a Life of Meaning.

  Robert Burton, former neurology chief at UCSF and a neuroscience author, has contributed an excellent short essay to the NYTimes philosophy series The Stone. Read more

  Posted on 08 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Brain Network Characteristics of Highly Intelligent People.

  Schultz and Cole show that higher intelligence is associated with less task-related brain network reconfiguration: SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The brain's network... Read more

  Posted on 07 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Feeling Good? Do Something Unpleasant.

  A curious piece from Taquet et al.: Most theories of motivation have highlighted that human behavior is guided by the hedonic principle, according to which our... Read more

  Posted on 06 September 2016 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE