Deric Bownds

LATEST ARTICLES ( 2628 )

• Top-down Alpha Band Oscillations Optimize Visual Perception.

  Interesting work from Samaha et al.: Significance In contrast to canonical, stimulus-driven models of perception, recent proposals argue that perceptual... Read more

  Posted on 24 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Universal Features of Human Music.

  

  I have read through a fascinating paper by Savage et al. that makes a convincing case for statistical universals in the structure and function of human music.... Read more

  Posted on 23 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Screams and the Communication Soundscape

  A fascinating piece from Amal noting that human screams occupy a privileged niche in the communication soundscape. Highlights •We provide the first... Read more

  Posted on 22 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Ohmygawd - a Social App That Aims for Fleeting Authenticity?

  I prodded my troglodyte brain to actually read this article about yet another social networking app, Beme, and came away fascinated. Read more

  Posted on 21 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• How Experiencing Nature Influences Our Brains.

  

  Bratman et al., in their PNAS article with the title "Nature experience reduces rumination and subgenual prefrontal cortex activation," suggest an explanation... Read more

  Posted on 21 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Happy Or Anxious?

  I want to point to two interesting recent pieces: Luhrmann notes that the Western, and particularly American, definition of anxiety or depression is very... Read more

  Posted on 20 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Sense8 - Sympathetic Sci-Fi

  I started watching the NetFlix original Sci-Fi drama series "Sense8" two weeks ago, and was completely hooked, watching one episode every day until I had... Read more

  Posted on 20 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• How Did Kindness Come to Be Our Forbidden Pleasure?

  This post is a tertiary product: a review of a review of a book. In this case I want to note Maria Popova’s piece on the book by Adam Phillips and Barbara... Read more

  Posted on 19 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Four Books from Edge.org's Summer Reading List.

  I pass on links to four books that I'm very tempted to buy and read: Mindware: Tools for Smart Thinking - Richard E. Nisbett A Beautiful Question: Finding... Read more

  Posted on 17 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Participants in the Senior Olympics Have Fitness Age 25 Years Younger Than...

  I have previously mentioned the fitness age calculator developed by reserarchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim. Read more

  Posted on 17 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Cleaning up the Queue - Interesting Ideas.

  As I scan the table of contents for various journals, mining for material that might become a MindBlog post, I accumulate a long list of links that I think are... Read more

  Posted on 16 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Genetic Risk Factors for Bipolar Disorder and Schizophrenia Predict Creativity.

  As a follow up to my June 30 post on creativity and neurosis, I wanted to point to the following account by Power et al. (Numerous epidemiological studies have... Read more

  Posted on 15 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Evolving Ourselves

  I pass on a few clips from Xue’s review of “Evolving Ourselves: How Unnatural Selection and Nonrandom Mutation Are Changing Life on Earth” by J. Enriquez and... Read more

  Posted on 14 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Embodied Cognition of Your Love Life.

  MindBlog has done a number of posts on how physical changes in our bodies can influence social cognition (Holding a warm versus an iced cup of coffee makes you... Read more

  Posted on 13 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Kinda Neat! - a Soft Jumping Robot

  Using a multi-material 3D printer for manufacturing allowed Wyss Institute researchers (Bartlett et al.) to fabricate the jumping robot in one uninterrupted job... Read more

  Posted on 12 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Why Don't the Poor Rise Up?

  Thomas Edsall offers interesting comments on the seeming intractability of rising inequality in our society, and I pass on a few clips, continuing the MindBlog... Read more

  Posted on 10 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Political Ideology, Self Control, and Belief in Free Will.

  MindBlog has a thread of posts noting psychological studies on those who endorse traditional values and the status quo (conservatives) versus those who endorse... Read more

  Posted on 09 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Caffeine as an Antidote to Depression Caused by Stress.

  Kaster et al. do work that suggests adenosine A2A receptor (A2AR) antagonists might be therapeutic agents for relieving stress induced depression. Read more

  Posted on 08 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Groups Are Better Lie Detectors Than Individuals.

  From Klein and Epley: Significance Detecting lies is difficult. Accuracy rates in experiments are only slightly greater than chance, even among trained... Read more

  Posted on 07 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Science of 'Instide-Out"'

  Sure enough - after last Monday's post pointing to Anthony Lane's review of 'Inside-Out' and noting how accurately the movie's depiction of goings-on inside an... Read more

  Posted on 06 July 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE