Deric Bownds

LATEST ARTICLES ( 2628 )

• Why Do We Experience Awe?

  Awe, like reverence, is a pro-social emotion that subordinates individual self interest to a larger whole. Dacher Keltner and Paul Piff, in their NYTimes piece... Read more

  Posted on 08 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Lack of Exercise Disrupts Body’s Rhythms.

  Natural daily rhythms in spontaneous movement patterns in both humans and mice show scale invariance, i.e., movement patterns repeat over time scales of... Read more

  Posted on 05 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• It’s Not a Stream of Consciousness, Its a Rhythm.

  In the NYTimes Gray Matter series Gregory Hickok gives an exegesis on the implications of his Psychological Science paper "The Rhythm of Perception. Read more

  Posted on 04 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Humans Need Not Apply.

  Check out this chilling video on the increasing obsolescence of humans, which was referenced in a recent meeting of the Chaos and Complexity Seminar group I... Read more

  Posted on 03 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• How We Fashion Meaning and Purpose.

  This is a brief post about some material I thought I might get to cohere, maybe something along the lines of purpose as an evolved means of generating order,... Read more

  Posted on 02 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Sleep Stabilizes, but Does Not Enhance, Motor Performance Training.

  From Nettersheim et al., a result challenging the prominent model that sleep enhances the performance of a newly learned skill (which is my experience in... Read more

  Posted on 01 June 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Cultural Differences, Emotional Expressivity, and Smiles

  Rychlowska et al. analyze cultural display rules from 32 countries to reveal that the extent to which a country’s present-day population descends from numerous... Read more

  Posted on 29 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• How Biased Are Our Brains?

  Kristof reviews some recent work on unconscious bias, particularly racial bias. Scholars suggest that in evolutionary times we became hard-wired to make... Read more

  Posted on 28 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• After Phrenology: Neural Reuse and the Interactive Brain

  I've been reading through an interesting article by Michael Anderson, a précis of a book accepted for publication and available as a PDF through BBS. Read more

  Posted on 27 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Neural Basis of Anxiety Reduction by Placebo.

  Meyer et al. directly measure neural consequences of expecting a placebo treatment to be effective in relieving anxiety: The beneficial effects of placebo... Read more

  Posted on 26 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• How Alarm Amplifies Through Social Networks.

  We've all probably played the parlor game with 10 or more people sitting in a circle, with one whispering a word into the ear of the person to their right,... Read more

  Posted on 25 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Modulating Movement Intention and the Extended Present with tDCS.

  Douglas et al. do a fascinating bit of work on the 'extended present' in which our brains function, during which our experienced intention to make a movement... Read more

  Posted on 22 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Brain Correlates of Loving Kindness Meditation.

  Garrison and collaborators extend their work on brain correlates of meditation practice, noting again a central role for the posterior cingulate cortex/precuneu... Read more

  Posted on 21 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Essentialism

  I pass on some clips from Richard Dawkins' brief essay, and suggest you also take a look at Lisa Barrett's comments on essentialist views of the mind:... Read more

  Posted on 20 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• What to Do with Brain Markers That Predict Future Behaviors?

  

  An interesting review from Gabrieli et al. suggesting how predicting individual futures with neuromarkers might make a pragmatic contribution to human welfare. Read more

  Posted on 19 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• More Comment on Anti-aging Regimes

  A recent brief review by Jane Brodie points to work showing a small effect of cognitive training programs engaging memory, reasoning, or speed of processing. Read more

  Posted on 18 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Grasp Posture of Our Hands Biases Our Visual Processing.

  Fascinating observations from Laura Thomas: Observers experience biases in visual processing for objects within easy reach of their hands; these biases may... Read more

  Posted on 15 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Literary (like Musical and Athletic) Expertise Shifts Brain Activity to the...

  Erhard et al. find that creative writing by expert versus amateur writers is associated with more activation in the caudate nucleus, the same area that become... Read more

  Posted on 14 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Human Purpose

  The recent NYTimes David Brooks Op-Ed piece “What is your purpose?” has drawn a lot of feedback and comment. He laments the passing the era of lofty authority... Read more

  Posted on 13 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Trust and the Insula

  From Belfi et al: Reciprocal trust is a crucial component of cooperative, mutually beneficial social relationships. Previous research using tasks that require... Read more

  Posted on 12 May 2015 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE