Brain

WASHINGTON -- How can some people respond to a question without answering the question, yet satisfy their listeners? This skill of "artful dodging" and how to better detect it are explored in an article published by the American Psychological Association.

From drinking coffee to having sex to blowing your nose, you could temporarily raise your risk of rupturing a brain aneurysm — and suffering a stroke, according to a study published in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

Washington, D.C. – Most African-Americans report calling a friend instead of 911 when faced with the symptoms of a stroke, according to a new study that surveyed those hospitalized for a stroke.

The findings, published today online in the journal Stroke, indicate that most people, who didn't call for emergency help, believed their symptoms were not serious enough and/or did not require treatment.

Philadelphia, PA - 5 May 2011 - The use of animal models to study human disease is essential to help advance our understanding of disease and to develop new therapeutic treatments.

Social deficits are common in several psychiatric disorders, including autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia. Individuals with severe social dysfunction can experience significant difficulties with everyday functioning.

A subgroup of adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) also exhibit excessive emotional reactions to everyday occurrences, and this combination of ADHD and emotional reactivity appears to run in families. A study from a Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH)-based research team finds that siblings of individuals with both ADHD and deficient emotional self-regulation (DESR) had a significantly greater risk of having both conditions than did siblings of those with ADHD alone.

A new study from Cambridge University has for the first time found that female-to-male transsexual people have a higher than average number of autistic traits.

The Medical Research Council (MRC) funded study, published today in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, has important implications for the clinical management of biological girls with gender incongruence that persists into adulthood, and for the 'extreme male brain' theory of autism.

PASADENA, Calif.—When a group of gamblers gather around a roulette table, individual players are likely to have different reasons for betting on certain numbers. Some may play a "lucky" number that has given them positive results in the past—a strategy called reinforcement learning. Others may check out the recent history of winning colors or numbers to try and decipher a pattern. Betting on the belief that a certain outcome is "due" based on past events is called the gambler's fallacy.

If you want to improve HIV testing rates in remote rural areas, get the community involved, says UCLA's Thomas Coates, who has directed a new study examining HIV testing programs in communities in Africa and Southeast Asia.

Latinas who endure violence at the hands of a partner during or within a year of pregnancy are five times more likely to suffer postpartum depression than women who have not experienced such violence, according to a new study by researchers at the UCLA Center for Culture, Trauma and Mental Health Disparities.

Sadness, apathy, preoccupation. These traits come to mind when people think about depression, the world's most frequently diagnosed mental disorder. Yet, forthcoming research in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology provides evidence that depression has a positive side-effect.

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Four Northwestern University scholars authored or co-authored three essays in "Race, Inequality, and Culture." In the new issue of Daedalus, the Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 22 prominent social scientists examine race in America today, weighing in on topics ranging from the future of African American studies to intra-minority group relations in the 21st century.

COLUMBIA, Mo. – Top researchers throughout the country have developed mental health programs to address many of the most profound issues facing schools, including students' disruptive and aggressive behavior, anger outbursts, anxiety, and suicide. However, according to University of Missouri researchers, many schools lack the capacity to access and fully adopt these programs. This lack of capacity hurts schools, students and families.

Mapping the fat distribution of the healthy human brain is a key step in understanding neurological diseases, in general, and the neurodegeneration that accompanies Alzheimer's disease in particular. Antonio Veloso and colleagues, from the University of the Basque Country in Leioa, Spain, find a new technique to reveal the fat distribution of three different areas of the healthy human brain. Their work is published online in Springer's journal, Analytical & Bioanalytical Chemistry.

Montreal May 4, 2011 – A new blood test that will diagnose Alzheimer's disease may soon hit the market, thanks to an innovative study from the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC). Their findings have characterized a unique biochemical diagnosis, which identifies patients with this devastating disorder. This research, published in the month's issue of the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, has implications for the half-a-million Canadian sufferers and many millions more worldwide.

A study of older married couples that gives new meaning to the matrimonial adage "for better or worse" finds that spouses have a much greater impact on their partner's health than previously known.

The study, published in the current issue of the American Psychological Association's journal Health Psychology, finds strong associations between the physical and emotional health of older married couples – and provides important new information on the psychological toll of physical limitations in old age.