Brain

Wide-eyed expressions that typically signal fear may enlarge our visual field and mutually enhance others' ability to locate threats, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

The research, conducted by psychology graduate student Daniel Lee of the University of Toronto with advisor Adam Anderson, suggests that wide-eyed expressions of fear are functional in ways that directly benefit both the person who makes the expression and the person who observes it.

(San Diego, May 1, 2013) — Are today's youth really more materialistic and less motivated than past generations, or do adults tend to perceive moral weakness in the next generation?

San Diego State University psychology professor Jean M. Twenge — along with co-author Tim Kasser, professor of psychology at Knox College — has set out to answer that question.

In a study published today by Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Twenge and Kasser show that there is in fact a growing gap for today's young adults between materialism and the desire to work hard.

May 1, 2013 — (BRONX, NY) — While the search continues for the Fountain of Youth, researchers may have found the body's "fountain of aging": the brain region known as the hypothalamus. For the first time, scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University report that the hypothalamus of mice controls aging throughout the body. Their discovery of a specific age-related signaling pathway opens up new strategies for combating diseases of old age and extending lifespan.

New Rochelle, NY, May 1, 2013—More than 800 million people worldwide use the social networking site Facebook, and 93% of college students have an active Facebook account, according to a recent estimate. As both students and faculty on college campuses increasingly use Facebook as a means of communication, the sharing of personal information, likes and dislikes, or religious and political beliefs, for example, may affect what students think of professors and expect from their classes.

Long after a hangover, a night of bad decisions might take a bigger toll on the body than previously understood. Described in the current issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, a study at the University of Missouri has revealed a unique connection between binge drinking and the risk for developing alcoholic liver disease and a variety of other health problems.

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Female rats are much more likely to binge eat than male rats, according to new research that provides some of the strongest evidence yet that biology plays a role in eating disorders.

Australian scientists are much closer to developing a screening test for the early detection of Alzheimer's disease.

They identified blood-based biological markers that are associated with the build up of a toxic protein in the brain which occurs years before symptoms appear and irreversible brain damage has occurred.

CHICAGO --- A small group of elusive neurons in the brain's cortex play a big role in ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), a swift and fatal neurodegenerative disease that paralyzes its victims. But the neurons have always been difficult to study because there are so few of them and they look so similar to other neurons in the cortex.

In a new preclinical study, a Northwestern Medicine® scientist has isolated the motor neurons in the brain that die in ALS and, for the first time, dressed them in a green fluorescent jacket. Now they're impossible to miss and easy to study.

BOSTON—A type of low-grade but sometimes lethal brain tumor in children has been found in many cases to contain an unusual mutation that may help to classify, diagnose and guide the treatment of the tumors, report scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Chevy Chase, MD––Children who did not receive enough iodine in the womb performed worse on literacy tests as 9-year-olds than their peers, according to a recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

Iodine is absorbed from food and plays a key role in brain development. Even mild deficiency during pregnancy can harm the baby's neurological development.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego Department of Pediatrics and Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego, a research affiliate of UC San Diego School of Medicine, have found a link between multivitamin use and alcohol consumption before pregnancy, uncovering a need for education about the importance of vitamin supplementation, particularly among women who drink alcohol during their childbearing years. The study was published online this month in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.

More and more cruise ships visit the fjords of Western Norway. But cruise tourists only spend a fraction of what other tourists spend.

Over the past few years, the overall number of tourists to Western Norway has declined slightly. But one group of tourists is steadily rising: the cruise ship passenger. However, the cruise ship industry matters little to the tourism industry onshore.

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Most infants respond to a game of peek-a-boo with smiles at the very least, and, for those who find the activity particularly entertaining, gales of laughter. For infants with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), however, the game can be distressing rather than pleasant, and they'll do their best to tune out all aspects of it –– and that includes the people playing with them.

That disengagement is a hallmark of ASD, and one of the characteristics that amplifies the disorder as infants develop into children and then adults.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Scholars have long known that voters tend to believe that the candidates they support will win, even when victory seems unlikely. But there has been little research about how voter expectations of election outcomes change in the weeks before Election Day, or how those expectations relate to the level of disappointment experienced when a favored candidate or ballot measure loses.

More than a third of stroke patients don't get to the hospital by ambulance, even though that's the fastest way to get there, according to new research in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, an American Heart Association journal.