Increased testosterone, but not age, is related to increased sensitivity to immediate rewards, whereas increased age, but not testosterone, is related to a reduction in general impatience. This is the finding of a recent study conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development investigating the influence of testosterone on adolescents’ decisions. It is obviously…
Category: Psychology
Filled-in Blindspots Perceived As More Real Than Authentic Perception
To make sense of the world around us, we must combine information from multiple sources while taking into account how reliable they are. When crossing the street, for example, we usually rely more on input from our eyes than our ears. However, we can reassess the reliability of the information: on a foggy day with…
Why Sadness And Bad Moods Are Good For You
Homo sapiens is a very moody species. Even though sadness and bad moods have always been part of the human experience, we now live in an age that ignores or devalues these feelings. In our culture, normal human emotions like temporary sadness are often treated as disorders. Manipulative advertising, marketing and self-help industries claim happiness…
Slim Faced People 25% More Likely To Be Left Handed
Individuals who have slender lower faces are 25 percent more likely to be left-handed, according to a study published this week by a dentistry researcher from the University of Washington. The surprising finding came from three surveys comprising 13,536 people in the United States. People having slender jaws commonly have a lower jaw that bites…
Testosterone Reduces Cognitive Reflection In Men
Men given doses of testosterone performed worse on a test designed to measure cognitive reflection compared to a group given a placebo, a new study reports. The stereotype of the hotheaded, impulsive man who shoots first and asks questions later abounds in Westerns and 1970s cop films, and these findings show there might be a…
Brainstem Alertness Systems Modulate Decision Biases
When asked to make repeated decisions we will often choose differently each time even when we are given the same information to inform our choice. A stock trader, for example, will typically be more inclined to buy on some days and sell on others even if the financial markets remain unchanged. Fluctuations in the brain’s…
5HT3 Receptor Agonist May Help Patients Unresponsive To SSRIs
An activator of the serotonin type 3 receptor (5HT3R) produces antidepressant effects in mice and increases nerve cell growth in the part of the brain responsible for memory and spatial navigation, researchers at Osaka University have found. They also showed that it functions using a different mechanism than the commonly used serotonin reuptake inhibitor fluoxetine…
Poor Sleep in Depression, Anxiety May Hinder Positive Reappraisal
In people with poor sleep who suffer from depression or anxiety, an area of the brain called the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, may have to work harder to modify negative emotional responses, researchers have found. The research team, led by Heide Klumpp, assistant professor of psychiatry at University of Illinois, used functional MRI to measure…
Languages Develop Concurrently But Independently In Bilingual Children
When children learn two languages from birth, each language proceeds on its own independent course at a rate that reflects the quality of the children’s exposure to each language. This is the finding of a new study of Spanish-English bilingual children by researchers at Florida Atlantic University. Additionally, the study finds that Spanish skills become…