Psychology News

Pareidolia May Have Stimulated Paleolithic Humans to Make Cave Art

Upper Paleolithic drawing of the partial outline of a horse that uses the natural edge of the wall of La Pasiega Cave to represent the back and head of the horse. Image credit: Izzy Wisher / Gobierno de Cantabria.
Sep 25, 2023 by News Staff

Durham University archaeologist Izzy Wisher and colleagues investigated whether pareidolia — a psychological phenomenon where people see meaningful forms in random patterns, such as seeing faces in clouds — may have influenced the artists who painted depictions of animals in the Las Monedas and La Pasiega caves, in Northern Spain. If so, then the majority of drawings would be expected to be depictions of animals that included features...

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University of Bath Ph.D. student Alexz Farrall with a PAWS ‘breathing’ ball. Image credit: University of Bath.

Shape-Changing Biofeedback-Based Ball May Help Improve Mental Health

Aug 31, 2023 by News Staff

University of Bath Ph.D. student Alexz Farrall has invented a soft ball that ‘personifies’ breath, expanding and contracting as a person breathes in...

Goh et al. show that silences can substitute for sounds in three prominent auditory illusions caused by event representation. Image credit: Finmiki.

Silence is Truly Heard, New Research Suggests

Jul 11, 2023 by News Staff

Do we only hear sounds? Or can we also hear silence? These questions are the subject of a centuries-old philosophical debate between two camps: the perceptual...

Habitual coffee consumers justify their life choices by arguing that they become more alert and increase motor and cognitive performance and efficiency; however, these subjective impressions still do not have a neurobiological correlation. Using functional connectivity approaches to study resting-state fMRI data in a group of habitual coffee drinkers, Picó-Pérez et al. show that coffee consumption decreased connectivity of the posterior default mode network (DMN) and between the somatosensory/motor networks and the prefrontal cortex, while the connectivity in nodes of the higher visual and the right executive control network (RECN) is increased after drinking coffee; the data also show that caffeine intake only replicated the impact of coffee on the posterior DMN, thus disentangling the neurochemical effects of caffeine from the experience of having a coffee. Image credit: Sci.News.

Study: Boost from Morning Coffee Can’t Be Replicated with Plain Caffeine

Jun 29, 2023 by News Staff

Plain caffeine only partially reproduces the effects of drinking a cup of coffee, activating areas of the brain that make you feel more alert but not the...

Using an interventional study in healthy, normal-weight participants, Thanarajah et al. demonstrate that, independent of body weight gain and alterations in metabolic markers, exposure to high-fat/high-sugar food: (i) reduces preferences for low-fat food, (ii) plays a critical role in up-regulating brain responses to anticipation and consumption of highly palatable, energy-dense food, and (iii) has a generalized effect on the neuronal encoding of prediction errors in the context of associative learning and independent of food rewards. Taken together, repeated consumption of high-fat/high-sugar relative to isocaloric low-fat/low-sugar food, and in the absence of changes in body weight or metabolic state, can rewire brain circuits and thereby induce neurobehavioral adaptations. Hence, changing the food environment and reducing the availability of energy-dense high-fat/high-sugar food items is pivotal to combating the obesity pandemic. Image credit: Thanarajah et al., doi: 10.1016/j.cmet.2023.02.015.

Daily Consumption of Sweet and Fatty Snacks Alters Our Reward Circuits: Study

Mar 23, 2023 by News Staff

Western diets rich in fat and sugar promote excess calorie intake and weight gain; however, the underlying mechanisms are unclear. To close this gap, researchers...

Like humans, great apes voluntarily seek and engage in altered experiences of self-perception and situational awareness. Image credit: We-o.

Great Apes Spin Themselves to Deliberately Make Themselves Dizzy, Scientists Say

Mar 17, 2023 by News Staff

Among animals, humans stand out in their consummate propensity to self-induce altered states of mind. Archaeology, history and ethnography show these activities...

This artist’s impression shows the evolution of the Universe beginning with the Big Bang on the left followed by the appearance of the Cosmic Microwave Background. The formation of the first stars ends the cosmic dark ages, followed by the formation of galaxies. Image credit: M. Weiss / Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

Study: Our Momentary Perception of Time May Stretch or Shrink with Each Heartbeat

Mar 8, 2023 by News Staff

The role of the heart in the experience of time has been long theorized but empirical evidence is scarce. In new research, scientists from Cornell University...

Babies are able to learn abstract relations before the first year of life. Image credit: Kang Heungbo.

Study: Human Infants Outperform AI in Detecting What Motivates Other People’s Actions

Feb 22, 2023 by News Staff

Human infants are fascinated by other people. They bring to this fascination a constellation of rich and flexible expectations about the intentions motivating...

Varrette et al. run an exploratory study on whether intentionally introduced cognitive behavioral therapy, delivered through the medium of TTRPG groups, could positively affect social skills, reduce anxiety symptoms and behaviors, and enhance the mental well-being of participants. Image credit: Edwin Francisco.

Tabletop Role-Playing Games Reduce Anxiety, New Research Shows

Dec 5, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

In new research, a team of scientists from the Bodhana Group and the Harrisburg University of Science and Technology explored whether intentionally introduced...

Allen et al. developed a new predictive coding model of respiratory brain coupling, in which breathing rhythmically modulates both local and global neural gain. Image credit: Gerd Altmann / Clker Vector Images / Sci.News.

Breathing Impacts Our Emotions, Attention and Cognition, Scientists Say

Nov 9, 2022 by News Staff

A new review of more than a dozen previous studies with rodent, monkey, and human brain imaging demonstrates that the act of breathing exerts a substantive,...

Analyzing data from 168 studies, 496 effect sizes, and 355,173 participants, Hirnstein et al. suggest that a small but robust female advantage in verbal fluency and verbal-episodic memory exists; with respect to verbal fluency, the female advantage emerged only in phonemic fluency, whereas sex/gender differences in semantic fluency appeared strongly category-dependent. Image credit: Pexels.

Women are Better at Verbal Fluency and Verbal-Episodic Memory than Men, Study Suggests

Oct 17, 2022 by News Staff

Textbooks and popular science books claim with certainty that women are better at verbal fluency (sometimes also called word fluency) and verbal memory,...

McGreen et al. found the number of cravings a person experiences can indicate how many soft drinks they would eventually drink, with cravings triggered by a number of factors beyond thirst. Image credit: Ernesto Rodriguez.

Study: Stronger Cravings for Soft Drinks, Coffee Associated with Drinking More of Craved Beverage

Sep 14, 2022 by News Staff

Cravings for a range of substances including drugs, alcohol, and food have been shown to predict subsequent consumption or use. However, this link has...

Ohmura et al. provide a proof of concept that infant transport robustly reduces cry and potentially promotes sleep, and propose a behavioral protocol, ‘5-min carrying, 5- to 8-min sitting before bed’ for crying infants. For secure holding, caregivers should attach the infant body snugly to their own body and support the infant’s head. Five-minute walking should be on a flat and clear passage and at a steady pace, preferably without abrupt stops or turns. With these precautions, this protocol can be safely performed within the range of regular parental care. It should be noted that, unlike most behavioral interventions for infant sleep difficulties, this protocol does not address any long-term improvement of sleep regulation. This protocol instead provides an immediate calming of infant cry and may be useful especially on special occasions when the regular sleep routines, breastfeeding, or pacifiers are not effective or available. Image credit: Ohmura et al., doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2022.08.041.

Study: Five-Minute Walk Promotes Sleep for Crying Infants

Sep 13, 2022 by News Staff

Approximately 20-30% of infants cry excessively and exhibit sleep difficulties for no apparent reason, causing parental stress and even triggering impulsive...

Inadequate sleep represents a significant influential force determining whether humans choose to help one another, observable across micro- and macroscopic levels of civilized interaction. Image credit: Sasin Tipchai.

Inadequate Sleep Makes Us Less Generous, New Study Shows

Aug 25, 2022 by News Staff

New research by University of California, Berkeley scientists shows that a lack of sleep impairs our basic social conscience, making us withdraw our desire...

Ultrasound exposure improved depressive-like behavior in olfactory bulbectomized rats and reduced their plasma corticosterone levels. Image credit: Mary Theresa McLean.

Ultrasound Exposure Improves Depressive-Like Behavior in Rats, New Study Shows

Aug 16, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Scientists from the Tokyo University of Science and FUJIMIC, Inc. have investigated the effects of ultrasound exposure in olfactory bulbectomized rats...

Song et al. show that damaging effects of blue light at the organismal level are strongly age dependent and are associated with reduced activity of specific components of energy-producing pathways in mitochondria. Image credit: Pexels.

Damaging Effects of Blue Light Exposure Worsen with Age, New Research Suggests

Jul 28, 2022 by News Staff

Blue light is a predominant component of light emitting devices, which are increasingly present in our environment. There is already accumulating evidence...

Moncrieff et al. suggest that depression is not likely caused by a chemical imbalance, and call into question what antidepressants do. Image credit: Chenspec.

Serotonin Theory of Depression Debunked

Jul 21, 2022 by News Staff

In a systematic umbrella review of previous relevant studies, a team of scientists from the United Kingdom, Switzerland and Italy synthesized and evaluated...

Biswas et al. examined the effects of actual caffeine intake on spending. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Caffeine Consumption Leads to Impulsivity during Shopping, New Study Shows

Jun 17, 2022 by Natali Anderson

New research conducted at multiple retail stores across different countries and in the lab indicates that consuming a caffeinated (vs. non-caffeinated)...

Example of illusorily expanding central region or ‘hole;’ viewing the image full screen is best for eliciting the effect. Image credit: Laeng et al., doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2022.877249.

New Visual Illusion Trick Your Brain into Thinking Static Black Hole is Expanding

Jun 3, 2022 by News Staff

A new study published in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience shows that the ‘expanding hole’ optical illusion, which is new to science, is...

Young males with a poor diet saw a significant improvement in their symptoms of depression when they switched to a healthy Mediterranean diet. Image credit: Barbara Jackson.

Study: Mediterranean Diet Improves Depressive Symptoms in Young Men with Clinical Depression

May 9, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

New research highlights the important role of nutrition for the treatment of depression and should inform advice given by clinicians to young men. Young...

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