Not too long ago, 25 year-old Scott Deutsch had had enough. His beloved sister Marcy (diagnosed with schizo-affective disorder and autism) became the victim of severe cyber-bullying. It drove Marcy to the point at which she began to retreat farther inside herself, eventually even considering suicide. Rather than accepting online bullying for what it was, [...]

I recently read about a study that had some good news in it for me–researchers recently found that people, especially men, who actively watch or participate in sports and cultural activities are happier and healthier than those who stay at home. As an avid participant in athletics (softball, basketball, and golf), watcher of sports (season [...]

I was recently reading an article about the psychology of architecture on one of my favorite neuroscience blogs, The Frontal Cortex by Jonah Lehrer. I was particularly drawn to his mention of a study conducted in 2009 by Ravi Mehta and Rui Zhu that compared people’s performance on different types of tasks whether they were [...]

File this under strange but true: I recently saw a news story about a woman who had minor dental surgery and woke up from the operation speaking with a foreign accent. Post-surgery, Oregon native Karen Butler awoke to find she now spoke with a hodgepodge European accent. Doctors thought it might fade, but two years [...]

I’ve just gotten back from a very exciting scientific meeting in Greece (yes, the life of a brain scientist occasionally has its perks!) I had the opportunity to visit our collaborators in the Long-Lasting Memories consortium. This research group, with members in Greece, Spain, Austria, France, and Cyprus, is working to develop a combined brain [...]

The results of the 7th Annual Best Illusion of the Year are in! The winner: “Silencing awareness of change by background motion.” Though of the top 10 finalists, I personally like “Mask of Love.” If you’d like to see a collection of fun illusions that befuddle the brain, check out our Brain Teasers page. You [...]

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a chronic, debilitating disease that attacks the neurological system, affecting both body and brain function. A recent study of Canadian MS  patients revealed that fewer than half of them consistently use MS medications for 2+ years.  The drugs, known as DMDs (disease-modifying drugs) have been proven to slow the progress of [...]

While my time in the office is steeped in talk of brain science, when I head home after work I like to decompress by watching some of my favorite TV funnymen like Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. Imagine my surprise when The Colbert Report cut to snippets from a lecture about the “gut brain” that [...]

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle just released results of a recent study. The researchers were looking at “chemobrain,” a type of cognitive impairment that occurs following chemotherapy treatment. The study showed that tpost-chemo cognitive impairment may be longer lasting and more severe than generally believed. This finding is important because even today, some doctors [...]

I recently read an interesting article in the New York Times about tilapia–the now-ubiquitous fish that graces menus all over the nation. Ten years ago, most of us had probably never heard of tilapia, but this fish has proved a good fit for mass farming and its mild taste pleases many palates. The article’s main [...]