1+ week, 13+ hour ago  (1040+ words) Summary: When you see a facial expression that could be either surprised or shocked, does your brain instinctively label it as "good" or "bad"? This split-second reaction is known as valence bias. A new review suggests that how we interpret…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago  (609+ words) Summary: In the animal kingdom, winning a fight is good, but getting injured is bad. To balance this, most animals use "threat displays" (posturing and intimidation) before resorting to physical violence. However, new research has identified the specific neural circuit…...

3+ day, 12+ hour ago  (931+ words) Summary: For decades, "mental wellbeing" has been a fuzzy, catch-all term that meant different things to different people. A landmark study has finally provided the world's first international consensus. By surveying 122 global experts across 11 disciplines'from economics to theology'researchers identified 19 dimensions…...

6+ day, 12+ hour ago  (1031+ words) Summary: For children with ADHD, a simple run on the treadmill might not be enough. A multicenter randomized clinical trial (RCT) reveals that integrated cognitive-motor exercise'movement that requires thinking and rule-following'is significantly more effective than standard aerobic exercise. While both…...

1+ week, 6+ day ago  (1075+ words) Summary: Why does a stressful day at work make a drink feel like a necessity rather than a choice? Researchers have mapped a previously unknown "direct line" in the brain that connects our stress centers to our habit-forming machinery. The…...

2+ week, 13+ hour ago  (576+ words) Summary: We've long known that alcohol changes how the brain functions, but new research has uncovered a startlingly direct mechanism: alcohol doesn't just influence brain chemistry'its breakdown products (metabolites) directly regulate gene expression. The study shows that these epigenetic "rewrites…...

2+ week, 16+ hour ago  (971+ words) Summary: Ketamine has been a miracle for the 30% of patients with treatment-resistant depression (TRD), lifting suicidal thoughts and heavy moods in hours rather than weeks. However, its "Achilles" heel" is its fleeting nature'the effects usually vanish within days. A research…...

3+ week, 3+ day ago  (1006+ words) Summary: A massive study of over 2. 2 million individuals has fundamentally redefined how we understand the genetics of addiction. The research reveals that most genetic risk for substance use disorders (SUD) isn't about how the body reacts to a specific drug,…...

3+ week, 5+ day ago  (1513+ words) Summary: One of the most debilitating aspects of schizophrenia is the loss of "cognitive flexibility'the ability to update beliefs when presented with new information. Neuroscientists have identified that a mutation in the grin2a gene disrupts a specific brain circuit responsible for…...

3+ week, 5+ day ago  (884+ words) The study found that when the "expectation effect" is leveled'meaning patients in both groups knew exactly what drug they were taking'psychedelic-assisted therapy was no more effective than traditional antidepressants. Psychedelic-assisted therapy may be no more effective than traditional antidepressants when…...