Empathy Plays a Role in Resolving Classic Ethical Dilemmas
CHESTNUT HILL, MA; May 22, 2013—Is it permissible to harm one to save many? Those who tend to say "yes" when faced with this classic dilemma are likely to be deficient in a specific kind of empathy, according to a report published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE.
Philosophers and psychologists have long argued about whether there is one "right" answer to such moral questions, be it utilitarian ethics, which advocates saving as many as possible, even if it requires personally harming an individual, or non-utilitarian principles, which mandate strict adherence to rules like "don't kill" that are rooted in the value of human life and dignity.
In their new report, co-authors Liane Young, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College, and Ezequiel Gleichgerrcht of the Institute of Cognitive Neurology and Favaloro University in Argentina, address two key questions related to moral decision-making: First, what specific aspect of emotional responding is relevant for these judgments? Second, is this aspect of emotional responding selectively reduced in utilitarian respondents or enhanced in non-utilitarians?
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Boys Will Be Boys—In the U.S. but Not in Asia
CORVALLIS, OR; May 22, 2013—A new study shows there is a gender gap when it comes to behavior and self-control in American young children—one that does not appear to exist in children in Asia.
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Overeating Learned in Infancy, Study Suggests
BYU; May 22, 2013—In the long run, encouraging a baby to finish the last ounce in their bottle might be doing more harm than good. Brigham Young University sociology professors Ben Gibbs and Renata Forste found that clinical obesity at 24 months of age strongly traces back to infant feeding. “If you are overweight at age two, it puts you on a trajectory where you are likely to be overweight into middle childhood and adolescence and as an adult,” said Forste. “That’s a big concern.”
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Parent and Teacher Support Protects Teens from Sleep Problems and Depression
DARIEN, IL; May 22, 2013—A new study suggests that disturbed sleep in adolescents is associated with more symptoms of depression and greater uncertainly about future success. However, perceived support and acceptance from parents and teachers appears to have a protective effect.
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Study Finds Genetic Prediction of Postpartum Depression
Baltimore, MD; May 21, 2013—The epigenetic modifications, which alter the way genes function without changing the underlying DNA sequence, can apparently be detected in the blood of pregnant women during any trimester, potentially providing a simple way to foretell depression in the weeks after giving birth, and an opportunity to intervene before symptoms become debilitating.
The findings of the small study involving 52 pregnant women are described online in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.
"Postpartum depression can be harmful to both mother and child," says study leader Zachary Kaminsky, Ph.D., an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "But we don't have a reliable way to screen for the condition before it causes harm, and a test like this could be that way."
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Compound in Mediterranean Diet Makes Cancer Cells "Mortal"
COLUMBUS, OH; May 20, 2013 —New research suggests that a compound abundant in the Mediterranean diet takes away cancer cells' "superpower" to escape death.
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For Combat Veterans with PTSD, Fear Circuitry in the Brain Never Rests
NEW YORK; May 18, 2013—Chronic trauma can inflict lasting damage to brain regions associated with fear and anxiety. Previous imaging studies of people with post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, have shown that these brain regions can over-or under-react in response to stressful tasks, such as recalling a traumatic event or reacting to a photo of a threatening face. Now, researchers at NYU School of Medicine have explored for the first time what happens in the brains of combat veterans with PTSD in the absence of external triggers.
Their results, published in Neuroscience Letters, and presented today at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatry Association in San Francisco, show that the effects of trauma persist in certain brain regions even when combat veterans are not engaged in cognitive or emotional tasks, and face no immediate external threats. The findings shed light on which areas of the brain provoke traumatic symptoms and represent a critical step toward better diagnostics and treatments for PTSD.
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New Research Suggests Possible Direction for Treatment of Autism
WASHINGTON; May 17, 2013 — In the first successful experiment with humans using a treatment known as sensory-motor or environmental enrichment, researchers documented marked improvement in young autistic boys when compared to boys treated with traditional behavioral therapies, according to research published by APA.
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Bach to the Blues: Our Emotions Match Music to Colors
Berkeley, CA; May 16, 2013—Whether we’re listening to Bach or the blues, our brains are wired to make music-color connections depending on how the melodies make us feel, according to new research from the University of California, Berkeley. For instance, Mozart’s jaunty Flute Concerto No. 1 in G major is most often associated with bright yellow and orange, whereas his dour Requiem in D minor is more likely to be linked to dark, bluish gray.
Moreover, people in both the United States and Mexico linked the same pieces of classical orchestral music with the same colors. This suggests that humans share a common emotional palette—when it comes to music and color—that appears to be intuitive and can cross cultural barriers, UC Berkeley researchers said.
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Repeat Brain Injury Raises Soldiers' Suicide Risk
Salt Lake City; May 15, 2013—People in the military who suffer more than one mild traumatic brain injury face a significantly higher risk of suicide, according to research by the National Center for Veterans Studies at the University of Utah.
A survey of 161 military personnel who were stationed in Iraq and evaluated for a possible traumatic brain injury—also known as TBI—showed that the risk for suicidal thoughts or behaviors increased not only in the short term, as measured during the past 12 months, but during the individual's lifetime.
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MU Expert Discusses Workplace Mindfulness Practices
COLUMBIA, MO; May 13, 2013—In this interview, University of Missouri health psychologist Lynn Rossy discusses challenges to introducing mindfulness in the workplace and suggests steps to help employees become more self-aware and understanding of others, improve their self-esteem and enthusiasm, and decrease symptoms related to depression, anxiety, chronic pain and immune system dysfunction.
Nearly three decades have passed since mindfulness practice first entered the mainstream as a way for individuals to reduce stress. Researchers and clinicians at the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Healthcare, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School have helped bring the stress-reduction technique to healthcare, research, academic and corporate settings. Rossy has trained extensively at the center and, last month, delivered one of the keynote presentations at the center’s 11th Annual International Scientific Conference, “Investigating and Integrating Mindfulness in Healthcare, Medicine, and Society.”
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To Suppress or To Explore?
Emotional Strategy May Influence Anxiety
Urbana-Champaign; May 13, 2013—When trouble approaches, what do you do? Run for the hills? Hide? Pretend it isn't there? Or do you focus on the promise of rain in those looming dark clouds?
New research suggests that the way you regulate your emotions, in bad times and in good, can influence whether—or how much—you suffer from anxiety.
The study, which appears in the journal Emotion, revealed that those who engage in an emotional regulation strategy called reappraisal tended to also have less social anxiety and less anxiety in general than those who avoid expressing their feelings. Reappraisal involves looking at a problem in a new way, said University of Illinois graduate student Nicole Llewellyn, who led the research with psychology professor Florin Dolcos, an affiliate of the Beckman Institute at Illinois.
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Nobody Likes a 'Fat-Talker,' Notre Dame Study Shows
Notre Dame, IN; May 9, 2013—Women who engage in "fat talk"—the self-disparaging remarks girls and women make in relation to eating, exercise or their bodies—are less liked by their peers, a new study from the University of Notre Dame finds.
Led by Alexandra Corning, research associate professor of psychology and director of Notre Dame's Body Image and Eating Disorder Lab, the study was presented recently at the Midwestern Psychological Association annual conference.
"Though it has become a regular part of everyday conversation, 'fat talk' is far from innocuous," according to Corning.
"It is strongly associated with, and can even cause, body dissatisfaction, which is a known risk factor for the development of eating disorders."
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Look! Something Shiny!
How Some Textbook Visuals can Hurt Learning
COLUMBUS, Ohio; May 8, 2013—Adding captivating visuals to a textbook lesson to attract children’s interest may sometimes make it harder for them to learn, a new study suggests.
Researchers found that 6- to 8-year-old children best learned how to read simple bar graphs when the graphs were plain and a single color. Children who were taught using graphs with images (like shoes or flowers) on the bars didn’t learn the lesson as well and sometimes tried counting the images rather than relying on the height of the bars.
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Early Math and Reading Ability Linked to Job and Income in Adulthood
APS; May 8, 2013—Math and reading ability at age 7 may be linked with socioeconomic status several decades later, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The childhood abilities predict socioeconomic status in adulthood over and above associations with intelligence, education, and socioeconomic status in childhood.
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