Column |
Featured
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Correspondence |
Anthropology: it can be interdisciplinary
- Eric Alden Smith
- , Michael Gurven
- & Monique Borgerhoff Mulder
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News & Views |
Zooming in on a gene
Genome-wide association studies are often criticized for providing little insight of immediate physiological relevance. The finding of one such study, which implicates a signalling molecule in schizophrenia, is welcome news. See Letter p.499
- Hugh D. Piggins
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Spring Books |
Psychology: Holding on to happiness
Sonja Lyubomirsky welcomes a call for society to encourage people to 'flourish'.
- Sonja Lyubomirsky
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Research Highlights |
Think of yourself when quitting
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Books & Arts |
Psychology: More alike than different
Two books debunk gender differences in the brain, discovers Virginia Valian.
- Virginia Valian
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News Q&A |
Mars mission arrives in 'orbit'
Space travellers prepare to visit simulated Mars.
- Katharine Sanderson
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Books & Arts |
Books in brief
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Column |
Confessions of a procrastinator
Everyone puts off big tasks with smaller ones, and the only solution is to fight fire with fire, says Fabio Paglieri
- Fabio Paglieri
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Books & Arts |
Books in brief
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News |
Seven-month-old babies can 'read minds'
Recognition of the viewpoints of others seen much earlier than previously thought.
- Janelle Weaver
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Article |
A selective role for dopamine in stimulus–reward learning
Humans and animals readily learn to associate neutral cues paired with rewards, but the exact role that dopamine release has in this learning is controversial. Using previously established rat strains selectively bred for many generations to have greater or lesser propensity to assign value to learned cues, this study uses cyclic voltammetry to measure dopamine signals in the different strains and also examines the effect of blocking dopamine. It is concluded that dopamine selectively mediates motivational, rather than predictive, aspects of the cues.
- Shelly B. Flagel
- , Jeremy J. Clark
- & Huda Akil
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Comment |
Call in the women
A critical mass of female voices changes the tenor of political and corporate decisions — and should be used to galvanize climate policy, says Susan Buckingham.
- Susan Buckingham
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News Feature |
Science communication: Scientist as star
Sleep researcher Sara Mednick has straddled the line between media darling and respected scientist. But why is there still a line at all?
- Erik Vance
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Books & Arts |
Innovation: Lighting the creative spark
Ingenuity combines individual skill with shared ideas, explains Robert J. Sternberg.
- Robert J. Sternberg
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Books & Arts |
Psychology: A social animal revealed
The inner strengths of psychologist Elliot Aronson are on display in his honest autobiography, finds W. F. Bynum.
- W. F. Bynum
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Autumn Books |
History: A polymath rediscovered
George Rousseau uncovers the physiological side of Hermann von Helmholtz.
- George Rousseau
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News |
'Marilyn Monroe' neuron aids mind control
Volunteers fade famous images in and out using a 'brain–machine' interface.
- Alison Abbott
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Research Highlights |
Neuroscience: Soccer Samaritans
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Comment |
Altruism researchers must cooperate
Biologists studying the evolution of social behaviour are at loggerheads. The disputes — mainly over methods — are holding back the field, says Samir Okasha.
- Samir Okasha
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Research Highlights |
Psychology: Gaming the brain
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Research Highlights |
Networks: Contagious behaviour
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Correspondence |
Games and play mean different things in an educational context
- Anthony D. Pellegrini
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Books & Arts |
The makings of great leaders
Leadership, Michael Bond learns from two new books, is not about getting people to do things, it is about getting them to want to do things — and it emerged on the African plains.
- Michael Bond
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Research Highlights |
Neuroscience: Snakes on the brain
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News Feature |
Airport security: Intent to deceive?
Can the science of deception detection help to catch terrorists? Sharon Weinberger takes a close look at the evidence for it.
- Sharon Weinberger
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Letter |
Putting brain training to the test
Millions of pounds per year are spent on various 'brain-training' programs; however, the efficacy and performance of these training regimes is still unclear. In collaboration with the BBC, a six-week online study of brain training was conducted. Although improvements were observed in the specific tasks used for training, in the authors' view there was no evidence that these improvements transferred to other untrained cognitive tasks.
- Adrian M. Owen
- , Adam Hampshire
- & Clive G. Ballard
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Research Highlights |
Neuropsychology: Morality of murder
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Letter |
Neural evidence for inequality-averse social preferences
Social science hypotheses suggest that humans prefer more equality in outcome distributions because the knowledge of inequality reduces the reward experience. Here, functional MRI was used to test directly for inequality-averse social preferences in the brain during monetary transfers between pairs of participants and an experimenter. The results indicate that the brain's reward circuitry is sensitive to distribution inequality and is actively modulated relative to context.
- Elizabeth Tricomi
- , Antonio Rangel
- & John P. O’Doherty
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Books & Arts |
How lateral thinking saved lives
Martin Kemp is struck by the surreal quality of a home-made iron lung.
- Martin Kemp
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Letter |
An intrinsic vasopressin system in the olfactory bulb is involved in social recognition
Peptide hormones such as oxytocin and vasopressin influence social behaviour in several mammalian species. Here it is shown that a population of interneurons in the rat olfactory bulb releases vasopressin, and that vasopressin signalling is required in the olfactory system for proper social recognition in rats. Although vasopressin may not work in exactly the same way in humans, social recognition mediated by experience-dependent vasopressin release may be common.
- Vicky A. Tobin
- , Hirofumi Hashimoto
- & Mike Ludwig
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News |
Hopes grow over potential autism treatment
Oxytocin hormone shown to improve social interaction.
- Daniel Cressey
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News |
Changes proposed to key psychiatry manual
Controversial revision alters diagnostic definitions.
- Heidi Ledford
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News |
Self-doubt plagues female astronomers
Study seeks insight into astronomers' career paths.
- Karen Kaplan
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News |
Men prefer less powerful women
The positioning of people's photos affects how attractive and powerful they seem to be.
- Matt Kaplan