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July 06, 2007

2007-07-06 Spike activity:

Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news:

The Times looks at the effects and treatment of childhood depression.

Sweet smells make pain more tolerable according to research covered by Mixing Memory.

The study that reported that older child had slightly higher IQ than younger children is examined and criticised by Slate.

Is synaesthesia more prevalent than previously thought? asks Cognitive Daily.

Texas prevented from executing (yet another) mentally ill prisoner by the US Supreme Court, reports the The New York Times. Most surprisingly, he was originally allowed to defend himself when obviously psychotic.

New Scientist reports that the current level of testosterone affects men's judgments of fairness

Is there a specific electrical brain signal linked to face recognition? The Phineas Gage Fan Club investigates.

Yawning cools the brain say researchers in The New York Times.

OmniBrain finds some clay models of sensory and motor homunculi. If you don't know what they are, have a look!

BBC News reports that contrary to popular belief, men and women speak roughly the same amount. If you follow Language Log, it's old news of course.

—Vaughan.

Posted at July 6, 2007 08:00 AM

Comments

David says:

I do not buy the "yawning cools the brain" theory.
Even we yawn for a long time, the cooling won't be significant.
Plus: Yawning is more than common in animals. All animals yawn. Fish yawn too, and their brain will be at sea temperature no matter what. Even sponges do yawn. And they do not have a brain to cool down in the first place.

Comment posted at July 8, 2007 02:16 PM

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