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Archive for November, 2007

Cause and effect in brain development of paedophilia

Posted in brain connectivity, development, personality, social neuroscience on November 30, 2007 | 1 Comment »

Physorg reports about an interesting forthcoming MRI study linking paedophilia to regional changes in white matter. Analysing structural MRI using voxel-based morphometry, paedophiles were found to have significantly smaller white matter volumes in specific regions, as the abstract demonstrates:
The present investigation sought to identify which brain regions distinguish pedophilic from nonpedophilic men, using unbiased, automated [...]

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A cure for hooliganism?

Posted in emotions, personality, social neuroscience on November 13, 2007 | 3 Comments »

Can we rid ourselves of the meaningless violence and aggression seen in society today? A news story in Nature News this week shows that aggressiveness may be treated with a serotonin-acting ligand. At least in rats, but nevertheless the study holds the promise for human treatment as well. Serotonin levels are known to be associated [...]

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The death of critical science journalism in NY Times?

Posted in neuroeconomics, neuroethics, neuroimaging, neuromarketing, politics, social neuroscience on November 12, 2007 | 9 Comments »

Martha Farah just alerted me about her recent comment in the Neuroethics & Law blog. Yesterday, NY Times ran a story about neuro-politics. More precisely, they presented a study of how subjects’ brains responded to, e.g., different political words and pictures of US politicians involved in the 2008 presidental election. The article’s first author [...]

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Amygdala is (also) positive!

Posted in emotions, neuroscience, review on November 12, 2007 | 2 Comments »

That almond-shaped structure we call amygdala is typically thought of as solely (or mainly) involved in negative affect. However, some studies have suggested that the amygdala is also involved in other processes, such as novelty (of faces). It should come as a big surprise, however, to many researchers that this structure is also involved in [...]

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The evolution of animal personality

Posted in comparative studies, personality on November 8, 2007 | Leave a Comment »

It should come as no surprise to you that after a prolonged hibernation, the BrainEthics team is heading back to the web-surface to present the novelties and oddities of cognitive neuroscience. And let’s start again with some fresh news from Nature, which besides featuring a nice focus section on the Drosophila, also has a nice [...]

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