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From monkeys washing potatoes to cockatoos raiding trash cans, socially spread behaviors allow creatures to adapt more rapidly to changing environments than conventional evolution would allow. But the traits are also more easily lost.
What helps some people diagnosed with cancer, heart disease or diabetes stay relatively happy and healthy, while others are devastated? Psychologist Vicki Helgeson explains the traits and mindsets that can make the difference.
War, disasters, trafficking and immigration are tearing millions of children from their parents all around the world. A psychologist explores how to help them recover.
From the boardroom to the basketball court, some managers rely on berating and bullying employees. Researchers have learned one thing: It doesn’t work.
The thalamus has traditionally been viewed just as the brain’s sensory relay station. But it may also play an important role in higher-level cognition, MIT’s Michael Halassa explains in a Q&A.
The Covid-19 pandemic brought a sudden shift to virtual health care. That has increased access — and possibly outcomes, too — for patients with opioid use disorder.
Neuroscientists have long known that shut-eye helps consolidate memories in adults. Napping may play an equally crucial role in infants and young children.
Differences between the immune systems of males and females — in particular, ones involving cells called microglia — might help explain why the risk for conditions such as autism and Alzheimer’s varies between the sexes
How we want to be perceived influences how we act, and that presents persuasion opportunities. But the social factors involved are not easy to unravel.
Collaboration is vital when caring for an aging parent. Yet there are many stumbling blocks to good teamwork, from unequal division of tasks and differing perceptions of a parent’s needs to old, lingering resentments.
Empathy is a skill that can be learned and enhanced. But it has its limits, and can even promote conflict. Here’s what some experts say about how it works.
Individual behavior patterns may skew studies. A new approach called ‘STRANGE’ could help, by taking into account the habits, tendencies and life experiences of the creatures under scrutiny.
Kids with disruptive mood dysregulation disorder have explosive outbursts well past toddler age. Scientists are trying to work out the causes and what treatments help.
The strain of life — from everyday conflicts to major losses — can stretch our well-being to the breaking point. Here’s what scientists know, and still don’t know, about the stress-illness connection.
Trendy office layouts. Performance reviews that crush morale. There’s plenty of evidence on how to get the best out of workers, but businesses often ignore it.
VIDEO: Connect with brain health experts about the best ways to cultivate resilience as we age, and how to support loved ones with memory loss and dementia
Ten years after an influential book proposed ways to work with — not against — the irrationalities of human decision-making, practitioners have refined and broadened this gentle tool of persuasion
PODCAST: Sloppy by today’s standards, and maybe even back when it was published in 1955, Henry Beecher’s paper paved the way for sounder drug trials and pushed scientists to better understand how we process pain (Season 3, Episode 3)
Most of today’s psychotherapies are grounded in Western values. Researchers hope that tailoring treatments to patients’ cultural backgrounds will improve mental health outcomes.
It’s time to toss out the idea that dedicated professionals must always be on the clock or that retail shops will founder if they standardize employee hours, legal scholar Joan Williams says in a Q&A. The data tell a different tale.
The push to legalize magic mushrooms, MDMA, LSD and other hallucinogens is likely to heighten tensions between state and federal law, drug law expert Robert Mikos says
PODCAST: Serendipitous discoveries led to drugs like Prozac and to new insights into the physical basis of this debilitating disorder. But scientists continue to search for deeper understandings and therapies that will bring relief to those who still struggle. (Season 2, Episode 6)
PODCAST: Turns out, the best listener isn't quiet, as our host learns in a chat with two linguists. All those ums, ohs and mm-hmms have unexpected value.
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