Here's a strange one for the books: Science has taken notice that a really, really LARGE proportion of schizophrenic patients smoke. In fact, Scientific American Mind reports that an average of 85% of schizophrenic patients smoke cigarettes compared to only 20% in the general population. Many schizophrenics also appear to have abnormal thermoregulation, an impaired ability to understand body language, an inability to perceive an optical illusion called "the hollow mask illusion," an impaired ability to produce a brain protein known as the muscarinic M1 receptor, and an abnormally large number of genetic mutations known as CNV's or "copy number variations."
posted by mdpatrick on Sep 29, 2009 - 65 comments

Seeking - How the brain hard-wires us to love Google, Twitter, and texting.
posted by nickyskye on Sep 6, 2009 - 40 comments

A New State of Mind. "New research is linking dopamine to complex social phenomena and changing neuroscience in the process."
posted by homunculus on Aug 12, 2008 - 25 comments

New research finds that the human brain registers the avoidance of an anticipated punishment in pretty much the same way as it registers a reward. (See this link for a less technical discussion of the research.) Do these findings suggest that the use of punishment as a deterrent to undesirable behavior in effect actually motivates the undesirable behavior (as opposed to the use of negative reinforcement, or in other words, the withholding of reward)? Do punishment-oriented models of socialization/behaviorial conditioning actually encourage cheating, by in effect selecting for better cheaters?
posted by saulgoodman on Jul 12, 2006 - 28 comments