http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. Wide-eyed expressions that typically signal fear may enlarge our visual field and mutually enhance others' ability to locate threats, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-05-wide-eyed-usand-othersto-threats.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 01 May 2013 15:49:54 EST news286642187 (Medical Xpress)—People often think that other people are staring at them even when they aren't research led by the University of Sydney has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-people_1.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 09 Apr 2013 07:03:50 EST news284709818 Have you ever wondered whether it's possible to look at two places at once? Because our eyes have a specialized central region with high visual acuity and good color vision, we must always focus on one spot at a time in order to see our environment. As a result, our eyes constantly jump back and forth as we look around. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-role-tiny-eye-movements.html Neuroscience Thu, 21 Feb 2013 10:20:02 EST news280663370 Supposedly 'primitive' reflexes may involve more sophisticated brain function than previously thought, according to researchers at Imperial College London. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-primitive-reflexes-sophisticated.html Neuroscience Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:00:03 EST news280057552 Many drivers say the large digital billboards flashing ads every few seconds along Bay Area freeways are just too bright and too distracting. And they may be right. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-digital-billboards-distracting.html Health Tue, 08 Jan 2013 17:10:01 EST news276885980 The suffering caused by the loss of a nose must be indescribable. In terms of function, a sense of smell is perhaps less important than the ability to see, hear and eat - and we can breathe through our mouth or nasal cavity. But somehow, a missing nose elicits a more profound sense of shock in other people than the sight of an eye patch. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-3d-nose.html Other Thu, 08 Nov 2012 06:50:01 EST news271578304 Researchers from UCL have found that lonely people have less grey matter in a part of the brain associated with decoding eye gaze and other social cues. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-neurological-link-loneliness.html Neuroscience Thu, 25 Oct 2012 11:50:11 EST news270381846 Researchers in Georgia Tech's Center for Behavior Imaging have developed two new technological tools that automatically measure relevant behaviors of children, and promise to have significant impact on the understanding of behavioral disorders such as autism. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-georgia-tech-high-tech-tools-autism.html Autism spectrum disorders Tue, 25 Sep 2012 13:14:15 EST news267797649 In a new study that has implications for distracted drivers, researchers found that people are better at juggling some types of multitasking than they are at others. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-07-multitasking-dangerous.html Psychology & Psychiatry Mon, 23 Jul 2012 12:35:17 EST news262265685 Interactions between infants and their environment are limited because of the infants' poor motor abilities. So investigating infant cognition is no easy task. Which sensory event is the result of the infant's own motor action and which one is not? Researchers from the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies and from Goethe-Universitat Frankfurt am Main in Germany may have found the answer. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-infant-eye-movement-cognition.html Psychology & Psychiatry Fri, 09 Mar 2012 09:00:01 EST news250505083 Children with autism look away from faces when thinking, especially about challenging material, according to new research from Northumbria University. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-dont-im.html Autism spectrum disorders Wed, 07 Mar 2012 17:14:15 EST news250362826 While it may appear that infants are helpless creatures that only blink, eat, cry and sleep, one University of Missouri researcher says that studies indicate infant brains come equipped with knowledge of "intuitive physics." http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-babies-born-intuitive-physics-knowledge.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 24 Jan 2012 10:58:42 EST news246625113 Babies don't learn to talk just from hearing sounds. New research suggests they're lip-readers too. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-babies-lip-reading.html Autism spectrum disorders Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:03:17 EST news245952178 (Medical Xpress) -- Surgeons can learn their skills more quickly if they are taught how to control their eye movements. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-surgeons-eye-movement.html Other Wed, 30 Nov 2011 08:38:52 EST news241864724 The brain likes stereotypes - at least for movements. Simple actions are most often performed in the same manner. A mathematical model explains why this is the case and could be used to generate more natural robot movements and to adapt prosthetic movements. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-vision-heavy-choice-simple-movements.html Neuroscience Wed, 09 Nov 2011 12:57:28 EST news240065835 The benefits of virtual worlds can be used to help autistic children develop social skills beyond their anticipated levels, suggest early findings from new research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). Researchers on the Echoes Project have developed an interactive environment which uses multi-touch screen technology where virtual characters on the screener act to children's actions in real time. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-digital-worlds-autistic-children-social.html Psychology & Psychiatry Fri, 21 Oct 2011 10:07:36 EST news238410445 Although parents may have a hard time believing it, even infants can be trained to improve their concentration skills. What's more, training babies in this way leads to improvements on other, unrelated tasks. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-infants-added-benefits.html Psychology & Psychiatry Thu, 01 Sep 2011 12:48:50 EST news234100059 (PhysOrg.com) -- Just as grey hair and wrinkles are widely accepted as a natural part of ageing, so is an increased risk of falling, which can happen for many reasons and with devastating consequences, including increased likelihood of injury, hospitalisation and even death. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-older-people-fall-attention-feet.html Health Tue, 21 Jun 2011 10:22:25 EST news227870507 (Medical Xpress) -- Face recognition and the interpretation of facial expressions and gaze direction play a key role in guiding the social behavior of human beings, and new study results point to similar mechanisms in macaques. Until now, many scientists have assumed that the capability for face recognition in monkeys is significantly different from that in humans – and that different parts of the brain are involved. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen have now discovered that the circuitry for face processing in the brain is remarkably similar in both macaques and humans. Consequently, macaque monkeys could be suitable model organisms for studying human disorders such as autism or prosopagnosia, so-called “face blindness.” http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-similar-human-monkey-brains.html Neuroscience Thu, 28 Apr 2011 07:40:04 EST news223192951