The Sciences
Book Review: Scientific Babel
Books and recommendations from Scientific American
Language967 articles archived since 1845
Evolution
Neandertals Turned Eagle Talons into Jewelry 130,000 Years Ago
As longtime readers may have noticed, I have an abiding interest in Neandertals. To help me keep up with the latest scientific insights into these mysterious relatives of ours, I have a Google alert set for "Neandertal" (and the alternate spelling, "Neanderthal")...
Health
How Designers Can Improve Health Care For Everyone
The last place anyone expects to find a designer is in a hospital, clinic or operating room, but those are exactly the spaces where I embed myself.
Evolution
"Big Brain" Gene Allowed for Evolutionary Expansion of Human Neocortex
The newly identified gene is found in modern-day humans, Neandertals and Denisovans, but not in chimps
Mind & Brain
5 Common Myths about the Brain
Some widely held ideas about the way children learn can lead educators and parents to adopt faulty teaching principles
Mind & Brain
How To Make The Most Of Your Valentine’s Day!
Whether you’re single or partnered up this Valentine’s Day, psychology has all sorts of tips for you on how to find your next great love or improve your existing relationship with the one you’ve got...
Mind & Brain
Teens These Days, Always Changing Their Gray Matter
While we all may vary on just how much time we like spending with other people, humans are overall very social beings. Scientists have already found this to be reflected in our health and well-being - with social isolation being associated with more depression, worse health, and a shorter life...
Mind & Brain
Climate Influences Language Evolution
The ease with which certain sounds are produced in different climes plays a role in the development of spoken languages. Christopher Intagliata reports
Mind & Brain
Genetic Memory: How We Know Things We Never Learned
I met my first savant 52 years ago and have been intrigued with that remarkable condition ever since. One of the most striking and consistent things in the many savants I have seen is that that they clearly know things they never learned...
Technology
Facebook Puts Its Money Where Your Mouth Is
The social media behemoth buys voice-recognition start-up Wit.ai to prepare for the impending Internet of Things. Larry Greenemeier reports
Mind & Brain
Five Things Being a Zumba Instructor Has Taught Me About Science Communication
So, here is something that the casual reader of this blog may or may not know about me: In my other, non-psychology life, I’ve been working part-time for the past 2 years as a licensed Zumba® Fitness instructor...
Mind & Brain
Publication Bias May Boost Findings for Bilingual Brain Benefits
Of studies presented at conferences, those that found a cognitive benefit to bilingualism were almost twice as likely to get published in journals as were studies finding no benefit. Karen Hopkin reports
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The Sciences
"You Are Welcome Here": Small Stickers Make a Big Difference for LGBTQ Scientists
When I visited the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod in early 2013 for an open house for prospective students, in many senses I was feeling under the weather.
Evolution
How Pearlfish Use Oysters as Underwater Amplifiers for Communication
A new study has revealed how marine pearlfish communicate with each other from the confines of their very safe and comfy homes inside oysters – they use the internal structure of the shell to amplify their strange, pulsing noises to the ocean outside...
Environment
"Climate Change" or "Global Warming"? Two New Polls Suggest Language Matters
On Friday, a new Yale-Associated Press-NORC poll on environmental attitudes reported that just 56 percent of Americans believe global warming is happening.
Seeing Science: Exploring Color Perception with the Stroop Effect
A fun family psychology problem from Science Buddies
Mind & Brain
Calling It Sex When They Mean Love
The saying "Why do they call it love when they mean sex?" is often used when a person feels a strong physical attraction toward another person and they camouflage it as love or a special connection...
Mind & Brain
Seeing Cuteness Improves Our Performance, Study Finds
Scientists conclude that cute things not only make us happier, but they also improve our performance in tasks that require behavioral carefulness
Technology
Intel Upgrades Stephen Hawking's Portal to the World
Movie audiences who went to theaters this fall to see The Theory of Everything got a glimpse of the challenges physicist Stephen Hawking has overcome to deliver his groundbreaking insights into the nature of black holes, space and time...
Mind & Brain
One Last Goodbye: The Strange Case of Terminal Lucidity
I'm as sworn to radical rationalism as the next neo-Darwinian materialist. That said, over the years I've had to "quarantine," for lack of a better word, a few anomalous personal experiences that have stubbornly defied my own logical understanding of them...
