IB Psychology Crane

Musical hallucinations, the experience of hearing music when none is being played, have been the subject of a study by Dr Sukhbinder Kumar, a research fellow at Newcastle University.

Salamone, a UConn Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor, has spent most of his career battling a particular long-held scientific idea: the popular notion that high levels of brain dopamine are related to experiences of pleasure. As increasing numbers of studies show, he says, the famous neurotransmitter is not responsible for pleasure, but has to do with motivation.

Neurologist and author Oliver Sacks brings our attention to Charles Bonnet syndrome - when visually impaired people experience lucid hallucinations. He describes the experiences of his patients in heartwarming detail and walks us through the biology of this under-reported phenomenon

Director of Translational Neuroscience, Contemplative Studies Initiative Assistant Professor (Research), Department of Family Medicine. Why does mindfulness meditation begin by focusing on the breath? Does mindfulness-based somatic awareness (cultivated through attention to breath, body sensations) change the brain? Catherine Kerr received a B.A. from Amherst College, and a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University. Before arriving at Brown, she was at Harvard Medical School where her original focus was on developing innovative approaches for investigating placebo effects. Currently, her work focuses on using Magnetoencephalography (MEG) and other tools to investigate brain mechanisms underlying body-based attention and healing in mindfulness and other mind-body practices such as Tai Chi

In a new case study, a team of Swiss and French neurologists followed a similar strategy during brain surgery with a 23-year-old female patient. She has temporal lobe epilepsy and experiences "ecstatic auras" before seizure onset. During these periods she has "intense feelings of bliss and well-being", a floating sensation in her stomach, enhanced senses and time appears to contract.

Despite a wealth of research, we still don't know the purpose of sleep. A new animal study suggests one possible function: to promote the repair of support structures in the brain

Abby and Brittany Hensel are conjoined twins determined to live the normal, active life of outgoing 20-somethings anywhere. They have been to university, they travel, they have jobs. But how easy is it for two people to inhabit one body?

The impact of food on mental health

Whingeing workmates and fed-up friends may be making you sick, according to researchers who say depression could be a contagious illness transmitted through social networks.

Czech doctors are prescribing psycho-pharmaceutical drugs, such as antidepressants, to more and more children, treating the symptoms rather than the causes of their condition, the daily Lidove noviny (LN) writes Thursday

People can be educated about the importance of eating sensible serving sizes - but their self-control will fly out the window the moment they are given a bulging plate of food.

Twenty-five years after Prozac was introduced, the name has entered the cultural lexicon and helped define how people think of mental illness.

Is it true that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, or is stress always debilitating?

f you witnessed a crime, could you be sure you recognised the perpetrator? Our memories are surprisingly vulnerable, and our recollection of names, numbers and details can often be incorrect at the most crucial of moments.