Troubled children diagnosed with bipolar disorder may fare better with a different diagnosis, according to researchers at The Hastings Center. The researchers support an emerging approach, which gives many of those children a new diagnosis called Severe Mood Dysregulation (SMD) or Temper Dysregulation Disorder with Dysphoria (TDD). ...

Shaking hands with a robotic arm could be a new way to help stroke patients learn to use their arms again. Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation report a pilot trial of the 'Braccio di Ferro' (Iron Arm) robot in 10 patients. ...

Extreme obesity is affecting more children at younger ages, with 12 percent of black teenage girls, 11.2 percent of Hispanic teenage boys, 7.3 percent of boys and 5.5 percent of girls now classified as extremely obese, according to a Kaiser Permanente study of 710,949 children and teens that appears online in the Journal of Pediatrics. ...

The presence of an attractive woman elevates testosterone levels and physical risk taking in young men, according to a recent study in the inaugural issue of Social Psychological and Personality Science (published by SAGE). Researchers asked young adult men to perform both easy and difficult tricks on skateboards, first in front of another male and then in front of a young, attractive female. The skateboard ...

Chronic feelings of loneliness take a toll on blood pressure over time, causing a marked increase after four years, according to a new study at the University of Chicago. A new study shows, for the first time, a direct relation between loneliness and larger increases in blood pressure four years later - a link that is independent of age and other factors that could cause blood pressure to rise, including bo ...

Social science is at the center of every major challenge the world faces, yet faces a tough future, according to a panel of senior academics and politicians speaking in London this week. They were taking part in a debate hosted by the British Academy and SAGE to explore how social science research can strengthen its involvement in policymaking, increase its impact, and combat potential public expenditure cu ...

Readers interested in central nervous system physiology may want to check out an excellent PDF ebook that, as the name implies, provides an overview of the human brain and nervous system. This ebook is published by and provided free of charge courtesy of The Society for Neuroscience. The quality and overall production of this 80-page publication is excellent with beautiful, full-color images and a relativel ...

A quest that began over a decade ago with a chance observation has reached a milestone: the identification of a gene that may regulate regeneration in mammals. The absence of this single gene, called p21, confers a healing potential in mice long thought to have been lost through evolution and reserved for creatures like flatworms, sponges, and some species of salamander. In a report published today in the P ...

It has long been known that alcohol exposure is toxic to the developing fetus and can result in lifelong brain, cognitive and behavioral problems. Now, a new report out of UCLA shows that the effects of prenatal methamphetamine exposure - or worse, a combination of methamphetamine and alcohol - may be even more damaging. ...

A family history of Alzheimer's is one of the biggest risk factors for developing the memory-robbing disease, which affects more than 5 million Americans and is the most common form of senile dementia. Now an international collaboration led by NYU Langone Medical Center researchers has found the likely basis for this heightened familial risk - especially from the maternal side. ...