A person scanning baggage or X-rays stands a better chance of seeing everything they are searching for if they are not feeling anxious, according to a new laboratory experiment. Duke psychologists put a dozen students through a test in which they searched for particular shapes on a computer display, simulating the sort of visual searching performed by airport security teams and radiologists. ...

The potentially lasting implications of day-to-day couple conflict on physical and mental well-being are revealed in a study published today in the journal Personal Relationships. Until now research has concentrated on the immediate effects of romantic conflict, typically in controlled laboratory settings. In one of the first studies to look at the longer term, Professor Angela Hicks investigated the physio ...

This recent series of posts has used the example of Stephen Colbert's satirical "March to Keep Fear Alive" as an illustration of a larger point: humans evolved to be fearful - a major feature of the brain's negativity bias that helped our ancestors pass on their genes. Consequently, as much research has shown, we're usually much more affected by negative - by which I mean painful - experiences than by posit ...

Contrary to earlier reports, a new study finds that stress does not appear to increase a person’s risk of developing multiple sclerosis (MS). The research is published in the May 31, 2011, print issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. ...

Stress promotes neuropathological changes that are also seen in Alzheimer's disease. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich have discovered that the increased release of stress hormones in rats leads to generation of abnormally phosphorylated tau protein in the brain and ultimately, memory loss. ...

My previous post used the example of Stephen Colbert's satirical "March to Keep Fear Alive" as a timely illustration of a larger point: humans evolved to be fearful - since that helped keep our ancestors alive - so we are very vulnerable to being frightened and even intimidated by threats, both real ones and "paper tigers." With this march, Colbert is obviously mocking those who play on fear, since we certa ...

In a study published in the current issue of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics the effects of psychotherapy on cortisol, the most important stress hormone, are examined. Psychotherapy added to pharmacotherapy results in greater improvement in clinical outcomes than does pharmacotherapy alone. However, few studies examined how psychotherapy coupled with pharmacotherapy could produce a long-term protective eff ...

The mechanisms underlying improvement in hypochondriasis are examined in a study published in the current issue of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) has been shown previously to be beneficial in the treatment of hypochondriasis. In the current study, the investigators sought to determine whether there was a differential treatment effect for patients with greater levels of ...

Perhaps the most puzzling symptom of anorexia nervosa – a disorder that tends to occur in young women – is the refusal to eat, resulting in extreme weight loss. While most people have a great deal of difficulty in dieting and losing weight, particularly if a diet extends over many months or years, individuals with anorexia nervosa can literally diet themselves to death. In fact, this disorder has a very hig ...

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert had dueling rallies in DC in October, 2010. Stewart's was "Rally to Restore Sanity" and Colbert's was "March to Keep Fear Alive!" Obviously, Colbert is a great satirist who was poking fun, since we sure don't need a rally to keep fear alive. Alarming messages are all around us, like the news about global warming or the "Threat Level Orange" announcements every few minutes in ...