Author: dispatchtimes news

A major study led by researchers at the University of Oslo has shown that changes in the brain’s cortical thickness can be detected years before amyloid-beta plaques reach detectable levels on scans, challenging the long-held view that amyloid buildup is the first event in Alzheimer’s disease. The research, published in Nature Neuroscience, was guided by James M. Roe and Yunpeng Wang and draws on data from three large longitudinal studies of cognitive ageing. Alzheimer’s disease is characterised by amyloid-beta plaques, and the traditional model holds that plaque accumulation comes first and drives subsequent brain shrinkage. A 2010 study framed this…

A new eye-tracking study suggests that followers who rate themselves as conscientious use gaze strategically when speaking to a leader, directing their eyes at the leader’s features to bolster their own arguments. The researchers say this behaviour can make such followers appear more conscientious to observers, indicating eye contact may signal reliability in workplace settings. The findings were published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology. Eye gaze is widely recognised as a powerful form of nonverbal communication, capable of attracting attention, increasing engagement and influencing the course of social interactions. While avoiding eye contact can sometimes be taken as…

A new study published in Royal Society Open Science suggests intelligence and personality traits do little to predict whether people notice an unexpected object while concentrating on another task. Led by Daniel J. Simons of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the researchers conducted two large online studies across multiple countries, each including 1,000 participants in the final analyses, to test whether cognitive ability or personality sways noticing. Inattentional blindness is the phenomenon at the heart of the research. It occurs when individuals fail to see something clearly visible because their attention is fixed on a different task. For example,…

PsyPost, the psychology and neuroscience news website, has unveiled an automated Python programme designed to monitor its archive for studies that have been retracted, corrected, or flagged by publishers. In its first run against the databases Retraction Watch and Crossref, the programme scanned PsyPost’s archive of more than 16,000 articles and identified six studies that had been retracted. The system now runs on a consistent weekly schedule to answer one question: has any PsyPost-covered study been withdrawn or altered, and which articles are affected? How the Programme Works The audit process runs weekly in four steps to translate publisher data…

An analysis of data from the Chicago Health and Aging Project suggests that daily fluctuations in salivary cortisol may help predict cognitive decline in older adults. The study found that those with medium to high intraday cortisol variability started with higher cognitive functioning and experienced slower decline, while the highest average cortisol levels were linked to faster cognitive deterioration. The research was published in JAMA Network Open. As people age, cognitive function can deteriorate, with memory, processing speed, attention and executive function common areas of decline. Chronic stress is thought to contribute to this process by repeatedly activating the body’s…

A major U.S. study published in Nature Human Behaviour has found that providing low-income mothers with a substantial monthly cash stipend during their child’s first four years slows the pace of biological aging in their children, as measured by epigenetic clocks. The Baby’s First Years project randomised 735 children and 777 mothers across four metropolitan areas, with households assigned to receive either $333 or $20 a month for the first four years of life, via debit cards with no spending restrictions. Biological aging in this study was assessed through DNA methylation, a process whereby chemical tags attached to DNA influence…

A new study published in Nature Communications finds robust but independent sex differences across how the brain functions, its structure and associated behaviours. Researchers Siyuan Liu and Armin Raznahan, working at the National Institute of Mental Health, show that while functional activation, grey matter volume and behavioural traits each reliably distinguish male and female profiles, the degree of sex typicality in one domain bears no relation to the others. The team analysed data from nearly 1,000 healthy young adults who underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing seven different tasks. The tasks spanned emotion processing, gambling, relational reasoning, social cognition,…

A nationally representative survey in the United States suggests public support for political violence decreased heading into the 2026 midterm elections, even as partisan tensions remained high. The research indicates that while people at large reject the use of physical force to pursue political aims, MAGA supporters were still more inclined than others to justify violence. The findings come from a mid-2026 wave of an ongoing, annual study conducted under the direction of Garen J. Wintemute, a distinguished professor of emergency medicine and the Baker-Teret Chair in Violence Prevention at the University of California, Davis. The work was published as…

A qualitative study into unicorn pursuit within consensual non-monogamy reveals that couples who seek a third partner often focus on their own pleasure, but the search process itself can also strengthen the existing relationship through improved communication and mutual understanding. The findings, published in Psychology & Sexuality, shed new light on how these dynamics unfold in practice. In this arrangement, established couples invite a third person to join their romantic or sexual life. The third participant, commonly referred to as a unicorn, is perceived as rare and highly sought after, with many searches traditionally centring on a bisexual woman as…

A new study published in Imaging Neuroscience suggests that a ten-minute very slow jog can lift mood and sharpen focus. Led by Hideaki Soya, a professor emeritus at the Institute of Health and Sport Sciences at the University of Tsukuba, and Ryuta Kuwamizu, an assistant professor there, alongside Chorphaka Damrongthai and colleagues at the Soya Laboratory, the work examined how the gentlest form of running affects the brain and mood. Humans have a long evolutionary history of running, a movement long linked with broad physical and mental health benefits. The prefrontal cortex, the region behind the forehead involved in complex…