Summaries | Headlines

Study Looks At Benefits Of Two Cochlear Implants In Deaf Children (February 23, 2007) -- Nature has outfitted us with a pair of ears for good reason: having two ears enhances hearing. University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists are now examining whether this is also true for the growing ... > full story

Extent Of Brain Involvement At Diagnosis May Predict Rate Of Later Brain Atrophy In Patients With MS (February 23, 2007) -- In patients with recently diagnosed multiple sclerosis, the extent of accumulated brain tissue loss and overall lesion load as determined by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) may predict the rate of ... > full story

Standardized Diagnostic Test For Learning Disabilities Developed (February 22, 2007) -- Researchers from the Center for Brain Research and Learning Disabilities at the University of Haifa have developed a standardized diagnostic test for learning disabilities for administration in the ... > full story

Harnessing The Brain's Plasticity Key To Treating Neurological Damage (February 20, 2007) -- To truly harness the capacity of neural prostheses to treat complex damage of the nervous system, the devices must be designed to exploit the brain's "plasticity," or capacity for change, says ... > full story

Linguistics Expert Warns Of Language Extinction (February 18, 2007) -- Humans speak more than 6,000 languages. Nearly all of them could be extinct in the next two centuries. So what? "I claim that it is catastrophic for the future of mankind," says University of Alaska ... > full story

Vasectomy May Put Men At Risk For Type Of Dementia (February 14, 2007) -- Northwestern University researchers have discovered men with an unusual form of dementia have a higher rate of vasectomy than men the same age who are cognitively normal. The dementia is Primary ... > full story

Recurrent Middle Ear Infections Can Have A Major Impact On Children's Development (February 6, 2007) -- A study by the University of Western Sydney has revealed that recurring middle ear infections in early childhood can have a detrimental impact on language and literacy skill development in later ... > full story

How Does Your Brain Tell Time? Study Challenges Theory Of Inner Clock (February 1, 2007) -- For decades, scientists have believed that the brain possesses an internal clock that allows it to keep track of time. Now a UCLA study in the February 1 edition of Neuron proposes a new model in ... > full story

How Listeners Perceive Verbs (January 31, 2007) -- The verb forms the heart of a sentence. Although a lot of research has been done into the role that verbs play during the transfer of information, less is known about exactly how and when the ... > full story

Conceptualizing A Cyborg: New Ideas On Developing Thought-Controlled Artificial Limbs (January 22, 2007) -- Investigators at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine describe the basis for developing a biological interface that could link a patient's nervous system to a thought-driven artificial ... > full story

Outcomes Comparable For Younger And Older Children With Surgically Implanted Hearing Aids (January 20, 2007) -- Outcomes following surgically implanted hearing aids that are anchored to bone appear comparable for children younger than five years and those older than five years, according to a report in the ... > full story

Internationally Adopted Children Shed Light On How Babies Learn Language (January 19, 2007) -- Each year, about 40,000 children are adopted across national lines, primarily by families from North America and Western Europe. Although most are infants and toddlers, thousands of older children ... > full story

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Psycholinguistics -- Psycholinguistics or psychology of language is the study of the psychological and neurobiological factors that enable humans to acquire, use, and understand language. Initial forays into ... > full article

Great Ape language -- Research into non-human Great Ape language has generated a great deal of evidence suggesting that apes are capable of using sophisticated communication with humans and other apes. Gorillas and ... > full article

Noam Chomsky -- Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is the Institute Professor Emeritus of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Professor Chomsky is credited with the creation of the ... > full article

Cognition -- The term cognition is used in several loosely-related ways to refer to a facility for the intelligent processing of information. In psychology, it is used to refer to the mental processes of an ... > full article

Hearing impairment -- A hearing impairment is a decrease in one's ability to hear (i.e. perceive auditory information). While some cases of hearing loss are reversible with medical treatment, many lead to a permanent ... > full article

Learning disability -- In the United States and Canada, the term learning disability is used to refer to psychological and neurological conditions that affect a person's communicative capacities and potential to be taught ... > full article

Stuttering -- Stuttering (known as stammering in the UK and scientifically known as dysphemia) is a speech disorder in which the flow of speech is disrupted by prolongations, repetitions, and blocks of sounds, ... > full article

Mirror neuron -- A mirror neuron is a neuron which fires both when an animal performs an action and when the animal observes the same action performed by another (especially conspecific) animal. Thus, the neuron ... > full article

Dyslexia -- Developmental dyslexia is a condition or learning disability which causes difficulty with reading and writing. Its standard definition is a difficulty in reading and writing in spite of normal ... > full article

Cognitive science -- Cognitive science is usually defined as the scientific study either of mind or of intelligence. Practically every formal introduction to cognitive science stresses that it is a highly ... > full article

Neocortex (brain) -- The neocortex is a part of the brain of mammals. It is the top layer of the cerebral hemispheres, 2-4 mm thick, and made up of six layers, labelled I to VI (with VI being the innermost and I being ... > full article

Thought -- Thought or thinking is a mental process which allows beings to model the world, and so to deal with it effectively according to their goals, plans, ends and desires. Thinking involves manipulation ... > full article

The evolution of human intelligence -- The nature and origins of hominid intelligence is a much-studied and much-debated topic, of natural interest to humans as the most successful and intelligent hominid species. There is no universally ... > full article

Autistic spectrum -- The autistic spectrum (sometimes referred to as the autism spectrum) is a developmental and behavioral syndrome that results from certain combinations of characteristically autistic traits. Although ... > full article

Communication -- Communication is the process of exchanging information, usually via a common protocol. "Communication studies" is the academic discipline focused on communication forms, processes and meanings, ... > full article

Developmental psychology -- Developmental psychology is the scientific study of progressive psychological changes that occur in human beings as they age. Originally concerned with infants and children, and later other periods ... > full article

Traumatic brain injury -- Traumatic brain injury (TBI), traumatic injuries to the brain, also called intracranial injury, or simply head injury, occurs when a sudden trauma causes brain damage. With mild TBI, the patient may ... > full article

Cognitive neuroscience -- The field of cognitive neuroscience concerns the scientific study of the neural mechanisms underlying cognition and is a branch of neuroscience. Cognitive neuroscience overlaps with cognitive ... > full article

Rett syndrome -- Rett syndrome (or Rett's disorder) is a progressive neurological disorder that is classified as a pervasive developmental disorder by the DSM-IV. The symptoms of this disorder are easily confused ... > full article

Human brain -- The human brain is the center of the central nervous system in humans as well as the primary control center for the peripheral nervous system. The brain controls "lower" or involuntary activities ... > full article