Dream and daydream: differences and similarities

Did you know that daydreams reflect events from the previous two days and “night” dreams resemble a fictional plot?

Does your dog have social skills?

A study suggests that viewing the owner’s face works as a positive social reinforcement for dogs. Learn more about this and other surprising results about “man’s best friend”.

Could mindfulness meditation benefit memory?

Aviva Berkovich-Ohana, supported by the BIAL Foundation in the scope of project 191/20 – Understanding the brain mechanisms of death-denial for fostering mindfulness-based existential resilience, concluded that the practice of mindfulness mediattion it is benefic to delcarative memory performance.

Can school behavior problems be predicted by oxytocin concentrations?

In the scope of project 158/12 – Neuroendocrine underpinnings of social bonds to parents and peers in preschool children. Oxytocin and cortisol on adopted children and non-adopted controls, Nuno Torres et al published in the journal Psychoneuroendocrinology, the paper Salivary oxytocin after play with parents predicts behavioural problems in preschool children

What we read has any neurophysiological impact?

Alessio Avenanti, supported by the BIAL Foundation in the scope of project 347/18 – Driving synaptic plasticity in motor-to-visual neural pathways to enhance action prediction, concluded that reading negative action sentences (e.g. you will not appreciate a book)  provokes a decrease on motor excitability, when compared with reading positive action sentences (e.g. you will appreciate a book).