By BENEDICT CAREY Decades ago modern medicine all but stamped out the nervous breakdown, hitting it with a combination of new diagnoses, new psychiatric drugs and a strong dose of professional scorn. The phrase was overused and near meaningless, a self-serving term from an era unwilling to talk about mental distress openly. But like a stubborn virus, the phrase has mutated. In recent years, psychiatrists in Europe have been diagnosing what they call “burnout syndrome,” the signs of which include “vital exhaustion.” A paper published last year defined three types: “frenetic,” “underchallenged,” and “worn out” (“exasperated” and “bitter” did not make the cut). This is the latest umbrella term for the kind of emotional collapses that have plagued humanity for ages, stemming at times from severe mental difficulties and more often from mild ones. There have been plenty of others. In the early decades of the 20th century, many people simply referred to a crackup, including “The Crack-Up,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1936 collection of essays describing his own. And before that there was neurasthenia, a widely diagnosed and undefined nerve affliction causing just about any symptom people cared to add. Yet medical historians say that, for versatility and descriptive power, it may be hard to improve upon the “nervous breakdown.” Coined around 1900, the phrase peaked in usage during the middle of the 20th century and echoes still. One recent study found that 26 percent of respondents to a national survey in 1996 reported that they had experienced an “impending nervous breakdown,” compared with 19 percent from the same survey in 1957. Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Depression; Schizophrenia
Link ID: 14133 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By KATHERINE ELLISON WALNUT CREEK, Calif. — I’m sitting in front of a gray plastic console that resembles an airplane cockpit. Each time I move, a small reflector on a makeshift tiara resting on my forehead alerts an infrared tracking device pointing down at me from above a computer monitor. Watching the screen, I’m supposed to click a mouse each time I see a star with five or eight points, but not for stars with only four points. It’s a truly simple task, and I’m a college-educated professional. So why do I keep getting it wrong? Halfway into the 20-minute session, I find myself clicking at a lot of four-point stars, while sighing and cursing with each new mistake and stamping my feet, sending further unflattering information to the contraption via tracking straps taped to my legs. Dr. Martin H. Teicher, the Harvard psychiatrist who invented the test, has an explanation for my predicament. “You have some objective evidence for an impairment in attention,” he said — in other words, a “very subtle” case of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. (Indeed, I had already received a diagnosis three years earlier.) Not only did I click too many times when I shouldn’t have, and occasionally vice versa, but subtle shifts in my head movements, tracked by the device’s motion detector, suggested that I tended to shift attention states, from on-task to impulsive to distracted and back. Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: ADHD; Attention
Link ID: 14132 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Karen Schrock BOSTON—Why do we often attribute events in our lives to a higher power or supernatural force? Some psychologists believe this kind of thinking, called teleological thinking, is a byproduct of social cognition. As our ancestors evolved, we developed the ability to understand one anothers’ ideas and intentions. As a result of this “theory of mind,” some experts figure, we also tend to see intention or purpose—a conscious mind—behind random or naturally occurring events. A new study presented here in a poster at the 22nd annual meeting of the Association for Psychological Science supports this idea, showing that people who may have an impaired theory of mind are less likely to think in a teleological way. Bethany T. Heywood, a graduate student at Queens University Belfast, asked 27 people with Asperger’s Syndrome, a mild type of autism that involves impaired social cognition, about significant events in their lives. Working with experimental psychologist Jesse M. Bering (author of the Bering in Mind blog and a frequent contributor to Scientific American Mind), she asked them to speculate about why these important events happened—for instance, why they had gone through an illness or why they met a significant other. As compared with 34 neurotypical people, those with Asperger’s syndrome were significantly less likely to invoke a teleological response—for example, saying the event was meant to unfold in a particular way or explaining that God had a hand in it. They were more likely to invoke a natural cause (such as blaming an illness on a virus they thought they were exposed to) or to give a descriptive response, explaining the event again in a different way. © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Autism
Link ID: 14131 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Alice Park While schizophrenia is a complex psychiatric disorder that has its roots in genetic changes, researchers at Johns Hopkins University have uncovered a potentially new culprit for some of the condition's most common symptoms. Reporting in the journal Schizophrenia Research, the psychiatrists describe a connection between the herpes simplex virus, responsible for cold sores, and the drop in concentration, memory and coordination that are often the earliest signs of schizophrenia. Previous studies have linked the presence of antibodies to the virus with both smaller brain volumes and cognitive problems in patients with the mental disorder. So the Hopkins researchers, led by David Schretten, studied blood samples from 40 schizophrenic patients and asked these volunteers to perform a series of cognitive tests. Their findings confirmed that indeed, those who had herpes simplex antibodies, indicating that they had fought off an infection with the virus, scored lower on the tests of coordination, memory and motor skills than patients not possessing the same antibodies. In addition, brain scans confirmed that the patients who performed poorly on the cognitive tests also had smaller brain volumes than those who hadn't been exposed to the virus. In particular the cerebellum, which controls motor function, was considerably smaller in these subjects. These results lead the authors to believe that the herpes virus may be directly attacking brain tissue and triggering the cognitive deficits, and that somehow, the schizophrenic brain is more vulnerable to the viral assault. © 2010 Time Inc

Keyword: Schizophrenia
Link ID: 14130 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Harry Collins TAKE a long look at the Mona Lisa. How do you see her? As blobs of paint or as a woman with an enigmatic smile? Now explain how you came to see those blobs of paint as a smile. For your second mission, think back to learning to form sentences. Your parents never told you "verb in the middle" (if you're English) or "verb at the end" (if you're German) but still you picked it up. And, more remarkable, once you did, have you any idea how come this sentence breaks the rules but read it you still can? These abilities demonstrate what's known as "tacit knowledge" - something as big and taken for granted as "air", "thought", or "language". Take away tacit knowledge and the human world disappears. Without it, what we think of as knowledge, the "stuff" contained in our books and intellectual artefacts, would make no sense and be no more than noise. The big question is whether, or how far, this tacit knowledge can be made explicit. The term was coined in the 1950s by the British-Hungarian physical chemist and philosopher, Michael Polanyi. In that era of enormous optimism about what physics and mathematics could achieve, it seemed only a matter of time before science formalised everything. This was to pave the way for computers to acquire all human abilities and run everything. Polanyi wanted to show there was more to scientific creativity than this and argued there was always something unspoken, even at the heart of the exact sciences. His most famous example was riding a bicycle: we can do it but without quite knowing how. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 14129 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Celeste Biever CAN people with autism take a pill to improve their social skills? For the first time, drugs are being tested that could address the social difficulties associated with autism and other learning disorders by tackling some of the brain chemistry thought to underlie them. The only drugs currently prescribed to people with autism seek to dampen aggression and anxiety. The new drugs, now in the very early stages of clinical testing, address some of the classic symptoms of autism. "People may learn more, learn to speak better, learn social skills and to be more communicative," says Randall Carpenter of Seaside Therapeutics in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which is testing one of the drugs. Geraldine Dawson, chief science officer at the charity Autism Speaks and a psychiatrist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is equally enthusiastic about the prospect of a new class of drugs. "For the first time we are seeing drugs that could tackle core autism symptoms," she says. For the first time we are seeing drugs that could tackle the core symptoms of autism The Seaside trial is aimed at a learning disorder called fragile X, which is associated with autism. People with fragile X carry a mutation in a gene involved in strengthening brain connections associated with salient experiences. Stronger brain connections allow people to distinguish these events from background noise, making this a key process in learning. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Autism
Link ID: 14128 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Dan Ferber Millions of people worldwide use acupuncture to ease a variety of painful conditions, but it’s still not clear how the ancient treatment works. Now a new study of mice shows that insertion of an acupuncture needle activates nearby pain-suppressing receptors. What’s more, a compound that boosts the response of those receptors increases pain relief—a finding that could one day lead to drugs that enhance the effectiveness of acupuncture in people. Researchers have developed two hypotheses for how acupuncture relieves pain. One holds that the needle stimulates pain-sensing nerves, which trigger the brain to release opiumlike compounds called endorphins that circulate in the body. The other holds that acupuncture works through a placebo effect, in which the patient's thinking releases endorphins. Neuroscientist Maiken Nedergaard of the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York state was skeptical about both hypotheses because acupuncture doesn’t hurt and often works only when needles are inserted near the sore site. Nedergaard instead suspected that when acupuncturists insert and rotate needles, they cause minor damage to the tissue, which releases a compound called adenosine that acts as a local pain reliever. Nedergaard first assigned the study as a summer project to her then-16-year-old daughter, Nanna Goldman. Goldman and other researchers in Nedergaard’s lab lightly anesthetized mice to get them to hold still, inserted a needle into an acupuncture point on the lower leg, and sampled the fluid around the needle. They found a 24-fold rise in adenosine, which seemed promising. © 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science

Keyword: Pain & Touch
Link ID: 14127 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Bruce Bower BOSTON — People who demand perfection of themselves may be affected, often for the worse, by the fact that they can’t live up to that standard. But under some circumstances, perfectionism may help people to live longer. Pregnant women who feel like they should be ideal mothers display an elevated risk for developing postpartum depression, scientists reported May 30 at the Association for Psychological Science annual convention. Yet, perfectionist seniors who develop diabetes for the first time tend to survive longer than their less exacting peers facing the same health predicament, according to an investigation presented at the same meeting session. The director of the diabetic study, Prem Fry of Trinity Western University in Langley, Canada, called the finding “highly unexpected.” Fry had suspected that death might come especially quickly for perfectionist seniors with diabetes. In a 2009 study, Fry and a colleague found that, among 450 community-dwelling seniors ages 65 and older, those reporting expectations of perfection for themselves on a brief questionnaire tended to die at least several years earlier than those who went easier on themselves. In contrast, the latest work suggests that a perfectionist outlook may foster longevity among senior diabetics by encouraging them to manage their illness with special care, Prem speculates. Many diabetics of all ages find it challenging to monitor their blood glucose every day and to refrain from eating sweets. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2010

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 14126 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Parents who despair over their teenagers' lack of concentration in class, inability to sit still long enough to finish homework or plan ahead, should take solace. Their children are not being lazy or careless – they are hapless victims of neurobiology. New research has found that teenagers' brains continue developing far longer into adulthood than previously thought. Adolescents may look like young adults but their brain structure resembles that of much younger children, according to the study to be published in the Journal of Neuroscience on Wednesday. "It is not always easy for adolescents to pay attention in class without letting their minds wander, or to ignore distractions from their younger sibling when trying to solve a maths problem," said Dr Iroise Dumontheil of University College London's Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, one of the authors of the research. "But it's not the fault of teenagers that they can't concentrate and are easily distracted. It's to do with the structure of their brains. Adolescents simply don't have the same mental capacities as an adult." Using MRI scans, the brain activity of adolescents were monitored as they tried to solve a problem in their heads while ignoring environmental distractions. The scans revealed an unexpected level of activity in the prefrontal cortex, a large region at the front of the brain involved in decision-making and multitasking. This indicated that the brain was working less effectively than that of an adult. "We knew that the prefrontal cortex of young children functioned in this chaotic way but we didn't realise it continued until the late 20s or early 30s," said Dr Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, who led the study. "What we discovered was that the part of the brain needed to complete this sort of process is still very much developing throughout adolescence. This means it continues to do a lot of needless work when making these sorts of decisions." © Guardian News and Media Limited 2010

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Glia
Link ID: 14125 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Carolyn Y. Johnson They have long been dismissed as the brain’s Bubble Wrap, packing material to protect precious cells that do the real work of the mind. But glial cells — the name literally means “glue’’ — are now being radically recast as neuroscientists explore the role they play in disease and challenge longstanding notions about how the brain works. More than a century ago, scientists proposed the “neuron doctrine,’’ a theory that individual brain cells called neurons are the main players in the nervous system. It became an underpinning of modern neuroscience and led to major advances in understanding the brain, but it has become increasingly apparent that the other 85 percent of brain cells, glia, do more than just housekeeping. “In a play in a theater, it’s not just the actors on the stage, but the whole ensemble that is critical for that production to be perfect,’’ said Philip Haydon, chairman of the neuroscience department at Tufts University School of Medicine. “The players on the stage are neurons, but if you don’t have every person backstage, you don’t have a production, and what we’re now realizing is this whole support cast [of glia] is essential for normal brain function.’’ Haydon became curious about glia nearly two decades ago as an unintentional consequence of an experiment. He killed neurons in a dish of brain cells and left the glia, expecting to see the chemical signals that neurons use to communicate with one another disappear. To his surprise, the signals did not stop — suggesting the glia were not passive. © 2010 NY Times Co

Keyword: Glia; Brain imaging
Link ID: 14124 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Sharon Begley It took Sherlock Holmes to deduce the significance of the dog that didn’t bark.* So maybe it’s understandable that neuroscientists have traditionally ignored the brain activity that just hums away quietly in the background when the brain isn’t doing much of anything. Assuming this “default” or “resting” activity was meaningless random noise, they went so far as to subtract it out—and thus ignore it—on brain images such as PET scans and fMRIs. Oops. Neuroscience is having its dark-energy moment, feeling as chagrined as astronomers who belatedly realized that the cosmos is awash in more invisible matter and mysterious (“dark”) energy than make up the atoms in all the stars, planets, nebulae, and galaxies. For it turns out that when someone is just lying still and the mind is blank, neurons are chattering away like Twitter addicts. The very idea of default activity was so contrary to the herd wisdom that when Marcus Raichle of Washington University in St. Louis, one of its discoverers, submitted a paper about it, a journal rejected it. That the brain might be so active in regions “doing nothing,” he says, had “escaped the neuroimaging establishment.” Now the establishment is catching up, with more and more labs investigating the brain’s default activity and a June meeting in Barcelona on brain mapping devoted to it. The brain is in default mode when we stare into space, sleep, succumb to anesthesia, make our mind a blank while sitting motionless—in short, when the brain’s only task seems to be keeping us alive and breathing. This default activity, to everyone’s surprise, is no mere murmur in the background of a loud symphony. It is the symphony, consuming 20 times as much energy as the conscious life of the mind, including thinking, feeling, and using our senses—the mental acts captured by the brain imaging that so entrances the public. “The brain at rest is not at rest,” says neuroscientist Alvaro Pascual-Leone of Harvard. “Even more important, this resting activity is not random, but is well organized and constitutes the bulk of the brain’s activity.” © 2010 Newsweek, Inc

Keyword: Attention; Brain imaging
Link ID: 14123 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By R. Douglas Fields At the age of 17 he began dissecting corpses from the church graveyard. Between the years 1508 and 1512 he painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Michelangelo Buonarroti—known by his first name the world over as the singular artistic genius, sculptor and architect—was also an anatomist, a secret he concealed by destroying almost all of his anatomical sketches and notes. Now, 500 years after he drew them, his hidden anatomical illustrations have been found—painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, cleverly concealed from the eyes of Pope Julius II and countless religious worshipers, historians, and art lovers for centuries—inside the body of God. This is the conclusion of Ian Suk and Rafael Tamargo, in their paper in the May 2010 issue of the scientific journal Neurosurgery. Suk and Tamargo are experts in neuroanatomy at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. In 1990, physician Frank Meshberger published a paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association deciphering Michelangelo’s imagery with the stunning recognition that the depiction in God Creating Adam in the central panel on the ceiling was a perfect anatomical illustration of the human brain in cross section. Meshberger speculates that Michelangelo surrounded God with a shroud representing the human brain to suggest that God was endowing Adam not only with life, but also with supreme human intelligence. Now in another panel The Separation of Light from Darkness (shown at left), Suk and Tamargo have found more. Leading up the center of God’s chest and forming his throat, the researchers have found a precise depiction of the human spinal cord and brain stem. © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 14122 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Katie Moisse Sprawling blooms of cyanobacteria have swathed the surfaces of lakes and oceans around the world for billions of years. But the serene, blue-green algae may be leaching a neurotoxin into the aquatic food chain, according to a study published May 3 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ( PNAS ). The report revived a nearly 50-year-old debate over the role, if any, of the toxin in the process of neurodegeneration. In the wake of World War II a deadly neurological disease plagued the small island of Guam. The natives called it lytico-bodig (from the Spanish paralytico, meaning weakness) and it had features of Lou Gehrig's (ALS), Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. Endemic to the native population (called Chamorros), the syndrome was 100 times more prevalent on Guam than anywhere else. After ruling out a genetic cause, scientists began the hunt for an environmental trigger that made Chamorros, but not immigrants, susceptible. A staple of the local cuisine raised suspicion. Chamorros made tortillas using flour ground from the seeds of cycads—plants often confused for ferns or palms and distantly related to both. The seeds were meticulously washed to remove toxins, such as beta-methylamino-L-alanine (BMAA), produced by cyanobacteria that inhabit cycad roots. Scientists wondered if BMAA could be causing neurodegeneration, but the concentrations ingested by the Chamorros were not sufficient to harm neurons in animal models. Huge concentrations, however, were. © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: ALS-Lou Gehrig's Disease ; Neurotoxins
Link ID: 14121 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Analysis by Tracy Staedter Fruit flies usually avoid light. But these larvae flock to it. That's because genetic scientists from Ruhr-Universitaet-Bochum Germany spliced a gene for a protein that activates under light into cells in the flies olfactory system that responds to smells. So when the light is turned on, the protein activates, but sends the signals through the fly larva's smell system. The fly perceives the odor of banana, marzipan or glue, normal smells present in rotting fruit, and go into the light. The researchers are able to activate single receptor neurons out of 28 olfactory neurons in the larvae for this sensory perception. That gives them control over turning on cells that normally register repulsive odors and ones that register attractive odors. The experiment doesn't hurt the flies but could give scientists more insight into how the smell sense works. Next, they try the experiment on adult flies and mice. This experiment reminds me of a human condition called synesthesia, which causes people to hear colors or smell music. Perhaps this condition has a genetic source. © 2010 Discovery Communications, LLC

Keyword: Vision; Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 14120 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Jessica Hamzelou Pond snails make unlikely speed freaks. But dosing the gastropods on methamphetamine is helping us understand how certain "pathological memories" form in human addicts. Meth users develop long-term memories of their highs, which is why the sight of places and people connected with a high can cause recovering addicts to relapse into taking the drug. "It's hard to get rid of those memories in addicts," says Barbara Sorg at Washington State University in Pullman. So potent is meth's effect on memory that, in low doses, the drug can be used as a "cognitive enhancer" in kids with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. To probe the drug's effect on memory, Sorg's team placed pond snails in two pools of low-oxygen water, one of which was laced with meth. In low-oxygen conditions snails will surface and use their breathing tubes to access more oxygen. By poking the snails, Sorg's team trained them to associate using the tubes with an unpleasant experience, and so keep them shut. Only the snails on speed remembered their training the following morning, and in a separate experiment it took longer for them to "unlearn" the memory. Humans are obviously more complicated, says Sorg, but "the snails still provide a model of how meth affects memory". The team's goal is to work out how to diminish specific memories, helping addicts recover. Journal reference: Journal of Experimental Biology, DOI: 10.1242/jeb.042820 © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 14119 - Posted: 06.24.2010

David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor "Ardi," the fossil female whose discovery is thought to stretch our human ancestry back more than 4 million years, has been challenged by specialists who discount the evidence of how she lived and maintain she was never a forerunner of the human line. Last October, Tim D. White, the noted UC Berkeley paleoanthropologist, and his colleagues announced in the journal Science their analysis of a partial female skeleton they had discovered after 17 years excavating her fossils in Ethiopia's harsh Afar desert. They named her Ardipithecus ramidus and estimated that she lived 4.4 million years ago. The journal where the analysis appeared hailed it as the "Breakthrough of the Year." Today that same journal is publishing two "technical comments" which raise strong doubts about Ardi's environment and her membership in the human line - as well as two responses from White and his colleagues. One group of scientists led by Thure E. Cerling, a geochemist at the University of Utah, maintains that Ardi's habitat was an open savanna with few trees, where she and her kind would have evolved the ability to walk and run in search of food. It was not the grassy woodland dotted with clumps of trees that White's team had concluded, Cerling and his colleagues said. © 2010 Hearst Communications Inc.

Keyword: Evolution
Link ID: 14118 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Mitch Leslie Some people just can’t help themselves. They wash their hands over and over, scrubbing their skin raw. Or they lock and relock doors, pull out their own hair, or obsessively rearrange the contents of their closet. Now, a study of mice suggests that faulty immune cells prompt such compulsive behaviors. The results raise the possibility of treating obsessive-compulsive disorder by targeting the immune system rather than the brain. Mice are fastidious, regularly cleansing their bodies from nose to tail. But animals with a defective version of the gene Hoxb8 groom themselves so much that they tear out patches of fur and develop skin sores. The behavior resembles a type of obsessive-compulsive disorder called trichotillomania, in which people tug out their own hair. The Hox family of genes is best known for helping to organize the embryo’s body, but Hoxb8 has several effects. The protein encoded by the gene functions in neural development, so mice lacking it have abnormal spinal cords and sensory ability, including pain sensitivity. This defect could in theory provoke the rodents to wash excessively, although molecular geneticist Mario Capecchi of the University of Utah School of Medicine in Salt Lake City and colleagues note that Hoxb8-lacking mice also obsessively groom other mice. That suggests that overcleaning is not a sensory problem but a behavioral one originating in the brain. © 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: OCD - Obsessive Compulsive Disorder; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 14117 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Bruce Bower BOSTON — Young children have a gift for doing things that adults find disgusting. But kids themselves take a surprisingly long time, until about age 5, to grasp the meaning of adults’ facial expressions of disgust, according to evidence presented May 28 at the Association for Psychological Science annual meeting. This conclusion flies in the face of a popular idea that evolution has produced an innate facial expression for this emotion that even infants should comprehend, said Boston College psychologist James Russell. Theoretically, an ingrained recognition of adults’ disgusted expressions would keep youngsters from eating poisonous and potentially fatal items or putting them in their mouths. “From that traditional view, it’s surprising that kids don’t understand facial expressions of disgust until age 5,” Russell says. “But we find that, until then, they see a ‘disgust’ face as being angry.” Russell regards the new results as consistent with his controversial rejection of an influential theory that six emotions that are built in from birth — happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise and disgust — appear in distinctive facial expressions displayed by people everywhere. Instead, Russell proposes that two core feeling dimensions, high arousal to low arousal and positive reaction to negative reaction, provide the building blocks for emotions that get elaborated in each culture. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2010

Keyword: Emotions; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 14116 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ANAHAD O’CONNOR For people suffering from sleep apnea, specialized breathing machines are the standard treatment. The machines use a method called continuous positive airway pressure, or CPAP, which keeps the airway open and relieves potentially dangerous pauses in breathing during the night. But the machines are expensive, and some people complain that the mask and headgear cause uncomfortable side effects, like congestion. One free and fairly simple alternative may be exercises that strengthen the throat. While they aren’t as established or as well studied as breathing machines, some research suggests they may reduce the severity of sleep apnea by building up muscles around the airway, making them less likely to collapse at night. In a study published last year in The American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, scientists recruited a group of people with obstructive sleep apnea and split them into two groups. One was trained to do breathing exercises daily, while the other did 30 minutes of throat exercises, including swallowing and chewing motions, placing the tip of the tongue against the front of the palate and sliding it back, and pronouncing certain vowels quickly and continuously. After three months, subjects who did the throat exercises snored less, slept better and reduced the severity of their condition by 39 percent. They also showed reductions in neck circumference, a known risk factor for apnea. The control group showed almost no improvement. Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Sleep
Link ID: 14115 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By GRETCHEN REYNOLDS Most of us think that exercise improves sleep. But it may be that thinking that exercise improves sleep improves sleep. That, at any rate, is the provocative finding of a new study completed recently in Switzerland and published last month in the journal of the American College of Sports Medicine. For the study, 862 Swiss college students were asked to record how much they exercised, how fit they believed themselves to be (on a scale from 1 to 10) and how well they slept (on a scale from 1 to 8). The correlations between how much some of the students exercised and how fit they believed themselves to be was not very precise. More than 16 percent of the students who rated themselves low on the fitness scale actually exercised the most. In other words, they worked out more than many of the other students but felt they weren’t doing enough. Those students who perceived that they weren’t exercising enough also tended to report sleeping less well, even though they were exercising more than some of the other students. In the end, the researchers found almost no correlation between how much students exercised and how well they slept. What mattered was whether they believed that they were being active enough. Those students who perceived that they were fit slept well. Those who didn’t, did not. As Markus Gerber, a researcher at the Institute of Exercise and Health Sciences at the University of Basel and lead author of the study told me in an e-mail message that the findings suggest that, when it comes to the role of exercise and sleep, “what people think is more important than what they do.” Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Sleep
Link ID: 14114 - Posted: 06.24.2010