By John Cloud Why is it so uncomfortable to stand really close to a stranger? Sure, there are the potentially icky things. Sometimes an elevator car is so crowded that you can smell a fellow rider's shampoo or chewing gum (or worse). But even when a stranger is perfectly groomed, it's usually a bit revolting to be pressed against him in public. Evolution seems to have programmed this discomfort via a brain structure called the amygdalae, a pair of almond-shaped brain regions deep within each temporal lobe that control fear and the processing of emotion. It's your amygdalae that keep you from getting so close to another person that he could easily reach out, gouge an eye, and then drag your woman off by her hair. (See the top 10 scientific discoveries of 2008.) So what happens if you disable the amygdalae? This is not something you could (ethically) do to a research subject, but scientists have been studying a 42-year-old woman who has such severe damage to her amygdalae — due to a rare genetic condition called Urbach-Wiethe disease, which causes calcification in the temporal lobes — that they have stopped functioning. The patient's identity isn't public, but neuroscientists call her SM, and a new paper in the journal Nature Neuroscience reports the results of experiments judging her conception of personal space. A team of scientists from Caltech put SM through a series of tests in which they asked her to indicate the position at which she became uncomfortable as another woman, a researcher, approached her. SM's preferred personal distance was 1.1 ft. (0.34 m), about half the preferred distance (2 ft., or 0.64 m) of a group of comparison subjects. © 2009 Time Inc.

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 13239 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By CATHERINE SAINT LOUIS MANY of the nearly 30 million Americans who suffer from migraines end up feeling like guinea pigs. Chronic patients — those who are laid low 15 or more days a month — often cycle through drug after drug in search of relief. They also contend with side effects like mental sluggishness and stomach upset. Treatment involves guesswork because doctors have not pinpointed what causes migraines, nor do they know which drugs will best help which patients. “It can be a merry-go-round going from medication to medication in pursuit of control,” said Dr. Roger K. Cady, the vice president of the board for the National Headache Foundation, a nonprofit organization devoted to patient education. No wonder that earlier this month, news of a surgical “cure” that touts a high success rate ricocheted worldwide. The double-blind study, published in the journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, found that more than 80 percent of patients who underwent surgery in one of three “trigger sites” significantly reduced their number of headaches compared with more than 55 percent of the group who had sham surgery. More than half of the patients with the real surgery reported a “complete elimination” of headaches compared with about 4 percent of the placebo group. Forehead lifts are cosmetic procedures that plastic surgeons typically perform to smooth furrowed brows. But a decade ago, after some of his patients reported that their migraines improved post-operation, Dr. Bahman Guyuron, a plastic surgeon and the lead author of the study, began to search for a surgical solution that could address migraine trigger points — which he defines as where the headache begins and settles — in the forehead, temples and the back of the head. Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Pain & Touch
Link ID: 13238 - Posted: 06.24.2010

An injectable hydrogel could aid recovery from brain injury by helping stimulate tissue growth at the site of the wound, researchers say. Research on rats suggests the gel, made from synthetic and natural sources, may spur growth of stem cells in the brain. The gel has been developed by Dr Ning Zhang at Clemson University, South Carolina, who presented her work to a conference on military health research. She predicted the gel may be ready for human testing in about three years. Following a brain injury the tissues tend to swell up and this causes the loss of even more cells, compounding the damage caused by the original wound. The standard treatments attempt to minimise this secondary damage at the site of the injury, for instance by lowering the temperature or relieving the build up of pressure. However, their impact is often limited. Scientists believe that transplanting donor brain cells into the wound to repair tissue damage is potentially a more productive approach. But while this method has had some success in treating some central nervous system diseases, it has produced very limited results when used to treat brain injuries. The donor cells do not tend to thrive at the site of injury, or to stimulate repair. This could be due to inflammation and scarring at the injury site, and the lack of supportive tissue and blood supply to provide the necessary nutrients. Researchers say the advantage of the new gel, which is injected into the injury in liquid form, is that it can be loaded with different chemicals to stimulate various biological processes. (C)BBC

Keyword: Regeneration
Link ID: 13237 - Posted: 09.03.2009

A British study has cast doubt on the supposed link between cannabis use and schizophrenia, but at least one Australian researcher says the study needs more evidence. Previous research has suggested cannabis use increases the risk of being diagnosed with either psychosis or schizophrenia. This latest study, led by Dr. Martin Frisher of Keele University, examined the records of 600,000 patients aged between 16 and 44, but failed to find a similar link. "An important limitation of many studies is that they have failed to distinguish the direction of association between cannabis use and psychosis," the authors write in the September edition of the journal Schizophrenia Research. They point out that "although using cannabis is associated with a greater risk of developing psychosis, there is also evidence of increased cannabis use following psychosis onset." Frisher and colleagues compared the trends of cannabis use with general practitioner records of schizophrenia and psychosis. They argue that if cannabis use does cause schizophrenia, an increase in cannabis use should be followed by an increase in the incidence of schizophrenia. © CBC 2009

Keyword: Schizophrenia; Drug Abuse
Link ID: 13236 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Constance Holden The two sides of the brain are responsible for different tasks in many animals. In people, for example, the left side is usually the language center, whereas the right side handles more visual and spatial chores. Now, research on parrots shows that this separation increases brainpower. For many years, researchers thought that the division of labor in the brain, known as cerebral lateralization, was unique to humans. But recent research has shown that such lateralization is actually pervasive in vertebrates. A leading theory suggests that the attribute leads to faster, more accurate problem-solving. The theory holds true for minnows--the ones whose brains are lateralized are better at catching shrimp while simultaneously keeping an eye out for predators--but many other species haven't been tested. Among birds, parrots and crows are renowned for their cleverness. So behavioral ecologist Culum Brown and biologist Maria Magat of Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, tested 40 parrots from eight different Australian species. Just as right-handedness indicates left-brain dominance in most humans, brain laterality was determined in birds by observing which eye each bird used to fixate on a piece of food and which foot grabbed it. Each bird received a laterality score ranging from 0 (no preference) to 5 (strongly lateralized). The parrots were then given two tests. One involved picking out seeds from a background of similar-looking pebbles; their performance was evaluated by dividing the number of seeds consumed by the number of pecks. The more challenging task required birds to obtain food hanging below their perch on a 50-centimeter-long string. Hauling up the prize is a problem requiring a lot of beak, foot, and eye coordination. © 2009 American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Laterality
Link ID: 13235 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Lynne Peeples Music is known to induce terror and tears, as well as inspire dance. Even basic human speech itself is laced with emotional direction: a musical pattern of long drawn out sounds versus short brief ones can be the difference between calming and exciting a child. Might it then be possible for a composer to manipulate an audience's emotions with some carefully chosen notes? That was the question posed by David Teie, a composer and cellist in the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C.. Little did he know that the query would lead him to write shrilly monkey music, and open a new door into animal communication and the evolutionary roots of human speech. Teie did know that seeking an answer from human subjects wouldn't work—children form emotional associations with music early on, which leads to biased responses throughout life. He needed a species that didn't necessarily listen to music, but still had a rich vocal repertoire. The obvious choice: monkeys. But a problem arose there, too. Monkeys not only don't listen to our music, they seemed to despise it. In fact, prior research had found that cotton-top tamarins, a South American monkey, preferred silence over both German technopop and Mozart. It was still possible that monkeys did like music, but perhaps just didn't share human tastes. So the musician teamed up with Charles Snowdon, a psychology professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, to compose some monkey music and watch to see how tamarins would respond. © 1996-2009 Scientific American Inc.

Keyword: Hearing; Evolution
Link ID: 13234 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Nathan Seppa Children born to women who have achieved drastic weight loss through stomach surgery are healthier than children born to severely obese moms, a new study shows. The findings suggest that obesity creates an unhealthy environment for a fetus that has ramifications later on, scientists report in the November Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism. “This is very important work,” says Dana Dabelea, a physician and epidemiologist at the University of Colorado–Denver and the Colorado School of Public Health in Aurora. “This is the first proof that exposure to obesity in utero is associated with long-term effects,” she says. Severely obese women should be encouraged to lose weight before becoming pregnant, asserts study coauthor John Kral, a surgeon at the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn. Obese women who are interested in having kids and getting weight-loss surgery at some point in their lives should get the surgery first, he says. Kral collaborated with researchers at University of Laval in Quebec City in contacting 49 women who had given birth and had also undergone a specific type of obesity surgery. About half of the women had one child before surgery and another child after. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2009

Keyword: Obesity; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13233 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Claire Ainsworth AT 43 years old, New York chef Thomas Pallozzi-Haynes was morbidly obese and close to despair. While his initial weight gain had been triggered by type 2 diabetes, he now found himself in an endless cycle of failed diets and weight gain that ultimately caused him to balloon to 124 kilograms. The chef's long commute to work was a misery thanks to backache and gut cramps from his diabetes medication. Like many overweight people, he ran a daily gauntlet of judgemental comments from other people, and eventually struggled to walk, sleep and even breathe properly. "My biggest fear was that something would happen to me medically," he recalls. "How would I take care of my wife and child?" Pallozzi-Haynes's life turned a corner when he watched a TV documentary about gastric bypass surgery, designed to physically limit the amount of food that the stomach can hold and restrict the gut's absorption of nutrients. On 17 April Pallozzi-Haynes signed up for the operation. The surgery closes off most of the stomach, leaving only a sac about the size of a walnut to receive food. Then the stomach's exit is replumbed so that it connects to the gut further down (see diagram). Clearly these drastic procedures will cut your calorie intake, but here's the strange thing: the operation is much more successful than anyone could have expected. Even though they can't eat as much, people who have undergone surgery are not constantly ravenous, in stark contrast to those dieting through will power alone. It seems the gut normally secretes hormones that make us feel hungry or full, and bypass surgery ramps up production of the ones that make us feel full. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Obesity
Link ID: 13232 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Teenagers who have minor depression are at a higher risk of mental health problems later in life, a study says. Psychiatrists at Columbia University and the New York State Psychiatric Institute spoke to 750 people. Anxiety, severe depression and eating disorders were all far more common in 20 and 30-year-olds who had had minor depression as adolescents, they found. The British Journal of Psychiatry report said further research was needed to unpick the reasons for the link. UK charities said specialist services for young people were vital. The study was based on interviews with 750 14 to 16-year-olds who were then assessed again as adults. It found that 8% of participants had minor depression as teenagers. By the time they got to their 20s and 30s, the risk of them having major depression was four times higher than those who did not have signs of minor depression at the first interview. There was a two-and-a-half times increased risk of agoraphobia, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder and a threefold risk of anorexia or bulimia. The researchers defined minor depression as milder than clinical depression but lasting at least two weeks and including symptoms such as feeling down, losing interest in activities, sleeping problems and poor concentration. Study leader Dr Jeffrey Johnson said more research was needed to see if depression problems in teenagers were an early phase of major depressive disorder or if minor depression earlier in life contributed to the development of more serious problems later on. (C)BBC

Keyword: Depression; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13231 - Posted: 09.01.2009

By BENEDICT CAREY If there is a society of expert sleepers out there, a cult of smug snoozers satisfied that they’re getting just the right number of restful hours a night, it must be a secretive one. Most people seem insecure about their sleep and willing to say so: they would like to get a little more; maybe they wish they could get by on less; they wonder if it’s deep enough. And they are pretty sure that being up at 2 a.m., pacing the TV room like a caged animal, cannot be good. Can it? In fact, no one really knows. Scientists aren’t sure why sleep exists at all, which has made it hard to explain the great diversity of sleeping habits and quirks in birds, fish and mammals of all kinds, including humans. Why should lions get 15 hours a night and giraffes just 5 — when it is the giraffes who will be running for their lives come hunting time? How on earth do migrating birds, in flight for days on end, sleep? Why is it that some people are early birds as young adults and night owls when they’re older? The answer may boil down to time management, according to a new paper in the August issue of the journal Nature Reviews Neuroscience. In the paper, Jerome Siegel, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angeles, argues that sleep evolved to optimize animals’ use of time, keeping them safe and hidden when the hunting, fishing or scavenging was scarce and perhaps risky. In that view, differences in sleep quality, up to and including periods of insomnia, need not be seen as problems but as adaptations to the demands of the environment. Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Sleep; Evolution
Link ID: 13230 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Carol and Dave Ochs What Carol remembers: I didn't think much of it when, one Thursday a few months ago, my husband asked me where he kept his vitamins. I thought he was joking when he asked me where he worked. What sort of annoying game was this, when I was scrambling to make breakfasts, pack lunches, feed the dog and get the kids to school? I didn't have time for 20 Questions. But then Dave asked again. And again. There was panic in his voice. "Where do I work?" It wasn't a joke. My husband was losing bits of his memory. * * * What Dave remembers: My day had started like any other in our house. I got dressed to work out, headed downstairs, rode the stationary bike for a half-hour or so, and then did some weight and resistance work. I remember doing abdominal crunches, and for some reason they were unusually hard that morning. I'd been an athlete, trained to fight through when the body struggled to find its rhythms, but this was tough and I was straining. That's the last memory my brain would make for the next six hours. I don't remember the end of my workout. I don't remember returning upstairs to ask for my vitamins. I don't remember panicking. I don't remember. Not then, not today. © 2009 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 13229 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By DAN BARRY Within the chemotherapy alumni corps there exists a mutual respect not unlike the bond shared by veterans of war. Sometimes that respect is silently conveyed; not everyone wants to talk about it. And sometimes it is shared in the shorthand of the battle-hardened. Where? Esophagus. Who? Sloan-Kettering. What kind? Cisplatin, fluorouracil, Drano, Borax ... . Side effects? The usual: nausea, vomiting, hair loss. And the toes are still numb. Yeah. At this point the two chemo alums may begin to sense a phantom metallic taste at the back of their throat, a taste sometimes prompted by the intravenous infusion of the corrosive chemicals intended to save their lives. A strong drink might be in order; maybe two. With that first, taste-altering sip, the two might begin to discuss another side effect that has received attention lately, the one rudely called “chemo brain”: the cognitive fogginess that some patients experience after completing their regimen. That fogginess does not always completely lift, and oncologists are now taking seriously what they might once have dismissed as a complaint rooted in advanced age or cancer fatigue. For me, reading about chemo brain has resurrected that faint taste of metal. I underwent chemotherapy in 1999 and again in 2004, thanks to a profoundly unwelcome recurrence. Depending on one’s perspective, I was both unfortunate and fortunate. Unfortunate in that I endured all the concomitant fears and indignities, twice. Fortunate in that I had the option of chemotherapy, twice. Not all cancers respond; not everyone is so lucky. Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Attention; Neurotoxins
Link ID: 13228 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Sunny Bains A MONKEY sits on a bench, wires running from its head and wrist into a small box of electronics. At first the wrist lies limp, but within 10 minutes the monkey begins to flex its muscles and move its hand from side to side. The movements are clumsy, but they are enough to justify a rewarding slug of juice. After all, it shouldn't be able to move its wrist at all. A nerve connection in the monkey's upper arm had previously been blocked with an anaesthetic that prevented signals travelling from its brain to its wrist, leaving the muscles temporarily paralysed. The monkey was only able to move its arm because the wires and the black box bypassed the broken link. The monkey was in Eberhard Fetz's lab at the University of Washington in Seattle. The experiment, performed last year, was the first demonstration of a new treatment that might one day cure paralysis, which is typically caused by a broken connection in the spinal cord. Though much work has focused on using stem cells to regrow damaged nerve fibres, some researchers believe that an electronic bypass like this is equally viable. The idea is to implant electronic chips in the relevant regions of the brain to record neural activity. Then a decoder deciphers the neural chatter, often from thousands of neurons, to figure out what the brain wants the body to do. These messages must then be relayed - ideally wirelessly - to electrodes that deliver a pulse of electricity to stimulate the muscles into action. Such "brain chips" are already restoring hearing to the deaf and vision to the blind, and helping to stave off epileptic fits, so the idea isn't as far-fetched as it might sound (see "Bionic medicine"). © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Robotics; Regeneration
Link ID: 13227 - Posted: 06.24.2010

The number of unexplained infant deaths - or cot deaths - has been falling, provisional figures from the Office of National Statistics suggest. There were 264 such deaths in 2007 across England and Wales, down 7% on the year before - which itself saw a significant fall in numbers. The rate was highest among babies born outside marriage where only the mother registered the birth. What causes the deaths is unclear, but there are measures to reduce the risk. These include putting a baby on its back to sleep, not smoking in the vicinity of the baby and not sharing a bed if the parent is very tired or has been drinking. The majority of deaths were among babies of a normal birthweight - 2,500 grammes or 5.5lbs and above, and occurred between 28 days and one year of age. At a rate of 1.42 per 1,000 live births, the rate among unmarried mothers registering the birth alone was eight times that of babies born within marriage. For births inside and outside marriage - and where the baby was registered by both parents - the death rate among parents in the routine and manual occupations was twice that among those classified as managerial or professional. Age was also a factor: rates were highest in mothers under 20, and fell the older she became. There were also regional variations: the North East had the highest rate, at 0.66 per 1,000 births, and the East of England the lowest, at 0.32 per 1,000. The figures include deaths described both as sudden infant deaths and those for which the cause is "unascertained" after a full investigation. ONS researchers said the terms were used interchangably by coroners. (C)BBC

Keyword: Sleep
Link ID: 13226 - Posted: 08.31.2009

Infants and preschoolers often appear to have a carefree life but a study suggests almost 15 per cent may have high levels of depression and anxiety. In the five-year study of 1,758 children born in Quebec and their mothers, 15 per cent of preschoolers suffered from atypically high levels of depression and anxiety, researchers reported in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. Feelings of depression and anxiety are a normal part of a child's develoment that increase over the preschool years, the researchers said. It's abnormally high levels of depression and anxiety that are of concern. "We found that children with difficult temperaments and maternal depression were the most important risk factors. These risk factors can be helped by interventions," said study author Sylvana Côté, a professor at the University of Montreal's department of social and preventive medicine. The signs can be spotted as early as the first year of life, the researchers found. For the study, mothers were interviewed about whether the child was nervous, high strung or tense, fearful or anxious, worried, less happy than other children or had difficulty having fun. The questions are considered a reliable way of determining whether children are at risk for depression and anxiety. Infant temperament and a mother's history of depression were important predictors of atypically high depressive and anxiety problems during preschool years, the researchers found, after controlling for low education and maternal antisocial behaviour. © CBC 2009

Keyword: Depression; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13225 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By MARIA CHENG, BARCELONA, Spain – An experimental drug reduces the stroke risk in patients with irregular heartbeats by nearly four times, compared with the popular drug warfarin — but possibly at a cost, according to new research released Sunday. Patients taking the new drug dabigatran etexilate, made by German pharmaceutical Boehringer Ingelheim, also were slightly more likely to have heart attacks or stomach pain, according to the research presented at the European Society of Cardiology meeting in Barcelona. Patients with irregular heartbeats are up to 17 times more likely to have a stroke than healthy people. About one-sixth of all strokes occur in patients with irregular heartbeats who also have other risk factors such as smoking or obesity. In the United States, there are about 2 million people with such a condition. Until now most such patients have been given warfarin, which has been around since the 1950s and has side effects including bleeding risks and requires lifestyle changes such as dietary restrictions. Doctors hope the new drug can help improve treatment for patients, who must be monitored continuously if they are put on warfarin and avoid alcohol and foods such as spinach and cranberries. © 2009 The Associated Press.

Keyword: Stroke
Link ID: 13224 - Posted: 06.24.2010

In a finding that sheds new light on the neural mechanisms involved in social behavior, neuroscientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have pinpointed the brain structure responsible for our sense of personal space. The discovery, described in the August 30 issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience, could offer insight into autism and other disorders where social distance is an issue. The structure, the amygdala—a pair of almond-shaped regions located in the medial temporal lobes—was previously known to process strong negative emotions, such as anger and fear, and is considered the seat of emotion in the brain. However, it had never been linked rigorously to real-life human social interaction. The scientists, led by Ralph Adolphs, Bren Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience and professor of biology and postdoctoral scholar Daniel P. Kennedy, were able to make this link with the help of a unique patient, a 42-year-old woman known as SM, who has extensive damage to the amygdala on both sides of her brain. "SM is unique, because she is one of only a handful of individuals in the world with such a clear bilateral lesion of the amygdala, which gives us an opportunity to study the role of the amygdala in humans," says Kennedy, the lead author of the new report. © 2002-2009 redOrbit.com.

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 13223 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Ewen Callaway A man's spit may indicate what kind of father and husband he is. In polygamous societies, men with high levels of testosterone in their saliva are more likely to take several wives and give their children less attention, compared to those with less of the sex hormone coursing through their bodies. The new study of rural Senegalese villagers adds to previous work underscoring testosterone's critical role in a mating and parenting. High testosterone levels have been linked to increased sexual activity, infidelity and marital conflict. However, after men become fathers, their bodies typically pump out less of the hormone. "This is good for us, so we can adapt to social challenges very quickly," says Alexandra Alvergne, an anthropologist at the University of Montpellier, France, and the University of Sheffield, UK, who led the new study. To find out whether testosterone's connection to mating and parenting also applies in societies where men may have several wives, Alvergne measured testosterone levels in 21 polygynous fathers as well as 32 monogamous dads and 28 unmarried men without children, all living in Senegalese villages. She also asked the men's wives how much time and money their husband devoted to his family. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Hormones & Behavior; Aggression
Link ID: 13222 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Gaia Vince It's hard to ignore a face filled with disgust, but people with an unsightly skin disorder seem to have a muted response to such facial expressions. This reduced sensitivity may serve to protect them from hurtful reactions. Christopher Griffiths, a dermatologist at Manchester University, UK, and colleagues showed people with psoriasis – a non-infectious skin condition that produces reddening and lesions – a series of images of faces while scanning their brains. Images of disgusted faces elicited less activation in the insular cortex, which processes feelings and observations of disgust, compared with a control group. Images of fearful faces produced normal levels of activation in the amygdala, which responds to fear, in both groups. Volunteers with psoriasis were also less likely to identify disgust in faces that showed only subtle signs of the emotion, compared with controls. People often react with disgust to psoriasis, even thought it is not infectious, says Griffiths. He reckons the brain adaptations in people with the disease "emerged to protect people that do not conform to facial norms". The psychological burden of the disorder is always far worse than the physical pain, says Linda Papadopoulos, a psychodermatologist based in London who specialises in the social effects of skin disorders. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 13221 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jessica Bennett | Newsweek Web Exclusive Ricky Gervais's new film, The Invention of Lying, is about a world where lying doesn't exist, which means that everybody tells the truth, and everybody believes everything everybody else says. "I've always hated you," a man tells a work colleague. "He seems nice, if a bit fat," a woman says about her date. It's all truth, all the time, at whatever the cost. Until one day, when Mark, a down-on-his-luck loser played by Gervais, discovers a thing called "lying" and what it can get him. Within days, Mark is rich, famous, and courting the girl of his dreams. And because nobody knows what "lying" is, he goes on, happily living what has become a complete and utter farce. It's meant to be funny, but it's also a more serious commentary on us all. As Americans, we like to think we value the truth. Time and time again, public-opinion polls show that honesty is among the top five characteristics we want in a leader, friend, or lover; the world is full of woeful stories about the tragic consequences of betrayal. At the same time, deception is all around us. We are lied to by government officials and public figures to a disturbing degree; many of our social relationships are based on little white lies we tell each other. We deceive our children, only to be deceived by them in return. And the average person, says psychologist Robert Feldman, the author of a new book on lying, tells at least three lies in the first 10 minutes of a conversation. "There's always been a lot of lying," says Feldman, whose new book, The Liar in Your Life, came out this month. "But I do think we're seeing a kind of cultural shift where we're lying more, it's easier to lie, and in some ways it's almost more acceptable." As Paul Ekman, one of Feldman's longtime lying colleagues and the inspiration behind the Fox TV series "Lie To Me," defines it, a liar is a person who "intends to mislead," "deliberately," without being asked to do so by the target of the lie. Which doesn't mean that all lies are equally toxic: some are simply habitual—"My pleasure!"—while others might be altruistic. But each, Feldman argues, is harmful, because of the standard it creates. And the more lies we tell, even if they're little white lies, the more deceptive we and society become. © 2009 Newsweek, Inc

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 13220 - Posted: 06.24.2010