readings in psychology for january 27 2011

Spanish Tortilla is something special and really not what you might expect. This is what I enjoyed today so CLICK on the picture and see our recipe!

Here is what I am reading today:

• butterflies have a brain GPS?

“A new study takes a close look at the brain of the migratory monarch butterfly to better understand how these remarkable insects use an internal compass and skylight cues to navigate from eastern North America to Mexico each fall. The research, published by Cell Press in the January 27 issue of the journal Neuron, provides key insights into how ambiguous sensory signals can be integrated in the brain to guide complex navigation.”

• the brain and addiction

“The growing numbers of new cases of substance abuse disorders are perplexing. After all, the course of drug addiction so often ends badly. The negative consequences of drug abuse appear regularly on TV, from stories of celebrities behaving in socially inappropriate and self-destructive ways while intoxicated to dramatization of the rigors of drug withdrawal on “Intervention” and other reality shows.”

• want to pick the colors consumer’s prefer? Ask a neuroscientist!

“Derval conducted her research on men and women of various ethnicities: Chinese, Caucasian, African and Middle-Eastern. Subjects reported their lower-order aberrations (nearsightedness or farsightedness), and then declared which color they preferred, which color they found relaxing and which color they found irritating. The reported colors were classified by their wavelength in nanometers (nm). Derval found the correlation between visual acuity and color preference to be slightly stronger in women than in men.”

• excitable rat brain linked to risky behavior

“Using a rat model, behavioral scientists are examining brain activity that could explain why adolescents are more vulnerable to drug addiction, behavioral disorders, and other psychological ills.”