Articles tagged with Perception
A new study suggests that a visual measure of illness perception can effectively convey symptom-related quality of life for patients with chronic lung illnesses. The study found that patients' visual perceptions of their lung disease were equally effective as standard questionnaires and test results in predicting quality of life.
Researchers at Leibniz Institute for Food Systems Biology found that bitter-tasting herbal extracts stimulate proton secretion in human gastric cells, with polyphenol-rich extracts showing the strongest effects. The study identified three human bitter taste receptor subtypes as key mediators of this response.
Researchers developed a nasal spray that reversibly reduces brain inflammation, restores cellular power plants, and improves memory. The treatment bypasses the brain's protective shield through intranasal delivery, suppressing chronic inflammation and promoting successful brain aging.
A Northwestern University study found that imagination is not just a copy of sensation, but emerges at later stages of processing when the brain represents information holistically. The researchers mapped brain activity during imagination and perception, finding overlap in higher-level association areas.
A recent study found that colour coding is more effective than traditional nutritional tables in influencing consumers' dietary choices, thanks to the brain's instant processing of benefit and risk signals. Colour-coded labels encourage healthier product selection by harnessing visual attention mechanisms.
A research team led by LEE Doyun and KIM Yee-Joon found that the primary visual cortex encodes motion summaries and variability before higher brain regions transform them into category signals. This process, known as ensemble perception, allows the brain to capture the overall structure of a scene at a glance.
A new study from Dartmouth College finds that social information can significantly impact how people experience negative events, including physical pain and mentally demanding tasks. When others describe an experience as painful, individuals tend to feel it that way, even when the actual experience is low in intensity.
A new study found that cannabis intoxication disrupts many types of memory, including verbal, visuospatial, and episodic content memory. Participants who consumed cannabis performed significantly worse than the placebo group on most measures, with significant differences appearing in 15 of the 21 tests.
Researchers have successfully reconstructed videos from mouse brain activity, allowing them to understand how the brain processes visual information. By analyzing the neural activity in the visual cortex, the team created high-quality reconstructions of 10-second video clips, revealing the brain's representation of visual cues.
A new study reveals that animal species with fast-paced ecologies have faster visual perception, tracking prey in mid-air versus grazing slowly across the seabed. This finding supports Autrum's hypothesis and highlights how ecology shapes the tempo of perception across life on Earth.
Research from UNSW Sydney and ANU found that people with average face-recognition ability performed only slightly better than chance in spotting AI-generated faces. Even super-recognisers, who excel at recognizing real human faces, were not immune to being fooled by highly realistic AI-generated images.
Researchers at the University of Rochester found that the brain analyzes global patterns of image motion caused by eye movements to understand how objects move and where they are located in 3D space. This discovery challenges conventional ideas that image motion produced by eye movements is visual noise to be subtracted off.
Research shows that bitter taste receptors can be activated by steroid hormones, influencing physiological processes. The study found that certain hormone types, like progesterone and testosterone, activate these receptors, which may play a role in pregnancy-related taste changes or stress-induced physiological responses.
A COVID-19 survey found that young carers experience higher stress levels with greater care responsibilities. However, they also exhibit positive emotions like a sense of accomplishment and pride. The surveys revealed more pronounced emotional responses in 2024, suggesting growing societal understanding and support for young carers.
Repeated exposure to bodily waste significantly reduces parents' disgust responses, with effects that persist over time. This desensitisation allows parents to care for their children when they are ill, and is an adaptive response to the high-risk environment of childcare.
Research from Karolinska Institutet found that alpha frequency determines body ownership by modulating temporal integration of bodily signals. Faster frequencies led to higher temporal resolution, while slower frequencies caused broader timing differences.
A team from Tokyo Metropolitan University found that numerical information in vision affects spatial perception, introducing complex interplay between object-based processing and number value. Their experiments with squares showed a strong vertical bias when numbers were present, highlighting the impact of the ventral visual stream.
Researchers at Tohoku University demonstrated that taste sensitivity can be enhanced through learning in a novel 'sweet taste recall training.' After just three days of training, participants showed significant improvement in taste sensitivity for all five sweet substances, indicating a sharper perception of sweetness. This finding pro...
A team of researchers from the University of Tokyo used AI and fMRI to study brain activity while participants viewed dance clips. They found that experts exhibited more diverse neural patterns than non-experts, suggesting a greater freedom in artistic expression.
Researchers found that zebra finches categorize calls into about a dozen call-types, similar to how humans hear and group them. The birds' ability to distinguish between calls with similar meaning suggests they have a mental representation of the meaning behind these vocalizations.
Researchers found that a rotating brain wave helps the cortex recover its computational path after a distraction, improving performance in visual working memory tasks. Longer time intervals between distractions also aid recovery.
Researchers at the University of Cambridge found that the human eye has a resolution limit, above which screens provide more information than can be detected. For an average UK living room, a 44-inch 4K or 8K TV does not offer additional benefits over a lower resolution Quad HD TV.
Researchers found that approach-avoidance behavior modulates facial expression recognition, with participants perceiving angry faces more when avoiding the face. This study contributes to understanding the reciprocal relationship between perception and action in social contexts.
Scientists at RIKEN Center for Brain Science found that fruit flies use separate circuits to compute pleasant and unpleasant odors, challenging the idea that 'good' is the opposite of 'bad'. The discovery may contribute to a better understanding of human brain's flavor appreciation mechanisms.
Researchers found that people process sounds differently when walking compared to standing or walking in place. The brain responds more strongly to sounds while walking, and this response changes depending on the direction of the walk.
Hyperthymesics possess extraordinary control over memories of life events, organizing them within a mental space for vivid recall. This ability allows for intense mental travel through time, with some individuals recalling details from different points of view.
Scientists discovered that people struggle to recognize ads on social media due to their ability to blend in with organic content. When participants realized an ad was sponsored, dwell time dropped significantly, indicating a loss of engagement.
A study published in Perception found that people consistently overestimate the steepness of a hill when viewed at an angle, regardless of their eye height. The researchers tested participants' ability to estimate the slope of a wooden ramp while seated, standing on a step ladder, or lying down.
Researchers have established apple snails as a system to study eye regeneration, which may hold the key for restoring vision due to damage and disease. The team discovered that the snail eye is anatomically similar to humans and can regrow itself, with genes such as pax6 playing a crucial role in development.
A new study reveals that the brain has distinct regions for processing 'things', such as rigid objects, versus 'stuff', like liquids or sand. These findings may help the brain plan interactions with different materials, similar to artificial physics engines used in video games.
A UNIGE team has identified a new brain mechanism responsible for modulating sensory signals. This discovery reveals a previously unknown form of communication between the thalamus and somatosensory cortex, which could explain perception variations and open up new avenues for understanding mental disorders.
Researchers found that friends tend to perceive products similarly and exhibit synchronized brain activity when viewed together, even predicting each other's purchasing intentions. As friendships deepen, this similarity strengthens.
A new study by the University of Cambridge found that seaside and blue-colored places are more likely to evoke feelings of nostalgia in people. The research suggests that these environments have visual properties that contribute to positive emotions, including 'fractal property' and high contrast.
A new study found that people's intuitive perception of biodiversity through visual and audio cues is remarkably accurate, aligning closely with scientific measures. Participants sorted images and audio recordings of forests based on perceived biodiversity, noticing vegetation density and light conditions visually, while acoustically d...
Researchers found that perception of visual diversity was linked to color, vegetation density, lighting, and forest structure, while acoustic diversity was linked to birdsong, volume, and seasonal cues. Participants were more accurate when assessing forest biodiversity through sound alone than through sight alone.
A new study published in PNAS Nexus explores how opinions within inner circles influence the perception of social division. The researchers found that consensus within one's circle can exaggerate perceptions of polarization, and that subjective lenses change over time, influencing how individuals perceive societal polarization.
A new study from the University of Bath found that individuals with a higher IQ make more realistic predictions, leading to improved life outcomes. Smarter people are significantly better at forecasting, making fewer errors and showing more consistent judgement compared to those with a lower IQ.
A recent study found that parental firearm storage methods, such as locking and unloading guns, may not be effective in preventing teens from accessing household firearms. Storing additional firearms securely does not necessarily negate the perceived risk of access if at least one gun remains unlocked.
Researchers found that male mosquito brains respond to a wider range of sounds than females and have more diverse responses. This suggests that males use complex acoustic cues to locate females in noisy environments, making traditional traps less effective.
A randomized controlled trial shows that eating more or less sweet-tasting foods didn't change how much people liked sweet flavors. The study found no association between the amount of sweet foods consumed and changes in body weight or biomarkers for diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
A team of researchers investigated the impact of Kyoto's Murin-an garden on viewers' relaxation. They found a correlation between rapid gaze shifts and reduced stress levels. The design features of the well-crafted Japanese garden led to frequent, rapid horizontal shifts in gaze, which induced a calming effect.
Research by MIT neuroscientists reveals that the brain separates its processing of spatial information to maintain cognitive advantage, yet seamlessly blends it with other features. The study also explores how the brain 'hands off' visual information between hemispheres.
A study by Technical University of Munich and University of Vienna found that resistance to restrictive measures is often less robust than feared by policymakers. Once the new rules come into force, people's attitudes towards them decline significantly, revealing a psychological mechanism behind this phenomenon.
A new method to measure touch reception has been developed, allowing robots to accurately sense object curves and edges. By addressing the insulation layer issue in robotic skins, the researchers provided a clear step-by-step guide for trouble-shooting.
A study from Rockefeller University's Charles D. Gilbert lab found that prior experience plays a crucial role in object recognition, allowing neurons to adapt and respond to complex visual stimuli. This countercurrent stream of 'top-down' information enables neurons to update their responsiveness moment-to-moment.
Researchers found that the brain's visual system adapts in real-time to make sense of information, depending on current tasks. This challenges traditional views and opens new approaches for designing AI systems with adaptive capabilities.
A team of researchers from the University of Tokyo and Monash University developed a novel approach to quantify consciousness, specifically analyzing color similarity judgments. They found that color-neurotypical red is relationally equivalent to other color-neurotypical's red, but not to colorblind people's red.
A study found that people process movements differently based on avatar appearance, with a neural system dedicated to perceiving others' movements playing a key role. The findings may help scientists improve human-AI interactions.
A virtual reality experiment found that fear, pain, and expectations can disrupt the mind's grip on the body. The study used the rubber hand illusion to test how top-down factors influence a sense of body ownership in individuals with depersonalization tendencies.
A new analysis of 105-year-old data found that while dazzle camouflage had some effect, the 'horizon effect' had a much greater influence on confusing enemy ships. The study, led by Aston University researchers, showed that when people looked at a ship in the distance, they significantly underestimated its direction of travel.
Research reveals that perceived trustworthiness of others alters brain activity in reward and salience networks, driving assessments of safety and risk. Higher perceived odds of HIV transmission lead to more distrust and activation of the salience network.
Researchers found that desert ants rely on the polarity of the geomagnetic field to navigate during learning walks, contradicting previous findings in other insects. The team manipulated magnetic fields and observed the ants' behavior, concluding that a compass-like navigation system is useful for short-distance navigation.
A study found that people's eyes are drawn to areas with high potential for change before any movement occurs, even when the scene appears static. This behavior is not limited to animate objects and has significant implications for intelligent machines.
A new study from Kessler Foundation scientists examines the determinants of feedback-seeking behavior and its impact on learning. The findings suggest that low confidence in task performance significantly motivates individuals to seek corrective feedback, which enhances learning outcomes.
Fiber-rich food manufacturers can now create palatable products by encapsulating insoluble fibers in a soft, velvety gel coating. The treatment reduces the sensation of grittiness and dryness in the mouth by up to 52% and 36%, respectively.
Researchers at Bar-Ilan University used a novel motion simulator to study rodent navigation in dark environments. The study found that rats use airflow cues, combined with their sense of balance, to enhance their self-motion perception. This breakthrough sheds light on the mechanisms behind sensory processing and brain function.
A study published in Neuron reveals that neurons are wired to connect seemingly unrelated concepts, enhancing the brain's ability to predict what we see based on past experiences. Visual experience influences the organisation of feedback projections, which store information about the world.
A study of Reddit comments on ChatGPT's launch reveals the tech community is more strongly divided in their opinions about AI. While non-tech discussions focus on social issues like job replacement, tech-centric subreddits have more focused and opinionated debates.
Researchers have published an extensive eye-tracking dataset of over 410,000 words for Japanese students learning English. The Tsukuba Eye-tracking Corpus (TECO) provides valuable data for studying reading comprehension and second language acquisition.
A study at TUM has debunked the assumption that people overestimate dramatic causes of death due to media attention. Instead, deaths in personal environments have a more significant impact on risk perception. Respondents can consciously engage with news reports and incorporate other sources into their judgment.