Addiction, alcohol or drugs
Penn and Teller: Twelve Step Programs Are Bullsh** - I kind of disagree sort of
Monday, June 9th, 2008The recovering alcoholics in my life sometimes act like they’re from Jupiter. (Everyone seems to be a recovering something these days. . . ) Their default position is negative attributional bias -they constantly are attacking based on presumed negative intention of others. They then confabulate to back fill facts to match their [...]
Neuro Literature Review: “Neurotech” in Portfolio.com May 2008 is Great
Saturday, June 7th, 2008How could I have missed this? Here’s a brief review of Portfolio.com May 2008 “neurotech” articles and graphics.
Starting with the graphic (click to go to the article) - it’s pretty telling: the two “neurotech” areas most associated with “character flaws” are the lowest revenue business areas — obesity and addition. (Graphic is modified to [...]
Smoking and drinking genetics update: MAOA is methylated
Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008I’ve been suspicious that most behavior is going to be non-Mendelian as far as genetic influences, (see here and here, and here for example) so here’s another study - this one by Philibert et al. - reporting that methylation dials down a gene linked to behavior — in women who smoke and drink. The [...]
Obesity research: Tesofensine and NS2359 drug family for weight loss - Better to block three receptors than only 5HT2c? Nah.
Friday, May 30th, 2008So far, lorcaserin is the only weight loss drug in the near future that makes commercial sense to me, not to say it is the most wonderful drug in the world and the science is, imo, sort of a yawner.
I keep an eye out for better weight loss drugs on the horizon — so here’s [...]
The Post-Smoking Society: Smokers - quick - band together and sell your genomes.
Wednesday, May 21st, 2008The anti-smoking drug Chantix is in the news for having significant side-effects — which brings up a conundrum: which is worse, the drug or the addiction?
New research shows the nature and the environment: (a) some people are clearly genetically loaded to smoke; and (b) when people quit, they quit in groups of three.
Which brings up [...]
Drink Green Beer, Not Green Wine
Monday, March 17th, 2008 On St. Patrick’s day, pour yourself a green beer, not a green wine: wine and spirits cause more hippocampal volume loss than does beer (in chronic alcoholics, anyway).
There are probably other good reasons for not drinking green wine, although some clever marketing group will probably market a sauvignon vert . . . [...]
NYT: This is your brain on NASDAQ
Friday, February 8th, 2008 “Dopamine Futures” original art by Swivelchair
(all rights, if any totally waived, copy it all you want).
If you compare a screen shot of on-line gambling with a screen shot of on-line stock trading, they look very similar. That is probably because humans are hard wired for rewards — if you hunt and are successful, [...]
Studies Cite Head Injuries As Factor in Some Social Ills - WSJ.com
Tuesday, January 29th, 2008Studies Cite Head Injuries As Factor in Some Social Ills - WSJ.com
The Wall Street Journal(subscription required for most, but not this) has an article saying that brain injuries are way more common, and account for way more problems, than we appreciate. (See the video either on [...]
Moderate fetal alcohol x genetics = trouble
Thursday, January 17th, 2008Kraemer et al., “Moderate Level Fetal Alcohol Exposure and Serotonin Transporter Gene Promoter Polymorphism Affect Neonatal Temperament and Limbic-Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis Regulation in Monkeys,” Biol Psychiatry63: 317-324 (2008).
This is another nature x nurture study. We know that in people, if you are mistreated in childhood, and you have a particular gene which causes your [...]
White matter month: Rehab dating
Saturday, January 5th, 2008Chanraud S, Martelli C, Delain F, Kostogianni N, Douaud G, Aubin HJ, Reynaud M, Martinot JL., Brain morphometry and cognitive performance in detoxified alcohol-dependents with preserved psychosocial functioning, Neuropsychopharmacology. 2007 Feb;32(2):429-38. Epub 2006 Oct 18 PMID: 17047671
Continuing “White Matter Month” — should you date someone you met at Rehab? Or should they [...]
Do Psychopaths Dream?
Friday, January 4th, 2008Updated: 02.02.08
Did you every wake up and say, “Wow. That dream was so real.”
My guess is that psychopaths — at least some — don’t do that. If you want to see if someone has psychopathic tendencies, maybe a one question, binary, yes-or-no question is, “do you dream” ?
I’m researching white matter as part of [...]
Neurological Correlates: Neuroeconomics - Who is likely to sue you?
Wednesday, September 26th, 2007Or, how do you pick customers unlikely to sue you? At least with doctors, there is now a paper:
What patient attributes are associated with thoughts of suing a physician? Fishbain, et al., Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 2007 May;88(5):589-96 (full abstract after the jump).