A new study published online (Aug. 3) in the journal PLoS ONE reveals that almost two-thirds of Americans believe that memory works like a video camera, accurately recording events for later review.
Follow the link to test yourself with the online survey. The survey is for educational purposes only, but University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign psychologist Daniel Simons and Union college psychologist Christopher Chabris worked with a polling company to ask the same questions to Americans over the telephone.
Older people taking new generation antidepressants are at more risk of dying or suffering from a range of serious health conditions including stroke, falls, fractures and epilepsy, a study involving researchers at The University of Nottingham has found.
The research, published on bmj.com,with a full report due on www.hta.ac.uk discovered that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are more strongly associated with an increased risk of several adverse outcomes in people over the age of 65 with depression compared with older tricyclic antidepressants (TCAs).
The authors say the risks and benefits of different antidepressants should be carefully considered when prescribing these drugs to elderly patients and have called for further research to investigate the findings.
Dr Carol Coupland, Associate Professor in Medical Statistics in The University of Nottingham’s Division of Primary Care said: “We’ve found some evidence from our study that the older tricyclic antidepressants may be associated with lower risks of several adverse outcomes compared with newer antidepressants in older people diagnosed as having depression.
“This was an unexpected finding, and so further research using other data sources is needed to confirm these findings as well as provide more evidence on the benefits of different antidepressants in this group of people.”
Depression is a common condition in older people and antidepressants — particularly SSRIs — are widely used. However, very little is known about the safety of these drugs in older people.
The team of researchers from the Universities of Nottingham and East Anglia set out to investigate the potential link between antidepressant treatment and the risk of a number of potentially life-threatening outcomes in older people. [continue reading…]
Many of us have a social media presence — a virtual personality made up of status updates, tweets and connections, stored in the cloud. Adam Ostrow asks a big question: What happens to that personality after you’ve died? Could it … live on?
When it comes to rearing children, just about any parent will say that what works with one kid might not work with another. Parents use all sorts of strategies to keep kids from being cranky, grumpy, fearful or moody, while encouraging them to be independent and well-adjusted.
But which parenting styles work best with which kids? A study by University of Washington psychologists provides advice about tailoring parenting to children’s personalities.
At the end of the three-year study, the psychologists found that the right match between parenting styles and the child’s personality led to half as many depression and anxiety symptoms in school-aged children. But mismatches led to twice as many depression and anxiety symptoms during the same three years.
The study was published online Aug. 1 in the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. [continue reading…]
