Research from the UCSD Center for Mindfulness suggests that what distinguishes people who are resilient in the face of physical challenges from others may be a natural capacity for the kind of self-awareness that mindfulness teaches, in other words, that body mindfulness and peak performance may be inextricably linked. Psychologist Lori Haase, and her colleagues at UCSD, have conducted a series of …
TMS Stimulates Brain Growth
In a recent poster presented at the 2015 Society of Biological Psychiatry meeting Martin Lan and colleagues presented data from the first study of structural changes in the brain following TMS. In the study, 27 patients in an episode of major depression underwent MRIs before and after receiving TMS treatment. Several cortical regions related to cognitive appraisal, the subjective experience of …
Chronic Pain and Depression
Chronic pain and depression often co-occur in the relationship between the two experiences can be hard to separate. An important article just published in Biological Psychiatry (Barthas, et al) identifies 2 sets of circuits in the brain for processing pain: One is located in the anterior cingulate cortex and seems to be involved in the emotional experience of pain, the …
Brain Morphometry Separates Bipolar vs Unipolar
Brain Morphometry refers to a technique for comparing the sizes of different structures in the brain. A new study suggests that using MRI scans of brains it is possible to distinguish between bipolar and unipolar depression with some degree of accuracy (70 – 80% accuracy). The study looked at two separate groups of patients, one from Munster, Germany and one …