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mPFC

·May 15, 2025·5 min read

The Brain Learns to Fear Through Inference, Not Just Experience

A new study reveals how rats can learn to fear through inference, offering insights into the neural basis of higher-order emotions. By pairing a neutral sound and image, then associating the image with an unpleasant experience, researchers showed that rats later feared the sound alone—demonstrating inferred emotional learning.

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·May 10, 2024·7 min read

Brain Flexibility: Neurons Multitask to Shape Perception and Action

A new study explains how the brain balances flexibility with focus through "mixed selectivity" in neurons. This mechanism allows neurons to participate in multiple computational tasks simultaneously, thus enhancing cognitive flexibility.

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·February 27, 2023·4 min read

How the Brain Creates Your Taste in Art

Using a combination of machine learning and neuroimaging data, researchers revealed a neural basis for aesthetic appreciation.

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·June 24, 2022·2 min read

Researchers Uncover Brain Waves Related to Social Behavior

Study reveals brain wave activity in the medial prefrontal cortex and amygdala associated with social behavior in mice.

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Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·May 23, 2022·5 min read

How Do You Know Not to Laugh at a Funeral? This Region of the Brain Is Key

Researchers reveal the role the prefrontal cortex plays in emotional processing and emotional suppression.

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Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·May 21, 2022·5 min read

Psychedelics: How They Act on the Brain to Relieve Depression

Researchers explore the effect psychedelics have on the brain and how they are effective at treating depression.

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·October 14, 2021·5 min read

Unique Brain Signature of Intimate Partner Aggression Identified

Study reveals blunted activity in the medial prefrontal cortex was associated with aggressive behaviors by abusive partners in relationships.

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·April 26, 2021·3 min read

How the Brain Encodes Social Network Structure

Brain regions associated with spatial processing also appear to govern and encode information about social relationships.

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Featured Neuroscience

·February 24, 2021·5 min read

New Experiences Enhance Learning by Resetting Key Brain Circuit

Novel experiences dampen previous memory representations in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, facilitating flexible strategy encoding in mice.

This diagram shows social acting monkeys

Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles Psychology

·November 2, 2020·3 min read

How the Brain Allows Actions Based on Social Cues

Information flow between the ventromedial premotor cortex and medial prefrontal cortex makes it possible for monkeys to correctly identify social cues.

Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles

·September 1, 2020·4 min read

Study Sheds Light on Brain Mechanism Activated by Uncertainty

Neurons in the medial prefrontal cortex respond more to loss than to gain. Avoidance of risk-taking is affected by an area of the hippocampus that is associated with memory and anxiety. The findings suggest a close relationship between memory processing and decision making when risk is present, especially in stressful situations. The fresh insights might help guide new psychiatric therapies for disorders marked by excessive avoidance, such as anxiety, and depression, and also mania and addiction, where excessive risk-taking is a common feature.