Papers in this group
-
-
The backlash against the recreational use of psychedelic drugs in the 1960s had a negative eff ect on research into their potential therapeutic benefi t. But now attitudes are changing and work in this area is being revitalised, with several…
-
Age-old battle lines over the puzzling nature of mental experience are shaping a modern resurgence in the study of consciousness. On one side are the long-dominant ‘physicalists’ who view consciousness as an emergent property of the brain’s neural…
-
How are hierarchically structured sequences of objects, events or actions learned from experience and represented in the brain? When several streams of regularities present themselves, which will be learned and which ignored? Can statistical…
-
A complex interplay between the pattern of DNA methylation and a large and growing number of post-translational modifications (PTMs) of histones contribute to the epigenetic regulation of gene transcription. This epigenetic regulation involves…
-
Recent research focusing on the participation of astrocytes in glutamatergic tripartite synapses has revealed mechanisms that support cognitive functions common to human and other mammalian species, such as learning, perception, conscious…
-
-
As indicated by the profound cognitive impairments caused by cholinergic receptor antagonists, cholinergic neurotransmission has a vital role in cognitive function, specifically attention and memory encoding. Abnormally regulated cholinergic…
-
Good sleep is necessary for physical and mental health. For example, sleep loss impairs immune function, and sleep is altered during infection. Immune signalling molecules are present in the healthy brain, where they interact with neurochemical…
-
-
Gap junctions are important to how the brain functions but are relatively under-investigated with respect to their contribution towards behaviour. In the present study a single trial discrimination avoidance task was used to investigate the effect…
-
Various philosophical definitions of free will are first considered. The compatibilist definition, which says simply that acts are freely willed if they are not subject to constraints, is identified as much used in the legal system and essentially…
-
-
BACKGROUND: Classic work on visual short-term memory (VSTM) suggests that people store a limited amount of items for subsequent report. However, when human observers are cued to shift attention to one item in VSTM during retention, it seems as if…
-
The stimulus complexity of naturally occurring odours presents unique challenges for central nervous systems that are aiming to internalize the external olfactory landscape. One mechanism by which the brain encodes perceptual representations of…
-
Cognitive control allows humans to overrule and inhibit habitual responses to optimize performance in challenging situations. Contradicting traditional views, recent studies suggest that cognitive control processes can be initiated unconsciously. To…
-
Hippocampal replay is thought to be essential for the consolidation of event memories in hippocampal-neocortical networks. Replay is present during both sleep and waking behavior, but although sleep replay involves the reactivation of stored…
-
Converging evidence from humans and nonhuman primates is obliging us to abandon conventional models in favor of a radically different, distributed-network paradigm of cortical memory. Central to the new paradigm is the concept of memory network or…
-
Consciousness involves phenomenal experience, self-awareness, feelings, choices, control of actions, a model of the world, etc. But what is it? Is consciousness something specific, or merely a byproduct of information processing? Whatever it is,…
-
In a recent article, [Sergent, C. & Dehaene, S. (2004). Is consciousness a gradual phenomenon? Evidence for an all-or-none bifurcation during the attentional blink, Psychological Science, 15(11), 720-729] claim to give experimental support to the…