Have you ever wondered why you jump when you’re startled? Maybe you wonder why you have a harder time handling stress and anxiety than your friends and family do. Part of the reason might lie in your ...

A study published in Nature Neuroscience examined the role the amygdala plays in diet regulation. Researchers at Cold Spring Research Laboratory found a group of neurons in the amygdala prompt mice to ...

Using MRI scans of almost 1,000 Dutch people, researchers show that there is indeed a connection between brain structure and ideology. However, the connection is smaller than expected. Nevertheless, ...

Conservative voters have slightly larger amygdalas than progressive voters—by about the size of a sesame seed. In a replication study publishing September 19 in the Cell Press journal iScience, ...

For a long time, the claim has been made that the brains of conservative people are different than those of progressives. Using MRI scans of almost 1,000 Dutch people, researchers from the University ...

In 1995, author Daniel Goleman coined the term “amygdala hijack”–an idea that has subsequently appeared in countless blogs, self-help books, and videos. According to this idea, a part of the brain ...

Forget crowd sizes — a new study confirms that conservatives boast slightly larger amygdalas, the part of the brain that plays a key role in identifying and reacting to potential threats, compared ...

Avery Hurt is a freelance science journalist who frequently writes for Discover Magazine, covering scientific studies on topics like neuroscience, insects, and microbes. View Full Profile. Sit ...

Psychotherapy caused measurable changes in the brains of people with severe depression, MRI scans revealed. Specifically, most patients experienced growth in brain regions responsible for processing ...