Understanding How the Brain Speaks Two Languages Hablan dos idiomas? You should, if you know what's good for you Learning to speak was the most remarkable thing you ever did. It wasn’t just the 50,000 words you had to master to become fluent or the fact that for the first six years of your life you learned about three new words per day. It was the tenses and the syntax and the entire scaffolding o

We don’t think of emotional states as passing from one person to another, but a new study suggests some depressive thoughts can go viral. Researchers studying a group of college students found that certain types of depressive thinking can spread from close-living roommates like a lingering flu. Although many people see depression as a chemical imbalance in the brain, scientists say social context

Pepsi’s latest refresher claims to fend off fat. But is a healthy soda an oxymoron? “Pepsi Special,” the new drink distributed by Pepsi’s partner in Japan, Suntory Holdings Limited, contains dextrin, a dietary fiber that dissolves in water and is found in fiber supplements such as Benefiber. Eaten appropriately, in fiber-rich foods such as vegetables and fruits, fiber helps to regulate the digesti

For one day a week, citizens in the city of Los Angeles are encouraged to be ‘veg heads.’ On Friday, the LA city council unanimously passed a resolution that declares every Monday a “Meatless Monday,” becoming the largest city to endorse the movement to curb meat consumption. The resolution [PDF] is voluntary for citizens, and the councilmen say it was passed in “support of comprehensive sustainab

Women who drank five or more cups of coffee a day were about 50% less likely to get pregnant through in-vitro fertilization (IVF) than non-drinkers, according to a recent Danish study. “Although we were not surprised that coffee consumption appears to affect pregnancy rates in IVF, we were surprised at the magnitude of the effect,” said lead researcher Dr. Ulrik Schiøler Kesmodel of the Fertility

Snoring and cover-hogging aside, studies increasingly suggest that couples enjoy health benefits just from sharing a bed. According to a round-up of emerging research by Wall Street Journal reporter Andrea Petersen, sleeping with a partner may be part of the reason that people in happy, committed relationships tend to have better health and longer lives than singletons. The new findings challenge