Articles
I am a contributing editor at Scientific American and write the Brain Waves blog for Psychology Today (you can find those posts here). My work has also appeared in The Atlantic, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Time, Vogue and many other publications. Earlier in my career, I was on staff at Newsweek, and People, among other places and I’ve included a few of my old favorites from those days.
Hearing Aids Stave Off Cognitive Decline
By Josh Fischman, Tanya Lewis, Carin Leong, Elah Feder Hearing aids may help maintain better brain functions in older people, and better health overall. Full Transcript Tanya Lewis: Hi, this is Your Health, Quickly, a Scientific American podcast series! Josh Fischman: We highlight the latest vital health news: Discoveries that affect your body and your mind. Lewis: And we break…
Hearing Aids May Lower Risk of Cognitive Decline and Dementia
As few as 15 percent of people who would benefit from hearing aids use them A friend recently noticed that she couldn’t always hear her phone ringing or family members calling from another room. A hearing test revealed mild loss in high frequencies, which was possibly age-related—she is in her…
Adjusting Your Body Clock May Stave Off Cancer
I usually get up by 7 A.M. and am in bed by 10 P.M. I tend to eat meals at the same times of day, too. This may sound a little dull, but it’s essential for my productivity. It’s also a schedule that rarely disrupts my body clock. And a steady clock, it turns out, just might help me and many other people avoid cancer and some other diseases, according to new research.
Brain Waves Synchronize when People Interact
Neuroscientists usually investigate one brain at a time. They observe how neurons fire as a person reads certain words, for example, or plays a video game. As social animals, however, those same scientists do much of their work together—brainstorming hypotheses, puzzling over problems and fine-tuning experimental designs. Increasingly, researchers are bringing that reality into how they study brains.
Too Much ‘Good’ Cholesterol Can Harm the Heart
Credit: Jay Bendt HDL cholesterol raises disease risk at levels above 80 milligrams per deciliter Anyone who has annual check-ups, as I do, knows that an optimal cholesterol level consists of not one number but two. Low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL) should be less than 130 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL), ideally….
You Don’t Really Need 10,000 Daily Steps to Stay Healthy
Credit: Jay Bendt New research points to different step counts based on age and fitness level In 2022 I averaged 9,370 steps a day. I know. I counted. Or rather my iPhone counted. I carried it everywhere—not so much to catch every call as to catch every step. My daily…