Mental Health Update

Researchers at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London have been looking into abnormalities in the white matter of people's brains and how this can lead to the development of schizophrenia. Professor Philip McGuire and Dr Sophia Frangou used a technique called diffusion tensor imaging to examine the white matter of adolescents and adults with schizophrenia. They found that the adolescents had severe deficits of white matter in the posterior (back) region of the brain; specifically the parietal region. In the older patients the white-matter abnormalities had "migrated" to the front of the brain where they had a dramatic impact on the frontal lobes. ... Read Full Story

Last year the UK government reclassified cannabis from a class C to a class B drug, partly out of concerns that cannabis, especially the more potent varieties, may increase the risk of schizophrenia in young people. But the evidence for… Read Full Story

Last year the UK government reclassified cannabis from a class C to a class B drug, partly out of concerns that cannabis, especially the more potent varieties, may increase the risk of schizophrenia in young people. But the evidence for… Read Full Story

Despite advice to 'never judge a book by its cover' people often judge by first impressions, whether it is a profile picture on a social-networking site or at a job interview. Now new research by psychologists at the University of Texas suggests that these judgements can be surprisingly accurate. The psychologists showed the participants in the study photographs of 123 subjects they had never met before. Some of the photographs were in a controlled, 'neutral' pose and others were more natural. The accuracy of the participants' judgements were compared to the self-assessments of the subjects and assesments of the subjects by their three closest ... Read Full Story

Sadly, for most people nowadays - barring lottery wins - early retirement is just a distant pipe dream. However, for those people lucky enough to be able to take it it could bring a dramatic improvement in sleep quality. Researchers from the University of Turku in Finland studied 14,714 employees of the French national gas and electricity company Electricite de France-Gaz de France who retired at an average age of 55. All of the participants had reported sleep disturbances at least once before and after their retirement. Overall the prevalence of sleep disturbance fell from 24.2% in the last year before retirement to 17.8% ... Read Full Story