Human Quirks: Living Well

February 10, 2025

Top Headlines

New Device Uses Electrically Assisted Wind to Fight Fires

Feb. 4, 2025 — Researchers have developed a new portable tool that could improve how firefighters douse fires, making the process more efficient and far less ...

The Big Chill: Is Cold-Water Immersion Good for Our Health?

Jan. 31, 2025 — In a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis, researchers have taken a deep dive into the effects of cold-water immersion on health and wellbeing. Analyzing data from 11 studies with 3177 participants, researchers found that cold-water ...

New Insights Into the Perception of Coffee Taste -- Genetic Predisposition Plays a Role

Jan. 29, 2025 — Why does coffee taste more bitter to some people than it does to others? Researchers have now come closer to answering this question. They have identified a new group of bitter compounds in roasted ...

Building Sentence Structure May Be Language-Specific

Jan. 21, 2025 — Do speakers of different languages build sentence structure in the same way? In a neuroimaging study, scientists recorded the brain activity of participants listening to Dutch stories. In contrast to English, sentence processing in Dutch was based ...

Latest Headlines

updated 9:28am EST

Salt Deposit Ring Inside Your Pasta Pan?

Jan. 21, 2025 — If you've ever tossed a generous pinch of salt into your pasta pan's water for flavor or as an attempt to make it boil faster, you've likely ended up with a whitish ring of deposits inside the pan. A ...

Electrohydraulic Wearable Devices Create Unprecedented Haptic Sensations

Jan. 8, 2025 — Scientists have invented compact wearable devices that deliver rich, expressive, and pleasant tactile sensations that go far beyond the buzzing vibrations of today's consumer ...

Heart Rate Activity Influences When Infants Speak

Dec. 17, 2024 — A psychologist found that a baby's first sweet sounds and early attempts at forming words are directly linked to the baby's heart ...

World Cup Soccer Is Getting Faster for Men and Women Alike

Dec. 17, 2024 — If the experience of watching a FIFA World Cup soccer final is intense, spare a thought for the players, who are competing at an ever increasing intensity, according to a new ...

Travelers Weigh in on Weight-Based Airfares for Eco-Friendly Skies

Dec. 17, 2024 — The holidays are in full swing and people are shopping, wrapping and packing to visit loved ones. Along with the extra fees for checked baggage and seat upgrades, some airlines are also considering ...

How the Dirt Under Our Feet Could Affect Human Health

Dec. 12, 2024 — Researchers are linking human activity to increased gene transfer from soil bacteria to ...

Dogs Use Two-Word Button Combos to Communicate

Dec. 9, 2024 — A new study shows that dogs trained to use soundboards to 'talk' are capable of making two-word button combinations that go beyond random behavior or simple imitation of their ...

Gaming for the Good!

Nov. 18, 2024 — It turns out gaming is good for you! New research indicates massive multiplayer online gamers learn by gaming and their skills in the workplace are enriched by those seemingly endless hours ...

AI Headphones Create a 'Sound Bubble,' Quieting All Sounds More Than a Few Feet Away

Nov. 14, 2024 — Researchers have created a headphone prototype that allows listeners to hear people speaking within a bubble with a programmable radius of 3 to 6 ...

Chimpanzees Perform Better on Challenging Computer Tasks When They Have an Audience

Nov. 8, 2024 — When people have an audience watching them, it can change their performance for better or worse. Now, researchers have found that chimpanzees' ...

Sound Is a Primary Issue in the Lives of Skateboarders, Study Shows

Jan. 31, 2025 — Sound plays a significant and often poignant part of skateboarders' relationship with their sport, a new study ...

Working Dogs Take a Day to Adjust to Daylight Savings Time, but Pets Are More Flexible

Jan. 29, 2025 — Working dogs take a day to adjust to the change in routine caused by Daylight Savings Time, whereas pet dogs and their owners seem to be unaffected, according to a new ...

Judging Knots Throws People for a Loop

Dec. 9, 2024 — We tie our shoes, we put on neckties, we wrestle with power cords. Yet despite deep familiarity with knots, most people cannot tell a weak knot from a strong one by looking at them, research ...

Giving a Gift? Better Late Than Never, Study Finds

Dec. 9, 2024 — If you feel terrible about giving a late gift to a friend for Christmas or their birthday, this study has good news for you. Researchers found that recipients aren't nearly as upset about ...

Texting Abbreviations Makes Senders Seem Insincere, Study Finds

Nov. 14, 2024 — If you want to seem sincere and receive more responses to your texts, spell out words instead of abbreviating them, according to new ...

Into the Great Wide Open: How Steppe Pastoralist Groups Formed and Transformed Over Time

Oct. 30, 2024 — With the 'time-traveling ability' of archaeogenetic studies it has become possible to shed light onto the dynamic past of human populations world-wide. Integrated with archaeological and ...

Nixing Narcolepsy Nightmares

Oct. 23, 2024 — A new study has demonstrated a new way to treat narcolepsy-related nightmares. The scientists combined cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and lucid dreaming to help patients in a small clinical ...

People Hate Stories They Think Were Written by AI: Even If They Were Written by People

Oct. 21, 2024 — AI-written stories are getting better, but people still distrust AI-generated ...

Butterfly Brains Reveal the Tweaks Required for Cognitive Innovation

Oct. 18, 2024 — A species of tropical butterfly with unusually expanded brain structures display a fascinating mosaic pattern of neural expansion linked to a cognitive ...

People Sympathize With Bullied AI Bots

Oct. 17, 2024 — In a new study, humans displayed sympathy towards and protected AI bots who were excluded from ...

Viruses Are Teeming on Your Toothbrush, Showerhead

Oct. 9, 2024 — Microbiologists found that showerheads and toothbrushes are teeming with an extremely diverse collection of viruses -- most of which have never been seen ...

Toddlers Show Increased Physical Activity With a Robot Playmate Moving Around the Room

Oct. 9, 2024 — Parents seeking help in encouraging toddlers to be physically active may soon need to look no further than an inexpensive robotic buddy for their kids, a new study ...

Bottlenose Dolphins 'Smile' at Each Other While Playing

Oct. 2, 2024 — Dolphins are extremely playful, but little is known about how they -- and other marine mammals -- communicate during playtime. New research shows that bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncates) use the ...

AI Simulation Gives People a Glimpse of Their Potential Future Self

Oct. 2, 2024 — 'Future You' is a generative AI tool that enables users to have a simulated conversation with a potential version of their future selves. The chatbot is meant to reduce users' anxiety, ...

'Who's a Good Boy?' Humans Use Dog-Specific Voices for Better Canine Comprehension

Oct. 1, 2024 — Humans slow their own speech when talking to their dogs, and this slower tempo matches their pets' receptive abilities, allowing the dogs to better understand their commands, according to a new ...

Feet First: AI Reveals How Infants Connect With Their World

Oct. 1, 2024 — Researchers explored how infants act purposefully by attaching a colorful mobile to their foot and tracking movements with a Vicon 3D motion capture system. The study tested AI's ability to ...

Sharing Biosignals With Online Gaming Partners to Enhance a Mutual Sense of Social Presence Between Complete Strangers

Sep. 27, 2024 — Although interactive online platforms, including esports platforms, aim to foster close connections between people, they often fall short of supporting the creation of bonds between the interaction ...

Increased Antioxidants and Phenolic Compounds Produced in Salted Red Perilla Leaves During Japanese Apricot Pickling

Sep. 26, 2024 — Antioxidant content and activity are increased during the processing and digestion of Japanese apricots pickled with salted red perilla leaves, new research ...

'Out-of-Body' Research Could Lead to New Ways to Promote Social Harmony

Sep. 9, 2024 — Out-of-body experiences, such as near-death experiences, can have a 'transformative' effect on people's ability to experience empathy and connect with others, new research ...

How Fish Guts Might Play a Role in Future Skin Care Products

Sep. 5, 2024 — There are some pretty strange ingredients in cosmetics and skin care products. One example is snail mucin -- also known as snail slime -- which is used for its moisturizing and antioxidant ...