The Bengalese finch is what happens when for 250 years, people breed the white-rumped munia for its snowy plumage. It’s paler than its wild counterpart, more social. And although its genetic architects (bird breeders) weren’t selecting for singing skills, the Bengalese finch has a far more complex, varied song. That last bit has some fascinating possible implications, concerning how we developed our own unique speaking abilities. The capacity for complex communication require

For parents of young children hoping to boost their offspring’s language skills, the solution might be simpler than you think: talk to them. And then, crucially, let them respond to you. Rinse and repeat—and repeat, and repeat, as much as you can. In a recent article from the Journal of Neuroscience, researchers studied 40 healthy young children (27 male, 13 female) between the ages of 4 and 6 across a range of socioeconomic backgrounds. Of course, 40 kids is not a large eno

Good news for those of you who make it a point to stay physically active: a recent experiment may suggest that regular exercise decreases the effects of age-related memory loss. In a study published in the journal Cortex, a group of young people (18 to 31 years old) and a group of older folks (55 to 74) each completed a memory test and a fitness test. To determine their memory chops, the participants had to essentially practice attaching a name to a new face—frequently a vexi

It’s an old stereotype that women can pick up on social nuances that men can’t. Ask a neuroscientist whether women are more adept at interpreting feelings from looking at people’s faces, and you’ll get a resounding yes. Or possibly, a resounding no. It turns out that it really depends which neuroscientist you ask. To pick one example, in 2009, Olivier Collignon and his team from the Université de Montréal Centre de recherche en neuropsychologie et cognition (CERNEC) hired act