Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but what’s influencing our eye? Scientists reveal that it’s not genetics but life experiences that lead us to find one face more attractive than another. This finding furthers the on-going debate of nature versus nurture.

Here's how the study went down: Researchers asked 547 pairs of identical twins and 214 pairs of same-gender fraternal twins to view 200 faces and rate them on a scale of one to seven, with one being the least attractive and seven the most attractive. A group of 660 non-twins then completed the same survey. If genes were more involved in facial preference, identical twins would have had similar ratings; if the influence of a familial environment carried more weight, fraternal twins w ...

Perhaps one of my favourite TEDtalks. Amy Cuddy’s research on body language reveals that we can change other people’s perceptions - and even our own body chemistry - simply by changing body positions. Her take-home message is simple, instead of faking it till you make it and living a life as an impostor, you must fake it till you become it.

Now you have an excuse to take more breaks at work - tell your boss or TEACHER "science said so!".

This family tree illustrates the lineages of Indo-European and Uralic languages though-out human history, and how some of the world's most-used languages came to be. And it's pretty enough to put on your wall.

Learning about how to become an elephant is almost synonymous with learning how to rediscover what it means to be human. Understanding elephants and saving elephants is a lesson in humanity. So many traits that are innate in elephants are those that we humans strive to be and possess. The "Elephant Lessons" take what we learn about elephant minds, culture and lives and applies it to our own everyday living to cultivate elephant qualities that are within each of us. Today's Lesson focuses on the Importance of Family.
 
Dame Daphne Sheldrick (photo shown above), the founder and director of The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, has lived in Kenya and has been hand-rearing baby and orphaned elephants for over thirty years. She notes that they share ...

Hate winter? Scientists believe they've found the protein that causes winter-specific depression, a psychological condition known as seasonal affective disorder (SAD). According to study conducted by the University of Copenhagan in Denmark, people who develop SAD have less access to serotonin, the brain signalling compound associated with feelings of well-being and happiness, as the days get shorter in the winter months. This is because their brains ramp up the production of a transporter protein called serotonin transporter, which transports serotonin into the nerve cells where it’s not active.

Source: http://sciencealert.com.au/news/20142710-26407.html ...