Children who experience everyday conflict between their parents have problems processing emotions, new research shows.

These problems can cause anxiety and over-vigilance, leading them to see conflict even when an interaction is neutral.

Shy children are particularly vulnerable, the study also found.

Maltreatment and neglect have been shown to alter how children process emotions.

But this study shows a lower level of adversity can have a negative effect.

The value of silence is felt by everyone at some point in their life. Silence is comforting, nourishing and cosy. It opens us up to inspiration, and nurtures the mind, body and soul. Meanwhile, the madness of the noisy world is drowning out our creativity, our inner connection and hampering our resilience. Science is now showing that silence may be just what we need to regenerate our exhausted brains and bodies.

Studies show that noise has a powerful physical effect on our brains, causing elevated levels of stress hormones. Sound travels to the brain as electrical signals via the ear. Even when we are sleeping these sound waves cause the body to react and activate the amygdala, the part of the brain associated with memory and emotion, leading to the release of stress hormones. So, living in a consistently noisy environment will cause you to experience extremely high levels of these harmful hormones.

Interestingly, the word noise is said to come from the Latin word nausia, (disgust or nausea) or the Latin word noxia, meaning hurt, damage or injury. Noise has been linked to high blood pressure, heart disease, tinnitus and loss of sleep. We've all experienced the detrimental effects of noise pollution. Excessive noise can be a major affront to the physical senses and today, more and more people are identifying as highly sensitive and unable to function in chaotic and noisy environments. But now science has the proof not only that noise hurts, but also that silence heals.

Risk of developing dementia is one-third lower.

Memory often worsens with age - it is a normal part of the aging process.

But, when do mild memory problems signal the onset of Alzheimer's?

Ironically, people who realise their memory is getting worse are less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease, new research finds.

Self-awareness, then, is a healthy sign.

Doctors have long suspected that people who seem unaware of their memory problems are at higher risk of dementia, but this is one of the first studies to demonstrate it.

Spatial representations of surroundings, including those outside the visual field, are crucial for guiding movement in a three-dimensional world. The visual system appears to provide sufficient information for movement despite our visual field being limited to the frontal region. However, this theory had not been scientifically tested until now.

A group led by Professor Satoshi Shioiri from the Research Institute of Electrical Communication at Tohoku University in Japan, used a visual search experiment to demonstrate that the human visual system indeed has the ability to perceive things beyond the limits of the visual field. The team designed a 6-panel-display which covered a 360 degree area surrounding the viewer. On each panel display, six letters appeared at the same time.

Have you ever been told when you're stressed to stop worrying and just relax? That it's all in your head? It would be nice if it were that simple. But it's not.

Physiology research shows that the stress response memory lives in your nervous system. Take for example exposure to a stressful event. One in which you felt helpless, hopeless, and lacked control. In this case your autonomic nervous system (ANS) is engaged. This is the part of the nervous system responsible for controlling unconscious bodily actions like breathing. To be more specific, it was the sympathetic branch (fight or flight) of the ANS that kicked in while you were strained. In addition, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis of the midbrain began firing. In which a signal from your hypothalamus sends a hormonal message to your pituitary gland that stimulates to your adrenal glands.

People studying artistic subjects like painting, music or drama are 90% more likely to be hospitalised for schizophrenia later in life, new research reveals.

The epidemiological study adds weight to the argument that creativity is linked to madness.

Among almost 4.5 million Swedish people, those studying creative subjects were also 62% more likely to be hospitalised for bipolar disorder.

Similarly, they were 39% more likely to be hospitalised for depression.

Hospitalisations were most likely to occur when the person reached their 30s.

IN 1965, a pair of psychologists from the University of Washington handed a questionnaire to 50 carefully selected motorists in the Seattle area. It focused on driving skills, but Caroline Preston and Stanley Harris weren't trying to find out how good the drivers were. They already had a pretty clear handle on that. They wanted to know how good the drivers thought they were.

The questionnaire was straightforward. It asked the drivers to rate their abilities from 0 to 9, with 0 being "very poor" and 9 being "expert". Preston and Harris probably expected the drivers to rank themselves nearer to zero than to 9. To their surprise, they found the exact opposite.

Given who these drivers were, that was very, very odd.

Back in the 1960s, traffic fatalities were a growing problem in the US. Around 36,000 people died in 1960, 39,000 in 1962 and 46,000 in 1964. Road crashes were the leading cause of death in children and young adults - and were costing a fortune.

A good deal of research into their causes was being done, mainly on vehicle design and traffic engineering. But a few researchers were becoming interested in the psychology and behaviour of drivers. That is what attracted Preston to the problem. She may have been seeking to discover some psychological trait that could be used to reduce the accident rate, but instead she inadvertently began a revolution in our understanding of the human mind that continues to unfold more than half a century later.

The childhood capacity to play creatively helps kids learn how to solve problems more effectively. Children develop their motor and mechanical skills, as well as planning skills and teamwork. The fact that many of our children now spend little time playing outdoors, growing up instead with commercial toys, video game consoles, computer games, and television prevents them from learning practical things in such a simple and joyful way as playing creatively in nature. Spending more time in nature or in a garden can bring this aspect back into the development of our children.

Spending time in nature can also significantly help children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Richard Louv, a contributor to the New York Times and the Washington Post, speaks of the "Ritalin of nature" and advocates that children be treated with time in nature instead of with medication. But even for children without ADHD, the effects of being in nature boost attention and concentration.

Can we treat psychosis by listening to the voices in our heads?

Sarah was four years old when her spirit guide first appeared. One day, she woke up from a nap and saw him there beside her bed. He was short, with longish curly hair, like a cherub made of light. She couldn't see his feet. They played a board game-she remembers pushing the pieces around-and then he melted away.

After that, he came and went like any child's imaginary friend. Sarah often sensed his presence when strange things happened-when forces of light and darkness took shape in the air around her or when photographs rippled as though shimmering in the heat. Sometimes Sarah had thoughts in her head that she knew were not her own. She would say things that upset her parents. "Cut it out," her mother would warn. "This is what they put people in psychiatric hospitals for."

Sarah was the youngest of four siblings. Her father was a sales manager for a pharmaceutical company, and he traveled a lot while his wife stayed home with the kids. Sarah's mother was a strict disciplinarian. She was determined to straighten out her children, whom she felt had been spoiled by the housekeeper they'd left behind when they moved to California. Sarah remembers one day, not long after she played the game with her spirit guide, when she and some neighborhood kids tried to set up a barbecue in the back yard. Her babysitter found them in the basement, burning strips of paper in the pilot light of the furnace. When Sarah's mother came home, she held the girl's fingers in the flame of a cigarette lighter as punishment.

As Sarah grew up, she started to dislike the strange experiences she had, and she decided that they could not be real. Then she went to college and became a nurse, and she began to see the souls of dead patients leave their bodies. Sometimes what emerged was a transparent version of the corpse. Other times she saw what the patients must have looked like when they were young. A few would stand next to the bed. More floated up to the ceiling and looked down. They were usually startled to see their own bodies and horrified to witness the pummeling they took from doctors trying to keep them alive.

Impostor syndrome causes people to doubt their achievements and fear that others will expose them as fraudulent. The condition can affect anyone, regardless of their job or social status.

Psychologists first described the syndrome in 1978. Research from 2011 suggests that approximately 70 percent of people will experience at least one episode of impostor syndrome in their lives. It may be especially prevalent among women considered to be high-achievers.

Many people experience symptoms for a limited time, such as in the first few weeks of a new job. Others may battle feelings of incompetency for their whole lives.

In this article, we discuss the many techniques a person can use to overcome impostor syndrome.