Recently, Orhan and Lake demonstrated the computational plausibility that children can acquire sophisticated visual representations from natural input data without inherent biases, challenging the need for innate constraints in human learning. The findings may also reveal crucial properties of early visual learning and inform theories of human visual development. Read Full Article (External Site) Dr. […]

Salient objects often capture attention in a purely exogenous way, followed by inhibition of their locations after a period. Yet, the neural circuits underlying the exogenous attention remain underspecified. Seidel Malkinson et al. explore this by uncovering large-scale cortical gradients associated with exogenous attention within the human cortex. Read Full Article (External Site) Dr. David […]

The motivations to protect oneself and others have often been seen as conflicting. Here, we discuss recent evidence that self-defensive mechanisms may in fact be recruited to enable the helping of others. In some instances, the defensive response to a threat may even be more decisive in promoting helping than the response to a conspecific’s […]