Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Friends for Life: An Emerging Biology of Emotional Healing - New York Times

Research on the link between relationships and physical health has established that people with rich personal networks — who are married, have close family and friends, are active in social and religious groups — recover more quickly from disease and live longer. But now the emerging field of social neuroscience, the study of how people’s brains entrain as they interact, adds a missing piece to that data.

The most significant finding was the discovery of “mirror neurons,” a widely dispersed class of brain cells that operate like neural WiFi. Mirror neurons track the emotional flow, movement and even intentions of the person we are with, and replicate this sensed state in our own brain by stirring in our brain the same areas active in the other person


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/10/health/psychology/10essa.html?ex=1318132800&en=bc81f39f082cfaa0&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

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