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December 28, 2023

2023’s Mind-Bending Revelations in the Brain Sciences

This year the explosion of interest in AI had a profound impact on how experts in the fields of neuroscience and psychology think about biological intelligence and learning

By Gary Stix

This year was full of roiling debate and speculation about the prospect of machines with superhuman capabilities that might, sooner than expected, leave the human brain in the dust. A growing public awareness of ChatGPT and other so-called large language models (LLMs) dramatically expanded public awareness of artificial intelligence. In tandem, it raised the question of whether the human brain can keep up with the relentless pace of AI advances.

The most benevolent answer posits that humans and machines need not be cutthroat competitors. Researchers found one example of potential cooperation by getting AI to probe the infinite complexity of the ancient game of Go—which, like chess, has seen a computer topple the highest-level human players. A study published in March showed how people might learn from machines with such superhuman skills. And understanding ChatGPT’s prodigious abilities offers some inkling as to why an equivalence between the deep neural networks that underlie the famed chatbot and the trillions of connections in the human brain is constantly invoked.

Importantly, the machine learning incorporated into AI has not totally distracted mainstream neuroscience from avidly pursuing better insights into what has been called “the most complicated object in the known universe”: the brain. One of the grand challenges in science—understanding the nature of consciousness—received its due in June with the prominent showcasing of experiments that tested the validity of two competing theories, both of which purport to explain the underpinnings of the conscious self.

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The past 12 months provided lots of examples of impressive advances for you to store in your working memory. Now here’s a closer look at some of the standout mind and brain stories we covered in Scientific American in 2023.

AI Drives a Machine That Can Decode the Contents of Your Brain

Researchers proved the usefulness of merging AI with neuroscience by reporting how they combined a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) brain scan with AI-driven LLMs to try to figure out what is actually going on in a person’s head. Demonstrated at the University of Texas at Austin, the model replicated—with a fair degree of accuracy—the stories a person listened to or made up while in the scanner. The researchers recorded brain activity when the participant listened to certain words. The data from these scans were then used to train an AI model to detect patterns in how the brain activated in response to these words. Then the system took a new set of scans, and the AI predicted, based on its training, what a person heard during those scans. It may be some time before you can buy this kind of technology on Amazon; such deductive feats require a ton of training. The best the current system can do is provide a rough gist of what’s in your head.

Victories in Go Inspire Better Gameplay

When the “superhuman” AI created by Google’s outfit DeepMind defeated then champion Lee Sedol at the strategy game of Go in 2016, it spurred collective hand-wringing about what this kind of superiority might imply for humans (who had previously been felled by computers in chess). Some researchers took it upon themselves to study exactly how Go players reacted to the defeat . The findings, published in March, hold some optimism for the future of human collaborations with AI systems: The study revealed that the Go community took Sedol’s defeat as a learning experience. These players analyzed the program’s moves and discovered that some had never been seen before in human gameplay. They then incorporated those moves into their own games—an example of an AI-human interaction that ultimately improved human gameplay and offered ideas about how such collaborations can better human decision-making.

Will We Finally Understand Consciousness by the Year 2048?

Headlines around the world revealed the outcome of a 25-year-old bet between philosopher David Chalmers and neuroscientist Christof Koch. The wager, settled at a New York University conference in June, was over whether neuroscience would be able to supply a “clear” neural signature of consciousness by this year. Koch—who thought a quarter-century ago that the consciousness signature would be QED by now—had to reluctantly agree that this lofty goal had yet to be reached. He proceeded to fork over a case of fine wine to Chalmers, and then he vowed to revisit the matter in another 25 years to assess whether more “clarity” had been achieved toward hacking consciousness. The conference also highlighted the results of experiments intended to test two leading theories of consciousness; it was agreed that both of them need a lot more work.

Quashing Bad Thoughts Makes You Feel Better

Not everything in the brain sciences has to do with AI. Clinical psychologists have done stellar work without the need to necessarily draw upon the resources of  an LLM. One simple at-home type of step has to do with turning off a negative flow of thoughts that might be streaming inside your head. The idea that if you ignore distressing thoughts and imagery, they’ll inevitably come back to haunt you later does not measure up, according to a study by researchers at the University of Cambridge in England. This is great news for people with anxiety, depression or trauma. Suppression of this flow of negativity really does seem to ratchet down the intensity of one’s inner fears.

In the brain, bursts of beta rhythms implement cognitive control

Bursts of brain rhythms with "beta" frequencies control where and when neurons in the cortex process sensory information and plan responses. Studying these bursts would improve understanding of cognition and clinical disorders, researchers argue in a new review.

The brain processes information on many scales. Individual cells electrochemically transmit signals in circuits but at the large scale required to produce cognition, millions of cells act in concert, driven by rhythmic signals at varying frequencies. Studying one frequency range in particular, beta rhythms between about 14-30 Hz, holds the key to understanding how the brain controls cognitive processes -- or loses control in some disorders -- a team of neuroscientists argues in a new review article.

Drawing on experimental data, mathematical modeling and theory, the scientists make the case that bursts of beta rhythms control cognition in the brain by regulating where and when higher gamma frequency waves can coordinate neurons to incorporate new information from the senses or formulate plans of action. Beta bursts, they argue, quickly establish flexible but controlled patterns of neural activity for implementing intentional thought.

"Cognition depends on organizing goal-directed thought, so if you want to understand cognition, you have to understand that organization," said co-author Earl K. Miller, Picower Professor in The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory and the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT. "Beta is the range of frequencies that can control neurons at the right spatial scale to produce organized thought."

Miller and colleagues Mikael Lundqvist, Jonatan Nordmark and Johan Liljefors at the Karolinska Institutet and Pawel Herman at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, write that studying bursts of beta rhythms to understand how they emerge and what they represent would not only help explain cognition, but also aid in diagnosing and treating cognitive disorders.

"Given the relevance of beta oscillations in cognition, we foresee a major change in the practice for biomarker identification, especially given the prominence of beta bursting in inhibitory control processes … and their importance in ADHD, schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease," they write in the journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences .

Experimental studies covering several species including humans, a variety of brain regions, and numerous cognitive tasks have revealed key characteristics of beta waves in the cortex, the authors write: Beta rhythms occur in quick but powerful bursts; they inhibit the power of higher frequency gamma rhythms; and though they originate in deeper brain regions, they travel within specific locations of cortex. Considering these properties together, the authors write that they are all consistent with precise and flexible regulation, in space and time, of the gamma rhythm activity that experiments show carry signals of sensory information and motor plans.

"Beta bursts thus offer new opportunities for studying how sensory inputs are selectively processed, reshaped by inhibitory cognitive operations and ultimately result in motor actions," the authors write.

For one example, Miller and colleagues have shown in animals that in the prefrontal cortex in working memory tasks, beta bursts direct when gamma activity can store new sensory information, read out the information when it needs to be used, and then discard it when it's no longer relevant. For another example, other researchers have shown that beta rises when human volunteers are asked to suppress a previously learned association between word pairs, or to forget a cue because it will no longer be used in a task.

In a paper last year, Lundqvist, Herman, Miller and others cited several lines of experimental evidence to hypothesize that beta bursts implement cognitive control spatially in the brain, essentially constraining patches of the cortex to represent the general rules of a task even as individual neurons within those patches represent the specific contents of information. For example, if the working memory task is to remember a pad lock combination, beta rhythms will implement patches of cortex for the general steps "turn left," "turn right," "turn left again," allowing gamma to enable neurons within each patch to store and later recall the specific numbers of the combination. The two-fold value of such an organizing principle, they noted, is that the brain can rapidly apply task rules to many neurons at a time and do so without having to re-establish the overall structure of the task if the individual numbers change (i.e. you set a new combination).

Another important phenomenon of beta bursts, the authors write, is that they propagate across long distances in the brain, spanning multiple regions. Studying the direction of their spatial travels, as well as their timing, could shed further light on how cognitive control is implemented.

New ideas beget new questions

Beta rhythm bursts can differ not only in their frequency, but also their duration, amplitude, origin and other characteristics. This variety speaks to their versatility, the authors write, but also obliges neuroscientists to study and understand these many different forms of the phenomenon and what they represent to harness more information from these neural signals.

"It quickly becomes very complicated, but I think the most important aspect of beta bursts is the very simple and basic premise that they shed light on the transient nature of oscillations and neural processes associated with cognition," Lundqvist said."This changes our models of cognition and will impact everything we do. For a long time we implicitly or explicitly assumed oscillations are ongoing which has colored experiments and analyses. Now we see a first wave of studies based on this new thinking, with new hypothesis and ways to analyze data, and it should only pick up in years to come."

The authors acknowledge another major issue that must be resolved by further research -- How do beta bursts emerge in the first place to perform their apparent role in cognitive control?

"It is unknown how beta bursts arise as a mediator of an executive command that cascades to other regions of the brain," the authors write.

The authors don't claim to have all the answers. Instead, they write, because beta rhythms appear to have an integral role in controlling cognition, the as yet unanswered questions are worth asking.

"We propose that beta bursts provide both experimental and computational studies with a window through which to explore the real-time organization and execution of cognitive functions," they conclude. "To fully leverage this potential there is a need to address the outstanding questions with new experimental paradigms, analytical methods and modeling approaches."

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Materials provided by Picower Institute at MIT . Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference :

• Mikael Lundqvist, Earl K. Miller, Jonatan Nordmark, Johan Liljefors, Pawel Herman. Beta: bursts of cognition . Trends in Cognitive Sciences , 2024; DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2024.03.010

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APS calls on Congress to promptly fund the U.S. government for the coming fiscal year to sustain important scientific programs and initiatives.

New Content From Current Directions in Psychological Science

A sample of articles on facts about sign languages, the power of identity, reliable lie-detection methods, humans’ bias blind spot, the development of visual attention in infancy, and much more.

The Tale of Two Cities: Water Access Influences Human Decision Making 

Podcast: Does our geographical location shape our thinking? Does water access have an effect on our decision-making habits? Under the Cortex hosts Dr. Hamid Harati and Thomas Talhelm, who explore how our ecological environment can shape our decision-making skills.

A sample of research on assessing autism in hard-of-hearing youths, the relationship between parenting and self-control, managing fear during pandemics, how expectations modulate pain, and much more.

In the “I” of the Beholder: People Believe Self-Relevant Artwork is More Beautiful

Our feelings about art may be more personal than previously realized, causing us to prefer art that speaks to our sense of self.

Biennial International Seminar on the Teaching of Psychological Science to Commence July 2024

The 3rd Biennial International Seminar on the Teaching of Psychological Science (BISTOPS) will take place July 1 – 5, 2024 in Paris at Maison Suger, at the Fondation Maison des Sciences de l’Homme—Maison Suger’s residential and working facility.

A sample of articles on young children’s gaze behaviors, improving the predictive power of psychometric scales, using market-research panels for behavioral science, and much more.

Loneliness Across the Globe: A Life-Span Approach 

Podcast: Under the Cortex hosts Samia Akther Khan, King’s College London, whose research examines the feeling of loneliness across lifespan.

Repeated Exposure to News Headlines Makes Behavior Seem Less Unethical

From frequent smartphone notifications to repetitious TV news programs, we often experience repeated exposure to various news headlines as we go about our daily lives. When the news provides stories of wrongdoing, that repeated exposure may influence our own sense of morality, making those narratives seem more true and less unethical.

For Whom the School Bells Toll: New Psychological Research for the New Academic Year

A collection of research published in the APS journals in 2022 and 2023 related to peer relationships, pandemic-related learning losses, the positive impacts of growth mindsets, and much more.

Wendy Wood: It’s Time We Trained Students for Diverse Careers in Psychological Science

Podcast: Only about half of psychology PhDs are hired in academia, but psychology graduate training in the United States has largely retained the classic graduate training model of a direct path to an academic job. It’s time to change that, says Wendy Wood.

Public May Overestimate Pushback Against Controversial Research Findings 

Do researchers overestimate the risk that certain research findings will fuel public support for censorship, defunding, and other harmful actions?

Best Of: The Myers-Briggs Test, the Grieving Brain, Common Myths, More 

Podcast: Excerpts from our first 100 episodes: a skeptical look at the Myers-Briggs test, what happens in the grieving brain, common myths of psychological science, and more.

A sample of research on suicidal ideation, sex-related substance use among gay and bisexual men, the importance of collaborative decision-making, and much more.

Career Crossroads? How to Map Your Journey Beyond Academia 

A wide range of companies, organizations, and government agencies need psychological scientists. Tips from insiders on how to navigate the journey.

Has Academia Become More Gender-Fair for Women? Findings From an Adversarial Analysis of Gender Bias 

“Happily, the realities of today no longer support the belief that [STEM] jobs are pervasively biased against women.” But the findings come with caveats. New Psychological Science in the Public Interest.

Alison Gopnik Receives 2024 Rumelhart Prize in Cognitive Science 

The award is named after David Rumelhart, known for his contributions to the formal analysis of human cognition. Gopnik (shown with her grandchild): “The reason I study children is to try to make very general discoveries about how the mind works.”

Understanding Childhood Adversity Across Time and Cultures 

Podcast: Children have faced threats and deprivation at varied levels across time, favoring the ability to tailor development to different conditions. Researchers Willem Frankenhuis and Dorsa Amir discuss their findings.

A sample of research on brain-to-brain synchrony, learning from novel metaphors, how thinking about god encourages prosociality, subjective age, generational differences in shyness, and much more.

Water-Scarce Cultures Value Long-Term Thinking More Than Their Water-Rich Neighbors Do

Even in modern environments with easy access to water, cultural responses shaped by historical water scarcity still influence individuals’ decision-making processes.

A sample of articles on parental burnout, motivated egalitarianism, the philosophy of perception in the psychologist’s laboratory, facing the unknowns in data analysis, and much more.

A sample of research on mapping psychosis risk states, increases in depressive symptoms during antidepressant discontinuation, race-based rejection sensitivity, the longitudinal association between PTSD, emotion dysregulation, and postmigration stressors among refugees, and much more.

Nobody’s Fool: How to Avoid Getting Taken In 

Podcast: How can our habits of thinking make us vulnerable to deception? How can we spot deception before it’s too late? Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris answer these questions and more, drawing from their new book: Nobody’s Fool: Why We Get Taken In and What We Can Do About It.

People Generalize Expectations of Pain to Conceptually Related Tasks 

Avoiding experiences associated with pain can be an adaptive behavior, but generalized avoidance can become problematic, even potentially culminating in disability.

Gratitude, Reflection at the 2023 APS Awards Ceremony

“You don’t get to this stage without the help of a lot of people,” said Eduardo Salas, one of 19 honorees of the 2023 APS Awards Program.

A sample of research on statistical learning within objects, the effects of acute stress on learning and decision-making, aging-associated declines in cognition, reconsidering belief in contradictory conspiracy theories, and much more.

Native Americans’ Awareness of Omission and Discrimination Fuels Civic Engagement

Native American adults who identified more strongly as Native were more likely to notice group omission and discrimination, prompting increased civic engagement.

Carl Hart on Clinicians’ Bias Toward Drug Use 

Podcast featuring Carl Hart, a neuroscientist at Columbia University who has studied the behavioral and neuropharmacological effects of psychoactive drugs in humans. His lab attempts to understand factors that mediate drug use, to develop effective treatments, and to translate that knowledge into more humane drug policies.  

A sample of articles on emotional disclosure and social judgment, reconceptualizing recurrent depression, the role of choice in childhood development, and much more.

Bringing Contexts In, Taking Racism Out: How to Improve Cognitive Psychology 

Podcast: How can researchers reshape cognitive psychology to become more aware of the roles of culture and context? Ayanna Thomas joins APS’s Ludmila Nunes to discuss scientific racism in cognitive psychology. 

“The Tribe Has Spoken”: Race and Gender Bias Influence Voting Outcomes in Reality TV Show 

Women and BIPOC players in the reality TV show Survivor may be less likely to win due to sexual and racial biases that arise when it comes to voting.

Collaborative Research, Globalization Efforts Are Priorities for APS President-Elect Randi Martin

Martin (Rice University), Teresa Bajo (University of Granada), and Lila Davachi (Columbia University) joined the APS Board of Directors for three-year terms starting June 1, 2023.

Passion, Dedication, Brilliance: Diverse Voices and Perspectives at the 2023 APS Annual Convention 

The event attracted more than 2,250 psychological scientists from at least 40 countries and featured dozens of symposia, flash talks, and workshops, along with more than 1,200 poster presentations.

Founders, Funders, Teams: Exploring the Psychology of Entrepreneurship

To discuss the value of research at the intersection of psychological science and entrepreneurship, three speakers presented their different career paths and experiences within entrepreneurship in a symposium at the 2023 APS Annual Convention in Washington, D.C.

Endless Love: You’ve Got Ideas About Consensual Nonmonogamy. They’re Probably Wrong 

Podcast: In this episode of Under the Cortex, Amy C. Moors joins APS’s Ludmila Nunes and demystifies common misconceptions about consensually nonmonogamous relationships.

A sample of research on transparency in characterizing past knowledge, psychology’s contributions to anti-blackness in the U.S., questioning the value of reflexivity statements in research, conceptions of self-control, and much more.

Peak Science: At 35, the APS Annual Convention Hits Its Stride

The 2023 APS Annual Convention began with a keynote by Catherine Alexandra Hartley (New York University) examining the causes and consequences of exploration across the lifespan.

Decades at the Helm: APS 2023 Convention Honors APS Founding Executive Director Alan G. Kraut 

APS Founding Executive Director Alan G. Kraut received a special proclamation for his contributions to APS and the field more broadly.

Brain-to-Brain Synchrony Between Students and Teachers Predicts Learning 

Monitoring of students’ brain activity shows that “getting on the same wavelength” within groups of students and between students and their teacher is predictive of learning outcomes.

Psychology’s Role in the Criminalization of Blackness

Podcast: Evan Auguste and Steven Kasparek examine how psychology has contributed to anti-Blackness within psychological research, criminal justice, and mental health, and what scientists and practitioners can do to interrupt the criminalization of Blackness and redefine psychology’s relationship with justice.

A sample of research on shared depressive symptoms in close relationships, correlates of interrupted and aborted suicide attempts among U.S. active duty service members, maximizing rationality with post-justificationist knowledge, and much more.

APS Announces Winners of 2023 Student Poster Awards

Student researchers share their motivations and personal stories behind their award-winning posters featured at the APS 2023 Annual Convention.

A sample of research on visual short-term memory, the development of spatial cognition and its malleability, how heart rate predicts the performance of elite athletes, and much more.

Conspiracy Theorists May Not Always Think Rationally, but They Don’t Generally Believe Contradictory Claims

Regardless of the popular conspiracy theory, most of its believers stick to their guns — and do not subscribe to contradictory theories as well.

A sample of articles on small-study findings, evaluating the quality of social/personality journals, comparing analysis blinding with preregistration in the many-analysts religion project, information provision for informed consent procedures, and much more.

Doing Good and Taking Chances: Winning Entrepreneurship Posters Explore Business Mindsets

Chen Ji and James Wages receive the 2023 Psychological Science and Entrepreneurship Poster Award, supported by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

A sample of articles on the role of phenomenological control in experience, the positive impact of social connectedness, contextualizing empathy, and much more.

Presenting Information About Mental Health in a Second Language Could Help Counter Cultural Norms Against Treatment 

Bilingual people from cultural backgrounds in which mental health is a taboo topic may be more open to treatment when they hear information in their second language.

Industrialized Cheating in Academic Publishing: How to Fight “Paper Mills” 

Podcast: Dorothy Bishop talks with APS’s Ludmila Nunes about the metascience of fraud detection, industrial-scale fraud and why it is urgent to tackle the fake-article factories known as “paper mills.”

A sample of research on system-centered care, adolescent social communication through smartphones, promoting equity in the United States, the clinical utility of the HiTOP system, and much more.

Black Women’s Childhood Symptoms of Disordered Eating Predict Symptoms in Adulthood

New research finds that childhood symptoms of disordered eating are predictive of symptoms in adulthood regardless of race, debunking the myth that eating disorders don’t affect Black women.

A sample of articles on assessing and mitigating bias in AI applications for mental health, investigating coping vs. thriving, exploring mnemicity attribution as a cognitive gadget, and much more.

A sample of research on how mnemonic content and hippocampal patterns shape our judgment of time, well-being and cognitive resilience, face familiarization, the prioritization of due process, and much more.

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