Bruce Bower

Bruce Bower

Behavioral Sciences Writer

Bruce Bower has written about the behavioral sciences since 1984. He often writes about psychology, anthropology, archaeology and mental health issues. Bruce has a master's degree in psychology from Pepperdine University and a master's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri. Following an internship at Science News in 1981, he worked as a reporter at Psychiatric News, a publication of the American Psychiatric Association, until joining Science News as a staff writer. In 1996, the American Psychological Association appointed Bruce a Science Writer Fellow, with a grant to visit psychological scientists of his own choosing. Early stints as an aide in a day school for children and teenagers with severe psychological problems and as a counselor in a drug diversion center provided Bruce with a surprisingly good background for a career in science journalism.

All Stories by Bruce Bower

  1. Mind over Muscle: Placebo boosts health benefits of exercise

    The physical rewards of exercise derive not just from muscular exertion but also from a person's mind-set about exercise.

  2. Aging vets take stress disorder to heart

    Veterans grappling for decades with post-traumatic stress disorder have a greater risk of developing and dying from heart disease than do their peers who don't suffer from the stress ailment.

  3. Starved for Assistance: Coercion finds a place in the treatment of two eating disorders

    Attempts by family, friends, and others to coerce people with serious eating disorders into getting mental-health care provide a valuable jump-start to treatment.

  4. Message Songs: Wild gibbons warble with a simple syntax

    Gibbons, a line of apes in southeastern Asia, rearrange their songs in order to communicate with one another.

  5. Aging Lessons: Training gives elderly practical assistance

    Sessions aimed at improving memory, reasoning, or visual concentration in healthy elderly people yield notable cognitive returns, even 5 years later, a long-term study suggests. The training largely protected the participants from age-related declines in the ability to perform everyday tasks such as preparing meals, doing housework, and managing money. A handful of booster sessions […]

  6. Sniffle-Busting Personalities: Positive mood guards against getting colds

    People with generally positive outlooks show greater resistance to developing colds than do individuals who rarely revel in upbeat feelings.

  7. Anthropology

    Neandertals’ tough Stone Age lives

    Neandertals that 43,000 years ago inhabited what's now northern Spain faced periodic food shortages and possibly resorted to cannibalism to survive.

  8. Anthropology

    South African find gets younger

    The partial skeleton of a human ancestor previously found in South Africa dates to about 2.2 million years ago, roughly 1 million years younger than the original estimates.

  9. Health & Medicine

    Bitter Pill: Costs surge for new schizophrenia drugs

    Medications widely prescribed to treat schizophrenia cost hundreds of dollars more each month than does a less popular, older medication that has similar success at alleviating symptoms of the disorder.

  10. The Predator’s Gaze

    A new wave of research is trying to untangle the origins and nature of psychopathy, a personality style characterized by a lack of conscience, empathy, or guilt that attracts intense interest from the legal system.

  11. Anthropology

    Stone Age Role Revolution: Modern humans may have divided labor to conquer

    A new analysis of Stone Age sites indicates that a division of labor first emerged in modern-human groups living in the African tropics around 40,000 years ago, providing our ancestors with a social advantage over Neandertals.

  12. Age Becomes Her: Male chimpanzees favor old females as mates

    Male chimpanzees in Uganda prefer to mate with older females, a possible sign of males' need to identify successful mothers in a promiscuous mating system.