Because it is always our brain’s left hemisphere that stands watch, at least initially, while our right hemisphere slumbers. Hence, in order to sensehack your sleep, you need to minimize any sensory disruption to the hemisphere that is keeping guard so that it does not wake you up quite so often. So why, you might well be wondering, did I suggest

Nevertheless, the latest developments in social, cognitive and affective neuroscience are increasingly highlighting the profoundly beneficial effects of stroking the skin.

In most situations, two senses really are better than one. It is just that in our study we deliberately distorted the sound in order to introduce a conflict between eye and ear. This is a favourite technique of research scientists who study the senses and their interaction.

No surprise, then, that our ‘innate’ affinity for nature (biophilia) is matched by biophobia, an equally strong fear of things that look like, or move like, or, indeed, are spiders and snakes, etc. Biophobia appears to reflect some kind of evolved preparedness to develop a fear of, or acquire an aversion to, these ancestral threats.39 While so many

The Glenmorangie campaign, like the Guinness example, shows how the latest in digital experience, together with the emerging knowledge of perception, can be used to hack the multisensory experience in the home online, or in store. Figuring out how such experiences can be delivered, enhanced and propagated digitally is one of the most intriguing

Nowadays, consumer neuroscience, the preferred name for neuromarketing amongst many academics, allows researchers to peer directly into the shoppers’ brain in search of the haloed ‘buy button’. This without the need to rely on what people say.4 What is more, machine learning and big data analysis are also starting to provide some intriguing

The key point to remember is that we experience nature through all of our senses, and so ensuring as balanced a diet of natural multisensory stimulation as possible is probably one of the best things that any of us can do to promote the health and well-being of both ourselves and those we care most about.

While an evolutionary account of the nature effect (stress recovery theory) is often put forward, it is worth noting that an alternative account in terms of perceptual fluency might well be as plausible. The idea here is that we find it especially easy to process natural scenes because their fractal arrangement matches the statistics that our

According to the scientists, our brains tag unpleasant smells as potentially dangerous. Hence, we retain our awareness of them, so that we can continue to monitor their source, in a way that is simply not the case for pleasant or neutral smells that can safely be ignored once our brains have classified them as harmless.