Interoception is how your brain senses and responds to what’s going on inside your body. “It’s how we know when we’re hungry, thirsty, anxious, or even need to take a deep breath,” says Wen G. Chen, ...

Sarah Garfinkel has received research funding from the Medical Research Council, Wellcome and the MQ Mental Health Research Charity. She holds an unpaid position on the scientific advisory committee ...

Visceral interoception refers to the perception and integration in the brain of afferent (primarily vagal) signals pertaining to the homeostatic state of the body (Craig, 2002). Neuroanatomical and ...

Sometimes our bodies react to the world around us before we realise, so how do internal signals such as a quickening heart or deep breathing affect our thoughts? It was day 29 of a gruelling 600-mile ...

Alex Hutchinson is a National Magazine Award-winning journalist and Outside’s Sweat Science columnist, covering the latest research on endurance and outdoor sports. New perk: Easily find new routes ...

Scientists are learning how the brain knows what’s happening throughout the body, and how that process might go awry in some psychiatric disorders. By Carl Zimmer Last year, Ardem Patapoutian got a ...

Sight, smell, taste, touch, and hearing – these are the senses we’re probably all familiar with. But we humans may not be limited to just five: some scientists argue for a “sixth sense” – though there ...

LYING in the dark, my senses are straining for inputs and finding none. I am floating in warm, salty water that is so close to my body temperature, I can’t tell where my body ends and the water begins ...

Imagine a world in which our bodies had their own built-in health and wellness data tracker, which kept tabs on our rest, heart rate, and breathing, the way an Apple Watch would. No longer would we ...