SUNDAY, June 28, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Genetics play a major role in how affectionate women are, but the same does not hold true for men, new research shows. "When we measure people's tendency to be affectionate and to receive affection from other people, almost without exception we find that women score higher than men," said study leader Kory Floyd. He's a professor in the University of Arizona's department of communication, in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences. For the new study, Floyd's team assessed differences in the levels of affection expressed by 464 pairs of adult twins, aged 19 to 84. About half were identical twins and half were fraternal twins. In women, genes explain 45% of variability in affectionate behavior, while environmental influences such as the...

SATURDAY, June 27, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- If you're having nightmares during these stressful times, rest easy: A sleep expert says it's to be expected. "Your experiences and interactions during the day can affect your dreams, and right now many of us are spending time watching the news or reading articles that are downright scary," said Jennifer Martin, a director of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. "It's natural that the fears and stressors of daily life make their way into our dreams." This is called dream incorporation, and it occurs when your real-life experiences show up in your dreams, she explained in an academy news release. Martin added that changes in sleep patterns -- including fragmented sleep -- can make people sleep less soundly, which means they remember...

THURSDAY, June 25, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Animal studies of a potential COVID-19 vaccine have been so encouraging that researchers plan to speed up testing of the vaccine in humans. Initially, the next phase of the trial was expected to begin in September, but that start date has now been moved to August. Developed by researchers at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, the vaccine uses genetic material called messenger RNA to trigger an immune response in the body. Once injected, the vaccine prompts the body to make proteins like those of the actual virus. The body will then know what coronavirus-infected cells look like and can learn to fight them off. Most vaccines are purely preventive, but this vaccine may also be able to treat an active case of coronavirus, the...