A car backfires, and your shoulders jump. A shadow moves, and your eyes fly open before your brain catches up. That dramatic ...

The legs and head extend while the arms jerk up and out with the palms up and thumbs flexed. Shortly afterward the arms are brought together and the hands clench into fists, and the infant cries ...

New research published in The Journal of Physiology suggests that a cause of whiplash injuries could be startle reflexes elicited by unexpected loud sounds. New research published in The Journal of ...

When we’re suddenly confronted with a shocking image, our skin becomes moist and we blink strongly. These actions are automatic and unintentional; they happen without conscious thought. So it may come ...

To understand the expressive range of the human face, nothing beats watching a colleague scream his head off in slow motion. When my lab began to study protective reflexes in the early 2000s, the ...

The startle reflex is a rapid, involuntary response to sudden acoustic stimuli, and its study has provided valuable insights into the neural mechanisms underlying motor preparation. Research in this ...