News from the University | School of Physiology and Pharmacology. Scott Barry Kaufman, Ph.D.: Brain Stimulation Makes the 'Impossible Problem' Solvable. "The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify ... into every corner of our mind. " --John Maynard Keynes Try connecting all nine of these dots with just four straight lines without lifting your finger or retracing a line: Have difficulty? You're not alone. In their prior research, Allan Snyder and his colleagues have found that zapping the brain leads to increased insight. They gave 28 healthy right-handed participants (aged 19 to 63) the nine-dot problem to solve. After 10 minutes of right lateralizing tDCS, more than 40 percent of the participants got the problem correct. The chances of these findings coming about purely through chance are miniscule (they estimate about 1 in 10,000).
Why did stimulating these brain areas have such an effect? Of course, there are other interpretations of their findings (as the researchers recognize), but their effects are consistent with a number of different studies conducted by various researchers. Carlsbad.patch. While we often feel stress in our bodies in the forms of headaches, muscle tightness, but studies show it can affect your brain too. Whether you have read studies about stress and its effect on the body or not, most of us have felt the results of excessive stress.
Perhaps you have experienced headaches, high blood pressure, digestive issues and a weakened immune system. While these symptoms are primarily experienced in the body, the brain also experiences disruptions due to stress. Robert Sapolsky is a professor and researcher in the field of stress and the effect it has on health. For the past three decades Sapolsky has been studying how the mind and body handle stress. In an interview with Stanford Report, he said: "It's becoming clear that in the hippocampus, the part of the brain most susceptible to stress hormones, you see atrophy in people with post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression. ... This also includes TV viewing. Compassion Meditation May Boost Neural Basis of Empathy.
"May" boost neural basis of empathy? And a bear "may" sh! T in the woods. There is considerable evidence of this already, but in America more is always better. For this study, they are using Cognitively-Based Compassion Training, a technique developed with the assistance of Lobsang Tenzin Negi, director of the Emory-Tibet Partnership, and based in traditional Tibetan Buddhist practices. Here is some info on CBCT from the Tibet-Emory page: There are doubtless many methods one could employ to enhance compassion beyond the biological level to an impartial altruism, and in fact many religious traditions contain methods for such cultivation.
Senior author on this study Charles Raison is now at the University of Arizona. Here is a short video of Dr. Journal Reference:J. ScienceDaily (Oct. 4, 2012) — A compassion-based meditation program can significantly improve a person's ability to read the facial expressions of others, finds a study published by Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. Susan Celia Greenfield: Jane Austen Weekly: The Brain and Mind. Since I wrote about Jane Austen and sex organs last week, it's only fair that I give the brain and mind equal time. (Plus, it's a good excuse to avoid the presidential debate.) No problem here. Among her countless accomplishments, Austen is making news in the field of neuroscience. The Stanford Center for Cognitive and Neurobiological Imaging (CNi) has been tracking the blood flow patterns in the brains of Austen readers. How? By having literature graduate students read the second chapter of Mansfield Park while getting brain images using fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging).
Natalie Phillips, an Assistant Professor of English at Michigan State University, is a co-director of the study. "Natalie," I said, "the study is fascinating, but why is Jane Austen relevant? Not really, Natalie said. I told Natalie I wanted to write about Austen's representation of the mind and thought. I found this positively dizzying. Then her mind takes a more suspicious turn. Brain’s Perceptual Activity Impacted by Social Opinions. By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on October 8, 2012 New research from the Brain and Creativity Institute at USC suggests liking or disliking a person can affect how your brain processes actions.
Researchers say that most of the time, watching someone else move causes a “mirroring” effect – that is, the parts of our brains responsible for motor skills are activated by watching someone else in action. However, in the new study, researchers discovered that whether or not you like the person you’re watching can actually have an effect on brain activity related to motor actions. This brain action can lead to “differential processing” – for example, thinking the person you dislike is moving more slowly than they actually are. The study is published in the journal PLOS ONE.
“We address the basic question of whether social factors influence our perception of simple actions,” said Lisa Aziz-Zadeh, Ph.D. Source: USC Abstract of a blue brain photo by shutterstock.