How the Mind Works: 10 Fascinating TED Talks How memory works, what visual illusions reveal, the price of happiness, the power of introverts and more… 1. Peter Doolittle: How “working memory” works “Life comes at us very quickly, and what we need to do is take that amorphous flow of experience and somehow extract meaning from it.” In this funny, enlightening talk, educational psychologist Peter Doolittle details the importance — and limitations — of your “working memory,” that part of the brain that allows us to make sense of what’s happening right now.” 2. “What motivates us to work? Behavioral economist Dan Ariely presents two eye-opening experiments that reveal our unexpected and nuanced attitudes toward meaning in our work.” 3. “Why do people see the Virgin Mary on a cheese sandwich or hear demonic lyrics in “Stairway to Heaven”? Using video and music, skeptic Michael Shermer shows how we convince ourselves to believe — and overlook the facts.” 4. 5. 6. “Can happiness be bought? 7. 8. 9. 10.
Looking back: Finding Little Albert - Vol. 24, Part 5 ( May 2011) Hall P. Beck, with Gary Irons, reports on a seven-year search for psychology’s lost boy In 1920 the British Psychological Society invited John Broadus Watson to address a symposium on behaviourism (Watson, 1920). Watson was disappointed that his university was unable to fund his crossing. In the winter of 1919/20, Watson and his graduate assistant, Rosalie Alberta Rayner, attempted to condition a baby boy, Albert B., to fear a white laboratory rat (Watson & Rayner, 1920). Despite its methodological shortcomings and questionable ethics (Cornwell & Hobbs, 1976; Samelson, 1980), the attempted conditioning of Albert is a staple in psychology textbooks and one of the most influential investigations in the discipline. After the last day of testing, Albert left his home on the Johns Hopkins campus. What was known about Albert From Watson’s writings we learned that Albert’s mother was a wet nurse in the Harriet Lane Home, a paediatric facility on the Hopkins campus. - Hall P.
The 12 Cognitive Biases That Prevent You From Being Rational The human brain is capable of 1016 processes per second, which makes it far more powerful than any computer currently in existence. But that doesn’t mean our brains don’t have major limitations. The lowly calculator can do math thousands of times better than we can, and our memories are often less than useless — plus, we’re subject to cognitive biases, those annoying glitches in our thinking that cause us to make questionable decisions and reach erroneous conclusions. Before we start, it’s important to distinguish between cognitive biases and logical fallacies. Some social psychologists believe our cognitive biases help us process information more efficiently, especially in dangerous situations. Confirmation Bias We love to agree with people who agree with us. Gambler’s Fallacy t’s called a fallacy, but it’s more a glitch in our thinking. Relatedly, there’s also the positive expectation bias — which often fuels gambling addictions. Post-Purchase Rationalization Neglecting Probability
Looking Back: The making and breaking of attachment theory - Vol. 22, Part 10 ( October 2009) Barbara Tizard on John Bowlby – the origins of his ideas, their impact and his often underestimated willingness to revise them John Bowlby (1907–1990) first attained fame – some would say notoriety – in 1951, with the publication of his monograph Maternal Care and Mental Health. In it he presented evidence that maternal care in infancy and early childhood is essential for mental health. He claimed this as a discovery comparable to that of the role of vitamins in mental health. Bowlby’s own experience of maternal care seems to have been limited. After public school, he read medicine at Cambridge and University College Hospital, and did voluntary work in an analytically oriented school for maladjusted children, before starting a seven-year Kleinian psychoanalysis, and training as an adult psychiatrist at the Maudsley Hospital. The book made a tremendous impact on the general public. Some psychologists at once criticised Bowlby’s theories.
Cognitive neuropsychology An introduction Cognitive psychology is the scientific investigation of cognition, that is, of all mental abilities: perception, attention, learning, memory, processing of spoken and written language, thinking, reasoning and belief formation (Coltheart, 2002). It assumes that cognition can at least in principle be fully revealed by the scientific method, that is, individual components of mental processes can be identified and understood. Any theory about any domain of cognition will therefore be a theory about (a) what the modules are of the system by which performance in that domain is accomplished, and (b) what the pathways of communication between these modules of the system are; that is, a theory about the functional architecture of the system. This sharp distinction between research on the mind (cognition) and research on the brain is urged by numerous philosophers of mind and cognitive psychologists including Block (1995), Fodor (1999), Marshall (see e.g. Figure 1: Applications 1.
Parenting Style Caffeine - a powerful and addictive drug | Mind-Body Self Help Caffeine is a potent drug. So each time you drink tea, coffee, cola or cocoa you are giving your body a ‘hit’ of caffeine. Along with nicotine and alcohol, caffeine is one of the three most widely used mood-affecting drugs in the world. If you have more than two or three caffeine drinks per day this is likely to be affecting your moods and your physiology – and in a more powerful manner than you might expect. Caffeine is not harmful – but overuse of caffeine could be. What is caffeine? It is a potent and quick-acting drug which produces an effect similar to the stress response in our bodies. Caffeine research New research into the effects of caffeine continues appear every few months and these reports frequently contradict one another – depending on who did the research, how many people were evaluated and, of course, who funded the research… So the definitive word on caffeine has not yet been agreed Reported effects of caffeine On the other hand… Sources of caffeine Caffeine Withdrawal Symptoms
Improving Memory - Top 10 Tips for Improving Memory 11. Get some sleep. Researchers have long known that sleep is important for memory and learning. Some recent research has shown that taking a nap after you learn something new can actually help you learn faster and remember better. One study actually found that sleeping after learning something new actually leads to physical changes in the brain. So the next time you are struggling to learn new information, consider getting a good night's sleep after you study. 10 Fascinating Facts About Human Memory References: Bjork, D. (2001, March). Yang, G., Lai, C. This content is provided in partnership with National 4-H Council. 4-H experiences help GROW confident, caring and capable kids.
A Layman’s Guide to Mindful Meditation “Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes. If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed. Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as bird wings.” ~ Rumi Here’s the thing: we all know we should meditate, right? When it comes down to it, meditation can be as simple, or as complex, as we want it to be. All of life is a moving meditation. So if our goal is to achieve presence with the vibration of the universe, and presence is about being in the moment and familiarizing ourselves with the current state of our mind-body-soul, then how do we actually do it? We do it by finding a sacred “place” to “perform” our meditation. The main purpose for resonating with this sacred vibration is to nix the overreach of the Ego. At the end of the day, meditation helps us to take a step back and get a different perspective. When is the last time you did absolutely nothing for 10 whole minutes?
Caltech economist nets MacArthur genius grant A Caltech researcher who fused economics and neuroscience to make sense of human decisions that often don’t make cents has won the MacArthur genius grant. Colin Camerer came to Caltech in 1994 with an MBA in quantitative studies and a doctorate in decision theory from the University of Chicago’s business school, a place he described as “the temple of beliefs in highly rational people who make really good decisions and take into account the future.” “I just thought that was a useful caricature, but not the right model of human nature,” Camerer said. Veering from the notoriously conservative orthodoxy of economics at the University of Chicago to study human behavior may seem a risky career turn, but things got weirder when Caltech opened its brain imaging lab in 2003. Actual neuroscientists might have chased away a business school graduate who wanted to put people under the magnet to see what went on when they played obscure game theory experiments.