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The Willpower Paradox: Scientific American
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-willpower-paradoxAsserting willpower actually diminishes performance. This made me think of the mindfulness/Vipassana training (Kabat-Zinn). The only effort you extend is a certain curiosity about how things will unfold. The rest happens naturally in proportion to your willingness to see things as they really are. Senay designed another experiment to look at the question differently. In this study, he recruited volunteers on the pretense that they were needed for a handwriting study. Some wrote the words “I will” over and over; others wrote “Will I?” After priming the volunteers with this fake handwriting task, Senay had them work on the anagrams. And just as before, the determined volunteers performed worse than the open-minded ones. The research paper: http://www.psych.illinois.edu/~dalbarra/pubs/Wll%20I%20I%20will.pdf
Tags: psychology, motivation, willpower, behavior, brain, mind, neuroscience, toread, article, interesting Saved by: admin
Why the #$%! Do We Swear? For Pain Relief: Scientific American
"How swearing achieves its physical effects is unclear, but the researchers speculate that brain circuitry linked to emotion is involved. Earlier studies have shown that unlike normal language, which relies on the outer few millimeters in the left hemisphere of the brain, expletives hinge on evolutionarily ancient structures buried deep inside the right half. "One such structure is the amygdala, an almond-shaped group of neurons that can trigger a fight-or-flight response in which our heart rate climbs and we become less sensitive to pain. Indeed, the students' heart rates rose when they swore, a fact the researchers say suggests that the amygdala was activated."
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-do-we-swear
Tags: swearing, brain, science, language, psychology, pain, research, health, relief, article Saved by: admin
"How swearing achieves its physical effects is unclear, but the researchers speculate that brain circuitry linked to emotion is involved. Earlier studies have shown that unlike normal language, which relies on the outer few millimeters in the left hemisphere of the brain, expletives hinge on evolutionarily ancient structures buried deep inside the right half. "One such structure is the amygdala, an almond-shaped group of neurons that can trigger a fight-or-flight response in which our heart rate climbs and we become less sensitive to pain. Indeed, the students' heart rates rose when they swore, a fact the researchers say suggests that the amygdala was activated."
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-do-we-swear
Tags: swearing, brain, science, language, psychology, pain, research, health, relief, article Saved by: admin
An Easy Way to Increase Creativity: Scientific American
According to the construal level theory (CLT) of psychological distance, anything that we do not experience as occurring now, here, and to ourselves falls into the “psychologically distant” category. It’s also possible to induce a state of “psychological distance” simply by changing the way we think about a particular problem, such as attempting to take another person's perspective, or by thinking of the question as if it were unreal and unlikely. Participants in the first study performed a creative generation task, in which they were asked to list as many different modes of transportation as possible. This task was introduced as having been developed either by Indiana University students studying in Greece (distant condition) or by Indiana University students studying in Indiana (near condition). As predicted, participants in the distant condition generated more numerous and original modes of transportation than participants in the near condition.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=an-easy-way-to-increase-c
Tags: creativity, psychology, science, inspiration, research, brain, design, article, ideas, innovation Saved by: admin
According to the construal level theory (CLT) of psychological distance, anything that we do not experience as occurring now, here, and to ourselves falls into the “psychologically distant” category. It’s also possible to induce a state of “psychological distance” simply by changing the way we think about a particular problem, such as attempting to take another person's perspective, or by thinking of the question as if it were unreal and unlikely. Participants in the first study performed a creative generation task, in which they were asked to list as many different modes of transportation as possible. This task was introduced as having been developed either by Indiana University students studying in Greece (distant condition) or by Indiana University students studying in Indiana (near condition). As predicted, participants in the distant condition generated more numerous and original modes of transportation than participants in the near condition.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=an-easy-way-to-increase-c
Tags: creativity, psychology, science, inspiration, research, brain, design, article, ideas, innovation Saved by: admin
Depression's Evolutionary Roots: Scientific American
Analysis requires a lot of uninterrupted thought, and depression coordinates many changes in the body to help people analyze their problems without getting distracted. In a region of the brain known as the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC), neurons must fire continuously for people to avoid being distracted. But this is very energetically demanding for VLPFC neurons, just as a car’s engine eats up fuel when going up a mountain road. Moreover, continuous firing can cause neurons to break down, just as the car’s engine is more likely to break down when stressed. Studies of depression in rats show that the 5HT1A receptor is involved in supplying neurons with the fuel they need to fire, as well as preventing them from breaking down. These important processes allow depressive rumination to continue uninterrupted with minimal neuronal damage, which may explain why the 5HT1A receptor is so evolutionarily important.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=depressions-evolutionary
Tags: depression, psychology, evolution, science, health, brain, happiness, psychiatry, research, article Saved by: admin
Analysis requires a lot of uninterrupted thought, and depression coordinates many changes in the body to help people analyze their problems without getting distracted. In a region of the brain known as the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC), neurons must fire continuously for people to avoid being distracted. But this is very energetically demanding for VLPFC neurons, just as a car’s engine eats up fuel when going up a mountain road. Moreover, continuous firing can cause neurons to break down, just as the car’s engine is more likely to break down when stressed. Studies of depression in rats show that the 5HT1A receptor is involved in supplying neurons with the fuel they need to fire, as well as preventing them from breaking down. These important processes allow depressive rumination to continue uninterrupted with minimal neuronal damage, which may explain why the 5HT1A receptor is so evolutionarily important.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=depressions-evolutionary
Tags: depression, psychology, evolution, science, health, brain, happiness, psychiatry, research, article Saved by: admin
Getting It Wrong: Surprising Tips on How to Learn: Scientific American
For years, many educators have championed “errorless learning," advising teachers (and students) to create study conditions that do not permit errors. For example, a classroom teacher might drill students repeatedly on the same multiplication problem, with very little delay between the first and second presentations of the problem, ensuring that the student gets the answer correct each time. The idea embedded in this approach is that if students make errors, they will learn the errors and be prevented (or slowed) in learning the correct information. But research by Nate Kornell, Matthew Hays and Robert Bjork at UCLA that recently appeared in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition reveals that this worry is misplaced. In fact, they found, learning becomes better if conditions are arranged so that students make errors.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=getting-it-wrong
Tags: learning, education, science, memory, psychology, brain, cognition, studying, research, data Saved by: admin
For years, many educators have championed “errorless learning," advising teachers (and students) to create study conditions that do not permit errors. For example, a classroom teacher might drill students repeatedly on the same multiplication problem, with very little delay between the first and second presentations of the problem, ensuring that the student gets the answer correct each time. The idea embedded in this approach is that if students make errors, they will learn the errors and be prevented (or slowed) in learning the correct information. But research by Nate Kornell, Matthew Hays and Robert Bjork at UCLA that recently appeared in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition reveals that this worry is misplaced. In fact, they found, learning becomes better if conditions are arranged so that students make errors.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=getting-it-wrong
Tags: learning, education, science, memory, psychology, brain, cognition, studying, research, data Saved by: admin
Seven Answers to Climate Contrarian Nonsense: Scientific American
Scientific American article on answers/info used to refute the global climate warming naysayers. Awesome!
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=seven-answers-to-climate-contrarian-nonsense
Tags: science, climate, politics, climatechange, environment, reference, green, 2009, change, resource Saved by: admin
Scientific American article on answers/info used to refute the global climate warming naysayers. Awesome!
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=seven-answers-to-climate-contrarian-nonsense
Tags: science, climate, politics, climatechange, environment, reference, green, 2009, change, resource Saved by: admin