vaughanbell

Uncovering hidden motives

TV programme Scientific American Frontiers has made online video available from a programme on the psychology and neuroscience of hidden motives.

The first segment explores the brain’s reaction to ‘cool’ and ‘uncool’ products, a new field, christened neuromarketing.

Other segments explore the Implicit Association Test, a relatively new technique for measuring unconconsious associations and biases, and an exploration of the neural basis of moral reasoning.

Link to Frontiers webpage with video feeds (via PsyBlog)
Try the Implicit Association Test for yourself.

2005-04-15 Spike activity

Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news:

Brain scanning study shows people with synaesthesia who experience colours from letters or numbers, show activation in the ‘colour cortex’ during the experience.

A study finds that parents are more likely to give attention to good looking children.

Researchers study interaction between psychological and physiological factors in premature ejaculation “by measuring average times to ejaculation with stopwatches”.

Paper from journal Science discovers how sound can be transmitted to the brain with such precise timing.

Love is better than dieting for losing weight, says Italian news story that is suspiciously vague on where the findings come from.

American Scientist interviews philosopher and cognitive scientist William Hirstein.

UPDATE:

Research suggests men who take risks and like danger sports are not more attractive to women.

ABC Radio’s All in the Mind discusses the historical relationships between ‘neurology and the novel’ in classics such as Dracula and Jekyll and Hyde (transcript, realaudio).

Neuroprosthetics on BBC Frontiers

Yesterday’s BBC Radio 4 science programme Frontiers discusses the developing science of neuroprosthetics, the science of controlling electronic devices by cortical implants or taking readings from the brain.

The programme discusses the research involved in developing this technology, and has some interesting speculations from the scientists involved. This is from Miguel Nicolelis:

Our hypothesis is that the brain fine-tunes its cells, or a group of cells, to find the optimal solution on how to control a device, and I don’t think that happens only for prosthetic limbs. I think it happens to any tool that we learn to use; a pen, a football, a car… We can readily incorporate them as extensions of our own body.

Link to Frontiers Neuroprosthetics edition web page.
Link to realaudio archive of programme.

Edge debate on sex, autism and engineering

The latest issue of online science and technnology magazine Edge interviews Simon Baron-Cohen, author of the book The Essential Difference, on autism, engineering and sex differences.

The debate continues with contributions from eminent psychologists such as Stephen Pinker and Elizabeth Spelke.

Baron-Cohen is proposing his ‘Assortive Mating Theory’. He argues that ‘systemizing’, a tendancy to think in terms of rules, laws and systems, is more prevalent in some, particularly males, and is expressed as autism or Asperger’s syndrome in its extreme form.

The child of two systemizers is more likely to have this trait, both due to genetic and parental influences, and is therefore more likely to be on the autistic spectrum.

‘Systemizing’ is, unsurprisingly, associated with professions such as science and engineering. It is argued that this is more prevalent in males due to the biology of inheritance and fetal development.

An alternative trait is ’empathizing’, supposedly more prevalent in females, which is a tendency to empathise with people’s feeling and intentions, and enjoy and understand the nuances of social situations.

Link to debate with Simon Baron-Cohen from edge.org
Link to article on Baron-Cohen’s work from wired.com
Link to online test to measure empathizing and systematizing.

Classic case: Psychiatric treatment of ghost possession

In 1994 a curious case-report was published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. It described a man who believed he was possessed by a spirit and was successfully treated by medication. Unusually however, the article mentioned that other people had seen the ghost.

Belief in possession is not uncommon in psychosis, the mental state that can sometimes accompany severe mental illness and typically involves delusions and hallucinations.

Psychiatry usually assumes all such experiences to be tricks of the mind, rather than the result of other-worldly powers.

The case-report by Anthony Hale and Narsimha Pinninti (summary) is almost unique however, in that it suggests that the authors are unsure whether the possession was mental illness or spiritual intervention.

As well as making for a gripping read, it reveals some of the assumptions and difficulties of contemporary psychiatry.

Continue reading “Classic case: Psychiatric treatment of ghost possession”

Sony patents direct brain input

In what could be more marketing ploy than innovation, Sony has patented a method for directly manipulating parts of the brain to allow computers to simulate sensory experiences.

Sony’s idea is to use beams of ultrasound to penetrate the skull and stimulate specific brain areas involved in receiving or processing sensory information.

If appropriate parts of the brain could be targeted, and if the way in which the neurons process and code conscious experience could be understood, the technology is, in principle, feasible.

These are two very big ‘ifs’ however, and each describe two of the biggest problems in contemporary neuroscience. Indeed, some doubt whether the latter is possible at all.

So, this is probably not something you might find attached to your games console in the near future.

Link to story from newscientist.com
Link to story from timesonline.co.uk

2005-04-08 Spike activity

Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news:

A brain imaging study suggest an area of the brain a particular area of the brain is active when deciding whether to trust someone.

An article considers the link between blood sugar, mental performance and brain function.

Attention is an important aspect of effective memory. Also contains tips for optimising tasks to reduce load on memory and attention to increase performance.

A psychologist investigating polyamory notes the unique feelings and language required by these unorthdox relationships.

Research shows that children who watch more television are more likely to become bullies.

Dementia can be slowed by sex, crosswords and a run says tired researcher.

Poetry requires more brain power than prose

A collaboration between the English department of St Andrews University and psychologists from Dundee has discovered that reading poetry involves deeper thought than prose.

Psychologist Martin Fischer led a team that used an infra-red eyetracking device to measure how often the eyes moved across the page and within sentences, when people were reading poetry or prose.

The poems were in their original format, and the prose was created by taking the poems and removing the line breaks and formatting, while leaving the words intact. This was so any differences could not be attributed to the words themselves.

Among the poems were Shelley’s Ozymandias and parts of Lord Byron’s Beppo.

The team found that the poems took more time to read, involved far more recapping of words and sentences, and less jumping forward, suggesting poetry had to be analysed and considered more deeply than prose to be understood.

The team plan to use brain imaging to discover which areas of the brain are involved in understanding different these different forms of text.

Link to write-up of research from Scotland on Sunday.

Science of the psychic

Zener Cards A surprisingly level-headed article from the Sunday Herald discusses the history of Edinburgh University’s Koestler Parapsychology Unit, and its research into the unknown depths of the mind.

The article gives a concise overview of research into ‘psi phenomenon’, such as precognition, clarevoyance and thought transference and considers many of the controversies in the field, with opinions from both ‘believers’ and ‘skeptics’.

The Koestler Unit is unique, as it is the only parapsychology unit in a UK university, having been established by a large sum of money left after the death of the controversial novelist Arthur Koestler.

If you want to help out with their research, you can even take part in some psi experiments online. Just visit the the Koestler Unit’s website and click ‘Research’, then ‘Online’ for a list of experiments.

The site also has summaries of the various theories of psi abilities and the results of past scientific experiments.

Link to article Parapsychology: Fact of s√©ance fiction? from the Sunday Herald.
Link to Koestler Parapsychology Unit website.

Neuroanthropology

Historian Anne Harrington discusses the public fascination with the lives of people with injured brains, recounted in books such as Oliver Sacks’ The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat.

Alexander Luria Interviewed on ABC Radio National’s All in the Mind, Harrington considers how these detailed case studies have influenced neuroscience, from early description by Russian neuropsychologist A. R. Luria, to the variety of similar books available today.

These literary accounts have been christened ‘neuroanthropology’ by some, highlighting their focus on the effects of brain injury on day-to-day reality and human existence.

One of my favourites is a recent book by Paul Broks entitled Into the Silent Land (first chapter) that combines case studies, neuropsychology, philosophy of mind and a sometimes hallucinatory style.

Realaudio or transcript for All in the Mind interview with Ann Harrington.

Link to interview with Paul Broks from amercianscientist.org
Link to A.R. Luria archive, with audio and video.

More mind hacks

While mistyping my Google search terms, I found the similarly named mindhack.net, a site also concerned with tweaking the human mind.

Mindhack.net (in contrast to this site, mindhacks.com) relies solely on user contributions – sort of like a tradetricks.org for psychology.

Although it seems to have been a little quiet of late, it has plenty of fascinating material in its archives, and is undoubtedly an underused resource.

Link to mindhack.net

‘Dhat’ and semen loss

An article by psychiatrist Athula Sumathipala that discusses a curious syndrome involving pathological anxiety about semen loss, has just become available online from last year’s British Journal of Psychiatry.

The syndrome, known as dhat, involves feelings of fatigue, weakness, anxiety, loss of appetite, guilt and sexual dysfunction, all attributed to the loss of semen.

Dhat is typically associated with India and China, where it was discussed in ancient texts. Sumathipala’s review makes it clear however, that such concerns have been prevalent in the west as well.

In fact, they were discussed as far back as early medical texts by Galen, and formed the basis of relatively recent (although spurious) theories on madness and masturbation.

The article starts with a discussion on the shaky psychiatric concept of a culture-bound syndrome – a supposedly culturally specific mental illness – and describes the curious syndrome in detail in the Results section of the paper.

Link to full text of article from the British Journal of Psychiatry.
Link to an Introduction to Culture-Bound Syndromes from the Psychiatric Times

2005-04-01 Spike activity

Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news:

A new edition of Scientific American Mind is available in the shops and two articles are freely available online. One on deja vu and the other a critical look at the Rorschach inkblot test.

An article on Kuro5hin discusses the psychology and construction of the ‘Big Five‘ personality model.

A paralysed man is able to control household appliances through an implanted brain chip (story from Guardian and BBC).

An article from the Pittsburg Post-Gazette discusses the work of psychologist Jennifer S. Lerner on the effect of emotion on decision-making and risk-taking.

A personality analysis of Adolf Hitler, commissioned by the forerunner to the CIA during the 1940s, is published online by Cornell University.

Teasing is “an indispensable social tool, vital to all healthy relationships”.

Fantasy friends

While most children believe in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny at some point, researchers are now starting to discover that children’s fantasy worlds are more subtle than previously suspected, and may even last into adulthood.

An in-depth article from Science News Online examines a child’s understanding of fantasy characters and how imagination is being used to help children cope with traumatic and painful medical procedures.

One surprising finding is that although one third of 7-year olds seem to have imaginary friends, similar experiences can last into adulthood. Some professions may even rely on this experience to help their work.

Psychologist Marjorie Taylor interviewed 50 fiction writers ranging from an award-winning novelist to scribblers who had never been published. Of those authors, 46 provided vivid examples of made-up characters who had taken over the job of composing their life stories and who sometimes resisted their creators’ attempts to control the narrative. Some fictional folk wandered around in the writers’ houses or otherwise inhabited their everyday world.

Link to article from Science News Online.
Previously on MindHacks: Imaginary friends are linked to positive psychological development in children.

Banishing depression with exercise

This week is Mental Health Action Week, and a major attempt is being made to highlight the beneficial effects of exercise in treating depression.

Depression is commonly treated with antidepressant drugs, and for some people, these may be the most effective treatment.

For mild or moderate depression however, regular excercise is known to work as well as medication in some people.

Exercise is also known to complement the use of antidepressant drugs, may prevent further relapses, and could help counter the slightly increased risk of heart problems recently linked to depression.

Although doing exercise may seem daunting during a period of depression, a gentle start is a good way to ease yourself into the habit.

If you live in the UK, you may be able to get referred to a tailored exercise programme, prescribed by your GP.

Link to more information from mentalhealth.org.uk

Tyrannosaurus reflex

In a wonderful comic strip, dinosaurs explain the neural mechanism of why locking the hands together can release the knee jerk reflex.

It’s not often the finer points of neurological examination are explained by cartoon dinosaurs, but may this be the first in a long line of comic book / neuroscience fusion spectaculars.