# Question
Title: Does mindful meditation inhibit diffuse thinking (aka default mode network), creativity and make studying less effective?
Barbara Oakley's "Learning how to Learn" and "Mindshift" courses claim that having some break time in which diffuse mode thinking (afaik it's the same as default mode network) is active between study sessions (at least if you acquire knowledge or practice intellectual skills) is important. She says that seemingly unrelated concepts get linked, and the brain figures out what to do with all this new information during diffuse mode. It also boosts creativity. From my own experience diffuse mode also helps me think of ways to use the new information, e.g. to achieve my goals or to study more effectively (maybe it's a part of the "creativity" thingy).

Mindful meditation seems to provide multiple benefits for mental health. I wonder if replacing many breaks (aka time when I don't do intellectual work) with meditation is bad because I will not have enough diffuse mode thinking and creativity time.

I've tried 2 types of mindfulness meditation: body scan, during which one sequentially goes over different body parts and listens to the senses in that body part and tries not to think or do anything else; and breathing meditation, during which one focuses on one's breathing and ignores everything else. Just from how I feel during that time, I would say that I am not in diffuse mode during meditation.

What diffuse mode is, citations from A Mind for Numbers:

> Since the very beginning of the twenty-first century, neuroscientists have been making profound advances in understanding the two different types of networks that the brain switches between—highly attentive states and more relaxed resting state networks.1 We’ll call the thinking processes related to these two different types of networks the focused mode and diffuse mode
>
> Edward de Bono is the grand master of creativity studies, and his vertical and lateral terminology is roughly analogous to my use of the terms focused and diffuse (de Bono 1970).
>
> Astute readers will notice my mention that the diffuse mode seems to sometimes work in the background while the focused mode is active. However, research findings show that the default-mode network for example (which is just one of the many resting state networks), seems to go quiet when the focused mode is active. So which is it? My sense as an educator and a learner myself is that some nonfocused activities can continue in the background when focused work is taking place, as long as the focused attention is shifted away from the area of interest. In some sense, then, my use of the term diffuse mode might be thought of as “nonfocused mode activities directed toward learning” rather than simply “default-mode network.”

UPDATE: It turns out the the second week has a video on mindfulness and learning:

> researchers can sometimes classify meditation techniques into two different types that seem to be fundamentally different. Focused attention and open monitoring.
>
> Focus attention types of meditations such as mantra, sound or chakra meditation appear to help enhance focus mode type thinking, this kind of meditation sometimes seems to make people feel better.
>
> In contrast, open monitoring types of meditation such as, vipassana and mindfulness, appear to improve diffuse imaginative thinking. With open monitoring, we don't just focus on one thing. Instead we keep our attention open to all aspects of experience without judging or becoming attached to our thoughts.
>
> Part of the reason that building your focusing abilities may help make you feel happier. Is that it appears to suppress the diffuse mode, while it builds the focusing mode. So what does all this mean? It means that meditation can have surprisingly different effects, depending on the type. It's all very complex, and researchers are far from sorting everything out yet. In the end, practices that encourage focusing can be a great benefit for learning. But having some daily time where your mind relaxes and wanders freely is also very important, particularly if you want to encourage creativity. *From a particular stand point then if you are a meditator you might try to avoid feeling you should always be stirring your thoughts back into focus, If you catch your mind wondering outside meditation sessions.*

Turns out that some types of meditation happen in diffuse mode and others happen in focused mode. My guess would that guided body scan and breathing meditation are focused.

Also I am not sure what she means saying that diffuse mode meditations may improve diffuse imaginative thinking. Did she just randomly blurt it out meaning trying to say that those types of meditation happen in diffuse mode? Or did she say that meaning that if you practice entering diffuse mode by meditating then your diffuse mode becomes better or you will enter it more often?

Also I think that even during diffuse mode meditations, e.g. listening to body sensations that come to attention (I thnk it's diffuse mode, not 100% sure), you don't get creative and don't link concepts and process knowledge, because you're still thinking about body sensations and nothing else.

# Answer
> 3 votes
That's a great question. I've wondered about this myself, given that some forms of meditation - particularly those that aim to exclusively focus on a particular object - seem to be the antithesis of creative thinking.

Here's an article by meditation teacher, Michael Taft, that cites some of the research into focused-attention vs open-monitoring methods of meditation. It supports the statements in your updated post, that open-monitoring methods can support increased creativity. https://wisdomlabs.com/meditation-makes-innovative/

# Answer
> 0 votes
A Note on Resting States, Resting Brains, and Meditative States

A resting state, or ‘somatic rest’, would seem to correspond with a brain at rest or ‘neurologic’ rest, but by definition, somatic and neurologic rest are entirely different things. A resting ‘state’ or somatic rest represents the inactivity of the striatal musculature that results from the application of resting protocols (continual avoidance of perseverative thought represented by rumination, worry, and distraction.). Resting states also are affective states, as they elicit opioid activity in the brain. Resting states in turn may occur in tandem with all levels of non-perseverative thought that are passive or active, from just passively ‘being in the moment’ or being mindful, to actively engaging in complex and meaningful cognitive behavior. The latter cognitive behavior is also additionally affective in nature due to its elicitation of dopaminergic activity, and resulting opioid-dopamine interaction results in a perceived state of ‘bliss’ or ‘flow’. On the other hand, a resting ‘brain’, neurologic rest, or the so-called ‘default mode network’ is a specific type of neural processing that occurs when the mind is in a ‘passive’ state, or in other words, is presented with no or very limited cognitive demands. This results in ‘mind wandering’ that can entail non-perseverative (creative thought) or perseverative thought (rumination, worry). As such a resting brain may or may not correlate with somatic rest, and is correlated with a level of demand, not a kind of demand, as in somatic rest. Like the broad color palate that emerges from the intermix of three primary colors, it may be argued that meditative states are simply emergent properties of two very distinctive neuro-physiological resting states that have separate and easily definable causes. It is remarkable that in the literature of meditation, the neuro-physiology of rest both in body and mind is not defined, with a similar neglect to how neuro-muscular activity is actively shaped by experience or learning. The importance of meditation is very real, and the meditative community is understandably averse to equating it with rest since it makes meditation less ‘special’ or less marketable. But that is my argument nonetheless, which in the end provides a better advocacy of meditation by denying that meditation elicits a unique physiological process or state, which like the concept of ‘phlogiston’, or the imaginary element that enabled fire, impedes rather than furthers scientific inquiry.

from 'The book of Rest' at doctormezmer.com

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Tags: learning, creativity, meditation
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title: Perception Cardinality

text:
# Question
Title: Perception Cardinality
While reading a science fiction book, Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer, I came across the following lines:

*“Well, if I showed you one object - one rock, say - you would not have to count it. You would just perceive its cardinality: you would know there was one object. The same thing happens with two objects. You just look at the pair of rocks and in a single glance, without any processing, you perceive that there are two of them present. You can do the same with three, four, or five items, if you are an average human. It is only when confronted with six or more items that you actually start counting them.”*

*“How do you know this?”*

*“I watched a program about it on the Discovery Channel.”*

Assuming this is a real psychological phenomenon, is there a name or reference for it? I have contacted the author but have not received a response yet.

# Answer
> 3 votes
The author responded. It is called "Subitising" or "Subitizing" or "Perceiving cardinality at-a-glance". The term was coined by Kaufman in 1949.

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, perception
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# Question
Title: Why do people press elevator call buttons repeatedly?
Many people, particularly those in a rush, keep on pressing the elevator call button despite the light clearly indicating that it was previously pressed, and the knowledge that such action will have no effect.

What theory explains such a behaviour?

I could put forth two hypotheses. When people are desperate they:

* **Prefer action over inaction** \- If an action does not carry a high price or penalty, by taking action people feel that at least they are doing something.
* **Are more likely to change their beliefs**. Complete atheists, for instance, may pray to God, or try a supernatural/spiritual healer, if the life of a dear one is on stake.

But I can't find a theory for neither of these.

# Answer
It's an interesting phenomenon, and I think it can be seen in many other domains beyond lifts. At least where I live, pedestrian crossings have buttons, which I've seen people repeatedly press. You can see it often on computers and other digital devices when the system does not immediately respond to user input.

### Basic Bayesian Rational Actor

My starting point for analysing the behaviour would be that of a bayesian rational actor. While you state that the individual "knows that such action will have no effect." This is not actually true. Many states of the world are possible about the consequence of second and subsequent button presses:

* **Beneficial:**

+ The first button press may not have been recorded (perhaps you didn't press the button correctly, perhaps the system malfunctioned)
    + Repeatedly pressing the button might increase the system's awareness of the importance of the request
    + The first button press may have timed-out and a second button press may resend the request
* **Makes no difference:**

+ The first button press has been recorded and the second button press makes no difference.
* **Detrimental:**

+ The first button press was recorded. Any subsequent button press resets the time required.

So from the perspective of a Bayesian rational actor, the individual does not know the state of the world. Instead, each state has a certain probability of being true. And each state of the world has a certain cost/benefit. Thus, if the individual assigns very low probability to the detrimental option and minimal cost to the physical movement involved in pressing the button, and some small probability of any of the beneficial scenarios being true, then the beneficial scenarios have the greatest expected utility. This is despite the fact that the "makes no difference scenario" having very high probability of being true.

The important point is that it is the subjective beliefs and subjective utility which drives action and not the objective state of the world. Most models of human action would also incorporate a random component. So even if people generally preferred not to do the repeated press, they might occasionally. Such randomness can be seen as rational behaviour in the broader sense, in that it allows the actor to sample the utilities associated with actions even if they aren't currently deemed to maximise utility.

Presumably many factors would influence the beliefs about truth and utility in this situation:

* The clearer the indicator that the button has been pressed, the more likely the individual will believe that the button has been pressed. So for example, on some pedestrian crossings there is no indicator light, or sometimes the indicator light on a lift button stops working. In such cases, people would presumably be much more likely to repeatedly press.
* The more experience someone has with the specific lift or even lifts in general, the less likely they are to draw on general experience with other lifts or with other button-based systems.
* The longer the time passes between pressing the button and the lift not arriving, the more likely the individual is to believe that something has failed. Now in some cases this is a lift malfunction, but presumably often another button press would also seem like a more reasonable strategy than if little time has passed.
* The cost is assigned to the physical press might vary between people and situations. Some might experience minor social embarrassment of repeatedly pressing a lift button when others are present. Other people who are less energetic or active, may not wish to expend energy repeatedly pressing the lift button.

### Further reading

If you're interested more about these ideas, you could check out some of the ACT-R research on strategy selection.
> 14 votes

# Answer
I suspect it has to do with operant conditioning: behaviours that are rewarded are repeated and very hard to extinguish. We get a little rush of dopamine when something goes our way (eg. the elevator arrives and opens its doors) and if that event was immediately preceded by a certain action on our part, it acts as positive reinforcement for that action. Maybe some time in the past we pushed the button and the elevator arrived immediately. In our subconscious, we want to try and achieve the same instant reward. If the elevator doesn't come immediately, our brain is wired to repeat the action until the reward is obtained.

Our brains aren't very good at processing cause and effect, so the fact that the elevator will come after one of our button pushes can only act as reinforcement. Also, the fact that there is at least some link between our pushing of the button and the arrival of the elevator is enough to kick-start the process. Muscle memory doesn't care whether we're pushing it for the first, second or fifteenth time.

It's similar to dogs that chase mailmen. Eventually, the pursued mailman will leave, rewarding the dog's behaviour. The dog quickly learns that chasing the mailman will always be followed by a positive outcome.
> 2 votes

# Answer
When someone is slow to respond to someone else's request, they requester gets angry. Anger causes certain instinctive behaviours (repeating the request, swearing, shouting, bashing) which are very effective at persuading a human to hurry up. Because people anthropomorphise computers, they show the same anger response to a slow computer as they do to a slow human.

I have seen many people crash their computers with repeated clicks, and all of them have enough years of experience with computers to know that the computer will respond sooner if they click once and wait. I have also seen people damaging their computers by hitting and throwing them. A Bayesian rational actor might click again after a few seconds in case the first click didn't register, but it certainly wouldn't act like a human.
> 0 votes

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, motivation, decision-making, human-factors
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title: Reading list for character defects

text:
# Question
Title: Reading list for character defects
Could you recommend books/articles about character defects (e.g. envy, laziness, hate, etc.).

I am particularly interested in:

* A comprehensive list of character defects
* Description of possible causes of those defects
* Examples

The character defects should not be necessarily caused by mental illness.

An example of a book that seems to fit my criteria would be (although it is related to mental illnesses): `50 Signs of Mental Illness - A Guide to Understanding Mental Health - by James Whitney Hicks`

No limits about the date of publication (the older the better).

# Answer
> 4 votes
The lists of "character deficits" can be mixtures of judgements, beliefs, attitudes and emotions. The common denominator of the things on such lists is often just that they are not acceptable for some people, but they are not all necessary bad and some of them may not need to be changed or treated.

Examples:

Laziness can be a temporary *mood,* which, if excessive, can become *a bad habit.*

Anger is an *emotion,* which can help you refuse inappropriate attitudes of others or, when not controlled by proper thinking, can result in destruction.

Hate is an intense *dislike* for something or someone and it is not necessary bad; together with anger, it can help you refuse things that are not good for you. On the other hand, hate is often completely unreasonable.

Fear can be perceived as *weakness,* but it is also a *warning emotion* that can help you avoid a danger.

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Tags: personality
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# Question
Title: Are there any studies regarding elderly people and learning resiliance?
On Parenting, issues regarding emotional resilience are often discussed as something of great value, a lifelong gift to give to one's child, and I cite studies and articles to help parents learn what resilience is and how to teach it. I define resiliency as a kind of positive mind set which allows a child/person to maintain a healthier outlook in the face of stress. For example, resilient kids see setbacks as learning opportunities rather than failures, feel that they have agency instead of helplessness, avoid negative self-talk, etc.

It seems to me (totally uninformed opinion coming) that much older people are less likely to be able to change their psychological habits/traits. (It's a cognitive bias I have.)

I know from my own dogs that it's quite possible to teach an old dog new tricks (my 13 year old Border Collie could learn new tricks in a few minutes), but so far, I've not been able to find anyone willing to fund a grant involving clicker training patients my age to learn new ways to cope with unwanted emotions or negative experiences. (J/k about the grant. And the clicker training/operant conditioning, but with clicker training, there is no negative feedback except for lack of reward.)

If someone can point me in the right direction to literature demonstrating how to successfully increase resiliency in elderly patients, it would be much appreciated.

# Answer
This isn't quite my area of expertise, but I did find a couple recent papers that attempted to use behavioral interventions to improve some measure of resilience in older populations and showed positive results:

*Luskin, F., Reitz, M., Newell, K., Quinn, T. G., & Haskell, W. (2002). A controlled pilot study of stress management training of elderly patients with congestive heart failure. Preventive cardiology, 5(4), 168-174.*

*Perez-Blasco, J., Sales, A., Meléndez, J. C., & Mayordomo, T. (2016). The effects of mindfulness and self-compassion on improving the capacity to adapt to stress situations in elderly people living in the community. Clinical Gerontologist, 39(2), 90-103.*

In addition to one showing an effect of a *physical* intervention, which makes sense since physical and mental/emotional outcomes tend to be highly correlated:

*Roh, S. Y. (2016). Effect of a 16-week Pilates exercise program on the ego resiliency and depression in elderly women. Journal of exercise rehabilitation, 12(5), 494.*

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In summary, it seems like it's possible to improve psychological habits in older adults, though I didn't find anything comparing older to younger populations, and the vast amount of literature in this area seems to be focused on measuring and correlating measures of resiliency with other health outcomes, rather than improving it directly. Seems like an important area for future work.
> 3 votes

# Answer
Bit too long for a comment, so here it is. The following quote from Yuval Harari's *Homo Deus* is skeptical about what you call "elderly people and learning resilience":

*"Of course, by 2033 many new professions are likely to appear — for example, virtual-world designers. But such professions will probably require much more creativity and flexibility than current run-of-the-mill jobs, and it is unclear whether 40-year-old cashiers or insurance agents will be able to reinvent themselves as virtual world designers (try to imagine a virtual world created by an insurance agent!). And even if they do so, the pace of progress is such that within another decade they might have to reinvent themselves yet again."*

The reference that he gives is: E. Brynjolfsson and A. McAffee, *Race Against the Machine: How the Digital Revolution is Accelerating Innovation, Driving Productivity, and Irreversibly Transforming Employment and the Economy* (Lexington: Digital Frontier Press, 2011)
> 1 votes

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Tags: learning, behavior
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# Question
Title: Did research in psychology lead to any useful technology?
Research in physics allowed us to build bridges, computers, put people in space. Research in chemistry led to the discovery of all sorts of new materials which we use everyday. Research in biology led to many the discovery of many drugs that save millions of people every day. \[Fill in more examples of game-changing technology based on hard sciences here.\]

Did research in psychology lead to any useful technology? If yes, what are your favorite examples?

# Answer
Artificial intelligence has received a strong influence from cognitive science, not only in its name.

Concepts like the P300 might have an application in lie detection. See this.

Cognitive psychology is in the basis of assessments for drivers, pilots. For that you'll need to work through concepts like attention, concentration, and the like.

That said, it's not in the scope of psychology to produce technology. So, you won't find much more than concepts/views/ideas flowing into/inspiring a technology.
> 2 votes

# Answer
Here are just a few examples from the top of my head:

* Robots are made to look as artificial as possible because psychologists found out that the closer they look to a real person, the higher the discomfort.
* The surroundings of large Cat scanners (MRI) to make people more comfortable and allow reduced dosage of Benzodiazepines
* Upcoming developments in general AI that would be impossible without deep insight into psychological processes
* Lights and sounds in tunnel systems and airport tunnels (birds chirping in Frankfurt, Germany is one example)
* Elevator music to prevent people from having claustrophobic attacks
* Light therapy devices
* Performance enhancing military devices (currents to shorten training time in drone pilots etc)
* Positioning of instrumentation in vehicles
* Street surfaces that make sounds to prevent accidents
* Use of colors and shapes in all guidance systems (traffic)
* Lie detectors
* Some biometric access systems (gait analysis)
* Countless medical devices for natal care (everything that feels good;))
* Devices and robots for elderly care
> 2 votes

# Answer
Psychology and Neuroscience informs the science of human biology and chemistry in order to create the many drugs used to help with mental health disorders.

Other than that, I cannot think of any physical technology born out of psychology alone. Depending on your definition of technology, there are instruments providing rudimentary diagnostics questionnaires such as the mental health assessment from PsychologyToday at https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/tests/health/mental-health-assessment, and there are other instruments used by therapists such as Patient Health Questionnaires (PHQs). Examples can be found at https://www.phqscreeners.com/select-screener
> 1 votes

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Tags: psychology
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title: Auditory Processing Speed

text:
# Question
Title: Auditory Processing Speed
Why do I find myself lost when; for example, Sheldon (from the Big Bang Theory) talks fast about complex physics. I try to comprehend what he's saying but I guess my brain isn't fast enough.

Also is there any way I cant increase the passage speed between my ears and my brain.

# Answer
> 1 votes
A concept has the property of depth, which is basically how much background understanding must be recruited to interpret it. The deeper the concept, the more understanding is required. Sheldon talking complex physics is relating many deep concepts.

Your mind tries to make sense of new information by associating it with your background understanding of reality. If you lack the background, it will have to work harder to make sense of it, and if it can't make sense of it, you will find yourself lost.

When new information is taken in and used in various ways (eg. muilling it over; using it in everyday life), redundant portions of it become incorporated into the unconscious mind to be used as a framework to further understanding (i.e. it becomes "second nature"). Unconscious information processing is much faster than conscious processing, so while you lose conscious access to the concept, you gain fast processing speed effortlessly.

When Sheldon speaks, he is accessing a deep unconscious network of understanding. The way to increase speed of processing is to use related information repeatedly until your mind builds up the background understanding. Much of the more redundant processing will be relegated to the unconscious, freeing up your conscious mind to take in more information.

In other words, you lack the requisite foundation to understand Sheldon's complex physics in realtime, so are trying to consciously process everything said. Practice, practice, practice thinking about complex physics to build a foundational understanding that'll take the load off to speed up processing.

*–Yuri*

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Tags: language-processing
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# Question
Title: What effects does multitasking have on comprehension and memory of audiobooks/speech?
I've heard around that our comprehension of audiobooks versus read books is roughly on the same level (the processes aren't really all that different, usually when we read we vocalize the words in our imagination, and when we are listening with attention we recap all the words we hear after we hear them to make them "stick" in a similar kind of way; when we lose our focus on either the words don't stick and it's like we never heard/read them.)

The major difference I see is that when reading we can double back and re-read a word several times until it sticks (which according to some arguments may actually impair comprehension rather than increase it), but when listening we can not do this, which also makes listening a slightly faster process unless you're an avid "speedreader"

So with that out of the way, I'm wondering about the effects (if any) of doing other tasks while we listen to audiobooks on our comprehension and memory of the contents are, especially if the contents are educational or historical material (not novels, where comprehension isn't as important, and our attention is kept more easily (since novels tend to be more exciting/engaging than history or sociology books))

Tasks can include **low attention tasks** that don't engage the brain that much (like chores, exercise (from swimming to weightlifting), doodling or mini-games (angry-birds or farmwille or flappy bird or tetris even), essentially things that anyone can just space out and do on "auto-pilot" without giving it any thought.

And **high attention tasks** (like reflex video games such as world of tanks, league of legends/dota2, call of duty or dark souls. Wiring/fixing electronics, creative drawing/design, sudoku or chess/go, or even programming or math), tasks which require us to stay relatively or completely engaged in order to succeed at them.

Assuming with all the possible low and high attention tasks that there is nothing that can distract your auditory senses (video games for example would be muted, and you wouldn't be playing music), what kind of effect would these kinds of tasks have on a persons memory and comprehension of an audiobook they'd be listening to while doing it?

I've heard some experts claim that some people can focus better on the teacher's voice in class while they're doing something with their hands (most commonly doodling) and that doing something with your ears (essentially instrumental music) can help them focus on written material (i.e. read better with music, hear better while using your hands & eyes for something) I do not know how true that may be, but if it is there is a chance that doing another task while listening to an audiobook could increase your comprehension instead of degrade it as one would normally suspect (meaning I can't rule that out either until I would see some data on this whole thing).

# Answer
> 2 votes
There does not seem to be any research on your exact question on:

> the effect of "low attention tasks" and "high attention tasks" on the comprehension and memory of speech modality learning.

However, if we widen the scope of the question to different modalities of learning like reading, then there is ample research. However, most of the research seems to be done on comprehension and not memory.

## Low Attention Tasks

Lin Lin et. al. (2009) did a study on college students for assessing their reading performance under three conditions: (a) reading only (silence condition), (b) reading with a video playing in the background (background multitasking condition), and (c) reading and watching video simultaneously (test multitasking condition). **They found that the participants performed best in the background condition, i.e. when they had a background video playing**. This a surprising finding. A similar study was done by Jennifer Lee et. al. (2011) and found that the performance was similar for cases (a) and (b).

For your case, this suggests that "low attention tasks" will not negatively affect your comprehension, and may even increase comprehension (as suggest by Lee et. al. (2009)).

## High Attention Tasks

Beyond conclusions about the effect of low-attention tasks, Jennifer et. al. (2011) also rigorously tested the effect of "high attention tasks". To quote from their abstract:

> Participants were given a timed (16 minutes) reading comprehension test in three conditions: Silence (only reading), Background multitasking (reading with a non-tested video shown simultaneously), and Test multitasking (reading with a tested video shown simultaneously) conditions.
>
> Our findings indicated that: (1) participants in the Background condition performed as well as those in the Silence condition, and (2) **when participants were tested on their video comprehension, the group in the Test condition performed significantly better than the group in the Background condition**. The results of this study suggest that cognitive load plays an important role in determining how much information is retained when students perform more than one task at a time.

Their conclusion tells that the division of cognitive load affects your performance very clearly. Hence, it is best to avoid the high-attention tasks altogether.

### References:

* Lin Lin, Tip Robertson & Jennifer Lee (2009) Reading Performances Between Novices and Experts in Different Media Multitasking Environments, Computers in the Schools, 26:3, 169-186, DOI: 10.1080/07380560903095162
* Jennifer Lee, Lin Lin & Tip Robertson (2012) The impact of media multitasking on learning, Learning, Media and Technology, 37:1, 94-104, DOI: 10.1080/17439884.2010.537664

# Non-research Sources

Beyond what the current research says, I would like to cite 2 more sources: "**Deep Work**" book by **Cal Newport**, and the training modality of **Samurai Jack** (a fictional character in an animated series).

In "Deep Work", Cal Newport makes a very compelling case for why deep work (i.e. work devoid of all distractions) is so important. The first half of the book is completely dedicated to understanding its importance; while the second half deals with its implementation. Cal Newport is an academic, and so he backs his claims with scientific research and his own careful observations.

Finally, as a kid, I was always fascinated with the training regime of Samurai Jack. When training for sword fighting, he used to blind-fold himself and then train. This made him one of the best Samurais, capable of defeating a redoubtable evil dragon. What I got to understand from his regime was that he was blocking all the various stimuli in order to bring intense focus and really bring out the potential of the remaining active senses.

This is not just true for Samurai Jack. Masters in any field have been doing this through the ages : **cutting down stimuli**.

It's surprising, then, today we are instead adding more stimuli instead of reducing them. I think it's best to go the old-fashioned way. It's best we embrace the The Samurai Jack Blindfold:

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Tags: memory, attention, working-memory, multi-tasking, speech-comprehension
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title: Strange question in a job-interview

text:
# Question
Title: Strange question in a job-interview
I would like to ask you the reasoning behind a question they asked me during a job interview (with a psychologist) a few years ago.

He basically handed me a bunch of colored cards (fifteen at least), asked me to think of my own logical order and to sort the cards according to the chosen order.

After I ordered them, he took notes on a sheet of my result, took the papers from me, shuffled them and gave them back to me, telling them to reposition them in the same order they had previously chosen. And he added "70% of people change the order of at least one card in the second round". It is clear that he only told me to influence me.

What is the purpose of this test? I'm very curious.

# Answer
> 1 votes
I mentioned in the comment that it could be just a memory test, but now, with knowing a bit more of the context (it was an interview to join a bank), it could be a test about how you stick with your first decision and how you are influenced by an *obvious suggestion* to change it because, supposedly, "70% people before you did", so to *change the logic* by which you ordered the cards the first time.

It was one of the aptitude tests, probably a variant of a situational judgement test.

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Tags: personality
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title: How can fear be a positive emotion?

text:
# Question
Title: How can fear be a positive emotion?
Fear is something we all feel, and we typically experience it as negative. It seems difficult to treat it as a positive emotion or find any satisfaction in overcoming it.

So my question is: Can people learn how to have positive experiences with being afraid?

# Answer
> 11 votes
*So this may be long-winded, but I gotta get through some theoretical background first!*

## Conceptual Act Theory

If we take from the Conceptual Act Theory (CAT) of emotions (Barrett, 2014), then we can consider emotions like fear to be what are called "situated conceptualizations." This means that we feel an emotion when we make meaning out of our situated affective experiences (what CAT calls a "conceptual act").

For example, I'm making a conceptual act when I interpret (conceptualize) as *fear* my high arousal and negative affect in the context of anticipating a snake bite. What this means is that I'm automatically categorizing my experience using an emotion concept (i.e. fear) that I've learned.

As Condon, Wilson-Mendenhall, & Barrett (2014) point out:

> Emotion concepts make affective changes in the body meaningful, guide action, allow communication about one’s state to another, and influence another’s mental state and actions.

So categorizing my experience as "fear" is just like categorizing a big gray moving thing with a trunk as an "elephant." The elephant categorization makes meaning of the moving gray mass, allows me to compare it to other objects, communicate what I saw, guides my actions, etc.

## Emotion Variability and Pleasant Fear

What's interesting about CAT is that it predicts tremendous variability in emotional experience. The ways in which we can *conceptualize* our situated affective experiences are vast. In this sense, CAT might predict something like **pleasant fear**. I've shown you this image before (from Condon et al., 2014), but it's even more relevant here:

As you can see, our prototypical fear concept involves negative feelings. We are very familiar with this negative fear concept, and so we can easily and automatically apply it to our affective experiences.

On the other hand, we never really talk about what it might mean to experience *pleasant fear*. The pleasant fear concept is not in our folk taxonomy of emotions. We're unfamiliar with it. Thus, we'll have greater difficulties activating that concept and applying it to our experiences.

## Conceptual Learning

**So, can we *learn* to experience pleasant fear**? Yes!

But at the moment there's little empirical research on learning emotion concepts (in adulthood). We can probably draw from the literature on emotion socialization in children (e.g., Widen & Russell, 2010), but I'm not personally convinced that we can make an easy parallel.

There is potentially some indirect evidence that there is rapid conceptual learning when exposing remote tribes to Western emotion concepts (Sauter, Eisner, Ekman & Scott, 2015, and a response by Gendron, Roberson, & Barrett, 2015).

Also, there's some emerging evidence (Kashdan, Barrett, & McKnight, 2015) that we can improve people's levels of "emotion granularity." High emotion granularity means you label your affective experiences using many different emotion words (happy, sad, surprised, angry, remorseful, contemptuous, etc.). Low granularity means less diverse labeling (happy, sad, good, bad).

So if we can teach people to make more fine-grained conceptualizations of their affective experiences (i.e., improve granularity), you can probably learn to experience pleasant fear.

## Conclusion

This is a new and growing area of research, so you'll have to stay tuned for more direct evidence. But overall, you *can* learn new emotion concepts like pleasant fear, and you can get better at using them with practice.

## Emotion Utility (Edit)

It's also possible to treat negative fear as having positive utility (see Maya Tamir's work, e.g., here). That is, even though fear might feel unpleasant, you might learn to view it as serving some adaptive function within certain contexts, e.g., facilitating quick withdrawal from danger.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Merriam-Webster dictionary defines fear as "an **unpleasant** often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger."

Fear is **helpful** when it helps you to avoid things that are not good for you.

Fear is **harmful** when it stops you doing something what is good for you or someone else.

So, even when fear is helpful (positive), it is not pleasant, but when you properly react to it, you can experience a pleasant feeling of **satisfaction** *after your action*; for example, you can feel safe after reacting to fear and running away from a danger or feel peace and joy after doing something despite fear.

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# Question
Title: What are current neuronal explanations and models of 'consciousness'?
I would like to understand more about consciousness from a neuroscientific perspective. I have a limited understanding of it in the philosophical/psychological sense through lectures.

Although it is hard to define, here is a definition from Christof Koch's website I will provide:

> "At this point in the scientific exploration of this phenomena, it cannot be defined rigorously. **Consciousness usually (but not always) involves some form of attentional selection and a rapidly decaying form of information storage.** For strategic reasons, most of the empirical research has focused on the brain states underlying conscious sensory perception, the *neuronal correlates of consciousness*, or *NCC*. I avoid taking any particular ideological position in the debate concerning the exact relationship between the NCC and conscious experience."

I do not know what the debate is about but I'm curious about this relationship between NCC and overall conscious experience.

Rather than reading through every model of consciousness proposed, I was hoping someone who might be more knowledgeable to **briefly explain or provide references to literature/reviews of models with a strong neuronal emphasis**. In particular I would **prefer models more so if they are not specific to a single mode of sensory perception**.

# Answer
> 29 votes
The major neural models of consciousness at the moment roughly fall into two camps: cognitive and phenomenological. They are defined by controversy surrounding what types of experience qualify as concious.

### Cognitive models

On the one hand there are strong cognitive models of consciousness, such as the one proposed by Stanislas Dehaene, where consciousness is characterised - neurally - by large scale, reverberant processing across the whole brain. That is, when feedforward stimulus based activity and top down feedback activity (i.e. internal, cognitive factors) are coordinated across the whole cortex. On this view, a stimulus can be said to be consciously perceived when it gains access to a special population of *workspace neurons* that have limited capacity and broadcast information related to the stimulus to other modular subsystems (e.g., memory, language sensory modalities). Limited capacity and broadcasting are properties of workspace neurons that account for both the limited nature of consciousness (e.g., attention), and coherency of consciousness (that is we perceive multi-sensory information coherently as events that are bound together, not as separate bits of visual, auditory and tactile experiences). It is believed that these workspace neurons are apart of the fronto-parietal attention network, and are involved in selecting information in the occipital-temporal systems.

### Phenomenological models

In contrast, so called phenomenological theories, such as the those put forward by Victor Lamme and Ned Block, propose that consciousness also arises from local recurrent activity between two brain regions. The central feature of these theories is that - in addition to the cognitive forms of consciousness - there is also phenomenal consciousness which accounts for raw sensory (non-cognitive) properties of consciousness.

The key argument for this type of consciousness is that phenomenal consciousness overflows cognitive consciousness, that is, we are conscious of things that are outside of the focus of attention and that do not become encoded in a more durable form by the central cognitive system (I think Ned Block would still argue phenomenal consciousness requires attention so I am setting up a caricature here). According to this theory, phenomenal consciousness is supported by local recurrent activity between two regions. For example, it is possible to have a phenomenal sense of motion when motion selective cortex (area MT) and primary visual cortex (V1) enter into a feedforward and feedback relationship. *Note Block and Lamme hold the same views as Dehaene regarding cognitive consciousness.*

### Old and other models

It is also possible to distinguish these two theories of consciousness from other dated views that argue that particular parts of the brain reflect the goings on of consciousness. For example, one common view is that the processing in the frontal lobes reflects consciousness. These regionally specific theories are quite different from the ones described above where consciousness is characterised by relationships between regions. However, these types of theories are very much out of fashion and for good reason - consciousness is likely to be a complex dynamic property of the system.

However, once you start to say that the whole system is important some people, such as Alva Noe, argue that it is pointless even saying that consciousness resides in the brain!!!! For Noe, consciousness is a dynamic relationship between the organism and the environment. I would not say that Noe's views are widely held in the neuroscientific community.

Well, these are the only models that I have followed in any detail. I know there are other more complex models, such as Giulio Tononi's Information Integration model, but this model requires a good knowledge of information theory (so I never followed it up). If any of this material needs more clarification I am more than happy to expand on it.

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### Bibliography

For an intro, try reading:

* Kouider, S. (2009). Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness. In Banks, W. (Ed.) Encyclopedia of Consciousness. Elsevier, vol. 2, 87-100. (pdf)

See also:

* Dehaene S, Changeux JP, Naccache L, Sackur J, and Sergent C (2006) Conscious, preconscious, and subliminal processing: A testable taxonomy. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10: 204–211. (pdf)
* Lamme VA (2006) Towards a true neural stance on consciousness. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 10: 494–501. (pdf)

# Answer
> 14 votes
One of Koch's collaborators, Francis Crick (yes, that Francis Crick, much later in his career), put forth an interesting theory with Koch that while perhaps is a bit far fetched, it's worth mentioning for sake of a slightly different perspective.

Crick and Koch posited the claustrum (see diagram below) as one of the seats of consciousness in the brain. Koubeissi, Bartolomei, Beltagy and Picard (2014) supported their hypothesis when conducting electrical stimulation mapping on a 54-year-old epilepsy female patient, who became unresponsive under the stimulation in the left claustrum/anterior insula region. However, several limitations in this study need further investigation, such as a high electric current, 14mA and lack of stimulation on right hemisphere.

As you've already read some of Koch's work, you have some idea of their working definitions for consciousness, but in brief

> ...almost all neuronal theories of consciousness...need...continuous interactions among groups of widely dispersed pyramidal neurons that express themselves in the ongoing stream of conscious percepts, images and thoughts.

http://www.wikinfo.org/upload/8/84/Gray718.png

Now, before you ask how a small strip of gray matter running along between two prominent white matter tracts could essentially "bind" together stimuli from the entire brain consider the following points (drawn mainly from non-human primate and cat data):

* The type I cells of the claustrum receive inputs from nearby areas of the cortex, and also have been found to project back
* There is significant overlap between the representation of sensory and motor cortices, visual cortices and prefrontal areas, along with motor cortices and prefrontal areas within the claustrum
* Interneurons there may possess a more "finely-tuned" timing sensitivity, appropriate for binding together the areas responding to multimodal stimuli
* The cat claustrum, in addition to the connections with sensorimotor areas and the visual cortices, also has a prominent section ventral to the visual projections that integrates auditory information

Crick and Koch assert that these points support the idea that the claustrum might be acting as a (orchestral) conductor for multimodal stimuli. Using gap junctions (direct connections between cell membranes, in this case being used as high-speed electrical synapses), interneurons of the claustrum could be employing the type I cells to "grab" and piece together information from disparate portions of the cortex simultaneously.

Of course, once the information is bound together, it would remain to be seen as to which particular structures would interpret this bound data. Crick and Koch don't really comment on this, but since there are strong bidirectional connections with the prefrontal areas, perhaps the "conductor" is also sending back cues upon which the attention of the frontal lobe could be gated, but that is simply an educated guess, and I have no further support for that.

So, as far-fetched as it may seem, a brain structure that is small on volume may have a significant enough representation of cortical information, ability to project back and "conduct" cortical areas, along with an interneuronal backbone capable of precise timing, all of which give it some chance at being an important seat of consciousness in the brain.

> Crick, F.C., Koch, C. (2005) What is the function of the claustrum? Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 360: 1271–1279 \[DOI\] \[PDF\]
>
> Koubeissi, M. Z., Bartolomei, F., Beltagy, A., & Picard, F. (2014). Electrical stimulation of a small brain area reversibly disrupts consciousness. Epilepsy & Behavior, 37, 32-35. \[DOI\] \[PDF\]

# Answer
> 2 votes
Paul Thagard has been working with the Neural Engineering Framework (NEF) and the Semantic Pointer Architecture (SPA) to create a biologically unified theory of consciousness. This is presented in the paper "Two theories of consciousness: Semantic pointer competition vs. information integration" where Thagard's theory is contrasted directly with Tonini's Information Integration Theory.

Basically, competition between Semantic Pointers which "unpack into neural representations of sensory, motor, emotional, and verbal activity". Several computer simulations are run and reported in the paper to demonstrate the applicability of this to various aspects of consciousness.

# Answer
> 1 votes
A highly controversial exploration of consiencesness can be found in

* Penrose, R. (1994). Shadows of the Mind. Oxford University Press, 1st ed.

It argues conscienceness can't be modeled by a turing machine, using Godels theorem and then hypothesizes that quantum mechanic effects in microtubili inside neurons might play an important role in the emergence of conscienceness.

I have asked 3 neuroscientists and 2 AI-researchers about this perspective, all of them complained about the book and some said conscienceness is the mere result of emergence and that no fancy quantum mechanics is required to explain it.

So (based on my survey of 5 scientists), this book does not convey the/any consensus of the field of Neuroscience. Nevertheless I think it is, up to a certain extend, important to consider opposing arguments/perspectives when studying topics.

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Tags: neuroscience, reference-request, cognitive-modeling, consciousness, theoretical-neuroscience
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title: Mechanism for deleting old memories

text:
# Question
Title: Mechanism for deleting old memories
Do we have any mechanism for deleting neuronal connections?

That is, if I learn a better version for doing something, I assume the brain will create a new neuronal connection, and we will use this connection. However, what happens to the old, non-used version? Does it fades away after a while? or is it enough to have a better, stronger connection to have the older version ignored, even if present?

# Answer
> 2 votes
Yes.

One particular mechanism for reducing synaptic strength is called long-term depression (note: this terminology is not related to the mental health term depression). Much like the opposite process that strengthens synapses, certain firing patterns tend to weaken synapses.

Additionally, synaptic scaling is a homeostatic mechanism by which more excited cells become less excitable over time, including by reducing their response to inputs globally (this is also a particular category of long-term depression). If you keep re-strengthening certain synapses, and then scaling all of them down, the result over multiple iterations is that those synapses that don't get re-strengthened get weaker.

The synaptic homeostasis hypothesis of sleep suggests that this process occurs during sleep and is a key reason why sleep is important (there are many other theories about sleep, however).

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# Question
Title: How to deal with APA in-text citations in long texts?
In APA referencing style, the first in-text citation of a work by three to five authors must include all the authors, while the subsequent citations should only mention the first author followed by the expression "et al."

Does this apply literally to a long text such a thesis (in my case, 25 pages)? Or is there some kind of reset, say, for each chapter?

# Answer
> 3 votes
APA style is mostly designed for defining manuscript submission rules for journal articles.

When you seek to apply these rules to a thesis or book, you inevitably have to apply your own rules.

The general principle is that in-text citations should unambiguously identify an end of text reference. Thus, whatever principle you adopt should do this.

For a thesis, I think either approach would be fine. You could use et al across chapters or reset each chapter.

More generally, I think that if you have a combined reference list at the end of the book/thesis, then it's fine to not reset after each chapter. In contrast, if each chapter has its own reference section, then it makes sense to reset each chapter.

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# Question
Title: How do I handle contradicting study results?
A foundation of my psychological work is the body. Simply put, I work on a big part with embodiment to diagnose, as well as to intervene and to integrate.

One illustration, or rather one important reasoning for embodiment seems to be the so called facial feedback test. I have read about this test over and over again in literature.

In 2016, there have been efforts to reproduce this test, and these efforts did fail. See here:

https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/effect-of-facial-expression-on-emotional-state-not-replicated-in-multilab-study.html

All this is rather new to me, so I don't know how to handle this situation. My intention is to do honest work. I am wondering:

* Is it careless to still cite the facial feedback although it cannot be reproduced?
* Or is it only careless to still cite if several studies proved it explicitely wrong?
* How do I talk to clients about the facial feedback?
* Should I simply try it myself and choose to belief what I want?

Please note that I am not asking for opinions. My question finally is:

> As an ethic worker in the field of psychology, how do I handle contradicting study results, based on the example of the facial feedback?

The example of facial feedback implicitely includes a) the contradicting study results and b) the contradiction becomes visible over time.

# Answer
> 3 votes
**Short answer**
Many individual papers report non-reproducible findings. I would advise you to look for review papers and meta-analysis studies to get the bigger picture. If not available, you can consider to set up a literature study yourself.

**Background**
Nature puts it down neatly (emphasis mine):

> Science moves forward by corroboration – when researchers verify others’ results. Science advances faster when people waste less time pursuing false leads. **No research paper can ever be considered to be the final word**, but there are too many that do not stand up to further study

Recently it has appeared that the results of a great many studies cannot be reproduced, leading to what is referred to now as the "**Replication crisis**".

Many factors may contribute, chief among those are according to Nature:

> the increased levels of scrutiny, complexity of experiments and statistics, and pressures on researchers.

More reliable resources than individual primary research reports are the so-called **meta-studies**, *i.e.*, review studies that collects as much information there is and where the authors attempt to synthesize the bigger picture to extract solid conclusions from them, as well as confounding factors explaining why some studies may have drawn less correct conclusions.

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# Question
Title: Assertiveness - should I have feeling that someone need to do something for me
I have seen a assertiveness training videos and there is said that the person should show assertiveness with "I" statements.

For example : I feel seed due to the way you just spoke to me.

My problem is that I see that this can't be used, as in my opinion it is just a manifestation of weakness. If there we split all possible situations in just 3 :

* in family or with love one
* at work
* on the street

The only place where this type of place where this type of sentence would not be seen as a weakness is maybe only in first case , so the question is, why is this so ? Am I wrong or the world is wrong ?

Second example : I feel that you don't invest enough of time in keeping the apartment clean.

In this type of assertive sentence, I see the problem that someone is saying what they feel or what they think but the only way to fix that is that other person do something about it. This one way view of this is also a major brake in using sentence like this one. The second problem is that if somone would use this type of sentence offten, he would be a needy person ? And also here is the same question. Am I wrong or the world is wrong ?

# Answer
> 2 votes
From what I could understand, you are broadly asking:

* How can I ask for something assertively without seeming demanding or weak?
* Is it ok for me to be demanding and even selfish?
* How am I expected to be assertive under different circumstances / environments (e.g work, family, general social interactions etc)?

It helps to think of "Assertiveness Training (AT)" as:

* a way to effectively **communicate with others**
* considering the **rights of all party** involved in a social interaction, and
* keeping in mind the **context of the social interaction**.

Just like a constitution in a democracy gives you certain "rights", AT also defines some **rights** that you need to recognize and understand to be assertive in a social situation.

These rights are:

1. Every individual has the right to do anything as long as it does not hurt others.
2. Everyone has the right to maintain their dignity by being assertive - even if it hurts someone else's feeling.
3. Everyone has the right to make a request from someone, as long as they recognize that the other person has the rights to say no.
4. In many interpersonal situations the rights aren't clear. But you always have the right to discuss the problem with the persons involved, to clarify it.
5. Everyone has the rights to these rights.

Source: Fensterheim Ph.D., Herbert and Jean Baer, (1975). *Don't Say Yes When You Want to Say No: Making Life Right When It Feels All Wrong*. RHUS.

We have all come across people who are **aggressive** or **passive**.

In the context of AT:

* An **aggressive** person is someone who doesn't respect the rights of others nor cares for their feelings. Aggression is about dominance. E.g. of this kind of behaviour include yelling at someone, threatening someone or even physical brawls to get your way.
* A **passive** person on the other hand is someone who sacrifices their own rights or feelings and often gives into the demands made by someone, irrespective of what they genuinely want to do or how they feel about it. Passivity here is about being submissive. E.g. of this kind of behaviour include doing what everyone asks you to do, trying to be nice to everyone even if you don't feel like it, not standing up for your beliefs etc.

So assertiveness is kind of like trying to navigate another path between being aggressive and passive by being considerate of the feelings / rights of others you are interacting with while also respecting your own feelings / rights too depending on the situation and the person(s) involved.

Thus, an assertive approach is about respect and consideration for self and others.

Under certain circumstances, deliberately choosing to be aggressive or passive can also be considered being assertive.

Another important concept to understand in AT is to understand the situational context of any social interaction.

That means, depending on the situation, context and the person(s) involved, how you communicate also needs to change.

E.g. When your wife yells at you, you may feel comfortable to yell back at her. But obviously when your boss yells at you, being assertive-passive and choosing to be quite is a better choice at that moment.

Or, for example, it is not assertiveness if you express your undying attraction and love to a widow at her husband's funeral, however badly you want to, because it is socially not appropriate.

So now, let's address your doubts:

* How can I express or ask for something assertively without seeming demanding or weak?

Keeping AT concepts in mind, being demanding can be an aggressive behaviour if you are totally disregarding the rights of the other person (i.e. their right to say no to you). So if you are not disregarding the rights of the other person, as per AT you are not being demanding.

But you also have to consider the situational context. E.g. Sometimes you may choose to be rude with a stranger if they are annoying you or you may even be aggressive with someone if threatened by them. Or you might purposefully choose to obey and be passive when you feel threatened, so as to not endanger your life.

As a boss you can make some demands on your employees to do their job better or in a particular way. This may seem like an aggressive behaviour, but can be considered an assertive approach because of the social context - a boss is required to manage his employee, and employees are expected to do their job well.

About appearing weak - AT does not consider expressing your thoughts, wants and feelings as weakness. In fact it actually encourages you to express it clearly, directly and openly. (e.g. "I didn't like that movie", "I want to go a movie", "I felt bad when you arrived late for the movie"). Expressing yourself like these isn't a weakness because it helps the other person(s) understand you better, without any room for misunderstanding.

Ofcourse, most of the times, it is not assertiveness if you aren't considerate of the other person's rights.

* Is it ok for me to be demanding and even selfish?

Depending on the situational context, yes.

You have the right to say no, even to your close friend, even if they may feel hurt about it.

Obviously, assertiveness doesn't mean you always have your way. But AT says you should also be considerate to yourself too (you have the same rights as others), and so if you feel someone is making some unjustified demand on you, it is ok to say no even if some may perceive that as selfishness.

You can be demanding if required so. For example, at work, sometimes you may need to be aggressive to further your career. (Note that the appropriateness of this varies based on a society's culture. For e.g. in US, it may be appropriate for you to go home before your boss, but in Japan or Korea, this may be considered as you being rude to the boss).

**(It is very important to keep in mind that AT is not about always getting your way).**

* How am I expected to be assertive under different circumstances / environments (e.g work, family, general social interactions etc)?

By balancing your rights vs the rights of the other person(s) in a socially appropriate manner. Sometimes it may be apt to be assertive-passive and sacrifice your rights for the demands made by someone you love. Sometimes it may be apt for you to be assertive-aggressive with a pesky family member. And so on.

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Tags: cognitive-psychology
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# Question
Title: How to explain individual ignorance towards people wanting to help?
Please allow me to introduce the context of the situation first before asking my questions.

This week I was taking part in a non-violent occupation of a public place (in Paris) within the context of an international movement (you may have heard of it or not).

Part of this occupation was blocking a bridge for car traffic, still allowing bicycles and pedestrians to pass.

At one point in time, the authorities decided to completely close one side of the bridge by using thick and high metal fences, no one could pass through any longer - and they were patrolling on the other side of the fence.

The event organizers decided to deploy "peace-keepers" on the other side of the bridge (the open one) so that people would be informed that it is really blocked - it was not really visible before almost traversing the bridge completely - and they were given a deviation-possibility and other help - friendly and non-violent!

What did I observe with individuals and couples (very biased of course):

Tourists (non-french) were very open and happy to be there, asked what all this is about and so on - no problem for using the deviation, some even participated in the event for some time.

Young, "native" people were partially very open, partially they did not want to listen (up to ignoring) to the help and had to learn it the hard way (when facing the fence).

The ratio of those strongly ignoring any help seem to raise with age and status. From "Don't worry, I'm a lawyer, I will pass" up to getting a hysterical crisis of one individual when realizing that one cannot get through.

I wasn't observing a female/male variance.

It was quite disturbing to us to see so many people ignoring our advice as it was well meant and the situation was not caused by us.

Is there any study concerning this kind of behavior? Does it have a name?

Ideally I would like to know what makes people behave in this way. Why are some open, why are some so stubborn?

How much is it depending on the culture of the society?

Is there a method which could help to improve our impact?

# Answer
Different personalities at play can partly explain this.

An old joke goes:

> "There are two kinds of people in this world. If there is an electrical fence, and you tell them about it, one will believe you. The other will insist on peeing on the fence to find out the truth."

Individuals prone to anxiety may indeed be less trusting.

Trusting someone's word, especially a stranger's, carries uncertainty and uncertainty to an anxious mind causes a lot of mental distress. So anxious people often try to cope with this by trying to regain the feeling of being in control by "doing their own research".

A narcissist personality type may have an unrealistic view of their status in society and thus expect to be treated differently than "normal" folks. Due to their exaggerated sense of importance of their own self, they may feel that regular rules don't apply to them.

A paranoid personality type would be less trusting of a stranger too, as they sometimes tend to be overly suspicious and distrustful of people.

(These are the few personality types that immediately came to my mind and their underlying way of thinking could explain why these kind of people may have opted to not listen to your group of "peace-keepers").
> 1 votes

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Tags: behavior
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# Question
Title: Research shows that doing anything in bed other than sleeping can disrupt sleep. What if these other things are done on another bed?
I read this and some other articles stating that you should not do anything in bed except sleep. This includes studying, eating, and watching T.V, because your brain will have a difficult time associating what exactly your bed is for, which can lead to insomnia when trying to sleep.

So my question is, can I do these other things on a bed on which I do not sleep in (in another room)? Contrary to what the article says, I just don't want to study on a desk, I find it very hard to focus (eg. in school) because my body position from sitting on a desk is not ideal/comfortable for me. I prefer to lay down as this helps me relax and thus keeps me concentrated. Would it hurt my sleep if I switched to studying on a bed that I don't sleep on?

# Answer
> “Mixing sleep and study in the same location sends mixed signals to the brain,” Carter wrote in an email. “It does not know which it is supposed to be focusing on. This leads to less effective studying (and) learning, and it makes it harder to fall asleep when you want to.”

This may have to do in the context of Pavlovian Conditioning.

Pahlov found he could trigger a dog's salivating reflex to the ring of a bell by ringing a bell whenever the dog was fed (over a period of time). (McLeod, S. A. (2018, Oct 08). Pavlov's dogs. Simply Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/pavlov.html)

The theory proposed in the article is suggesting something similar: to condition your body to associate the bed with sleeping. So that, just as the sound of a bell makes the dog salivate reflexively, a bed where you regularly sleep in can also make you automatically feel sleepy when you lie down on it and thus help you fall asleep more easily.

But this can only happen if sleeping is the only activity that you do on a bed.

If you do other activities, and your brain find these more stimulating, then the bed can become associated with that feeling / stimulation / action and trigger it.

So for example, if you play video games in your bed repeatedly over a period of time, lying on the bed may automatically remind you of video games and get you all stimulated. Obviously a stimulated brain will find it difficult to fall asleep. And you may then go on to do some other activity instead of sleeping, without realising why you couldn't sleep. Over a period of time, this kind of cycle (not being able to sleep and doing something else till you feel sleepy) could develop into a sleep order.

> So my question is, can I do these other things on a bed on which I do not sleep in (in another room)?

Theoretically, you can. In effect, you can try to condition yourself to associate one environment with your sleeping activity and another for studying. You just have to ensure that the environment has enough differences (maybe use a different mattress on the bed, a bed sheet with a different texture, a bed placed in a different direction, a light source at a very different location etc. etc.).

Once you've differentiated between the two environments, try to keep both unchanged as it is for a period of time.

> Contrary to what the article says, I just don't want to study on a desk, I find it very hard to focus (eg. in school) because my body position from sitting on a desk is not ideal/comfortable for me.

Your body is telling you something when it protests (through aches and pains) when you sit for long hours on a desk. It is because you are not taking the right amount of breaks and hydrating and fueling yourself at regular interval.

And make sure your chair and desk are ergonomically designed.

In general, follow the guidelines as in using a computer. And if you use a computer install a software like Workrave (Windows) or TimeOut (Mac) that will force you to take a break regularly. The difference to the body on taking these micro-breaks and short-breaks can really be surprising.
> 1 votes

# Answer
Best to just be able to wind down and turn off your mind (as much as possible). For example, according to the study below, just watching TV will not affect your sleep but binge watching TV can. A person needs to ‘cool down’ before going to sleep. Besides, if we are just supposed to sleep in bed, how is it that people regularly have sex in bed yet rarely complain that sex leads to insomnia?

binge watching tv
> 0 votes

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# Question
Title: Why do some people undergo sudden savant syndrome?
According to https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/brain-gain-a-person-can-instantly-blossom-into-a-savant-and-no-one-knows-why/, sometimes somebody suddenly becomes a savant. I don't know how it works. Since probably nobody knows the answer, I was wondering if somebody could give me a theory on how it happens that researchers determined were a reasonable theory. I believe some people already have theories on why Kim Peek's brain worked the way it worked so maybe it's a similar explanation to that.

Here's my theory. I think everybody's brain is destined to have megasavant skills after enough time goes by and is slowly getting closer to it although their brain might be forgetting everything from more than 30 seconds before while they're part way there because it's the one and only true energetically favourable state of the brain, provided that other factors such as a change of the circulatory system in the brain caused by failing organs or the aging of individual brain cells doesn't occurr. I think a brain closely resembles a bounded 3D Conway's game of life and I have a reason to think it's probable that almost all of them are destined towards megasavant tendencies although they get low scores on an IQ test because they don't have one and only one way of thinking that matches a universal human intuition, but it's too long to describe here.

I think that some day, the evolutionary learning laboratories will suddenly have the research results to start a self sustaining research technique with a complex state that's destined to continually rapidly self evolve into higher and higher complexity. Maybe a similar effect can happen to the brain of an individual human. I already feel like I'm very slowly and sluggishly getting closer to starting sudden savant syndrome which gives me optimism that it might some day happen to me. From what this question says, I think that forgotten memories are still in the brain with the theoritical capability to recall them again after they were previously hopelessly forgotten, and people might stop being locked out of their account as a result. I also saw a YouTube video about somebody who got a seizure then could remember really well from then on but probably could not remember all those details from before the seizure. I feel like I'm recalling more fragments of my past than I could have before and recalling old ones is probably a more complex task than remembering really well from then on. Also, I used to not be one speck perfect pitch then over time, I started being able to correctly recall the pitch of something I heard a few hours earlier a bit more often and then after season 2 of the show "The Worst Witch," I heard it's introduction a few more times and then for quite a while, I was perfect pitch for the introduction of the show "The Worst Witch" almost all the time. I think I was about 30 at that time. That appears to be a sign that I'm sluggishly getting closer to starting sudden savant syndrome. I'm saying all this not because an answer you help me improve my personal life but because I think the information about myself can help research on how sudden savant syndrome occurs.

Update: Some time after I posted this question, I look at the image with a hidden dog which appeared at http://www.illusions.org/dp/1-18.htm or another image that was exactly the same and I saw the hidden dog right away. Once when I was a kid, I looked a picture with a hidden dog that I think was the same one and I couldn't find the dog at all. I believe I never looked at the image at all between those two times.

# Answer
Savant syndrome can be congenital or acquired.\[1,2\] The acquired savant syndrome can occur in people with stroke, head injury, and even some degenerative diseases (such as dementia) that affect the left fronto-temporal lobe. \[1\] Transcranial magnetic stimulations of this area, which can cause inhibition in this area, can also elicit these kinds of unusual capacities too, even though only transiently. \[3-5\] So, there is a theory that the extraordinary skills of savants, such as calculating, memorizing, and performing music, exist latently within us all but are not normally accessible because there is inhibition from some areas, especially the left fronto-temporal lobe.

> Snyder and Mitchell (1999) have argued that the extraordinary skills of savants, including mathematics and drawing, are within us all but cannot normally be accessed without some form of brain damage. It has also been argued that such skills can be made accessible to normal people by switching off part of their brain artificially using magnetic pulses (Carter, 1999). Using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to interrupt the function of the frontotemporal lobe, a region of the brain implicated in the development of savant skills (Miller et al., 1996,1998), we tested this hypothesis. Here we show that savant-type skills improved in 5 out of 17 participants during the period of stimulation.\[4\]

So, lesions at the left fronto-temporal lobe can cause disinhibition of neural processes in some other areas and enable those areas to function with extraordinary capacities \[3,4\]; thus, some people can suddenly develop savant syndrome because there is an acute lesion, such as stroke, head trauma, and even transcranial magnetic stimulation, at the left fronto-temporal lobe (or other yet-undiscovered inhibiting areas) thereby releasing the latent savant skill.

**References:**

1. Treffert DA. The savant syndrome: An extraordinary condition. A synopsis: past, present, future. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2009 May 27; 364(1522): 1351–1357doi: 10.1098/rstb.2008.0326.
2. Wikipedia. Savant syndrome.
3. Snyder A. Explaining and inducing savant skills: Privileged access to lower level, less-processed information. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2009 May 27; 364(1522): 1399–1405. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2008.0290.
4. Young RL, Ridding MC, Morrell TL. Switching skills on by turning off part of the brain. Neurocase. 2004 Jun;10(3):215-22.
5. Snyder A, Bahramali H, Hawker T, Mitchell DJ. Savant-like numerosity skills revealed in normal people by magnetic pulses. Perception. 2006;35(6):837-45.
> 2 votes

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Tags: cognitive-neuroscience, savant-syndrome
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title: Is psychology an art or work?

text:
# Question
Title: Is psychology an art or work?
Some are born psychologists and they have passion towards it unlike some people who just work to earn money on it.

The people who just do the same as work, will they satisfy the people with the care which is the prime importance, and is the real burden of talking to the patients concealed?

# Answer
> 3 votes
This is an interesting question, which may or may not garner more than one useful answer. There will be a small element of opinion in the answer which must be very limited for an answer to be a good one for this site, and therefore I will try and formulate my answer with as little opinion as possible.

Your question on whether psychology is an art or work depends much on the differences within your definitions of each. I will base the difference on the first statement you made:

> Some are born psychologists and they have passion towards it unlike some people who just work to earn money on it.

In other words, it is an art if you only need to have a passion for psychology, rather than it being work because you just need to be able to analyse effectively.

This then leads on to the question of whether you **can** analyse human psychology effectively if you don't have a passion for it or a high interest in it.

@sfxedit cited an interesting study (Gollwitzer & Bargh, 2018), which points out that:

> some lay individuals can reliably judge established social psychological phenomena without any experience in social psychology.

with *social psychological phenomena* meaning

> predicting how human beings in general feel, think, and behave in social contexts and situations

You can predict how human beings in general feel, think, and behave in social contexts and situations without actually empathising with the people in question. A problem with that if you work directly with clients is the fact that clients can detect whether the therapist is empathic or not (Xiao et al. 2015) so can those who are only providing therapy for the money going to be that effective?

That is open to opinion, so I will leave that for you to decide, however, the founder of Person Centered Therapy (Carl Rogers) believes that one of the core conditions for effective therapy is empathy. Plus, from my own personal experience as a client facing therapist, in order for a strong rapport to be built, you need to be able to empathise with your client's situation.

> We believe that the most useful definition of empathy would emphasize the ability to detect accurately the emotional information being transmitted by another person. This entity has been termed empathic accuracy by others (see Ickes et al., 1990, for a brief review)
> — Levenson & Ruef 1992

So my answer to your question depends on the kind of psychologist you are wanting to be. If you are a Research Psychologist who is not client facing, then all you need is to be able to analyse the data effectively. Whether the effectiveness will depend on your passion for the subject or not is open to opinion, as is whether the work of a non-client-facing Research Psychologist is work or just an art.

If you are a Clinical Psychologist, or other Clinical Therapist who is client facing, you need to be able to empathise. For this reason, and the fact that empathising in harrowing client situations can be emotionally draining, it is work in the definition and context put forward. There is however, an art involved in effectively dealing with the emotions internalised through empathy.

So in summary, Psychology and related fields can be seen as an art or hard work. The decision on that definition is yours.

## References

Gollwitzer, A., & Bargh, J. A. (2018). Social psychological skill and its correlates. *Social Psychology, 49*(2), 88. doi: 10.1027/1864-9335/a000332

Ickes, W., Stinson, L., Bissonnette, V., & Garcia, S. (1990). Naturalistic social cognition: Empathic accuracy in mixed-sex dyads. *Journal of personality and social psychology, 59*(4), 730. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.59.4.730

Levenson, R. W., & Ruef, A. M. (1992). Empathy: a physiological substrate. *Journal of personality and social psychology, 63*(2), 234. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.63.2.234

Xiao, B., Imel, Z. E., Georgiou, P. G., Atkins, D. C., & Narayanan, S. S. (2015). " Rate My Therapist": Automated Detection of Empathy in Drug and Alcohol Counseling via Speech and Language Processing. *PloS one, 10*(12), e0143055. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0143055

# Answer
> 2 votes
This social psychology study found that some lay individuals can accurately infer social psychological phenomena without any background in psychology.

So yes, as in every field, some people maybe more "gifted" and thus better suited to being psychologists than others.

At the same time, psychologists too cannot ignore the fact that they too have to make a living. So yes, it is work too, even for the passionate or the naturally gifted. And most psychologist realistically understand that they cannot help everyone, even if they want to.

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Tags: psychology
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# Question
Title: Is there a diagnostic term for a person who impulsively keeps secrets?
Almost like an addiction, similar to the way a pyromaniac feels about fire or burning... I don't know if there's even a word for this, seeing as it's not a common experience, but if there is, it would probably end with "maniac"?

# Answer
Wikipedia has a list of impulse control disorders described in the DSM.

As can be seen from the list, many "official" names of impulsive disorders do not end in mania - eg, pathological gambling, sexual compulsion, compulsive buying, and the one most closely related to what is described in the question: Pathological lying. And if it doesn't fit in the latter category, then:

> Disorders characterized by impulsivity that were not categorized elsewhere in the DSM-IV-TR were also included in the category "Impulse-control disorders not elsewhere classified".
> 0 votes

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Tags: abnormal-psychology, terminology, compulsive
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title: Using CBT for a justified fear?

text:
# Question
Title: Using CBT for a justified fear?
I am a speech language pathologist. I have a 19 year old patient who grew up with a number of different speech impediments (*not a stutter*). He was bullied a lot, and because of this he is very sensitive about how he speaks.

Recently, he has become so anxious about it he has developed a stutter. Note that stuttering was *not* one of the impediments he grew up with. He only developed it a couple of months ago because of his anxiety. He is not in a financial position to afford a psychologist, so I decided to help him with his anxiety. I know I'm not in a position to get rid of his anxiety; thats outside my scope of practice - I'm only trying to help with the manifestation of his anxiety in his speech, which is within my scope.

He blocks completely - in other words, when trying to pronounce certain words, he becomes completely silent for a couple of seconds as he tries to "push" the word out. Rather than the usual case of repeating the same sound over and over again, he simply becomes silent while he waits for the word to come out.

His main fear is not being able to get the word out and just being completely silent while the other person is waiting for him to complete his sentence. This fear is quite justified unfortunately - most of us would be confused if a person just stopped talking and would ask him to continue. I've used CBT for a stutter before, but that was to show the patient that some of their fears (i.e. being laughed at) were irrational.

How do I address the anxiety that stems from a fear that is relatively justified and logical?

# Answer
**The first option** is to investigate exactly what his worries are and to put them in perspective. Often, people catastrophize their fears, imagining the worst possible scenario for a given situation. While that outcome may be a realistic possibility, often is not the only or even the most likely possibility.

For instance, is he afraid that people will think he lacks intelligence? Or that people will laugh and make fun of him? You might examine his thought this way:

1. What is the worst possible outcome if he stutters or freezes in front of another person?
2. What is the best possible outcome in the same situation?
3. What does he think is the most likely outcome? (Usually this is somewhere in between the two extremes).

**Second**, you can caution him against mind-reading (i.e., assuming he knows what others will say, do or think). If he is concerned that when he freezes, "people will think I'm stupid," encourage him to think of other possibilities. They might think that, or they might just be confused, or they might recognize he's socially uncomfortable and have compassion.

**Third**, while the thought or fear itself may be true (e.g. "She made fun of me") the meaning he attaches to it might not be completely valid.

*What does it say about him?* For instance, if he thinks "She's right, I'm stupid, I'm a loser" you can explore all of his strengths and things he does well. Often people maximize painful experiences or don't give themselves credit for other accomplishments. Other thoughts, such as "This is something I struggle with, but I'm good at other things," might be more adaptive.

*What does it say about that other person?* You could work with him to reframe his thoughts (e.g. "She just doesn't understand and isn't sure how to react," or "That person has to be mean to others to make himself feel good; what he says isn't really true.")

*What does it mean if someone reacts poorly when he freezes?* If his thought is akin to "They'll think I'm stupid" figure out what it would mean in his life if they thought that way. How would that impact him? Is it "If I freeze, they'll think I'm stupid, and then I won't....get the job, make a friend, etc."? If you can figure out what consequences he is concerned about, then you can go back to option 1 and think through how likely those scenarios are.

Often fears and anxieties have some kernel of realistic risk to them. Some spiders or snakes can be dangerous, some people can judge us and be cruel, etc. However, if the fear is paralyzing, there is often a distortion to the thoughts that can be discussed and possibly adapted to reduce anxiety.

This book may provide additional ideas:

Beck, J. S. (2011). Cognitive behavior therapy: Basics and beyond. Guilford Press. (pgs. 1801-84 discuss some of the points mentioned above).
> 5 votes

# Answer
CBT stands for Cognitive **Behaviour** Therapy (I mention this because in the thrill of learning it, the "B" part is often ignored or forgotten). CBT integrates aspect of both cognitive psychotherapy and **behaviour psychotherapy**.

Behaviour psychotherapy was formed earlier and its basic gist (very simply put) is that our behaviours and environment can influence our thoughts and feelings and so changing our behaviour / environment can change how we think and feel. (Knowing the basics of cognitive therapy, which supposes that your thoughts influence your emotions and behaviours, you can understand how it was logical to integrate both to treat someone - and thus we have CBT.)

So for the situation you described where the cognitive distortions have all been addressed, and part of the problem still exists or a new one is revealed, it may be helpful to try and address it through behavioural changes.

For example, exposure therapy is a technique in Behaviour therapy that is used to reduce certain kinds of anxiety, and could be helpful here.

As suggested by others in the comments too, for example, a behavioural change he could do is to reveal to people before hand that he has a speech impediment that sometimes causes him to stutter or pause as he searches for words. You can role play this with him. Then ask him to say it to a close friend or family member not aware of it. And then slowly escalate to saying it to a stranger.

Or ask him to deliberately pause when speaking with someone and see what their reaction is. (First role play it with him).

Sometimes facing your fears this way (in a more controlled manner) reveals new cognitive distortions (examples of which user30295 has described in his detailed answer) that one may not be aware of, and that would need to be addressed using cognitive therapy techniques.
> 3 votes

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, language, clinical-psychology
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# Question
Title: what causes an action potential to propagate exactly and why should it propagate?
Hello I am taking a neurophysiology course and learned about the action potential and that it propagates in one direction from axon hillock down along the axon. I understand that action potential is simply the voltage difference caused by influx of Na+ ions causing the inside of the cell relatively more positive

My questions is why/how does action potential propagate? **why should it propogate?**

If at one site where a sodium channel opens to depolarize, and k+ channel polarize the cell to membrane potential **at that site**, how does this affect the next neighboring ion channels down the axons to open and close? Why doesn't it just cause an action potential at one section of the membrane and stop? What exactly causes the neighboring ion channels to open continuously as well after the previous one open and closes?

Textbooks just says 'it propagates down the axon' but never mentions why it should and why should the previous ion channel configuration affect the next region of the membrane. I guess this might be a rather dumb question but I hope I did not confuse you, I realize my questions is a bit odd?

# Answer
> 1 votes
When a sodium (Na) channel is stimulated by a strong-enough stimulus (such as from an electrical stimulus or from an incoming action potential), it will open and let a lot of Na+ ions influx rapidly into the cell at that channel, creating an action potential there. The locally high concentration of Na+ ion inside the cell at that channel will cause Na+ ions there to spread around immediately. This will cause depolarization and openings of the nearby Na channels, resulting in new actions potentials occurring at the nearby channels. This whole process will repeat itself again at these channels, causing more new action potentials to spread out further. In each cycle of an action potential, the potassium channel opens after the sodium channel does about 1 msec. Although the opening of the potassium channel causes repolarization, it doesn’t have any effects on the concentration of Na+ ion and does not stop the spreading out of the Na+ ions. Therefore, an action potential inevitably spreads out and out.

If the axon is stimulated at its trunk, the action potential will spread out both ways, up and down the axon. Figure 3.1 A shows a schematic diagram of an axon and the charge distribution along the membrane of that axon. More positive charges exist on the outside of the axon, and more negative charges on the inside. Now consider the consequences of delivering some stimulus to a point in the middle of the axon, Figure 3.1 B. If the depolarization is sufficiently large, voltage-dependent sodium channels will be opened, and an action potential will be initiated, and the sodium ion (Na+) will influx into the cell.

The influx positive charges Na+ will spread to the adjacent regions of the membrane. As the charges move to the adjacent regions of the membrane, the adjacent regions of the membrane will depolarize. If they depolarize sufficiently, voltage-dependent sodium channels in the adjacent regions of the membrane will be opened and "new" action potentials will be initiated, Figure 3.1 C. This perturbance of charge distribution will then spread to the next regions and initiates other "new" action potentials, Figure 3.1 D to 3.1 F.

\[The above text and the figure are adapted from Reference 1\]

Now, if the action potential spreads down from the axon hillock (which is located to the left side of the axon and is not shown in the picture) as in Figure 3.12 above, it will spread only one way to the distal end of the axon \[inset 2, 3, and 5\] because the previously depolarized channels will still be inactive (or in refractory period) for a while after the action potential ends \[inset 4\].

\[The above text and the figure are adapted from Reference 2\]

**References:**

1. Byrne JH. Chapter 3: Propagation of the Action Potential. Neuroscience Online. The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth). McGovern Medical School.
2. Augustine GJ. Chpater 3. Voltage-dependent membrane permeability. In: Purves D, Augustine GJ, David Fitzpatrick D, Hall WC, Lamantia AS, McNamara JO, Williams SM, editors. Neuroscience. 3rd ed. Sunderland, Massachusetts: Sinauer Associates Inc; 2004. ISBN-13: 9780878937257 ISBN-10: 0878937250.

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Tags: neuroscience
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