Thoughts on the brain and the mental process.
I’ve had an LJ account for a year. Until now, I only used it to keep track of everything, to have the latest news regarding my interests. I think it’s high time I used this place for myself, for my own “heart”. Quotation marks for it’s improperly used, we all know that my brain is actually the one that needs some treatment here, and more specifically, my mind, which brings me to the subject I would like to address today.
The talk about human brain and mind would be, without a doubt, endless, so, for this post, I chose to stay out of philosophical or scientific analysis describing the relationship between the two. I’ll simply refer to “brain” as in the organ responsible and “mind” as in the complex ensemble of cognitive faculties.
The reason why I opened this particular topic is because, recently, I realized I’m not even close to being satisfied with the “place” I’m in right now, in terms of achievements and in terms of state of mind. The things I’m unhappy about are my indecision, negativism and lack of motivation. Many might indentify with at least one of the three. The next question to be asked is the trickiest I’ve ever asked myself: “What shaped me into who I am now?”
Therefore, I’ve given some thought to the way my own brain evolved, to the external factors and even inherited genetic material which led to the development to the current state it’s in.
As many have probably done before me, I started thinking about it and blaming everyone around me for how I turned out to be, simply because of the reason I mentioned earlier: external factors.
I’ll take it step by step so today, I’ll give more attention to this discussion and leave additional topics for a later time.
Brief scientific explanation:
External factors have the ability to influence the activity of the brain because of one of its attributes called brain plasticity (or neuroplasticity). This means the brain (or, more precisely, neural pathways) can change (permanently) depending on what it’s subjected to, especially when a certain stimuli is repeated. The plasticity is different depending on which part of the brain we’re talking about. It’s lower in the parts of the brain that influence basic functions, such as breathing, and higher in the parts of the cortex that influence the thinking process and feelings.
The plasticity is, therefore, the ability of the brain to change when it learns. This is how the brain is shaped, allows more synapses to be made, there are formed or reorganized certain pathways, which eventually alter the way we think and the way we respond to the environment. There are pathways in the brain responsible for the process of motivation (more precisely, the reward pathway), which is also something that’s in my interest (and to which I will probably return with a separate entry).
Here is a nice image of neural pathways in our brain provided by the Department of Psychological Sciences at the University of Missouri-Columbia.
The fastest way we learn is from experiences and emotions triggered by them. As a practical example, if we have a certain illness, we dedicate more attention to the way we inform ourselves about it, therefore, we learn faster and better than if we just had to study it for school (which, obviously, also involves activity of the brain). This happens because we are involved into this, it is a personal experience that triggered an emotion, fear. The learning process is also the same in the case when we’re excited or passionate about something. How many times haven’t you learnt things completely unrelated to your schoolwork or professional development only because you liked them?
So, the changes in our brain are caused by the unique environment we are exposed to.
One might not have known the specific terms, but all of us have experienced all of the above at some point in our lives.
Throughout my life, I’ve been exposed to both positive and negative experiences (external factors). The question raised next is: “What does my mind focus on?”
I believe that the negative experiences have influenced me far more than the positive ones and they’ve ultimately altered the way my brain reacts to information. I figured it had to do with the quantity of negative information I was receiving compared to the positive one. I found out later that this is explained by the term of negativity bias.
Due to selective attention (or, the “cocktail party effect”!), people can only focus on one piece of information at once. This is what allows us to focus on a single voice in a room, “tuning-out” the rest. The brain handles positive and negative information in different hemispheres (note: The positive information is primarily processed in the left hemisphere and the negative one in the right hemisphere). Back to the process of “tuning-out”. The conclusion drawn is that if you are given at the same time two pieces of information, a positive and a negative one, you will only be able to focus more on one of them, which, according to these studies, is the negative one.
According to Prof. Clifford Nass, Stanford U, “Negative emotions generally involve more thinking, and the information is processed more thoroughly than positive ones”. I quoted this because I found it out of context, so I’d like to talk a little about the phrase he used: “more thinking”. Supposedly it means negative emotions trigger more processes into the brain that the positive ones. The positive events have close to no follow-up, as opposed to negative ones which, after they take place, might raise questions in your mind such as what went wrong, if there was something you could’ve done about it, etc. and because of this, they might be “stuck” in your mind in the hope the same event won’t happen twice. This also shows how close memory is to negative thinking, indifferent on the way a certain memory is stored: as a piece of information or as a feeling. To strengthen this affirmation, studies have also shown that the negative experiences seem to remain more distinct in one’s mind.
If you’re given negative information (as small as it may be: a critique, a snarky remark etc.) over a longer period of time, and if you focus on that, you will tune out the positive comments or events, and maybe this will lead to you having the feeling that nothing positive has even happened to you.
It is indeed external factors, especially other people, who are of vital importance in the process of development of another person’s mind. Nothing really new to this conclusion right? But I think it’s still early to start throwing rocks left and right! Every single person we’ve been in contact with has influenced in one way or another the way we perceive the world. Some have affected us negatively more than others, but most likely, they have also brought some positive effects in our lives that we might not even be aware of.
As answers to some questions only raise more questions, the next one would be: “What can we do about it? How can we teach our brain to focus on the positive feelings rather than negative ones?”
This is something I have yet to discover.
Until the next time ;)
Note:
I am obviously not a specialist, so this post links and describes only the phenomena regarding my own case. For further information, I recommend reading about each term I underlined. Don't be afraid to use wikipedia and the sources that it refers you to in each article.
I could also recommend the following studies and articles:
Hemispheric asymmetry http://www.ane.pl/pdf/5227.pdf
Neurophysiology and Mental Function http://www.benbest.com/science/anatmind/anatmd8.html#attention
Environmental Influences on Brain Development http://www.ipce.info/library_3/files/glaser/glaser_2.htm
Edit: This article goes hand in hand with my post, you guys should read it:
http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-13409/what-everyone-should-know-about-positive-psychology.html
The talk about human brain and mind would be, without a doubt, endless, so, for this post, I chose to stay out of philosophical or scientific analysis describing the relationship between the two. I’ll simply refer to “brain” as in the organ responsible and “mind” as in the complex ensemble of cognitive faculties.
The reason why I opened this particular topic is because, recently, I realized I’m not even close to being satisfied with the “place” I’m in right now, in terms of achievements and in terms of state of mind. The things I’m unhappy about are my indecision, negativism and lack of motivation. Many might indentify with at least one of the three. The next question to be asked is the trickiest I’ve ever asked myself: “What shaped me into who I am now?”
Therefore, I’ve given some thought to the way my own brain evolved, to the external factors and even inherited genetic material which led to the development to the current state it’s in.
As many have probably done before me, I started thinking about it and blaming everyone around me for how I turned out to be, simply because of the reason I mentioned earlier: external factors.
I’ll take it step by step so today, I’ll give more attention to this discussion and leave additional topics for a later time.
Brief scientific explanation:
External factors have the ability to influence the activity of the brain because of one of its attributes called brain plasticity (or neuroplasticity). This means the brain (or, more precisely, neural pathways) can change (permanently) depending on what it’s subjected to, especially when a certain stimuli is repeated. The plasticity is different depending on which part of the brain we’re talking about. It’s lower in the parts of the brain that influence basic functions, such as breathing, and higher in the parts of the cortex that influence the thinking process and feelings.
The plasticity is, therefore, the ability of the brain to change when it learns. This is how the brain is shaped, allows more synapses to be made, there are formed or reorganized certain pathways, which eventually alter the way we think and the way we respond to the environment. There are pathways in the brain responsible for the process of motivation (more precisely, the reward pathway), which is also something that’s in my interest (and to which I will probably return with a separate entry).
Here is a nice image of neural pathways in our brain provided by the Department of Psychological Sciences at the University of Missouri-Columbia.
The fastest way we learn is from experiences and emotions triggered by them. As a practical example, if we have a certain illness, we dedicate more attention to the way we inform ourselves about it, therefore, we learn faster and better than if we just had to study it for school (which, obviously, also involves activity of the brain). This happens because we are involved into this, it is a personal experience that triggered an emotion, fear. The learning process is also the same in the case when we’re excited or passionate about something. How many times haven’t you learnt things completely unrelated to your schoolwork or professional development only because you liked them?
So, the changes in our brain are caused by the unique environment we are exposed to.
One might not have known the specific terms, but all of us have experienced all of the above at some point in our lives.
Throughout my life, I’ve been exposed to both positive and negative experiences (external factors). The question raised next is: “What does my mind focus on?”
I believe that the negative experiences have influenced me far more than the positive ones and they’ve ultimately altered the way my brain reacts to information. I figured it had to do with the quantity of negative information I was receiving compared to the positive one. I found out later that this is explained by the term of negativity bias.
Due to selective attention (or, the “cocktail party effect”!), people can only focus on one piece of information at once. This is what allows us to focus on a single voice in a room, “tuning-out” the rest. The brain handles positive and negative information in different hemispheres (note: The positive information is primarily processed in the left hemisphere and the negative one in the right hemisphere). Back to the process of “tuning-out”. The conclusion drawn is that if you are given at the same time two pieces of information, a positive and a negative one, you will only be able to focus more on one of them, which, according to these studies, is the negative one.
According to Prof. Clifford Nass, Stanford U, “Negative emotions generally involve more thinking, and the information is processed more thoroughly than positive ones”. I quoted this because I found it out of context, so I’d like to talk a little about the phrase he used: “more thinking”. Supposedly it means negative emotions trigger more processes into the brain that the positive ones. The positive events have close to no follow-up, as opposed to negative ones which, after they take place, might raise questions in your mind such as what went wrong, if there was something you could’ve done about it, etc. and because of this, they might be “stuck” in your mind in the hope the same event won’t happen twice. This also shows how close memory is to negative thinking, indifferent on the way a certain memory is stored: as a piece of information or as a feeling. To strengthen this affirmation, studies have also shown that the negative experiences seem to remain more distinct in one’s mind.
If you’re given negative information (as small as it may be: a critique, a snarky remark etc.) over a longer period of time, and if you focus on that, you will tune out the positive comments or events, and maybe this will lead to you having the feeling that nothing positive has even happened to you.
It is indeed external factors, especially other people, who are of vital importance in the process of development of another person’s mind. Nothing really new to this conclusion right? But I think it’s still early to start throwing rocks left and right! Every single person we’ve been in contact with has influenced in one way or another the way we perceive the world. Some have affected us negatively more than others, but most likely, they have also brought some positive effects in our lives that we might not even be aware of.
As answers to some questions only raise more questions, the next one would be: “What can we do about it? How can we teach our brain to focus on the positive feelings rather than negative ones?”
This is something I have yet to discover.
Until the next time ;)
Note:
I am obviously not a specialist, so this post links and describes only the phenomena regarding my own case. For further information, I recommend reading about each term I underlined. Don't be afraid to use wikipedia and the sources that it refers you to in each article.
I could also recommend the following studies and articles:
Hemispheric asymmetry http://www.ane.pl/pdf/5227.pdf
Neurophysiology and Mental Function http://www.benbest.com/science/anatmind/anatmd8.html#attention
Environmental Influences on Brain Development http://www.ipce.info/library_3/files/glaser/glaser_2.htm
Edit: This article goes hand in hand with my post, you guys should read it:
http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-13409/what-everyone-should-know-about-positive-psychology.html