Neuroscience In The News On May 2

These are articles that I found of interest relating to news about Neuroscience.  In this issue, I have highlighted articles about the brain anatomy and sensation seeking behavior, how the brain responds to reading and wisdom being measured and influenced by heart rate variability.

Please check out the article links below and feel free to comment with other information related to these subjects.  I enjoy learning as much as I can about the brain and passing this information on to everyone else that shares these passions.

This is for the week beginning May 2, 2016.

Please come back each week and hopefully I will have some more highlights.  Feel free to share with me ones that you have found and I may highlight those as well.

Feel free to check out the highlighted articles from April 25, 2016

Sensation Seeking Behavior Linked To Brain Anatomy

This study builds on well-established links between impulsivity, sensation-seeking, and substance abuse. Prior research indicates genes play a role in these behaviors. Other studies conclude substance use can affect brain anatomy and function over time. Scientists don't know the extent to which brain abnormalities, present prior to drug-taking, contribute to the likelihood that a person will develop a substance abuse disorder.

The strongest links occurred in brain areas related to the ability to regulate emotions and behaviour, the anterior cingulate and middle frontal gyrus. Changes in those brain structures also correlated with participants' self-reported tendency to act on impulse and with heightened use of alcohol, tobacco, or caffeine.

Article Link:

• Research Links Sensation Seeking Behavior To Brain Anatomy
• Source:  www.scicasts.com
• Avram Holmes, Psychologist at Yale University

The Brain And Reading

Neuroscientists at UC Davis have come up with a way to observe brain activity during natural reading. It’s the first time researchers have been able to study the brain while reading actual texts, instead of individual words, and it’s already helping settle some ideas about just how we read.

Until now, neuroscientists have only measured brain activity as a volunteer fixes his or her attention on individual words. The signals of brain activity from functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, last for several seconds — too slow to keep up with natural reading, which processes several words a second.

Article Link:

• How Do Our Brains Respond To Reading
• Source:  www.laboratoryequipment.com
• John Henderson, Professor Of Psychology, UC Davis Center

Wisdom Influenced By The Heart

While many individuals believe such aspects are solely driven by cognitive functioning, the team notes that some behavioral scientists have suggested the heart may also play a role in wisdom.

Participants were required to take part in a series of tasks, including a social reasoning task and an attributional judgement task. As part of these tasks, subjects were required to offer their opinion on social issues they felt strongly about, from both a first- and third-person perspective.

The participants' resting heart rates were measured during each task using an electrocardiogram (ECG).

Article Link:

• Wisdom Influenced By Heart Rate Variability
• Source:  www.medicalnewstoday.com
• Professor Igor Grossman, University Of Waterloo, Canada

Source Of Possibility

So often in life, we look for what we don't see, or what we do not feel we have. We look at the half empty part of our glass as the source of possibility. Yet, at the same time, we fail to see the half full part of our glass.

This leads us on a wild chase of looking for that which is there but ignoring that which we already have. It is easier for us to have narrow vision when we need to be looking at the broader view before us.

Within our body is much wisdom, energy and strength. Outside of our body is a sense of false interpretations masking as the real thing. The more we listen to our body and the more we go within our body, will we find this wisdom, energy and strength.

As we travel inward, we give ourselves the opportunity to grow in awareness and consciously evolve as humans. To fully inhabit our body is to find something more solid and truth based than anything that any one could ever tell us.



Blog Post & Images (c) 3/1/11 Don Shetterly - use by permission only
http://www.donshetterly.com

Pain, It Does A Body Good

Pain scares me as it does most humans. it often leads us to think that there is something wrong or abnormal about ourselves. In conjunction with fear, it can create doomsday scenarios in our mind. It can alter reality to the point that we barely recognize life in the way that it actually appears.

Yet, pain is a messenger. It is something that lets us know there is a situation that needs our attention. Just like there are warning flags at the beach, so is pain a warning flag to our lives. It is something to get our attention and get us to acknowledge our bodies, instead of ignoring them.

All too often, we want to avoid the pain. This is so understandable because it sometimes becomes very hard to live with. Pain affects our day, our mood and our quality of life. We usually strive to flee from it through medication, surgeries and procedures. We even use alternative health procedures to stimulate, treat or wish it away. Yet, in the end, have we really gotten rid of the pain or have we just masked it so much that we don't recognize it? Does it just return a few days or weeks or years later? Does it morph into something else that becomes the new face of our pain?

Fear is a big motivator in the desire to not feel pain whether we consciously connect to it or not. Fear is a strong force that can alter the view of how we see pain, how we feel it and how it shows up. Fear can make pain appear as being much harder to give up and let go than it really is. I'm not talking about theory either. I have faced some horrible pains and fears in my own life. I've been there, done that and got way too many t-shirts as souvenirs.

To try to avoid or ignore the pain is the same as letting fear talk you into ignoring the messages coming from the body. Yes, it would seem to be that relief from pain is the right thing to do. However, you're hiding valuable messages the body and mind are sending you.

There are times when some pain relief is needed to help us hear the messages more clearly and take care of ourselves. If we however, look to medications, surgeries, and alternative health treatments to give us our reasons for the pain, we are only letting fear fool us. There is a time and a place for different treatment methods but only if we do these in a consciously connected way with our mind, body and soul.

If you really want to get at the source of your pain, you need to feel it more - not less. Yes, it may hurt and it may be difficult to do that, but by doing this, you are able to travel deep to the source of the pain. Remember, fear is very deceptive and it alters how we feel, view, sense and understand pain.

By going into the pain through the fear, we get the opportunity to take back our power and heal parts of our life that were untouchable before. We give ourselves the moment to grow and evolve in consciousness, so we can make different choices for our life. It gives us the ability to heal our body in ways we can barely imagine. It makes us more human. It helps us discover and reclaim more of who we are.

I'm not going to state that it is easy to do this. However with courage, we all have the ability to stand up to our fears, take on our pain and discover the wisdom waiting for our life. No person, treatment or thought can do that for us. This must come from within. After all, this ability is in all of us and it has always been there. May we search our lives and find it.


*For more articles, check out the Mind Body Thoughts Blog

Prosperity Through Love

If you have been fighting anything in your life, rest your overworked mind and emotions by declaring often, divine love and wisdom are united in the situation, through it perfectly."

Then loose it and let it go: "I bless every situation in my life with love and wisdom. Love and wisdom are united in me, expressing perfectly through every phase of my life now."

(Page 152, Open Your Mind to Prosperity)