Cooperation, neurotransmitters & the Ecuadorian wren

Are we stronger and more effective when we cooperate or do we perform better when we work towards our own interests? It’s a question that you’ll probably find elicits an illuminating response one way or another.

Research in this months Science Journal produces evidence for cooperation from an unlikely source, the Plain Tailed Ecuadorian Wren, or to afford him his proper title, Pheugopedius Euophrys to his friends. This particular little wren has the entertaining karaoke style party trick of performing a duet whenever it gets the opportunity. Male and female wrens cooperate during the duet by singing alternate syllables whilst rocking out. Researchers measured the wren’s neural mechanisms throughout the performance and found that neurons within the brain reacted more strongly to the duet than to the wrens own individual sections of the song. The sensory information from each wren was used to coordinate singing between individuals producing cooperative behaviour and a virtuoso performance by the wrens.

The conclusion by Fortune et al the papers authors? As the wrens possess similar neurotransmitter systems to other vertabrate animals, our brains are organised in a similar way, potentially yielding similar results when cooperating. So whether its karaoke your trying out or you’re wondering how to improve performance, it could well be worth considering how cooperation could help you.

Why taking 40 winks will improve your learning (probably)

Does the prospect of taking quick a nap fill you with guilt at the thought of all the other, seemingly more pressing, productive things that you could be doing? Fear the afternoon nap no more, new research from UC Berkley suggests that the time spent napping outside of the REM phase of sleep may just improve your learning.

Researchers at the University College of Berkley, California, studied the non–REM phase of sleep in the learning process on a group of 44 volunteers, by subjecting them to rigorous tasks aimed at the hippocampus & memorisation. During the non-REM phase of sleep (where there is no rapid eye movement or REM), sharp spikes of electrical activity called sleep spindles were recorded from the hippocampal region. Normally, these spikes occur about a 1000 times per night, and are thought to be associated with the process of leaving the hippocampus free of short-term memory traces, helping further short-term memory at accumulation once we wake up. The study found, half of the subjects were allowed to have a 90 minutes nap in between two learning sessions in the afternoon and in the evening. These sleep spindles were noted in the above group, and they typically demonstrated better learning in the evening session, compared to the other half who were not allowed to sleep.

One of the important implications of the study is that non-REM sleep serves an important purpose than previously thought — recharging the brain for learning. Concomitantly performed electroencephalogram (EEG) studies mapping the brainwaves of the participants showed a correlation between the amount of sleep spindles and the quality of learning soon afterwards. These spikes where seen selectively in the hippocampus, also looping to the prefrontal cortex, the two parts of the brain that are thought to be the key areas involved in learning. Walker, the lead researcher of this study published in a recent edition of Current Biology, stated that sleep selectively restores critical learning functions of the brain. In their opinion, non-REM sleep deprivation typically seen in the older population may account for the reduced memorisation capacity during learning.

So the next time you feel like a quick 40 winks give yourself a break, it might just improve your performance.

All Heart. Can Happiness Protect Your Heart?

It’s well known that stress, depression and generally being none too happy with your lot in life has a huge impact on your health, but what about opposite states? Could the act of happiness and contentment help you to live longer?

New research published in the European Heart Journal this month examines data from a long term study of 8000 UK civil servants. The researchers examined levels of happiness amongst participants in an attempt to see if happiness brings with it above average cardiac health

Typical questions asked of participants were: “All things considered, how satisfied or dissatisfied are you” with each of the following: your job, leisure time, standard of living, health, sex life, “marital or love relationship,” and “yourself as a person.” The findings were published online July 4 in the European Heart Journal.

People who reported having the highest overall levels of satisfaction (ranked on a numerical scale) were about 26 percent less likely than the unsatisfied to have preliminary manifestations of coronary heart disease, such as chest pains—also known as definite angina. Moderately satisfied workers were about 20 percent less likely than the lowest-raters to have these heart problems.

The most important categories for heart health were job, family life, sex life and one’s self esteem —high satisfaction in each accounted for about a 12 percent dip in a person’s risk for moderate cardiac issues.

Participants were not significantly protected against heart attack or coronary disease but, as the researchers pointed out, “angina is a strong predictor of future cardiovascular events.” And as the participants were only, on average, about 50 years old, the less frequent chest pains in the especially satisfied might indicate that they will have healthier hearts down the road.

Despite the fact that the research group work in an increasingly underfunded and demotivated environment which has experienced sweeping and far reaching changes over the past few years, the results show promise.

So the next time you’re sweating it out down at the gym or resisting the temptation of something naughty but nice spare a thought for your levels of happiness and contentment they might prove to be just as important as a healthy diet and lifestyle.

Harnessing Your Green Eyed Monster

Harnessing your green eyed monster

It’s generally accepted that envy does us no good. It fails to bring us happiness or joy, just endless social comparisons with others. Yes, envy is indeed a big, bad, green eyed gremlin. Research in positive psychology warns us that both upward and downward social comparisons are not the components of a happy life. The phenomenon that is Jeremy Kyle with it’s daily dose of car crash TV will only serve to bring us down after the initial relief that at least things aren’t THAT bad.

New research from Van De Van et al (2011) suggests that envy takes on different functions for different folk. For some, as we know, envy is painful. Van De Ven suggests that to avoid that pain we translate envy into admiration and that admiration then becomes an admittance of defeat. Once that happens, we’re no longer motivated by our admiration of others, just paralysed by the fear that we’ll never be as good as they are so why bother trying?

This leaves us with something of a dilemma. If admiration for someone who has been a success demotivates us then when we’re looking for a trail blazer to inspire us, what should we do?

Van De Ven suggests there are two types of envy, benign and malicious. When we feel malicious envy it’s usually the result of believing that success is not deserved or earned (feel free to fill in your own blanks here). Benign envy occurs when we believe the success to be deserved (again, fill in the blanks as appropriate). Van De Ven’s research indicates that it is benign envy that becomes a motivating force, whilst malicious envy will usually destroy our motivation to achieve completely.

Van de Ven et al. (2011) tested the two types and found benign envy to be a powerful motivating force. Benign envy encouraged people to perform better on measures of intelligence and creativity, when compared with both admiration and malicious envy.

So if you’re going to be just a little bit green eyed about something or somebody make sure that you choose someone deserving to aim it at.

The Ultimate Life Workout

The Ultimate Life Workout Series

Welcome to the first in our Ultimate Life Workout series where we look at science backed tools & strategies to get you where you want to go in life. Maybe you’ve been stuck in the same place for a while, or you’re looking for a new career, or you just want to get cracking on your goals and need a healthy dollop of motivation to get started. Look no further. Each week as well as giving you something new to think about we’ll bring you the best strategies to kick start your ultimate life workout.

Self Beliefs

Years ago I worked with a man who would regularly berate his car when it refused to start. The car, an ageing, rusty land rover, would frequently be on the receiving end of physical blows and shouts of admonishment rained down upon it by my colleague in the belief that the car would somehow be shown the error of it’s ways. The ritual would last for five to ten minutes until the perpetrator stood back, kicked off his steel toe capped Wellington boots (I kid you not), placed his hands on his hips and stated “That told it”. As we say up north, “There’s nowt so queer as folk”. He truly believed that this strange and irrational behaviour impacted upon the car’s performance.

Laugh as you may at this story, sometimes we can all be guilty of harbouring weird and wonderful beliefs about the world we inhabit. Ok, so I’m not suggesting that you are someone who kicks and shouts at their car believing that you’re persuading it to perform like a Ferrari, but there may be an equally erroneous belief about yourself that you’re holding on to. Like it or not, what you believe about yourself determines how you perform, what you think you’re capable of and ultimately what you get out of life whether it’s the career, relationship, income or lifestyle .

Years of research into human behaviour tells us that we all have blind spots or ‘schotomas’ things we can’t see or keep missing no matter how hard we look at ourselves. Perhaps you were told something about yourself as a child, by parents, teachers or some other authority figure. Were you told that you were clumsy? Not ‘academic’? That you were ‘plain’ or lacked talent in something you loved? My experience of working with hundreds of people (yes, even clever people like you) tells me that not only is this list endless, it also bears no relation to reality. These words or labels, often carelessly uttered, with little or no thought, can lead to years of inaccurate self assessment, ultimately leading to a belief that one single opinion from long ago is actually the ‘truth’ about who you are and what you’re capable of. We (along with the latest research in psychology and neuroscience) say a very big ‘Pah.’ to that.

The strange thing is, once that we’ve been told something about ourselves (especially as children) we’re prone to hold on to it. We become selective perceivers, looking for evidence to prove that we’re right to believe the inaccurate things we do. Psychologist Carl Festinger calls this the cognitive dissonance principle. Our subconscious is unable to hold two opposing beliefs at the same time so any evidence that suggests we might be wrong to cling onto these inaccurate labels is conveniently pushed to one side. We literally become blind to it. If I tell you that you are beautiful when somewhere down the line it was implied you were ‘the clever one’ but somewhat lacking in the looks department who do you think you’ll be more likely to believe? You’ll find a reason to discount my comment, just as you’ve been doing for years when anyone tells you the same thing, so that you can continue to believe you’re not. That’s selective perception. Once you get something into your head, it stays there and when you’re sifting through all of the stuff that the world presents you with, you’ll only pay attention to the information that proves you’re right, however misleading it might be.

Something to think about;

So my question for this week is where are your blind spots? What talents, skills, abilities or characteristics might you have overlooked? Take some time to really think about this one and examine some of the beliefs that you have about who you are and what you’re capable of. Where do they really come from?. Are they serving you or holding you back? To move forwards and create the changes you want in life you’ll need to reexamine them and decide whether they’re a true reflection of who you are now or just someone else’s outdated, dusty opinion.

If your beliefs are getting in the way of the kind of life you want, the next step is to ask yourself, ‘is that REALLY true?’. Look for evidence that proves the old belief is wrong or outdated. Remember you’ve been ignoring this kind of evidence for years so it might take a while to spot it at first. Be sure that you are being 100% honest with yourself when it comes to any evidence you might be overlooking. Letting go of these beliefs and leaving your usual way of thinking might feel uncomfortable at first but ultimately, it’s liberating.The next time you catch yourself reaffirming those tired old scripts about who you are and what you’re capable of, stop and ask yourself “Are you absolutely sure that’s true?”. Start to create a new bank of evidence, from events and situations that prove the opposite of the old belief, painting a brand new you picture of yourself, a canvas that truly reflects exactly who you are now as well as where you’re headed in the future.

And on that note I’ll leave you with the following thought from Patanjali (c. 2nd century) India.

‘If you desire a glorious future, transform the present’

Sharp Focus?

Sharp Focus?

If you find it hard to focus sometimes, you’re not alone. The speed and constancy at which we receive information from multiple sources can be a major distraction, leading to loss of concentration and seemingly, an inability to focus on even the simplest of tasks. The good news coming out of MIT and Harvard research this month is that there is something you can do about it, better still, it’s quick, it’s easy and it’s free. So what is it?

The study, published by the Brain Research Bulletin followed a group of research subjects as they were trained to meditate over an eight week period. Effects of the meditation practice on alpha rhythms were examined with encouraging results. The alpha brain waves, responsible for regulating the transmission of information between cells to the cortex, the area that processes sensory information, were more easily controlled by the meditating subjects, increasing their ability to focus on a series of tasks.

Chris Moore, the MIT Neuroscientist who led the research explained the positive effects of daily meditation on the subjects focus ‘Data indicated meditation makes you better at focusing, in part by enabling you to better regulate how things that arise will impact you’.

As little as ten minutes per day spent meditating will help you to keep your edge and improve your focus, in addition to this, it will also increase your ability to manage stress, be less reactive to external events and diminish the effects of any physical pain. That’s a pretty impressive return on investment for ten minutes a day.

Rumination and Neuroplasticity

It seems that the mere act of thinking really does change your brain. The latest research in neuroscience suggests that it’s not just the act of thinking that has an impact on the neurology of your brain, what you are thinking about is just as important. How and what we think about affects the neuroplasticity of our brain, its ability to rearrange its own structure in response to negative or positive stimulus.

Morgan and Banerjee’s Stanford University study into the effects of rumination (that’s negative thinking to you and me) examined the effects on research subjects asked to reflect upon the negative aspects of their lives. Not surprisingly, in addition to making the subjects feel like reaching for the biggest tub of Hagen Daz they could find, something else was happening within their neurology. Extended periods of such negative thinking resulted in an increase in the activity of the amygdala (the area of the brain responsible for the fight or flight response to fear). This increased activity precipitated a rush of damaging neurochemicals into the brain. So, if negative thinking makes us feel worse and changes our neurology, what kind of results will positive thinking produce?

Since 2008 Zoran Josipovic, adjunct professor at New York University has been studying Tibetan Buddhist monks in an attempt to identify the effects of meditation on brain neurology. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). His ongoing research has found that meditation alters the neural networks in research subjects, strengthening the anterior cingulate, regulating anger, reducing anxiety and increasing levels of happiness (and not a tub of Hagen Daz in sight).

So the next time you start to ruminate on negative events or things that you’re not happy with, stop, take a moment or two and shift focus, try the opposite to rumination and meditate.