A Short Video on the Effectiveness of Intentionally Changing Your Thought Patterns

Our brain is a bunch of plastic ... with lots of ridges, or neural circuits. To read more and comment, go directly to 'Beyond Blue' at http://www.beliefnet.com/beyondblue.

How Music Helps to Heal the Injured Brain Therapeutic Use Crescendos Thanks to Advances in Brain Science

Editor’s note: The use of music in therapy for the brain has evolved rapidly as brain-imaging techniques have revealed the brain’s plasticity—its ability to change—and have identified networks that music activates. Armed with this growing knowledge, doctors and researchers are employing music to retrain the injured brain. Studies by the authors and other researchers have revealed that because music and motor control share circuits, music can improve movement in patients who have suffered a stroke or who have Parkinson’s disease. Research has shown that neurologic music therapy can also help patients with language or cognitive difficulties, and the authors suggest that these techniques should become part of rehabilitative care. Future findings may well indicate that music should be included on the list of therapies for a host of other disorders as well.

 
The role of music in therapy has gone through some dramatic shifts in the past 15 years, driven by new insights from research into music and brain function. These shifts have not been reflected in public awareness, though, or even among some professionals.
Biomedical researchers have found that music is a highly structured auditory language involving complex perception, cognition, and motor control in the brain, and thus it can effectively be used to retrain and reeducate the injured brain. While the first data showing these results were met with great skepticism and even resistance, over time the consistent accumulation of scientific and clinical research evidence has diminished the doubts. Therapists and physicians use music now in rehabilitation in ways that are not only backed up by clinical research findings but also supported by an understanding of some of the mechanisms of music and brain function.
Rapid developments in music research have been introduced quickly into neurologic therapy (see sidebar) over the past 10 years. Maybe due to the fast introduction,  the traditional public perception of music as a ‘soft’ addition, a beautiful luxury that cannot really help heal the brain, has not caught up with these scientific developments.
But music can. Evidence-based models of music in therapy have moved from soft science—or no science—to hard science. Neurologic music therapy does meet the standards of evidence-based medicine, and it should be included in standard rehabilitation care.  Click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading...

Via:  The Dana Foundation

Executive Functions of the Human Brain

The executive system is a theorized cognitive system in psychology that controls and manages other cognitive processes.  The executive system is thought to be heavily involved in handling novel situations outside the domain of some of our 'automatic' psychological processes that could be explained by the reproduction of learned schemas or set behaviors. The executive functions are often invoked when it is necessary to override responses that may otherwise be automatically elicited by stimuli in the external environment. For example, on being presented with a potentially rewarding stimulus, such as a tasty piece of chocolate cake, the automatic response might be to take a bite. However, where this behaviour conflicts with internal plans (such as having decided not to eat chocolate cake while on a diet), the executive functions might be engaged to inhibit this response.  Click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading...

Via:  Wikipedia

Living with Traumatic Brain Injury

People with traumatic brain injuries may experience physical, cognitive or personality changes that affect their work and relationships. In this program from the University of Washington, hear stories of people who are rebuilding their lives and readjusting to family, careers and everyday life.




Via: University of Washington

About the Brain

The brain has been described as a three pound universe.  It has come to be thought of in those terms because quite literally; we live in our brains. The brain is our personal, private universe.  It is through our brains that we experience ourselves and the environment.  It is though our brains that we understand our relationship to others.  Scientists think of the brain as the organ of reason, language, complex social relations, and morality. It is, after all, what makes us distinctly human.  Click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading... 

Via:  The Brain Injury Resource Center

How to Block a Distressing, Recurring Thought Pattern with Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)

A distressing and recurring pattern of thought is often difficult to block if you do not have the right strategies. However, with this simple mental conditioning technique from neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), you may be able to eliminate a distressing thought pattern permanently.  Click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading...

Via:  wikiHow

Consciousness-Mind Over Matter: A Quantuum Perspective

An Interesting View to the Question of Consciousness

Born to be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life

I will take the audience on a tour of recent evolutionary thought, which suggests that our hyper vulnerable offspring rearranged our brains, genes, and social structures. I will detail new research on the vagus nerve and oxytocin, branches of the nervous system that have evolved to enable cooperation, trust, and caretaking. I detail new signaling systems -- tactile communication and vocalization -- which are critical to the transmission of prosociality across individuals. Throughout the talk I integrate the latest science with the wisdom found in Eastern thought.--Dr. Dacher Keltner



Via:  GoogleTechTalks

Rewriting Fearful Memories by Bringing Them Back to Mind

Bringing an old memory back to mind would, you might think, strengthen it. But not so - when memories are recalled, they enter a surprisingly vulnerable state, when they can be reshaped or even rewritten. It takes a while for the memory to become strengthened anew, through a process called reconsolidation. Memories aren't just written once, but every time we remember them.

This system allows us to rapidly update our memories with new information, for a more flexible and adaptable brain. It also means that the very act of remembering provides a valuable window of opportunity, during which memory can be manipulated. Click Anywhere in This Sentence to Continue Reading...

Via: Not Exactly Rocket Science

Conation: One of Three Parts of the Mind, Along with the Affective and Cognitive

...In short, the cognitive part of the brain measures intelligence, the affective deals with emotions and the conative takes those thoughts and feelings to drive how you act on them.

Erich Fromm in his work on “Human Ethics” discussed the conative nature of man by saying the way man achieves virtue is through the active use he makes of his powers.

"Uncertainty (the cognitive) is the very condition to impel a man to unfold his power. If he faces the truth without panic, he will recognize that there is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by unfolding his powers, by living productively; and that only constant vigilance, activity and effort can keep us from failure in the one task that matters — the full development of our powers without the limitations set by the laws of our existence… “to be himself and for himself to achieve happiness by the full realization of those faculties which are peculiarly his — of reason, love and productive work.”

Fromm’s productive orientation was a fundamental attitude, a mode of relatedness in all realms of human experience. It covers mental, emotional and sensory responses to others, to oneself and to things. Productiveness is man’s ability to use his powers and to realize the potentialities inherent in him ... he must be free and not dependent on someone who controls his powers... he can make use of his powers only if he knows what they are, how to use them and what to use them for... they [must not be] masked and alienated from him.  Click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading...

Via:  Wikipedia

Al Seckel, TED Happiness Series: Your Brain Is Badly Wired — Enjoy It!

Al Seckel, a cognitive neuroscientist, explores the perceptual illusions that fool our brains. Loads of eye tricks help him prove that not only are we easily fooled, we kind of like it.

Google Personal Growth Series: Mindsight:

This interactive talk will examine two major questions: What is the mind? and How can we create a healthy mind? We'll examine the interactions among the mind, the brain, and human relationships and explore ways to create a healthy mind, an integrated brain, and mindful, empathic relationships. Here is one surprising finding: the vast majority (about 95%) of mental health practitioners around the globe, and even many scientists and philosophers focusing on the mind, do not have a definition of what the mind is! In this talk, well offer a working definition of the mind and practical implications for how to perceive and strengthen the mind itself—a learnable skill called mindsight. Then well build on this perspective to explore ways that the mind, the brain, and our relationships are influenced by digital information flow and also how they can be moved toward healthy functioning.



Presented by Daniel J. Siegel, M.D.

Via:  Google Tech Talks

Why You Can’t Help Believing Everything You Read

The argument about whether belief is automatic when we are first exposed to an idea or whether belief is a separate process that follows understanding has been going on for at least 400 years...click anywhere in this sentence to continue reading...

Via:  PSYBLOG

The Ever Elucidating Engaging Eloquent Carl Sagan on the Human Brain

 

How it feels to have a stroke

Neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor had an opportunity few brain scientists would wish for: One morning, she realized she was having a massive stroke. As it happened -- as she felt her brain functions slip away one by one, speech, movement, understanding -- she studied and remembered every moment. This is a powerful story about how our brains define us and connect us to the world and to one another.




Via http://www.ted.com

From Brain Dynamics to Consciousness: How Matter Becomes Imagination

Jacob Marschak Memorial Lecture by Nobel Laureate Gerald Edelman. Via UCLA

Discovering Psychology -The Cognitive Processes

By PhD Philip Zimbardo, this video explores the basics of human cognition.

Corporation for Public Broadcasting "To advance excellent teaching."

Brain, Mind and Behavior: Defining the Mind and Minding the Brain

Take a look into our current understanding of the function of the human brain and some of the important diseases that cause nervous system dysfunction. On this edition, Dr. Sophia Vinogradov of the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center explores the mixing of visual perception, emotion, and memory and the interplay of the different functions of the brain. There are some really interesting games she plays with the group so have pencil and paper ready to take notes.

Neurologist Alan B. Grindal Discusses the Essence, Operation, & Pathology of Human Consciousness

Psychology Basics

By Kendra Van Wagner, About.com Guide to Psychology

Before you begin studying psychology, you need to gain a clear understanding of exactly what psychology is. When did psychology originate? What do psychologists study? Explore this section to learn the answers to these questions and build a good foundation for further study of this vast and fascinating subject. Click anywhere in this sentence for a link to much much more.

1. Psychology 101
2. Brain and Behavior
3. States of Consciousness
4. Learning
5. Memory

6. Development
7. Personality
8. Social Psychology
9. Resources for Psychology Students