Schizophrenia is a well known mental illness, and when I mean well known I mean just the name schizophrenia. many people don't really know what schizophrenia is in the matter of what symptoms they have and what they go through. Lucky I found a video of a woman who has schizophrenia and discusses what it is like to have schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is found to be in about 1% of the world population. the symptoms of schizophrenia are bizarre delusions, auditory hallucinations, and disorganized speech and thinking. I have also found two videos 1 from YouTube which explains how schizophrenia works biologically and the second video is of Elyn Saks, a woman that has for the better part overcome schizophrenia.
Schizophrenia
Short 3D animation on Schizophrenia
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Elyn Saks: A tale of mental illness -- from the inside
"Is it okay if I totally trash your office?" It's a
question Elyn Saks once asked her doctor, and it wasn't a joke. A legal
scholar, in 2007 Saks came forward with her own story of schizophrenia,
controlled by drugs and therapy but ever-present. In this powerful talk,
she asks us to see people with mental illness clearly, honestly and
compassionately.
Elyn Saks asks bold questions about how society treats people with mental illness.
Mood disorders are very hard to understand from a viewers perspective, not knowing what is going on for them can be hard on them and hard on you if you know the person. Their are many mood disorders for human beings some such as Mixed Episode, most people hear mood disorder and think depression, but a Mixed Episode has both a depression state and a manic state. when I first heard of mood disorder when I was younger I would always assume that person had depression that resulted from just being a sad and lonely person. I never knew that their were several causes or depression such as genetic brain abnormalities or frequent feeling of being depression. Below is one link that takes you to a video to explain what a mixed episode is, and I posted two videos one that is a Q & A form of bipolar disorder, the second video explains more on Bipolar Disorder, Depression, Mania, Hallucinations, and Delusion.
About: There's a lot of confusions surrounding what a Mixed Episode is and let
me start out by saying that according to the Diagnostic manual somebody
who has a Mixed Episode meets criteria for both depressive symptoms of a
Depressive Episode at the same time that they're having the symptoms of
a Manic Episode. And it can be confusing because people can often
consider depression and mania to be opposites, so it's difficult at
first glance to understand how you can have both symptoms at once. But
usually individuals with a Mixed Episode exhibit irritable mood and it's
a combination of the negative thinking of a Depressive Episode with the
increased energy of a Manic Episode. So the individuals who have a
Mixed Episode are going to be irritable and pessimistic but they are
still at the same time going to have what we call flight of ideas or
jumping from one idea to another. And they may have what we call
psycho-motor agitation where they're moving around and very active as
opposed to people who have a pure depressive episode: they tend to be
lethargic and slow down. But a Mixed Episode is nothing more than having
the symptoms of a Depressive Episode at the same time that you have
symptoms of a Manic Episode. And it's usually going to be with irritable
mood. And that's basically what a Mixed Episode is.
About: Dr. Charles Sophy, F.A.C.N from vh1's "Celebrity Rehab" & "Sober
House" explains the mood disorder, bipolar disorder. He explains the
differences between bipolar I and bipolar II disorders and well as
explains common conditions that are usually mistaken as Bipolar
Disorder. Dr. Sophy goes over treatment options for people suffering
from Bipolar Disorder.
A New Perspective On Bipolar Disorder, Depression, Mania, Hallucinations, and Delusion
About: Bipolar In Order is based on a very simple premise: we can learn and
grow to the point that we see our condition as an advantage in our
lives. Because this concept is often difficult for many people to accept
on blind faith alone, I encourage everyone to simply begin by accepting
that this new perspective is possible. To make this perspective a
reality requires persistence, determination, and commitment. If you will
give this perspective a chance, you will prove it in your own life.
What is emotion one might say? Well emotion is what gets us by in our everyday lives. Emotion also helps indicate how we feel in appearance to others and if we have enough emotional intelligence we can understand our emotions on a level unique to our perceptions. Emotional intelligence is a difficult understanding of our own emotions and how we know what emotions we were displaying at any giving time. For example fast emotional intelligence is knowing what emotion you felt a couple of hours ago, slow emotional intelligence is knowing what emotion you where displaying a week later. Emotion in a strange way can also do damage to our body in several ways, one emotion like depression can cause our body to enter "I will make you sick to match your depressing symptoms."
Here is a very interesting video on the emotions of men and yes I picked it so women could understand men to have feelings/emotions.
Men and emotions; men and feelings
This upcoming video is slightly different of what is emotion but it does explain what certain activities trigger or counteract other emotions. I still find the video insightful especially the parts when she states playing games stops depression and enhances other social skills as well.
Jane McGonigal: The game that can give you 10 extra years of life
About:
When game designer Jane McGonigal found herself
bedridden and suicidal following a severe concussion, she had a
fascinating idea for how to get better. She dove into the scientific
research and created the healing game, SuperBetter. In this moving talk,
McGonigal explains how a game can boost resilience -- and promises to
add 7.5 minutes to your life.
Reality is broken, says Jane McGonigal, and we need to make it work more like a game. Her work shows us how.
"If you can manage to experience three positive emotions for every one
negative emotion … you dramatically improve your health and your ability
to successfully tackle any problem you're facing.” - Jane McGonigal
Sleep? Yes please! I know sleeping is what most college students never get when bombarded with work, going to class, doing various homework or projects, but it is very vital to our well being. Sleeping is great not only is sleeping relaxing it can also help us lose weight! Sleeping the wrong amount of hours or irregular amount of hours can reek havoc on out metabolism causing us to not lose the fat we have stored in our body. Lets not stop their sleep also helps build up our energy levels. Another weird fact about sleep is that scientists today still are not sure why we sleep. Other than for our nerve cells to rejuvenate we still are not sure why we need to sleep.
Here below are some very informative videos of why sleep is important:
How Sleep Works: Understanding the Restorative Process
About: Sleep is a vital part of our lives: "It's as important as air, water, or
shelter over the top of our heads," says Carol Ash, DO, medical
director of the Sleep for Life center in Hillsborough, N.J. In this
video, Dr. Ash describes how the body cycles through REM and non-REM
sleep, and how the process relates to problem solving.
Our next video is nothing else but Ted Talks!
Jessa Gamble: Our natural sleep cycle
About:
In today's world, balancing school, work, kids and more,
most of us can only hope for the recommended eight hours of sleep.
Examining the science behind our body's internal clock, Jessa Gamble
reveals the surprising and substantial program of rest we should be
observing.
Jessa Gamble writes about sleep and time, showing how our
internal body clock struggles against our always-on global culture
Well the title says it all but I am pretty sure everyone that hears the word sex thinks about erections, ovulation, and naked women or naked men. but not many people think about what is behind the word sex or what happens after you have sex. I am also willing to bet that most people brag and boast of how much they know about sex but majority of them don't know jack squat about sex. Taking sex for granted is quite common for humans, very few people either know why we have sex or think that sex is a great way to know someone like reading someones Facebook profile. Sex is actually a fascinating subject like how a pregnancy or sperm decide what the gender of a fetus will be. Sex also plays a role in love. Yes I know love is hard to define and understand from a biological perspective , but in a Darwinian perspective it does have a purpose and that purpose was to have a connection so strong with someone that they would agree to procreate with each other and successfully raise the young.
Anyway below is a couple of videos I found related and closely related to the subject of sex from a biological and psychological perception.
The 1st video is from YouTube uploaded from Cambridge college talking about the principles of animal behavior, reproductive
behaviors in humans and other animals in response to low-resource and
high-mortality environments.
Ethology Principles of Animal Behavior
The next video is from yes you guessed it TED Talks!
Helen Fisher: Why we love, why we cheat About:
Anthropologist Helen Fisher takes on a tricky topic –
love – and explains its evolution, its biochemical foundations and its
social importance. She closes with a warning about the potential
disaster inherent in antidepressant abuse.
Anthropologist Helen Fisher studies gender differences and the
evolution of human emotions. She's best known as an expert on romantic
love, and her beautifully penned books -- including Anatomy of Love and
Why We Love -- lay bare the mysteries of our most treasured emotion.
Her is also a quote from Helen fisher very interesting.
"There’s all kinds of reasons that you fall in love with one person
rather than another: Timing is important. Proximity is important.
Mystery is important. You fall in love with somebody who’s somewhat
mysterious, in part because mystery elevates dopamine in the brain,
probably pushes you over that threshold to fall in love.” (Helen Fisher)
Pain, as much as we hate it we need it. Without pain we wouldn't be able to survive as long as we would. Our body uses pain sensors to warn us of pain. Over time our body goes through different levels of pain and adapts in different ways such as our brain tells us not to touch fire anymore or when getting hit with a thrown object causes you to learn the thrown object is a danger to you and to avoid it. Some people have an obsession of pain, in regards of stopping it. Lots of people want to avoid pain but can't, so to those people the easiest way to avoid pain is to use or abuse drugs legal or illegally. This obsession with relieving pain is very dangerous, and lots of entities exploit that obsession, like the promotion of cigarettes and alcohol.
Below are two videos that explain in greater detail of how pain works and how people experience pain.
The first video is about how pain relievers work.
How Do Pain Relievers Work? - George Zaidan
About: Some people take aspirin or ibuprofen to treat everyday aches and pains,
but how exactly do the different classes of pain relievers work? Learn
about the basic physiology of how humans experience pain, and the
mechanics of the medicines we've invented to block or circumvent that
discomfort.
This upcoming video is of my favorite place to learn new information, TED Talks.
Elliot Krane: The mystery of chronic pain
About:
We think of pain as a symptom, but there are cases where
the nervous system develops feedback loops and pain becomes a
terrifying disease in itself. Starting with the story of a girl whose
sprained wrist turned into a nightmare, Elliot Krane talks about the
complex mystery of chronic pain, and reviews the facts we're just
learning about how it works and how to treat it.
At the Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford, Elliot Krane works on the problem of treating pain in children.
Memory is a very interesting part of human life. From birth to old age we have these things we like to call memories and experiences. For most of us we believe memory is best remembered by repeating it over and over again. We also believe that memory is more acute to when bad and good things happen to us. Contrary to the belief we remember most of our lives through bad events or rather selective memory. Strange to believe but hey when was that first time you ate your favorite ice cream? or that time somebody helped you in your time of need. Don't believe me when then I bet you still remember that moment when that guy cut you off in traffic or when you got that injury way back when. The fact is we learn from our mistakes and try two prevent them from happening again. I have found to very interesting videos relating to memory and how it works in our minds and what we do to control our memory from short term to long term.
How Nutrition and Biology Influence Mood Behavior, Attention and Memory - Mark Hyman, MD About: Mark Hyman, MD speaks on The Ultra-mind Solution: An Accidental
Psychiatrists Discovery of How Nutrition and Biology Influence Mood
Behavior, Attention and Memory at the 16th annual A4M conference in Las
Vegas, Nevada. More: In systems biology and medicine, everything is
connected in the body; thus the state of ones health and well-being is
highly dependent on the interplay of ones genes, lifestyle, and
environment. We review the core physiological dysfunctions that underlie
changes in mood, memory and attention including stress response,
identify medical factors and markers that contribute to these issues,
and propose how to best develop an effective treatment plan to address
brain dysfunction.
Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs. memory About: Using examples from vacations to colonoscopies, Nobel
laureate and founder of behavioral economics Daniel Kahneman reveals how
our "experiencing selves" and our "remembering selves" perceive
happiness differently. This new insight has profound implications for
economics, public policy -- and our own self-awareness. Widely regarded as the world's most influential living
psychologist, Daniel Kahneman won the Nobel in Economics for his
pioneering work in behavioral economics -- exploring the irrational ways
we make decisions about risk.
As popular to the belief of how which side of the brain is more dominate and what side of the brain has strengths in certain areas. There has to come a little more of an explanation of what side specializes in what popular psychology deems it does. Many broad generalizations of left-sided means your more logical and right-sided means your more creative. In fact, both of these logical and creative exist on both sides of the brain. Experimental data has shown very little evidence of your more logical since you use your left part of your brain. Although you can be dominate on one side of your brain it doesn't means your more creative or not. Brain lateralization is present when it comes to left- handed right-handed as well as left or right ear preference.
I have decided to shown you 2 videos and a link to a very cool show back in 2010.
The 1st video is an optical illusion test to see if you are right brain or left brain dominate.
The Right Brain vs Left Brain test - Optical Illusion
Virtual Reality Lateralized Attention Test (VRLAT)
The video below is a recently made virtual reality Lateralization attention test or VRLAT
for people who have damage to any part of the brain.
below is a link to youtube on a show that is 45 minutes long, and it isnt boring it an exciting show that tests your brains limits.
The cerebral cortex is a very interesting and unique part of the brain. More than 99% of cortical activity takes place strictly within the cortex alone. It also contains more than half of the brain cells in it. The cerebral cortex is divided into two hemispheres- the left and right hemispheres. Information is passed through the cerebral cortex from one hemisphere to another. The cerebral cortex is divided into 4 different lobes, but to be accurate we have 8 lobes witch I mean 4 on each side. The lobes are; frontal, parietal, occipital, and the temporal lobe. The frontal lobe has two specific areas the motor cortex which tells the body to move and the broca's area which controls the muscles of the mouth with speech. The parietal lobe contains the sensory cortex and is responsible for touch sensations for our body. Occipital lobe is in charge of our eyesight. The Temporal lobe controls our hearing and it contains the auditory cortex. All of these important areas within the cerebral cortex is quite fascinating. The not portion of this blog will be done with videos further explaining how the cerebral cortex works.
1st video is a very detailed power point presentation of how the cerebral cortex works.
Neuroscientist Michael Merzenich looks at one of the
secrets of the brain's incredible power: its ability to actively re-wire
itself. He's researching ways to harness the brain's plasticity to
enhance our skills and recover lost function.
Michael Merzenich studies neuroplasticity -- the brain's powerful
ability to change itself and adapt -- and ways we might make use of
that plasticity to heal injured brains and enhance the skills in healthy
ones.
Being able to see your brain activity in real time? Sounds crazy huh? Well it might be possible through fMRI! I will be going over the chemical events at the synapse and how it ties in with behavior. Different emotions trigger different synapses that fire off to envoke specific emotions or feelings. The chemical effect of dopamine is triggered when you feel happy and a flow of synapses is sent to the brain to trigger that response. I really find it interesting that we could see our brain responses in real time. It would allow us to in a way control our own brains and mask pain.
I will now present you with video of how fMRI can be used to see your thoughts and feeling in real time.
Christopher deCharms: A look inside the brain in real time About:
Neuroscientist and inventor Christopher deCharms
demonstrates a new way to use fMRI to show brain activity -- thoughts,
emotions, pain -- while it is happening. In other words, you can
actually see how you feel.
Christopher deCharms is working on a way to use fMRI scans to show brain activity -- in real time.
Between the two sections I took a liking for 2.2The nerve impulse. I decided to take a further look into what a Nerve Impluse is and how it functions. I found it very interesting on how a nerve impuse could do a number of things that help the human body, from memory to actions and reactions. Usually when students or people in general hear the word "nerve impulse" they would assume the discution was going to be about the nervous system. But for my post I will bring more than just the nervous system; I will talk in detail about the Nerve Impulse, and how the nerve impulse works in the brain. I have several videos I would like to show you but I will limit myself to two videos. This video is a more educational detailed version of a nerve impulse type, Animation: The Nerve Impulse.
Also since you and I love watching videos more than reading an article I decided to throw in a very insightful video from my favorite educational source: Ted Talks
About:
In the quest to map the brain, many scientists have attempted the incredibly daunting task of recording the activity of each neuron. Gero Miesenboeck works backward -- manipulating specific neurons to figure out exactly what they do, through a series of stunning experiments that reengineer the way fruit flies percieve light.
Using light and a little genetic engineering -- optogenetics -- Gero Miesenboeck has developed a way to control how living nerve cells work, and advanced understanding of how the brain controls behavior.
For some reason the embeded video is cut off abit, but you cant still click on the full screen option on the upper right of the TED video
I found this interesting video explaining the (Mirror) Motor Neuron system and how it connects with humans and human behaviors. I also thought this would be a good start to think of how the brain, neurons, and social behaviors work.
Neuroscientist Vilayanur
Ramachandran outlines the fascinating functions of mirror neurons. Only
recently discovered, these neurons allow us to learn complex social
behaviors, some of which formed the foundations of human civilization as
we know it.
Neurologist V.S. Ramachandran looks deep into the brain’s most
basic mechanisms. By working with those who have very specific mental
disabilities caused by brain injury or stroke, he can map functions of
the mind to physical structures of the brain.
