Brain Blogging, Thirty-Seventh Edition

Welcome to the thirty-seventh edition of Brain Blogging. In this round, we try to uncover the neuropathology of Asperger’s syndrome, correlate sleep disturbances with chronic fatigue syndrome, link OCD to specific neuroanatomy, and discuss several brain fitness techniques.

Remember, we review the latest blogs related to the brain and mind that go beyond the basic sciences into a more human and multidimensional perspective. If you were left out, just leave a comment with your blog entry. You can check our archive for every edition.

For future editions, please remember to submit your blog entries using the online submission form. We will do our best to review and include your entry! Enjoy your readings…

It’s All in the Mind…

Mind, Soul, and Body writes Man as an Island:

Asperger syndrome is the very high functioning end of the Austistic spectrum. By definition their intelligence is normal, usually even well above normal, but their capacity for reading nonverbal cues, socializing, and empathizing is severely impaired. We don’t understand the basis for this entirely and certain different theories abound, but it appears Asperger individuals lack the firing of what is known as the mirror neuron.

Fighting Fatigue writes Positive Relationship Between Sleep & Thalamic Size in ME/CFS:

Lack of sleep and sleep disorders is a major issue in ME/CFS that continues to frustrate patients and makes recovery and remission hard to obtain. The thalamus (a right and left pair of brain structures) is a key structure in sleep disorders and in certain cognitive functions previously shown to be impaired in ME/CFS patients.

Tic Toc Talk writes Grow New Brains – Through Plasticity: Guest post by Heather Johnson:

This “extraordinary discovery” of the brain (according to Canadian psychiatrist Norman Doidge) to change according to new learning and experience has been termed neuroplasticity or plasticity of the brain. On taking a closer look at how neuroplasticity works, we find that it’s involved at a major level when we’re infants and the brain matures as we transform into adults.

Were You Wondering writes Researchers Identified a Brain Region Implicated in OCD:

Researchers from the University of Cambridge in the U.K. have found a way to determine predisposition to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder by examining the lateral orbitalfrontal cortex. This area of the brain is responsible for habitual behavior, flexibility of thought and decision making.

Thomas J. West Music writes Visualization and Mental Rehearsal: The Power of the Movie Theater in Your Mind:

Any good music teacher and most accomplished music students will tell you that repetition is a key ingredient in mastering any musical instrument. Repetition of a physical skill makes that skill become automatic. Often with my students, I use the analogy that learning to play an instrument is like learning to tie your shoes.

Anand Dhillon’s Self-Help Blog writes Building High Self-Esteem:

The problem of low self esteem lies in the fact that many of us learn to equate who we are with the external position in the world. So when you are successful externally, you feel good about yourself. When you fail at something, you feel down. When someone finds you attractive or approves of you, you feel good. When someone finds you unattractive or disapproves, you feel bad.

Brain Fitness Blog writes Computerized Cognitive Assessments: opportunities and concerns:

I see these instruments as a critical part in the brain fitness puzzle. Neuroimaging techniques such as MRI and fMRI are very important to support clinical and research work, but are not mature/ scalable enough to help measure brain functions in millions of healthy individuals. Neuropsychological testing is still today often done with pen and paper, administered by a trained expert, and very resource-intensive.

ADHD College Blog writes Starting My Day the ADHD Way:

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is not only a daily struggle, it’s a morning struggle. Especially for me, because I wait to take my meds until just before I leave for work so I can get the most use out of them during my nine-hour day. Getting out of bed, showered, dressed, and making it to work without forgetting something at home is almost a superhuman feat… more like a super-ADHD feat.

HypNLP writes Framing: Sentence Focus Shifting:

This is a really simple example of NLP framing your words differently to strike different chords within the listener/reader. One sentence can be said/rewritten in 3 different ways the receiver of the sentence will in turn focus on various parts of the sentence.

Phil for Humanity writes The Definition of Morality and Ethics:

Western philosophy has been debating ethics and morality for thousands of years and still has not formalized a definition for them, so how can anyone truly understand them? Furthermore, if the greatest philosophers throughout history have been debating ethics and morality, how can the common man truly understand it? Therefore, I don’t think we regular folks have a chance at truly understanding ethics and morals.

Dr. Deb writes Mapping Your Mind:

Neuromarketing is a controversial new field which uses functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging – a medical technology – to sell products. It’s akin to mapping one’s mind for likes and dislikes. I’m fascinated by this technology, but also skittish about the use of it.

Spiritual Inquiry writes Less thinking leads to better decisions:

How much thought should go into our decisions? How long should we wait? It is a commonly held belief that the more we think about something, the better our decision will get. Many of us will ponder a decision for hours or even days. However, as shown in research by Dijksterhuis et al, over-thinking a problem can actually result in a worse decision.

Mind Think Success writes Train Your Brain To Work For You, Not Against You:

Put your two palms together. Start by using your left hand so that you are pushing your right hand. Then use your right hand to resist by pushing your left hand back. When your right hand is resisting the left hand by trying to pushing it away, your right hand is moving towards the directions of the left hand? So by resisting it, it is actually giving the energy and attention to the left hand.

The Success Triangle writes Key Behaviors for Success:

Success is the end destination of a long journey. Different people measure success differently. As you keep achieving your goals in business, the definition of success will likely change. Along the way to success, you will have to unlearn certain behaviors that could derail you from your path and you will have to make an effort to learn new behaviors so that you can invite success.

The Winding Path writes Self-affirmation makes hard-to-swallow advice more palatable:

The results showed that feelings of love increased regardless of which value the person rated as important. In other words, out of everyone who rated social life as the most important value, those who wrote about why it was important to them (the experimental group) felt more loving than those who wrote about why a less important value might be important to others (the control group). The researchers reported that the same applied for all the other values.

BlogMotivation writes Discovering Your Life’s Purpose:

It’s all in the direction that we take. Where you are going determines where you will end up. The question is, are you heading in the right direction? Clearly, if you are stuck in a daily routine that makes you ask yourself if life has more to offer than this, you are not going in the right direction!

I Will Not Die writes A guide for increasing your creativity:

Creativity is defined many ways by many people. We each probably have our own understanding of what creativity is. Many people associate it with art, or music or other “right brain” or non-analytical activities, but that’s not always the case. Creativity is as much a part of almost any activity as it is part of the arts. Creativity finds its way into our jobs, our homes, our schools, and even our relationships just as often, if not much more often, than it finds its way onto the end of a paintbrush or pen.