People Control Thoughts Better When They See Their Brain Activity

[thinker_jeff]

The study is the world's first investigation of how real-time functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) feedback from the brain region responsible for higher-order thoughts, including introspection, affects our ability to control these thoughts. The researchers find that real-time brain feedback significantly improves people's ability to control their thoughts and effectively 'train their brains.'

 

"Just like athletes in training benefit from a coach's guidance, feedback from our brain can help us to be more aware of our thoughts," says co-author Prof. Kalina Christoff, UBC Dept. of Psychology. "Our findings suggest that the ability to control our thinking improves when we know how the corresponding area in our brain is behaving."

 

For the study, published the current issue of NeuroImage journal, participants performed tasks that either raised or lowered mental introspection in 30-second intervals over four six-minute sessions. fMRI technology tracked real-time activity in the rostrolateral prefrontal cortex (RLPFC), the region of the brain involved with higher-order thoughts.

 

Participants with access to real-time fMRI feedback could see their RLPFC activity increase during introspection and decrease during non-introspective thoughts, such as mental tasks that focused on body sensations. These participants used the feedback to guide their thoughts, which significantly improved their ability to control their thoughts and successfully perform the mental tasks. In contrast, participants given inaccurate or no brain feedback did not achieve any improvement in brain regulation.

 

"When participants saw their brain reacting to their thoughts, they knew whether they were performing the task well or poorly, and they could adjust their thoughts accordingly," says co-author Graeme McCaig, a graduate of UBC's Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering's Human Computer Interaction specialization. "As a result, participants who received the real-time feedback were able to focus on the mental task more consistently."

 

The study points to the possibility of improving our everyday lives through fMRI-assisted advances in our ability to focus our minds on personal or professional matters, according to the research team, which includes Matt Dixon, Kamyar Keramatian and Irene Liu.

 

The findings also raise hope for clinical treatments of conditions that can benefit from improved awareness and regulation of one's thoughts, including depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive disorders, the researchers says. For example, with increased availability of fMRI technology, real-time brain feedback represents a potentially important complement to feedback provided by a therapist or a patient's own self-monitoring ability.

 

Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/04/110408101740.htm

 

 

 

[CaptainPanic]

I think that people often allow themselves to get distracted. I know I do - I wouldn't be on this forum if I didn't.

If someone is potentially keeping an eye on me, I can suddenly focus much better.

 

Could it be that simple?

[lemur]

I see a similarity here with blood pressure. I can personally mind my stress level and intentionally relax in many cases. It requires taking deep breaths and allowing myself to calm down, but I can usually do it. On the other hand, I know people who react to everything with stress. They basically have a single sub-conscious strategy for dealing with anything that comes to their attention, which is to stress about it until the problem gets solved or goes away (i.e. "fight or flight" response). Such people's blood pressure goes up when they are confronted with observing their own blood pressure. I think the same would occur if they were observing scans of their brain activity. You would tell them to just relax and not think about calming their minds and their response would be to think more about how to do that. Ideally, people would be able to replace automatic reflective reaction with consciously chosen "proaction," but I don't know if displaying brain-scans of their thought-activity would be sufficient. I think people need to have a whole philosophy and discipline of mind complete with reasons and strategies. They don't just naturally see why they should control certain reactions and know how. They think they are reacting to problems in order to solve them.

[thinker_jeff]

If someone is potentially keeping an eye on me, I can suddenly focus much better.

 

Could it be that simple?

It is simple, but painful. We are not kids anymore.

 

I think people need to have a whole philosophy and discipline of mind complete with reasons and strategies. They don't just naturally see why they should control certain reactions and know how. They think they are reacting to problems in order to solve them.

The evolution does not make us in this way because there is the speed advantage for the control by emotion. The coginitive output should be more precious in the most conditions; however, it is too slow. The slow resposes cost not only your time but probably your life. Driving a car should be a good example to imagine such advantage.

[Marat]

Marvellous, now we can put a thought-policeman in everyone's brain even without all those expensive Scientology training sessions! Does the importance of exploring thoughts and emotions freely and spontaneously, and experiencing every mood, whether good or bad, they might create in us, have nothing essential to do with being fully human? Or is our sole goal just to develop techniques to suppress negative thoughts and moods to transform ourselves into more efficient thinking and feeling machines? If you study the exerience of melancholy in the 17th century (e.g., Burton's 'Anatomy of Melancholy'), you will note that at that time it was felt to be an important part of being human to explore the full depths even of negative moods.

 

There are some useful feedback systems to control some genuine medical problems, however. Thus it has been known since the 1980s, for example, that patients supplied with automatic intraocular pressure readings from a continuous tonometer could learn to diminish their glaucoma by testing which thoughts raised pressure in the eyes and which thoughts reduced it.

[mattolsen]

I think of when I first started cooking on a more professional level I had noticed that the more I understood which flavors were associated with which spices, herbs, etc. , I more easily developed a talent to not only pick flavors out in complex dishes but also was more consciously aware of how something would fit into a particular dish. Therefore, I was able to visualize a flavor in my brain simply by projecting the components of something. I think that having the ability to visualize how your brain is reacting to feelings could drastically help science understand how to help people with mental disabilities. Or on a more personal level, you could better understand how your brain reacts to variables and feelings, which I think could help us visualize the flavors of life and how they affect our brain activity somewhat like visualizing a flavor. Consequently, linking your senses in a more pragmatic approach.

[thinker_jeff]

I think of when I first started cooking on a more professional level I had noticed that the more I understood which flavors were associated with which spices, herbs, etc. , I more easily developed a talent to not only pick flavors out in complex dishes but also was more consciously aware of how something would fit into a particular dish. Therefore, I was able to visualize a flavor in my brain simply by projecting the components of something. I think that having the ability to visualize how your brain is reacting to feelings could drastically help science understand how to help people with mental disabilities. Or on a more personal level, you could better understand how your brain reacts to variables and feelings, which I think could help us visualize the flavors of life and how they affect our brain activity somewhat like visualizing a flavor. Consequently, linking your senses in a more pragmatic approach.

 

I wish I could taste the food you cooked.

[CaptainPanic]

I think of when I first started cooking on a more professional level I had noticed that the more I understood which flavors were associated with which spices, herbs, etc. , I more easily developed a talent to not only pick flavors out in complex dishes but also was more consciously aware of how something would fit into a particular dish. Therefore, I was able to visualize a flavor in my brain simply by projecting the components of something. I think that having the ability to visualize how your brain is reacting to feelings could drastically help science understand how to help people with mental disabilities. Or on a more personal level, you could better understand how your brain reacts to variables and feelings, which I think could help us visualize the flavors of life and how they affect our brain activity somewhat like visualizing a flavor. Consequently, linking your senses in a more pragmatic approach.

I'm not sure I agree (but not sure I disagree either!).

 

I think you're describing "experience", while the article in the 1st post described "focus" or "concentration". I would suggest that these are unrelated (or did I miss something crucial here)?

[thinker_jeff]

I think you're describing "experience", while the article in the 1st post described "focus" or "concentration". I would suggest that these are unrelated (or did I miss something crucial here)?

You've got your point that he described mainly about his experience to learn the art of cooking.

But Mattolsen's experience has something uncommon - he was able to visualize a flavor in his brain simply by projecting the components of something. The visual imagery about something unable to see might be similiar as the visual feedback in the article.

Edited May 11, 2011 by thinker_jeff