Brilliant Blog

(Hat tip: Boing Boing)

The CIA has posted the full text of one of its guidebooks, "Psychology of Intelligence Analysis", published in 1999 by the CIA's Center for the Study of Intelligence.

Haven't had time to play with it yet, but these quotes sound fascinating:

- "Of the diverse problems that impede accurate intelligence analysis, those inherent in human mental processes are surely among the most important and most difficult to deal with. Intelligence analysis is fundamentally a mental process, but understanding this process is hindered by the lack of conscious awareness of the workings of our own minds..."
- "Thinking analytically is a skill like carpentry or driving a car. It can be taught, it can be learned, and it can improve with practice. But like many other skills, such as riding a bike, it is not learned by sitting in a classroom and being told how to do it. Analysts learn by doing. Most people achieve at least a minimally acceptable level of analytical performance with little conscious effort beyond completing their education. With much effort and hard work, however, analysts can achieve a level of excellence beyond what comes naturally..."

Link (via Boing Boing and Further: Strange Attractor & Beyond)

Today I had a great conversation with Martin Buschkuehl, one of the U Michigan researchers involved in the cognitive training study that has received much media attention since early last week, when the study was published at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

I will publish the interview notes next week. For the moment, let me paraphrase his answer to the question: "Why are computerized programs like the one you used fundamentally different from, say, simply doing many crossword puzzles?".

His answer was that for 3 reasons:

1. Adaptive: The constant adaptability of the challenge level, thanks to real-time assessments. The person using the program is truly pushed to his or her peak level all the time, thereby "stretching" the targeted ability.
2. Complex: The presentation of a very complex task, mixing different forms of stimuli (auditory, visual) and with time pressure.
3. Transferability: The tasks can be designed in a way that doesn't allow for the development of "strategies" to beat the game. One needs to truly expand capacity, and this helps ensure the transfer of the skill to non-trained domains.

All this is not to say that computerized programs are the only way to exercise our brains. There are many other ways, such as meditation, or mastering new skills. And there are other important factors in our overall cognitive health, like physical fitness and stress management. Having said that, technology, when designed and used well, can expand the realm of the possible.

Some of the media coverage:

Forget Brain Age: Researchers Develop Software That Makes You Smarter (Wired).

- "In a limited trial, he and his team were able to make 34 test subjects significantly better at answering IQ test questions after training them on a completely separate memory task" 

-"The improvement seems to be dosage dependent," Buschkuehl said. "We saw a linear increase in performance with increase in training time." 

To be continued...(next week)

As you have probably noticed, a growing number of Expert Contributors are writing in our blog, so that we can collectively discuss the latest research and trends on cognitive and brain health, and the implications of brain research in general for our everyday lives. 

If you haven't done so already, make sure to subscribe to our newsletter (above) and our RSS feed (on the right).

Below you have the profiles of some of our Contributors and links to their best articles with us so far. Enjoy!

Dr. Pascale Michelon has a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology and has worked as a Research Scientist at Washington University in Saint Louis, in the Psychology Department. She conducted several research projects to understand how the brain makes use of visual information and memorizes facts. She is now an Adjunct Faculty at Washington University, and teaches Memory Workshops in numerous retirement communities in the St Louis area.      Social Connections for Cognitive Fitness.  Teaser: Boost your visuospatial skills. Brain Plasticity: How learning changes your brain. Teaser: Words in your brain, learn as you exercise!.

Gregory Kellett has a masters in Cognitive Neurology/Research Psychology from SFSU and is a researcher at UCSF where he currently investigates the psychophysiology of social stress.      Relaxing for your Brain's Sake. Stress and Neural Wreckage: Part of the Brain Plasticity Puzzle.

	Dr. David Rabiner is a child clinical psychologist and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at Duke University. His research focuses on various issues related to ADHD, the impact of attention problems on academic achievement, and attention training. He also publishes Attention Research Update, a complimentary online newsletter that helps parents, professionals, and educators keep up with the latest research on ADHD.     Working Memory Training for Adults. How Strong is the Research Support for Neurofeedback in Attention Deficits?. Self-Regulation and Barkley's Theory of ADHD.
	Greater Good Magazine, a UC-Berkeley-based quarterly magazine that highlights ground breaking scientific research into the roots of compassion and altruism.      Robert Sapolsky on Peace Among Primates: Part 1, Part 2. Part 3. Daniel Goleman: The Power of Mindsight. Jill Sutie: Mindfulness and Meditation in Schools.
	John Medina, author of “Brain Rules,” is a developmental molecular biologist and research consultant. He is an affiliate professor of Bioengineering at the University of Washington School of Medicine. He is also the director of the Brain Center for Applied Learning Research at Seattle Pacific University. His article on exercise and the brain was selected by the Harvard Business Review (Feb 2008) as one of its “Breakthrough Ideas for 2008.”      Brain Rules: science and practice.
	W. R. (Bill) Klemm, D.V.M., Ph.D. Scientist, professor, author, speaker As a professor of Neuroscience at Texas A&M University, Bill has taught about the brain and behavior at all levels, from freshmen, to seniors, to graduate students to post-docs. His recent books include Thank You Brain For All You Remember and Core Ideas in Neuroscience.      New Neurons: Good News, Bad News.
	Prof. Schlomo Breznitz is the Founder and President of CogniFit. Previously, he served as the Lady Davis Professor of Psychology and the founding director of the Center for Study of Psychological Stress at the University of Haifa. He has also been visiting professor at the London School of Economics, Berkeley, Stanford, and National Institutes of Health.      Maximize the Cognitive Value of Your Mental Workout.
	eduwonkette is an anonymous blogger who writes a fantastic Education Week blog described as "Through the lens of social science, eduwonkette takes a serious, if sometimes irreverent, look at some of the most contentious education policy debates."      Schools: what should they do, and for whom?.
	Drs. Simon Evans and Paul Burghardt currently collaborate in the University of Michigan’s Department of Psychiatry, and the Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience Institute to study the effects of nutrition and exercise on brain function. They host the Brain Fit for Life blog and are collaborating on an upcoming book on the subject.      Preventive Medicine for Brain Health.
	Once a Knight Ridder columnist, Joanne Jacobs now blogs on education at joannejacobs.com. Her book, Our School: The Inspiring Story of Two Teachers, One Big Idea and the Charter School That Beat the Odds, is available online and in book stores.      The First Step Is Failure.
	Shannon Moffet has an MD from Stanford University School of Medicine, and is in her residency in emergency medicine at Highland Hospital in Oakland, CA. Her book on the brain (and eight dynamic brain-mavens, including Robert Stickgold) is The Three Pound Enigma: The Human Brain and the Quest to Unlock its Mysteries. Moffett recently appeared on The Brain Fitness Program, which aired nationwide on PBS.      Sleep, Tetris, Memory and the Brain.
	Larry McCleary, M.D, (blog) is a former acting Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Denver Children's Hospital. He is trained and has practiced as a pediatric neurosurgeon and has completed post-graduate training in theoretical physics. His scientific publications span the fields of metabolic medicine, tumor immunology, biotechnology and neurological disease. He is the author of The Brain Trust Program: A Scientifically Based Three-Part Plan to Improve Memory, Elevate Mood, Enhance Attention, Alleviate Migraine and Menopausal Symptoms, and Boost Mental Energy (Perigee Trade, 2007).      Why is Brain Evolution Meaningful Today to Improve Our Brain Health.

Behavior Analysis and Learning

Fourth Edition

• By W. David Pierce, Carl D. Cheney

Behavior Analysis and Learning, Fourth Edition is an essential textbook covering the basic principles in the field of behavior analysis and learned behaviors, as pioneered by B. F. Skinner. The textbook provides an advanced introduction to operant conditioning from a very consistent Skinnerian perspective. It covers a range of principles from basic respondent conditioning through applied behavior analysis into cultural design. Elaborating on Darwinian components and biological connections with behavior, the book treats the topic from a consistent worldview of selectionism. The functional relations between the organism and the environment are described, and their application in accounting for old behavior and generating new behavior is illustrated.

Expanding on concepts of past editions, the fourth edition provides updated coverage of recent literature and the latest findings. There is increased inclusion of biological and neuroscience material, as well as more data correlating behavior with neurological and genetic factors.

The material presented in this book provides the reader with the best available foundation in behavior science and is a valuable resource for advanced undergraduate and graduate students in psychology or other behavior-based disciplines. In addition, a website of supplemental resources for instructors and students makes this new edition even more accessible and student-friendly (www.psypress.com/pierceandcheney).

ISBN: 9780805862607

Published May 05 2008 by Psychology Press (formerly published by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates).

In the past two days, The New York Times has published two excellent articles on brain and cognitive fitness. Despite appearing in separate sections (technology and editorial), the two have more in common than immediately meets the eye. Both raise key questions that politicians, health policy makers, business leaders, educators and consumers should pay attention to.

1) First, Exercise Your Brain, or Else You’ll ... Uh ..., by Katie Hafner (5/3/08). Some quotes:

- "At the same time, boomers are seizing on a mounting body of evidence that suggests that brains contain more plasticity than previously thought, and many people are taking matters into their own hands, doing brain fitness exercises with the same intensity with which they attack a treadmill."

- "Alvaro Fernandez, whose brain fitness and consulting company, SharpBrains, has a Web site focused on brain fitness research. He estimates that in 2007 the market in the United States for so-called neurosoftware was $225 million."

- "Mr. Fernandez pointed out that compared with, say, the physical fitness industry, which brings in $16 billion a year in health club memberships alone, the brain fitness software industry is still in its infancy. Yet it is growing at a 50 percent annual rate, he said, and he expects it to reach $2 billion by 2015."

- "Boomers believe they have ample reason to worry. There is no definitive laboratory test to detect Alzheimer’s disease". 

- “Smart people find new ways to exercise their brains that don’t involve buying software or taking expensive workshops," he (Note: magazine publisher David Bunnell) said.

Article: Exercise Your Brain, or Else You’ll ... Uh ...

Comments:  I enjoyed the conversations I had with the NYT reporter, Katie Hafner. The main 3 points I wanted to convey were, and are:

a) The brain fitness software programs mentioned in the article (and others) are no more than "tools" to exercise certain brain functions. None of the products on the market today offer an overall brain health solution. Some programs are helpful at training specific cognitive skills that tend to decline with age, others improve attention or decision making skills, and still others help assess cognitive functions. If health, education and corporate executives as well as consumers become more familiar with the progress that cognitive science has made over the last 10-20 years, they will be able to make informed decisions about which, if any, tools, may help. This is what "smart people" do: adapt to new environments and use new tools appropriately - without falling prey either to manufacturers' inflated/ confusing claims, or negating the value of those tools as a general principle.

Language in the brain is processed in the temporal lobes. These are on the sides of your brain, next to you temples.

Different areas in the temporal lobe (mostly on the left side of your brain) deal with different aspects of language. For instance, the Wernicke area is the one that allows you to understand words. The Broca area, on the other hand, is the one that allows you to produce language or articulate words.

Damage to Wernicke's area causes Wernicke's aphasia, a condition in which people can hear language being spoken, but cannot understand it. Damage to Broca's area causes Broca's aphasia, a condition in which people have trouble producing language.

Below you will find a brain exercise that targets the neurons in your language areas. When to try to solve the problems, words (i.e., neurons and groups of neurons) in your left temporal lobe will be activated, electrical and chemical signals will travel from neuron to neuron. This stimulation is crucial for good brain health!

Ready to stimulate neurons in your temporal lobe? 

Read each definition and try to find the corresponding words. (Answers appear below).

_________________ = A plant having a permanently woody main stem, usually growing to a high height, and developing branches at some distance from the ground.

_________________ = A large, usually tawny-yellow cat, native to Africa and southern Asia, having a tufted tail.

_________________ = The nutritious, orange to yellow root of a plant of the parsley family.

_________________ = An article of furniture consisting of a flat top supported on one or more legs.

_________________ = An institution where instruction is given.

_________________ = A moving cage for carrying passengers from one level to another.

_________________ = A device for transmission of sound or speech to a distant point

_________________ = a body of water of considerable size, surrounded by land.

_________________ = A domestic fowl bred for its flesh, eggs, and feathers.

_________________ = A shallow, usually circular dish from which food is eaten.

_________________ = A precipitation in the form of ice crystals.

_________________ = Any circulating medium of exchange

Answers

Tree
Lion
Carrot
Table
School
Elevator
Telephone
Lake
Chicken
Plate
Snow
Money

--- This article was written by Pascale Michelon, Ph. D., for SharpBrains.com. Copyright 2008. Dr. Michelon has a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology and has worked as a Research Scientist at Washington University in Saint Louis, in the Psychology Department. She conducted several research projects to understand how the brain makes use of visual information and memorizes facts. She is now an Adjunct Faculty at Washington University, and teaches Memory Workshops in numerous retirement communities in the St Louis area.

Stephanie West Allen, our lawyer-blogger friend and Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz, a research psychiatrist at the School of Medicine at the University of California at Los Angeles and a neuroplasticity expert, have written a thought-provoking article for The Complete Lawyer.

See Article: Exercise Mind Hygiene On A Daily Basis. Excerpt:

- "Here’s an example of a Golden Moment of Choice: You have decided that you are going to keep your promise and get home each evening in time to put the kids to bed. When 7 p.m. rolls around, you recognize that you can move in one of two directions: you can keep working or get going. Because of your habit of working very late, the synapses in your brain have been forged to support your habit, and you feel the urge to stay. This physiological component of your habitual behavior is making your decision difficult. Nevertheless, you decide to leave. Now, each time you make this new choice, it will be easier: You will be laying down “going-home-to-the-kids” synapses to support the new behavior (and you will be using self-directed neuroplasticity).

- Our ability to step back and see that we have the choice is key. Often we do not even get that far: 7 p.m. comes and goes without our realizing that it’s a GMC. In order to improve your ability to observe yourself and your choices, you need to develop your self-awareness".

Article: Exercise Mind Hygiene On A Daily Basis

Reading this, and with a wife  and 6-week-old baby starting to fall asleep, reminds me of something...

how to say, "Good night, dear Blog!"