5 INTERESTING TOPICS OF BRAIN & BEHAVIOR

By Chris Vetrano 8/23/2013

5 Interesting Topics of Brain & Behavior This semester we covered many topics. Throughout the course, some of the ones that intrigued me were Consciousness, Dreams, REM sleep, Circadian Rhythm, and The Placebo Effect. The following is a detailed explanation of each, including the connection each one has to the environment. Studying how we interact with the environment provides essential information for designing healthy spaces and creating the ultimate placebo effect. Convincing the mind that it is happy, naturally, by creating psychologically friendly environments, we can combat depression, just like placebo drugs and therapies, through design.

Consciousness –

Consciousness is a “living” state, in which there is some form of awareness of life, it is the ability to feel energy. “Consciousness is our primary reality; through it, we perceive ourselves and our environment” (Holub, 2005) What is Life?

It is the flash of a firefly in the night.

It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime.

It is the little shadow which runs across the grass And loses itself in the sunset. ~Crowfoot, Native American Indian I chose Consciousness because of the “unknown” factor. With all we know about the brain, consciousness has challenged the greatest minds of all time and it has yet to reveal its mystery. I am also intrigued by how our environment affects consciousness. By altering our environment, we can alter our consciousness and vice versa.

Consciousness is a long debated topic by philosophers and scientists and yet with so many great minds collaborating consciousness is still somewhat unexplained when it comes to the underlying mechanism that provokes it. Is it the brain? Or is it some outside force that drives it.

Regardless, it can be defined as “Moment-to-moment perception of the body’s internal emotional state. This state is associated with activity of such brain structures as the reticular formation, the hypothalamus, and the somatosensory cortex. The reticular formation is also associated with consciousness in the minimal sense of wakefulness. Other structures involved in simply maintaining wakefulness include the pons, the raphe nuclei and the locus coeruleus.”

(The Brain, nd) There have been a few interesting studies on how solar flares affect humans. “Chizhevsky found after intense research that the rise and fall of solar activity—interacting with the earth's magnetic field—causes mass changes in human's perspectives, moods, emotions and behavioral patterns. All are affected by sunspots and solar flares.” (Aym, 2011) With the increase in solar activity over the last 5 years, this information seems to be in sync with current events around the world.

Dreams –

Dreams, everyone has them and yet they are still a somewhat unexplained phenomena. We have some insight into how to enhance, or otherwise alter our dreams. There are many New Age

techniques that explore Out of Body Experiences (OBE), Lucid Dreaming, etc. There is so much to reveal about dreams and there is so much, dreams can reveal about us.

I selected Dreams because of the connection to the unconscious. Certain aspects of the mind have been a mystery for as long as man has existed. That fact alone provokes further analyzing of dreams. I am also interested in how the environment affects dreams. By altering our environment, can we alter our dreams? Can that in turn alter our minds? (e.g. provide help with, mental disorders, mental illnesses, over all mental health). There are so many variables in the environment, it is important to carefully explore each of them. This attention to detail is essential if one is to fully understand the impact of the environment on human mental health.

Dreams can be interpreted in many ways “Carl Jung believed that dreams provide messages about "lost" or "neglected" parts of ourselves that need to be reintegrated. Many dreams simply come from a preoccupation with the day's activities. But some offer rich, symbolic expressions -an interface between the conscious and the unconscious that can fill in the gaps of our selfknowledge and provide information and insight.” (WebMd , 2012) A recent study by Japanese scientists use MRI scans to reveal the images that people were seeing as they entered into an early stage of sleep. (Morelle, 2013) This could lead to a new future in interpreting dreams "We were able to reveal dream content from brain activity during sleep, which was consistent with the subjects' verbal reports," explained Professor Kamitani.” (Morelle, 2013) How does the environment alter dreams? Dreams are induced by physical factors like indigestion and smells in your sleeping environment. Our environment is adding information daily to your subconscious that can be incorporated into your dreams.

“The way an individual relates to the unconscious is similar to the way they relate to other humans and to the environment.” (Merritt, nd)

REM Sleep - The moment at

which you become unconscious and the body goes into a high energy state is when REM sleep is attained.

REM sleep is important, without it you can die. According to Dr. Charles Czeisler, a Harvard Medical School sleep expert “Lab rats die after five weeks of getting no REM sleep” “Usually, REM sleep occurs 90 minutes after sleep onset. The first period of REM typically lasts 10 minutes, with each recurring REM stage lengthening, and the final one may last up to an hour. Polysomnograms show brainwave

patterns in REM to be similar to that recorded during wakefulness. In people without sleep disorders, heart rate and respiration speed upand become erratic during REM sleep. During this stage the eyes move rapidly in different directions. “Intense dreaming occurs during REM sleep as a result of heightened brain activity, but paralysis occurs simultaneously in the major voluntary muscle groups. REM is a mixture of encephalic (brain) states of excitement and muscular immobility. For this reason, it is sometimes called paradoxical sleep.” (WebMd, nd) We need REM sleep in order to repair brain cells and the body.

Our environment can also play a role in our ability to get REM sleep. “The bedroom environment can have a significant influence on sleep quality and quantity. Several variables combine to make up the sleep environment, including light, noise, and temperature.” It has been found that in very cold temperatures, we may be deprived entirely of REM sleep. (HMS, nd)

Circadian Rhythm –

“Circadian rhythms are regular changes in mental and physical characteristics that occur in the course of a day (circadian is Latin for "around a day"). Most circadian rhythms are controlled by the body's biological "clock." This clock, called the suprachiasmatic nucleus or SCN” (NINDS , nd) I selected Circadian Rhythm because it keeps the rhythm for many behavioral changes throughout the day and is an important part of sleep and REM. “Circadian rhythms are physical, mental and behavioral changes that follow a roughly 24hour cycle, responding primarily to light and darkness in an organism’s environment. They are found in most living things, including animals, plants and many tiny microbes.” (NIGMS, 2013) “Scientists do not yet know the details of how the central biological clock in the SCNs regulates so many different human cyclical behaviors. But scientists do know that it uses the pineal gland to do so, and they have shown that destroying the SCNs’ output pathways also destroys the body’s circadian rhythms.” (The Brain, nd)

A recent study published in the New Scientist, indicates there is “a direct connection between the Sun’s solar storms and human biological effect especially after an ‘M’ class solar flare. The conduit, which facilitates the charged particles from the Sun to human disturbance is the same conduit which steers Earth’s weather through the Magnetic Field on Earth, and also through the magnetic fields around humans.” (Carlini, nd) Older studies have also shown the effects of solar flares on humans. “In 1963, Becker, along with his colleague, Dr. Freedman, discovered that there was a marked correlation between solar activity and psychotic outbreaks of mass insanity on Earth.” (MTE, 2013) The environment plays a large part in our Circadian rhythm. “Circadian rhythms are produced by natural factors within the body, but they are also affected by signals from the environment. Light is the main cue influencing circadian rhythms, turning on or turning off genes that control an organism’s internal clocks.” (NIGMS, 2013)

The Placebo Effect – The mind is very powerful, so powerful it can heal itself if provoked. The Placebo Effect has demonstrated this in countless studies around the world. The healing effect of a therapy or medication, with a non-medicinal substitute, can be achieved with a placebo.

I chose Placebo Effect because it demonstrates the power of the mind. By tricking the mind to believe it has taken a drug that can heal the body, the mind essentially does the healing. This ability of the mind to heal is nothing new but how it works is still a mystery.

The placebo effect is quite simple and easy to understand although it is still a mysterious phenomenon. “A placebo is any substance that is not known to have any pharmacological effects (produces no meaningful changes in an organism, either chemical, biological, etc.) that is made to look like an active ("real") drug. Sometimes the act of taking a pill produces an effect if the person believes the pill is active. To compensate for this, scientists often give placebos to determine if an effect is due to the "real" drug or from the act of just taking a pill.” (Alley Dog, nd) The idea that we can trick ourselves into healing leads one to believe in the power of positive thinking and how much of the placebo effect is a result of that. There is also a study that has shown that genes play a part in the placebo effect. Apparently certain people are not fooled as easily. “People with a gene variant that codes for higher levels of the brain chemical dopamine respond better to placebos than those with the low-dopamine version.” (Ghose, 2012)

There is some talk about changing the name of Placebo Effect in order to capture the deeper meaning of it. “Kaptchuk proposes that the use of the word placebo, with its host of negative associations, be laid to rest. More helpful, he says, is the term “contextual healing,” which speaks to the importance of a healing environment.” (Marglin, nd) The environment can actually be the placebo effect and designing healing places that focus on individual environmental needs can greatly reduce the use of drugs and the amount of time needed for recovery. “Being removed from an environment which a patient associates with illness and being placed in a different environment which is commonly associated with healing, such as a physician's office or a hospital, can immediately reduce the patient's stress level. This means that placebos are not always in the form of medicines, and that merely changing environments can trigger the placebo effect” (Brown, 1998) Studying how our environment affects us will become more of a focus in the years to come.

Learning how to be sustainable of mind is just as important as being ecologically sustainable.

The mind is very powerful and with the right environment it can reach its potential.

“The real key is to live in an environment where the mind feels free to choose the right thing instead of being compelled by habit and inertia to choose the wrong thing.” ~Deepak Chopra

References Alleydog (n.d.). Placebo (placebo effect) Defined - Psychology Glossary.

Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Placebo%20(placebo%20effect)#ix zz2dnaJn0jc Aym, T. (2011, March 22). Scientists research warns humanity may be facing vortex of death by Terrence Aym - Helium. Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://www.helium.com/items/2122034-scientists-research-warns-humanity-may-be-facingvortex-of-death

Brown, W. (1998, July). Harnessing the Placebo Effect | Hospital Practice.

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Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://watarts.uwaterloo.ca/~sreinis/quantum.html Marglin, E. (n.d.). The Placebo Effect - Natural Health. Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://www.naturalhealthmag.com/health/placebo-effect?page=3 Merritt, D. L. (n.d.). Dreams and a Sense of Place. Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://www.dennismerrittjungiananalyst.com/Dreams_Sense_Place.htm MessageToEagle.com (2013, May 29). Solar Activity Causes Changes In Humans And Affects Our Health - Scientists Say - MessageToEagle.com. Retrieved September 3, 2013, from http://www.messagetoeagle.com/sunactivityhealth.php#.UiVt4jaD-Sp Morelle, R. (2013, April 4). BBC News - Scientists 'read dreams' using brain scans.

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