Google Glass takes this concept of multitasking aid to an entirely new level. The frames have the ability to insert a digital screen in our field of vision, but because that screen is confined to a small corner in this field, our eyes are still free to wander while we perform different tasks. Google designer Isabelle Olsson told Computerworld, “we created Glass so you can interact with the virtual world without distracting you from the real world. We don’t want technology to get in the way.”
This sentiment of not letting the technology interfere with “the real world” is, admittedly, quite enticing. But unfortunately, cognitive science suggests that such a scenario is unlikely if not impossible.
Multiple studies have actually shown that it’s actually a myth that our brain can juggle two things simultaneously. In actuality, the brain is designed to only process one piece of information at a time. Cognitive capacity models of attention, memory and processing explain that our brain has a limited amount of resources it can use to deal with new pieces of information it gets to process. The more difficult a task is, the more resources the brain will need to put on the job. But the more resources we use for one job, the less we have to apply toward another. Doing two things at once stretches our brain’s capacity thin, making it so we aren’t able to perform either task without sacrificing some time or performance quality. […]
The fact that Google Glass is a mobile, visual distraction is particularly worrisome to me. Some tasks such as walking and driving demand visual attention, and any technologies that encourage people to divert their visual focus should be a safety concern.
Practicing mindfulness on the job offers a bounty of benefits, according to Halliwell. It soothes and calms our bodies and minds. It improves our ability to work and produce great work. Even when stress strikes, instead of getting overwhelmed, it helps us confront challenges head-on, he said.
How? Mindfulness trains us to stay in the present. “It trains us to become more aware of what’s going on in and around us, giving us the capacity to see things clearly and act from a wider perspective.”
Below, Halliwell shared three ways of practicing mindfulness at work.
A Daily Meditation Practice
A regular meditation practice gives you the foundation for being mindful at work, Halliwell said. He suggested reading meditation books or listening to guided CDs for developing your practice. (Mindful.org has a great list of resources.)
Mindful Breathing
Our breath, of course, is always available to us. And we can use our breath to practice mindfulness. Mindful breathing is different from deep breathing. In fact, you’re not trying to control your breath at all, Halliwell said. You’re simply “letting it be as it naturally is and gently attending to that.”
Depending on your schedule, he suggested practicing mindful breathing anywhere from 2 minutes to 30 minutes.
Sit comfortably upright, and focus on the natural flow of your breath. Halliwell described mindful breathing as “Not thinking about the breath so much as feeling its texture, riding its waves a bit like you might ride a wave on the ocean.”
Checking In With Yourself
It’s common for people to move about their days with very little awareness. For instance, without even knowing it, you might be “tensing up, ruminating [or avoiding your emotions],” which only contributes to feelings of overwhelm.
So it’s important to check in with yourself throughout the day. Notice what’s happening in your body and mind, Halliwell said.
The more we practice mindfulness, the more likely it is to become our default way of being at work, Halliwell said, “and the more attuned we will become, to ourselves, others and our environment. And the more attuned we become, the more skilful we are likely to be at whatever job we’re doing.”
Nyasuke is an interceptor extraordinaire! You’e not going to get a ball past him, without at least a deflection. This is the same cat that impressed you with his high jumping abilities last year. Oh yeah, Nyasuke has his own blog, too! Link -via Daily Picks and Flicks
Sakurajima Volcano with Lightning
Why does a volcanic eruption sometimes create lightning? Pictured above, the Sakurajima volcano in southern Japan was caught erupting in early January. Magma bubbles so hot they glow shoot away as liquid rock bursts through the Earth’s surface from below. The above image is particularly notable, however, for the lightning bolts caught near the volcano’s summit. Why lightning occurs even in common thunderstorms remains a topic of research, and the cause of volcanic lightning is even less clear. Surely, lightning bolts help quench areas of opposite but separated electric charges. One hypothesis holds that catapulting magma bubbles or volcanic ash are themselves electrically charged, and by their motion create these separated areas. Other volcanic lightning episodes may be facilitated by charge-inducing collisions in volcanic dust. Lightning is usually occurring somewhere on Earth, typically over 40 times each second.
Music, dance, painting and other forms of art have shown to have an incredibly significant and positive effect on both children and adults. Art therapy has been used to awaken the senses of underprivileged children through both the viewing and creating of art. Through their artistic endeavors, they subconsciously associate themselves with their past. The memories come more freely since they are not elicited by direct objects, but indirect thought instead.
Due to many past experiences many children begin to develop nervousness, anxiety, sleeping excessive or too little, a lack of verbal, social and language skills. Many times depending on the color within a piece, or may be some other quality of the artwork, different emotions can be evoked by the observer unknowingly. Awakening of the senses through experimentation with the different types of art these children experience an untapped emotional world within themselves and with this association with their own inner being, they are able to show increased abilities in their cognitive, motor and social skills.
Previous research has shown that chewing gum can improve concentration in visual memory tasks. This study focussed on the potential benefits of chewing gum during an audio memory task.
The results showed that participants who chewed gum had quicker reaction times and more accurate results than the participants who didn’t chew gum. This was especially the case towards the end of the task.
Kate explained: “Interestingly participants who didn’t chew gum performed slightly better at the beginning of the task but were overtaken by the end. This suggests that chewing gum helps us focus on tasks that require continuous monitoring over a longer amount of time.”
The video above shows eight pianists sharing just two pianos ; seven of them are previous winners of the Dublin International Piano Competition.
Gorgeous Photography of The Elements
We all know the periodic table of the elements from high school chemistry, but have you ever wondered what the actual chemical elements look like? Japanese chemist and photographer R. Tanaka is on a mission to photograph the world’s most photogenic elements and we dare say he succeeded with flying colors.
Check out his website and Flickr page to see more wonderful images of the elements.
Pictured above: Bismuth
Two studies explore some of the developmental roots of depression in childhood and adolescence.
In the first study, published in the journal Clinical Psychological Science, researchers focused on depressive rumination, or the relentless focus on what has gone wrong or will go wrong, coupled with an inability to see a solution to these overwhelming problems. It’s no surprise that rumination has a strong connection to depression— in fact, studies show that some talk therapies can actually make depression worse by compelling people to focus on problems and their origins, rather than guiding them toward positive solutions on what to do about them.
They found that while much of brooding is influenced by environmental influences such as parenting and peers, virtually all of the connection between whether that brooding is associated with depression may be driven by genes. Someone who inherits a tendency to brood, in other words, also seems to inherit a tendency to become depressed.
That doesn’t mean that people who brood are necessarily at higher risk of depression. Because the research only looked at the twins at one point in time, the authors note that “it remains unclear from our results alone whether brooding is a risk factor for depression or is merely associated with depressed mood concurrently.” Since rumination can be re-directed and managed through cognitive behavioral therapy or other interventions, figuring out whether the tendency to brood can trigger depression could lead to early and effective treatments, which might actually prevent depression by stopping ruminating before it becomes engrained in brain circuitry.
Smith, who is also investigating some of the potential root causes of depression, reports in his study, published in Psychological Science, on an interesting connection between depression and people’s tendency to act without thinking when faced with strong emotion, known among psychologists as “urgency.” Although this behavior seems unrelated to depression, he and his colleagues found a surprising link.
“In numerous longitudinal studies, [urgency] has been shown to predict subsequent involvement in a range of rash, ill-advised behaviors, including problem drinking, pathological gambling, smoking, risky sex, drug use, binge eating, and others,” he says.
While the connections between either ruminative negative thoughts or impulsive behaviors and depression might seem obvious, such finer-grained understanding of how these tendencies may contribute to depression could lead to better ways of preventing an array of behavior problems.
We’ve discussed some of the benefits of meditation, including how it can help you at work and relieve chronic pain and stress, but new research shows that the mental benefits are much broader and can be achieved in as little as eight weeks of even short (but regular) meditation.
In a study published in the journal Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, researchers both reinforced previous research that indicated that regular meditation (or other “mindfulness exercises”) can produce measurable changes in the areas of the brain associated with empathy, memory, and sense of self.