1. What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Weaker? by Noam Shpancer, Ph.D

“In one recent study, healthy adults viewed fearful and calm faces while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging to measure activity in the amygdale, the part of the brain that forms and stores emotional memories. Half of the participants were within 1.5 miles of the World Trade Center on 9/11 and the other half lived at least 200 miles away. Participants who were near the World Trade Center on 9/11 had significantly higher amygdale activity when looking at the fearful faces compared to those who were living more than 200 miles away. “Our findings suggest that there may be long-term neurobiological correlates of trauma exposure, even in people who appear resilient,” said Dr. Barbara Ganzel, the lead researcher, “We have known for a long time that trauma exposure can lead to subsequent vulnerability to mental health disorders years after the trauma. This research is giving us clues about the biology underlying that vulnerability.” When trauma and hardship do leave a mark, it is usually a bruise under the skin, not a notch on the belt.”

Personal note: I’ve written from experience that I think some negative events can be transformed to make us stronger. I think these findings ultimately depend on the individual and their coping strategy. In general people have a tendency to let traumatic experiences keep them down, I think this research does a good job at illuminating this fact, although I by no means believe that “once broken, always broken.”

2. Cognition, Motivation Linked In The Brain by Todd Braver Ph.D, Washington University

“[A study] published in the Journal of Neuroscience, identified a brain region about two inches above the left eyebrow that sprang into action whenever study participants were shown a dollar sign, a predetermined cue that a correct answer on the task at hand would result in a financial reward.

Using what researchers believe are short bursts of dopamine – the brain’s chemical reward system – the brain region then began coordinating interactions between the brain’s cognitive control and motivation networks, apparently priming the brain for a looming “show me the money” situation.

‘The surprising thing we see is that motivation acts in a preparatory manner,’ says Adam C. Savine, lead author of the study and a doctoral candidate in psychology at Washington University. ‘This region gears up when the money cue is on.’ “

Excerpt 2:

“In this kind of test, as in the workplace, many distractions exist. In the midst of a deadline project with an “eye on the prize,” the phone still rings, background noise of printers and copying machines persist, an interesting world outside the window beckons and colleagues drop in to seek advice. A person’s ability to control his or her cognition – all the things a brain takes in – is directly linked to motivation. Time also plays a big factor. A project due in three weeks can be completed with some distraction; a project due tomorrow inhibits a person’s response to interrupting friends and colleagues and allows clearer focus on the goal.”

3. Fear and the Biological Non-Existence of Morality by Srini Pillay, M.D.

“The challenge in human existence is that our brain studies are showing us that the moral systems in the human brain live side by side with the formidable and often much more powerful systems for fear and craving and that the desire to forgive is also challenged by the desire for retribution. My point here is that these brain studies show that none of these ideas is absolute; that as human beings we are prone to a certain struggle of duality and opposites that live together in the brain, and that try as we may to restrain this, I do not believe that we can at the level of these systems. As Einstein said: ‘You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created’ – which begs the question: if we are to solve this internal battle, what “level” can we access to do this?”

4. Do-Gooders Get Voted Off Island First: People Don’t Really Like Unselfish Colleagues

“Parks and Stone found that unselfish colleagues come to be resented because they ‘raise the bar’ for what is expected of everyone. As a result, workers feel the new standard will make everyone else look bad.

It doesn’t matter that the overall welfare of the group or the task at hand is better served by someone’s unselfish behavior, Parks said.

‘What is objectively good, you see as subjectively bad,’ he said.”

Personal note: While this might reveal an ugly tendency in some humans, knowing this will be useful for organizations and businesses when trying to develop a social structure that limits tension between members or employees. I also wonder how true this is for professional sports teams which seem to share a strong collective identity.

5. Award-winning Research Launches Positive Neuroscience by Denise Clegg, Program Officer at the University of Pennsylvania

“In July 2009, I described the The Positive Neuroscience Project of the University of Pennsylvania and the John Templeton Foundation, including a new research initiative inviting proposals for Positive Neuroscience Research Awards. The recipients of the 2010 Templeton Positive Neuroscience Awards have now been announced. $2.9 million has been given to 15 new research projects at the intersection of neuroscience and positive psychology. The winning projects explore a range of topics including how the brain enables humans to flourish, the biological bases of altruism, and the effects of positive interventions on the brain.”

Personal note: I’ve written before about Positive Psychology and I am very glad to see that research is still advancing in the field. Taking a look at the neural correlates of these phenomena should shed a lot more light on how the brain corresponds to positive attitudes and mental well-being.

6. Test your attentional focus: is multi-tasking a good thing? by Dr. Pascale Michelon

“Human atten­tion is lim­ited. Think about your atten­tional focus as the beam of a light. If the light is on an object it can­not be on other objects at the same time with the same inten­sity. Only dim light will be avail­able to light up the objects in the periph­ery. The same hap­pens in your atten­tional sys­tem. Divid­ing atten­tion results in less atten­tional power devoted to all the dif­fer­ent tasks that you are try­ing to do at the same time. The more tasks, the less atten­tion can be devoted to each. The result is more errors and waste of time. Although we all have the feel­ing that mul­ti­task­ing saves us time, it is often not the case.”

7. Naming Tools Is A Hands-On Task

“Brain imaging studies have shown that when you identify a tool by name, the part of your brain that’s involved in manipulating the tool also turns on. Jessica K. Witt, of Purdue University, heard about some of this research and wanted to know whether it’s possible to slow down the process of coming up with the name by making the hands busy. We said, ’shouldn’t there be some behavioral consequences?”

In one experiment, each volunteer sat in front of a computer, squeezing a foam ball in one hand. They watched the screen while pictures appeared; each one showed either a tool or an animal. The participant was then supposed to name the tool or animal. People were generally slower at naming a tool if its handle was oriented toward the occupied hand. (They had no such problem with animals.)

The results suggest that keeping the hand which was closer to the tool’s handle busy interfered with people’s ability to think about the tool and retrieve its name. The research is published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.”

8. Laughter Can Play Key Role In Group Dynamics Even In A Serious Situation

“[Researchers] found that ‘laughter matters, even when it is a serious group task,’ Keyton says. ‘Laughter is natural, but we try to suppress it in formal settings. So, when it happens, it’s worth closer examination.’

For example, at one point a jury was unclear on whether a sentence related to one of the charges was for 30 days or 30 years. This confusion led to widespread laughter. ‘The laughter allowed the jurors to release some tension, while also allowing them to acknowledge they had made an error – so they could move forward with that error corrected,’ Keyton says.

‘Laughter is one way of dealing with ambiguity and tension in situations where a group is attempting to make consequential decisions and informal power dynamics are in play,’ Keyton says. ‘There are very few opportunities to see group decision making, with major consequences, in a public setting,’ Keyton explains. ‘It is usually done in private, such as in corporate board meetings or judicial proceedings. But laughter is something that occurs frequently, and not only because something is funny. Nobody in the jury was laughing at jokes.’

9. Loading up on berries a smart way to boost brain function

“A study presented at the American Chemical Society national meeting Monday concludes blueberries, strawberries and Amazonian acai berries act as a “housekeeper” to recycle toxic proteins linked to age-related memory loss and decline in mental function, said Shibu Poulose. The berries help fuel the body’s own scrubbers that remove toxic chemicals before they can do damage, according to the study.”

10. Moderate Exercise Enhances Connectivity in Brain Circuits

“A group of “professional couch potatoes,” as one researcher described them, has proven that even moderate exercise – in this case walking at one’s own pace for 40 minutes three times a week – can enhance the connectivity of important brain circuits, combat declines in brain function associated with aging and increase performance on cognitive tasks.

The study, in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, followed 65 adults, aged 59 to 80, who joined a walking group or stretching and toning group for a year. All of the participants were sedentary before the study, reporting less than two episodes of physical activity lasting 30 minutes or more in the previous six months. The researchers also measured brain activity in 32 younger (18- to 35-year-old) adults.

Rather than focusing on specific brain structures, the study looked at activity in brain regions that function together as networks.

‘Almost nothing in the brain gets done by one area, it’s more of a circuit,’ said University of Illinois psychology professor and Beckman Institute Director Art Kramer, who led the study with kinesiology and community health professor Edward McAuley and doctoral student Michelle Voss. ‘These networks can become more or less connected. In general, as we get older, they become less connected, so we were interested in the effects of fitness on connectivity of brain networks that show the most dysfunction with age.’”

Personal note: Coincidentally, I just wrote a short piece earlier this week about the mental costs of physical inactivity. A lot of this research has been hypothesized for a very long time, but it is still good to see that we are learning more details on how physical exercise improves brain function.

Happiness is something we like to believe we know and know well, but in practice it can become quite a difficult and elusive thing to obtain. Recently, positive psychologists and other researchers have begun to ask the question, “What is it that makes an individual truly happy?” These researchers hope to explain not just what makes a person happy in a single moment, but how habits of good living can create a life of fulfillment and satisfaction. Television documentaries like 20/20’s “Happiness,” and ABC’s “Mysteries of Happiness” went on a search to answer this golden question.

SOCIETY AND HAPPINESS

Social scientists and pollsters have spent their time giving questionnaires to thousands of people all over the globe to try and discover where the happiest places on earth are. According to the research on 20/20’s “Happiness”, Denmark was ranked at the top. But why is this so? Researchers say that it is Denmark’s government that plays such a large role in the nation’s level of happiness, a vast welfare state where citizens are taxed about 60% of their income. Despite the high taxes however citizens are secure. Things like healthcare and education are taken care of so individuals have a greater flexibility in choosing a career they will love and enjoy, rather than needing to worry so much about how to maintain a healthy living.

Singapore, despite the huge difference between its government compared to Denmark’s, ranked as the happiest country in Asia. Despite the incredible amount of government regulations and censorship in Singapore, the citizens there remain happy. Researchers say this is due to the sense of loyalty, security, and community within the nation. Individuals who break the law risk getting beaten with a bamboo cane, but this kind of incentive not to commit a crime is perhaps the kind of system of rules that can lead to a more obedient, safe and cleaner society. A similar sense of community is shown in Asheville, North Carolina where the streets are packed with coffee shops, art, and a rich culture. Even in the poverty-ridden India, and in Amish communities who reject to live in the industrialized world, these people have shown to be happier than those in a more “materialistic” society such as the state California. This is largely due to the strong sense of community that unites these particular societies to recognize themselves as a single family.

INDIVIDUALS AND HAPPINESS

So far what has been discussed only accounts for a small fraction of the happiness level of an individual. Researchers claim that “life circumstances” – the environments we are born and live in only include about 10% of our capacity for happiness. But what happens to the other 90%?

One of the biggest subjects of research, not only in psychology but biology, is genetics. Positive psychologists like Martin Seligman claim that over 50% of our capacity of happiness is actually dependent on genetics. Therefore, it is predetermined. One great example of this fact was portrayed in ABC’s “Mysteries of Happiness,” where researchers studied a set of twins who were separated at birth. Cases where identical twins have been separated – meaning they were born with the same set of genes but grew up in different environments – are great opportunities to see the effects that our genes play in our behavior.

Upon seeing these two twins who grew up in completely different life circumstances, it is evident to even a non-scientist that they both share an inclination towards happiness and mental well being. They literally laugh at everything, and they act as though they have been buddies all their life. Perhaps this is because their genes dispose each to a healthier and happier brain. For example, neuroscientists found that the left frontal cortex is an area in the brain that is highly correlated to happiness – meaning it becomes more active in happy individuals then those who are less happy.

The idea that genes may play such a large role in our happiness can sometimes seem daunting to those who are unhappy. Could it be that some of us are born to be depressed? Perhaps this is true to some extent, but researchers also claim that the remaining 40% of our happiness capacity is actually all up to us – we control it intentionally.

In what ways can we exercise this control of our mental well being? In 20/20s “Happiness,” positive psychologists describe a state of being called flow – where one is completely absorbed in the action they are partaking in. It is believed that skillful artists, musicians and athletes enter into this state of flow (sometimes called “in the zone”) when they are acting out their favorite hobbies. It is said to be a state of being that is not only skillful, but something that can lead to a greater satisfaction with life. When we can find our passions and pursue them we add more meaning to our lives and we give our self a greater purpose.

ABC’s “Mysteries of Happiness” depicts other ways for individuals to add a greater purpose and meaning to their life through religion. It has been shown that many of the happiest regions in the world are also deeply spiritual, and it is this ability to identify with a higher being that gives some the extra enthusiasm and motivation to embrace life to the fullest. The meaningful life is certainly not something to be ignored when cultivating happiness. In fact, it often allows the individual to perceive a stronger sense of control over one’s life. Some positive psychologists call this learned optimism (contrary to the popular psychology term “learned helplessness” where individuals obtain the sense that no matter what they do they cannot change anything).

The takeaway message is that happiness is something that can be cultivated from the inside; it is not something solely dependent on external conditions. Through our behaviors, and even how we perceive life, we can make serious changes. One psychology experiment described in “Mysteries of Happiness,” had one set of participants hold a pen in their mouth which mimicked a smile while the other half held the pen in their mouth so that it mimicked a frown (the participants were not away of the nature of the experiment). Results showed that those who were in the smile group were actually happier than those who were in the frown group. This creative study shows us that even by simply planting a smile on our face we are allowing ourselves to become more pleased with life, even if it is a fake smile – wow!

But the masters of cultivating happiness from the inside are Buddhist monks. They spend years and years meditating to relinquish their life suffering and to cultivate long-lasting, unconditional happiness and mental well-being. A study described in 20/20’s “Happiness” showed that even participants who only meditated for two weeks showed significant signs of improvement in their life satisfaction. It reduces stress, has physical benefits, and cultivates a greater appreciation and love towards life – and it’s all accomplished by sitting still and training the mind.

CONCLUSION

Both of these documentaries, 20/20’s “Happiness” and ABC’s “Mysteries of Happiness,” do a great job at covering all the different factors that affect our capacity to be happy. As shown, we can separate these factors into three main categories: life circumstances (10%), genes (50%), and intentional control (40%). Life circumstances entail the society we grow up in, institutions that affect our environment (especially government), and our family background. Genes are the factors that are determined by our biological make-up. Some of us get stuck with worse genes than others and therefore are more prone to mental disorders or depression.

These first two factors are essentially out of our control, but the final factor is that we have the ability to make decisions and pick up good habits of living that allow us to be happier. This is our intentional control over our life affairs, and it plays a great chunk in how happy we can really become. Whether it is engaging life through our own unique sense of flow, seeking meaning through a spiritual deity, meditating, or even just smiling more often: we have the power to make long-lasting changes that can lead to better living and, most importantly, true happiness.