I was listening to an interview with David Walliams of Little Britain on the radio the other day. He was talking about his swim to Africa through the Strait of Gibraltar with James Cracknell for Sport Relief.

Listening to him reminded me of the classic sketch of Vicky Pollard being questioned by her school teacher about her homework. Her infamous “No But Yeah But” response occupied my mind whilst I was driving, and I began to ponder on why it was such an memorable selection of words. (more…)

So we think we are pretty clever these days having so many ways to study and publish research about the brain. We have come a long way. We even have “Brain Awareness Week”

If you get the chance to see the Tutankhamun exhibition at the O2 you might be amazed by how advanced a civilisation could be 4000 years ago.

They also had an interesting take on the usefulness of the brain - given they didn’t have the technology to know what it’s role might be. Suffice to say they didn’t include it on the list of vital things to bury with the Pharoah for use in the afterlife.

Pretty stupid these Ancient Egyptians eh? Or were they? (more…)

This week sees the start of Brain Awareness Week. BAW is a series of events held around the world to increase public awareness about the brain.

With this in mind, we thought we would keep ourselves (and you) up to date with all the latest neuroscience research. Here is a list of brain questions to get you started, with links to the research for answers.

1. What mechanism in the brain tells us to drink something after eating a salty snack? Answers

2. What forbidden activity in public places has been found to combat the effects of schizophrenia? Answers

3. What recently discovered hormone decreases our desire to eat and could lead to targeted treatment to help people control their weight? Answers

4. What areas of the brain are flooded with dopamine (the pleasure chemical) when we anticipate financial gains? And what other physical activities are associated with the same chemical? Answers

5. What can have as big an effect on driving performance as drinking? Answers

For more fascinating research on the brain look out for an event near you by checking Brain Awareness Week and reading more on The Dana Foundation.

Last week I was surprised to read in the times newspaper about the research on anti-depressant drugs, such as Prozac and Seroxat, which have been found to be no better than a placebo for people with mild depression.

This “fantastically important” news comes at the same time as ministers have unveiled plans to train 3,600 therapists to treat depression.

But train them in what I wonder? (more…)

Now there’s a name for a band “The Law of Requisite Variety”. Bands, awards… nominations and so few to choose from in reality.

Who can possibly resist the temptation - Ozzy Osbourne presenting live. You can almost smell the fear of the producers with their hand hovering over a big red cut off button…..

I occasionally have the same feeling presenting with Daryll, that is of course when he isn’t banging on about something in relation to NLP and his best friend, John Grinder. But you know, sometimes he isn’t far off the mark especially when it comes to choices in life.

There’s not much choice when you only have 4 or 5 nominations is there? But think about your life in general for a moment…. how many choices do you give yourself in your day to day life REALLY…….? What if these choices you make conciously are only the tip of the iceberg….. or the limited nominations presented to you?

What if you make a whole load of choices you aren’t even aware of…..? (more…)

I popped to my GP the other day and having sat there in the consultation (feeling about 7 years old as usual) came away asking myself “Are they treating the symptoms here, or the cause?”

There are so many things that we attempt to find out more about and change in our lives personally and professionally. we often turn to psychometrics like Myers Briggs or Firo-B.

I used OPP’s FIRO-B for years helping people understand their behavioural needs and it’s a really effective tool but I can still remember the feeling I got when someone told me there was more and you can go deeper a bit like loving a book and finding there’s a whole series… (more…)

I first met Richard Wiseman at a guest lecture series at the University of London where he revealed the hidden secrets of magic tricks. He performed a card trick that bemused everyone and left us wondering how on earth he did it. Seconds later, the same trick, and on asking us all to focus on his right-hand helped us realise the limitations of our visual system and the reason why we fall for card tricks over and over again.
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I just had a conversation with someone who was convinced that their opinion was a fact. I have recently been learning to notice the difference between descriptions and evaluations helping me to understand how we habitually position our thoughts in the external world. (more…)

Last night (19th Dec) Professor Martin Seligman was interviewed on BBC World’s Hardtalk. Professor Seligman is Chairman of the American Psychological Association, one of the founders of Positive Psychology, and author of books such as Learned Optimism and Authentic Happiness. Over the past decade he has been involved in important applied psychology research investigating ‘What really makes people happy’�

The television exchange was really interesting viewing, with Stephen Sackur attempting to challenge the findings of Seligman and colleagues empirical research. Presented were the conclusions of many studies that argue the obvious; money doesn�t make us happy, and the less obvious; optimism predicts life expectancy.

Professor Seligman was also resolute about the make up of ‘happiness’. To find out the three main factors of happiness view the interview on-line using this link:

Click Here for Hardtalk Interview

For a range of assessment tools and more information on Positive Psychology view Professor Seligmans website www.authentichappiness.com

Michael

Yesterday left me with some questions yet again, to no surprise really!

Some of these questions popped up after I braved the weather to listen to an interesting lecture at the Royal Society of London, a Francis Crick Prize lecture by Geraint Rees called ‘Decoding Consciousness‘. Now, I’m certainly no expert in the study of the workings of the human brain as you can see here so you can imagine that some of the lecture left me a bit confused.

They managed to show in scans that there is a part of the brain that fires up in response to sensory stimuli even if we consciously are unaware of this. Either I missed the point completely (which is not unthinkable!) or it was a confirmation of something I already know.

Think about it for a moment……. As you sit here reading this how consciously aware are you of the temperature of the room, the brightness of the lights, etc? Not very much probably until I just pointed your attention to it. This to me shows that what we are consciously aware of is only a small part of what is really going on in reality (reality being another question, I’ll leave this one till later!).

So, is it just me or is this the question here; Is your consciousness something to rely on to paint you a picture of ‘reality’, to tell you what is really going on, to make you feel in touch with the world?