“Unlocking Prosperity and Responsibility: A Glimpse into ‘Stubborn Attachments” In a world brimming with endless distractions and fleeting trends, finding a literary work that not only captivates the mind but also sparks meaningful reflection is a rare gem. Today, we invite you to embark on an intellectual journey that promises to reshape your perspective on…
CHANGES IN PERFORMANCE Nevertheless, some decline in brain function is inevitable as we age. The first system to show its age is memory. Brains begin requiring more time to learn and store information in late middle age. At the same time, the prefrontal cortex experiences a drop in its ability to hold information in so…
A MATURE VISION SHE WAS BORN on a New York farm before the Civil War, when high technology meant steam railroad engines and telegraph lines. By the time of her death, America had sent rockets into space. In between those events, Anna Mary Robertson “Grandma” Moses learned to adapt, not only with the changing times…
EMOTIONAL CONTROL Further research indicated a difference between adults and children in their ability to lessen emotional responses. Mario Beauregard of the University of Montreal demonstrated the importance of age in emotional control with a two-part experiment. In the first part, he performed fMRIs on women between ages twenty and thirty, and on girls between…
EMOTIONAL APPRAISALS [ MATURITY ] The mature brain has the ability not only to register emotions but also to reappraise them before taking action. Adults, unlike children and adolescents, can mentally detach themselves from the emotions they experience, label them, and place them in context-in short, realize what they feel, why they feel it, and…
MATURITY – FINDING BALANCE AS THE BRAIN AGES AFTER ADOLESCENCE, the brain transitions into adulthood. A fully functioning prefrontal cortex is the highest expression of the human brain. The balance of reason and emotion marks the emergence of the adult brain. Only in functional adulthood does society expect a person to have the ability to…
JOHN NASH’S LONG JOURNEY ECONOMIST and mathematician John Forbes Nash, Jr., started hearing things when he was young. He became convinced that aliens were communicating through the New York Times, and he rambled through Europe in a vague quest of becoming a refugee. At Princeton University he scribbled late into the night on blackboards, earning…
SCHIZOPHRENIA – RESEARCH & TREATMENT [ WAVES OF CHANGES ] RESEARCH & TREATMENT Research for treatment and a future cure focuses on imbalances of dopamine and other neurotransmitters in the brain’s neural networks. In particular, the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate is believed to play a significant role in schizophrenic episodes. Imbalances damage brain cells, and the…
SCHIZOPHRENIA / MADNESS SCHIZOPHRENIA As the prefrontal cortex completes its final wiring, about one percent of adolescents and young adults develop the brain disease schizophrenia. People with the disease typically hear voices, experience other delusions and hallucinations, and have emotional disturbances.Neuroscientists believe that the foundation for the disease is laid in infancy, as neurons migrate…
ADHD – CAUSES & TREATMENTS [ WAVES OF CHANGES ] Research points to a lack of efficient dopamine use in the brain of those with ADHD. Medications such as Ritalin, Cylert, and Dexedrine increase the amount of dopamine and other neurotransmitters, either through introducing more of them into the synapses or inhibiting their reuptake so…