Results tagged “Research” from Ψ Dare To Dream...

I've been a skeptic about self-help books as have many of my colleagues. Self-help concepts often represent the home grown philosophy of the author. Seldom is there comprehensive research documentation of the foundations of the concepts shared. And so you can never be sure you are reading something that applies real science to every day needs.

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This book is an exception. Buddha's Brain - The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom. is the catchy title. Actually, there is little about Buddha or Buddhism in the book. Written by Rick Hanson Ph.D. with Richard Mendius MD, it uses some concepts of Buddhism as a frame of every day experience to convey the main themes. It thoroughly summarizes for the layman the latest neuroscience research as it relates to happiness, love, wisdom and peace of mind.

The book details proven methods to transform your brain using conscious thought to challenge our beliefs and assumptions as well as body focused imagery to access and change the implicit memory of emotion.

Did you know that suffering has two parts, one that is inevitable and inescapable, and one that entirely voluntary yet we seldom have the awareness to avoid?

Learn how to enhance your positive feelings, and cool your hot negative emotions and to focus your mind and body towards achieving your goals. Find peace and centeredness and maintain it even under stress.

Applying recent neuroscience and psychological research to teaching emotional intelligence has been a passion of mine for a number of years. And the topic has been common on my blog. I was curious about what inspired the authors to write this outstanding book, so I emailed Rick Hanson to ask about his motivation.

"As a child, I saw what seemed like a lot of needless unhappiness around me, and wondered about what led to lasting happiness. That question took me into the human potential movement, spiritual studies and practices, clinical psychology, and now brain science. At the intersection of psychology, neuroscience, and contemplative practice (especially Buddhism, the tradition I know best), there's a rich source of insights and tools for happiness, love, and wisdom. The brain is the final common pathway into the mind of all the causes and conditions that lead to joy or sorrow, helpfulness or harm - so understanding with increasing clarity, dexterity, and precision how to use the mind to change the brain to change the mind for the better is a fantastic new way to improve one's own life and the lives of others.

And hopefully this offers a way as well to nudge the world altogether away from greed and fear, poverty and war, since ignorance of how the brain works - both its dark tendencies and wonderful promise - is a major factor behind the mess the planet is in, with caveman/woman brains armed with nuclear weapons. So I am actually very hopeful, taking the long view, while also believing that we have a lot of work ahead of us."

It's apparent that Dr. Hanson and I have a similar view of the potential for emotional intelligence. The human being is a paradoxical creature. Believing we have transcended our animal nature, we alternate between being full of ourselves, inflated by false assumptions about ourselves and our world, to crushing self-punishment and shame about our natural foibles. For many of us, our moods swing with abandon, influencing our judgment, our decisions and our sense of fairness from self-serving to over-generosity. We idealize logic and often assume we are capable of it. And thus we allow the subtleties of emotion to distort our perceptions beyond our awareness.

We generally lack an ability to read the language of our body. Built into our genetic make up is thousands of generations of knowledge from our ancestors. Our implicit memory contains the painful learnings from our past that communicate their meanings in a similar language of emotion. We often ignore the more subtle feelings that are in fact deep in wisdom and act on intense compelling feelings. We make the erroneous assumption that slightly felt feelings are unimportant, and act on the compelling emotions. The result is poor judgments due to dismissing gut feelings and impulsive passion driven actions we soon come to regret.

Our self understanding is critical to our success in relationships and the foundation to our quality of life and ultimately our very survival. Learning about how our brains work will guarantee us a happier and more successful life. Buddha's Brain could be the beginning of your journey towards greater success and happiness.

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I very much enjoyed recent exchange on Psychotherapy Brown Bag. I find myself frequently thinking of the implications of our approach to research and how it contributes to our understanding of psychology.

"Intuition is, by no means, useless. A half-century ago, Karl Popper (1959) gave an answer to this that today remains powerfully compelling. Intuition, inductive reasoning, and philosophical theories are extremely valuable as the first step of a multi-step process. He termed this step the "context of discovery." His point was that we need creative thought, outside-the-box thinking, and alternative perspectives in order to drive progress, but that our thoughts, no matter how elegant, can not be the end point. We need to follow up this stage with deductive reasoning - testing our theories to see which ones are backed up by facts and which ones are clouded by flawed reasoning.

In this sense, science becomes a series of competing theories, each of which builds upon the past and corrects a variety of prior errors. No theory is pefect, most if not all are eventually overturned by others, and progress continues. Our progress, however, is marked by the evidence supporting our claims, not by the strength of our beliefs in our cause without reflection upon the evidence for its validity."

Not only can our interpretations effect how we see and use a research finding, but the assumptions we bring to the research effects our choice of hypothesis and measurement target. Wood et al.(2009) pre-publication manuscript has gotten much press inappropriately proclaiming that positive affirmations may in fact harm those those most in need, those with low self-esteem. As I stated in an article I wrote about these conclusions, there was I believe an error in one of the basic assumptions of the research. Wood and her colleagues assumed negative feelings after affirmations demonstrated harm. A review of basic theory might have captured what I believe was actually happening, the subjects were beginning a process of extinguishing their conditioned negative emotional response.

It seems researchers have drifted away from embedding their investigations in theory. Few authors seem willing to delve into the grand theoretical formulations as a basis for their research. For that reason, it's difficult to apply the results to much more than the specifics of the research setting. You've been discussing intuition as it impacts research. I think theory serves as a check on intuition.

I think one of the most important recent grand psychological theories was Henriques "Tree of Knowledge", yet I've caught little written about it since 2003 other than my humble attempt. I think this model provides us with a framework for these sorts of discussions. The link between psychology's investigation of the mind and interpreting the meaning of behavior (The Justification Hypothesis) is where data meets intuition, where research interfaces with theory. Ever since studying psychometrics I've integrated the concept of validity and reliability into my thinking about the theoretical interpretation of data. Reliable data that that is consistent wwith the hypothesis of the study, (predictive validity) set in a meaningful context (content and construct validity), give us an opportunity to further our understanding of the meaning of human behavior in it's cultural context (construct validity). Yet I've never seen the concepts applied outside of psychometrics where they certainly seem to belong. Perhaps its again related to researchers reluctance to bringing a theoretical discussion to their research.

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We have become a medicating culture. If we don't like how we feel, we can take a pill to feel better.

Kellen Von Houser, MA, LPC, in her blog Kellevision says it boldly.

"My concern is for people who are actually experiencing the normal emotions of life, labeling them "mood swings" and trying to medicate their discomfort away. My concern is for doctors who participate in this and validate it. My concern is for teaching people that emotions can be "negative" and undesirable. That they are "bad" in some way and should be eliminated, by chemical intervention or any other means. This is not a message we want to send. Emotions are what make us human. And expressing them is what keeps us sane. "

In this world, shrewd advertisers manipulate our moods to overwhelm our self-control so that we buy their products.

Jeremy Dean in his blog PsyBlog documents the research findings:

"New perspectives on how our self-control interacts with our spending see a battle between impulsive, emotional processes and far-sighted planning processes. One part of us is saying: "Buy it, you'll feel real good!" and another part is saying: "No, we need that money to pay the rent!"

Findings from this type of research are only just starting to emerge, but here are some fascinating highlights on how our self-control works:

• Increased cognitive load decreases self-control. This is something marketers are well-aware of: distracted people are more likely to spend money. Most shops are filled with shiny, complicated distractions - bright colours, music and 'incredible offers' - designed to confuse us and open our wallets.
• Our supply of self-control is limited. Studies show that our self-control is actually sapped each time we use it (Baumeister & Vohs, 2003). It's also sapped, predictably, by alcohol, lack of sleep and stress.

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Cultural explanations about how we managing our emotions carry almost a mythological quality. "Will Power" is that elusive asset that drives our self-control. But ask someone what "will power" is? Few people have a satisfactory answer. Many will attribute it to a quality within another ill defined concept called "character". "Strength of character" gives one self-control. But what is "strength of character"? Some say its a product of parenting. Others see it as something that is passed down in the bloodlines. According to the genetic hypothesis, certain families are best suited to lead by example. So many cultures have "blue bloods", families of entitled "royals" who serve sometimes as mere figureheads (e.g. Britain), sometimes as actual political rulers (e.g. recently in Nepal).

Psychology sees "will power" as motivation, a biochemical energy that drives humans to act. That role seems for us to be played by emotion. Again from PsyBlog.

"Sadness makes us want a change (any change). Sadness may well increase the chance we want to spend. One study found that those who are sad are more likely to want to sell at a lower price and buy at a higher price (Lerner, Small & Loewenstein, 2004)."

So does sadness make us devalue what we have and seek something better? There certainly could be some truth to that. Sadness may be the primary feeling state induced by loss of something we value. Indeed, we may feel the need to shed old priorities and invest in major change. But that seemed to hardly translate into selling low and buying high. That seems more like an escapist approach to grief.

But indeed, everything about our medicating culture is about escaping from how we feel.

"Disgust makes us want to get rid of everything. When we're disgusted we want to get rid of the things we have and don't want to buy anything."

In research settings, disgust is often broken up into disgust of actions (guilt) and disgust of self (shame). Getting rid of things and avoiding buying would seem like a form of self-deprivation or punishment. We know from research that punishment is not effective, in fact, it may provide add incentive to do whatever for which one is punished. A sign "Don't pull this cord!", as the cartoon goes, induces the inevitable response. So again, without contemplation, our emotional impulses provide us with at best a temporary escape, but the consequences of our actions are waiting for us in the next moment.

"Anxiety makes us want to reduce uncertainty. Anxiety makes us prefer low-risk options (Raghunathan & Pham, 1999)."

But if we follow the impulse, avoiding the risk, will actually make what we avoided even more anxiety provoking the next time. People who suffer from anxiety disorders find their world ever shrinking, sometimes to the point where they are afraid to leave their home! The treatment is to gradually face the fear and restart one's life. Sounds simple, but for many it's terrifying to contemplate. In fact, the very act of thinking about it induces intolerable anxiety, making withdrawal appear highly inviting.

So, in a nut shell, emotions are our motivations. But if we act on impulse, we will prolong our misery and inevitably face the same situation again, with more intense emotion. So it's not enough to recognize what our initial impulse is when we are highly motivated. We have to apply sound judgment as well. We must think about our situation and apply the motivation judiciously.

So, as it applies to make better decisions with money:

• Self-imposed limits. Research by Professor Dan Ariely (reported in his book Predicatably Irrational) suggests that self-imposed limits can help to increase self-control. Telling other people about these limits will tend to increase our adherence to them. Professor Ariely even suggests a special credit card which only lets you spend money on certain categories of goods (e.g. groceries) up to a certain pre-set limit, then it warns of overspending. Unsurprisingly credit card companies haven't taken up the idea, good though it is.


• Cooling-off periods. Take time to decide about a purchase, especially anything expensive. Not just a few minutes - more like a few hours or days. Many people already do this and it's an extremely effective method of financial decision-making....


• Monitor your self-control. The fact that self-control seems to run-down with use suggests we need to monitor its levels. Have you used a lot of self-control recently? Are you tired? Are you about to snap? Again, it might be better to wait until your self-control tank is refilled.

Another good option is to consult with someone you trust about your decision, someone who isn't similarly invested in the decision or depleted of "self-control".

Horwitz and Wakefield (2007) in their book, The Loss of Sadness, make the provocative proposal that psychiatry have transformed normal sadness into clinical depression. With the 1980 publication of the DSMIII, depression was defined as a set of symptoms without considering the context in which the symptoms occurred. Their central thesis is that much of what is now diagnosed as clinical depression is in fact a normal emotion of sadness that has resulted from major loss.

But it's not just psychiatry that has things confused, our entire culture contributes to the problem by not educating our children about emotion in any consistent way. How our children deal emotionally with school and social relationships have more to do with success as adults than any other reason. People who visit my office were wounded in childhood by emotionally ignorant parents. Without psychotherapy and education, these now grown up children are predestined to repeat many of their parents mistakes raising their own children.

Aaron Beck, considered the Father of Cognitive Therapy, is an American psychiatrist and a professor emeritus at the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania. He is President of the Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research that is directed by his daughter, Judith S. Beck, Ph.D.. He is noted for his research in psychotherapy, psychopathology, suicide, and psychometrics, and the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), one of the most widely used instruments for measuring depression severity. At age 87, the man is still publishing, building on his pioneering work on the cognitive model of depression. In his latest article published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, he recalls his early work:

"Caught up with the contagion of the times, I was prompted to start something on my own. I was particularly intrigued by the paradox of depression. This disorder appeared to violate the time-honored canons of human nature: the self-preservation instinct, the maternal instinct, the sexual instinct, and the pleasure principle. All of these normal human yearnings were dulled or reversed. Even vital biological functions like eating or sleeping were attenuated. The leading causal theory of depression at the time was the notion of inverted hostility. This seemed a reasonable, logical explanation if translated into a need to suffer. The need to punish one's self could account for the loss of pleasure, loss of libido, self-criticism, and suicidal wishes and would be triggered by guilt. I was drawn to conducting clinical research in depression because the field was wide open--and besides, I had a testable hypothesis.

I decided at first to make a foray into the "deepest" level: the dreams of depressed patients. I expected to find signs of more hostility in the dream content of depressed patients than nondepressed patients, but they actually showed less hostility. I did observe, however, that the dreams of depressed patients contained the themes of loss, defeat, rejection, and abandonment, and the dreamer was represented as defective or diseased. At first I assumed the idea that the negative themes in the dream content expressed the need to punish one's self (or "masochism"), but I was soon disabused of this notion. When encouraged to express hostility, my patients became more, not less, depressed. Further, in experiments, they reacted positively to success experiences and positive reinforcement when the "masochism" hypothesis predicted the opposite (summarized in Beck).

Some revealing observations helped to provide the basis for the subsequent cognitive model of depression. I noted that the dream content contained the same themes as the patients' conscious cognitions--their negative self-evaluations, expectancies, and memories--but in an exaggerated, more dramatic form. The depressive cognitions contained errors or distortions in the interpretations (or misinterpretations) of experience. What finally clinched the new model (for me) was our research finding that when the patients reappraised and corrected their misinterpretations, their depression started to lift and--in 10 or 12 sessions--would remit."

We owe a lot to Dr. Beck. His cognitive model of depression still dominates how I and most of my colleagues write treatment plans for persons suffering with depression. Our goal is to inspire and teach our clients to change their negative self-evaluations, correct distorted memories, and create an expectation of success. The only problem is depression is not that simple.

Try as they might, many clients are able to recognize what they need to do, understand how their thoughts about themselves and their world need to change, are able to state those changes, and diligently practice them. But when they really need to be able to master their fate, when ruminative thoughts spiral downward into the depths of depression, their efforts quickly collapse and they succumb.

So is the Cognitive Model of Depression wrong? No, I think it's incomplete. There is the biomedical model of depression involving errant neurotransmitter levels treated by various anti-depressants. That discussion is beyond this article's purpose. I'm more interested in what we as therapists can do differently in the counseling office. Of course we need to be sure a severely depressed client is referred for a medication review. But I want to know how we might better facilitate our clients attempts to master their mood. To this end, I will review my recent reading on the subject of emotion and argue to include emotion in a new Cognitive Theory.

PsyBlog reviewed interesting research this week. We all know how hard it is for many of us to ask for help. Our culture so values our individuality, openly acknowledging we might need other's help may be thought to show weakness by some. We may also have to bear the implication of rejection if we are refused.

But if we dared ask for help, we are likely to be surprised with the answer. As usual, emotions carry a message as well as a consequence, many of us are too often unwilling to face. The blush of embarrassment feels much more intense than the anxiety of anticipation. But we misinterpret the message of the emotion if we automatically withdraw from the challenge. Emotions warn us of risks that might not be so obvious to detect otherwise. But risks often accompany rewards well worth the risk.

"In a series of studies Francis Flynn and Vanessa Lake of Columbia University tested people's estimation of how likely others were to help them out. They got people to ask others to fill in questionnaires, to borrow cell phones and to escort them to the gym.

Across these studies they found that people underestimated how likely others were to help them by as much as 100%. This is such a high figure that it demands an explanation - what's going on here?

Part of the answer is our egocentric bias - we find it difficult to understand what others are thinking and feeling because we are stuck inside our own heads.

But it's more than just that, argue Flynn and Lake, it's also the fact that we underestimate just how much social pressure there is on other people to say yes. In effect, when you ask someone to help you, it's much more awkward and embarrassing for them to say 'no' than you might think.

In two further studies Flynn and Lake supported this intuition by asking participants to put themselves in either the role of someone asking for help, or someone being asked for help.

They found that when people were help-seekers they reliably played down the social costs of saying no. But when they were the potential helper they realised how difficult it was to say no.

Ask for help, but don't ask for too much. There's two very practical messages coming out of this research:

1. If you want help, just ask. People are much more likely to help than you think, especially if the request is relatively small. Most people take pleasure in helping others out from time-to-time.
2. Make it easy for others to say no. The other side of the coin is that most of us don't realize just how hard it is to say no to a request for help. Other people feel much more pressure to say yes to our requests than we realize. If the help you need is likely to be burdensome then think about ways of making it easier to say no."

The inhibition to ask is matched by an inhibition to say no. We have a built in mechanism that favors a cooperative spirit that promotes interdependence. Mutual cooperation enhances the survival of the entire community.