The study, recently published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, found that individuals who identified themselves as inhibited may experience habituation failure -- or the inability to adapt to new stimuli -- in the amygdala and the hippocampus regions of the brain.
The researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine adults with either an inhibited or uninhibited temperament. Study participants were shown pictures of unfamiliar faces multiple times.
Individuals with an uninhibited temperament demonstrated habituation in both the amygdala and hippocampus. Their brain response increased when the faces were new but declined as they became familiar.
In contrast, individuals with an inhibited temperament failed to habituate across repeated presentations of faces, meaning familiar faces triggered the same brain response as the unfamiliar.
"This failure to habituate provides a novel neural mechanism for understanding the shy and cautious behavior that is characteristic of inhibited individuals," said Jennifer Urbano Blackford, Ph.D., assistant professor of Psychiatry and Psychology and lead author of the study.
"Individuals who familiarize more slowly may find encounters with new people overwhelming and thus avoid new social experiences, whereas those who adjust more quickly may be more likely to seek novel social experiences."
Blackford and colleagues think that this failure to habituate may be a key cause of social anxiety disorder, the persistent, chronic fear of a specific social situation. Social anxiety disorder is the second most common anxiety disorder and affects approximately one in 10 adults in the United States.
She is continuing her research by studying inhibited children to see if this brain deficit is present early in development.
Blackford conducted this research with Amil Allen, fourth-year Vanderbilt University School of Medicine student; Ronald Cowan, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of Psychiatry; and Suzanne Avery, third-year Neuroscience doctoral student.
Overcome your anxiety
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Thursday, 15 March 2012
Mechanism Sheds Light On How the Brain Adapts to Stress
ScienceDaily (Jan. 25, 2012) — Scientists now have a better understanding of the way that stress impacts the brain. New research, published by Cell Press in the January 26 issue of the journal Neuron, reveals pioneering evidence for a new mechanism of stress adaptation and may eventually lead to a better understanding of why prolonged and repeated exposure to stress can lead to anxiety disorders and depression.
Most stressful stimuli cause the release of corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) from neurons in the brain. This is typically followed by rapid changes in CRH gene expression. In more practical terms, as soon as the CRH-containing neurons run out of CRH, they are already receiving directions to make more. CRH controls various reactions to stress, including immediate "fight-or-flight" responses as well as more delayed adaptive responses in the brain. Regulation of CRH activity is critical for adaptation to stress, and abnormal regulation of CRH is linked with multiple human psychiatric disorders.
"Despite the wealth of information regarding the physiological role of CRH in mediating the response to stress, the molecular mechanisms that regulate expression of the CRH gene, and thereby CRH synthesis, have remained largely elusive," explains senior study author, Dr. Gil Levkowitz, from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. "In our study, we used mouse and zebrafish model systems to identify a novel intracellular signaling pathway that controls stress-induced CRH gene expression."
Dr. Levkowitz and colleagues discovered that the protein Orthopedia (Otp), which is expressed in parts of the brain associated with stress adaptation, modulated CRH gene expression and was required for stress adaptation. The researchers went on to show that Otp regulates production of two different receptors on the neurons' surface. The receptors, which receive and relay CRH production instructions, essentially function as "ON" and "OFF" switches.
"This regulation of the CRH gene is critical for neuronal adaptation to stress. Failure to activate or terminate the CRH response can lead to chronic over- or under-activation of stress-related brain circuits, leading to pathological conditions," concludes Dr. Levkowitz. "Taken together, our findings identify an evolutionarily conserved biochemical pathway that modulates adaptation to stress."
Most stressful stimuli cause the release of corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) from neurons in the brain. This is typically followed by rapid changes in CRH gene expression. In more practical terms, as soon as the CRH-containing neurons run out of CRH, they are already receiving directions to make more. CRH controls various reactions to stress, including immediate "fight-or-flight" responses as well as more delayed adaptive responses in the brain. Regulation of CRH activity is critical for adaptation to stress, and abnormal regulation of CRH is linked with multiple human psychiatric disorders.
"Despite the wealth of information regarding the physiological role of CRH in mediating the response to stress, the molecular mechanisms that regulate expression of the CRH gene, and thereby CRH synthesis, have remained largely elusive," explains senior study author, Dr. Gil Levkowitz, from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. "In our study, we used mouse and zebrafish model systems to identify a novel intracellular signaling pathway that controls stress-induced CRH gene expression."
Dr. Levkowitz and colleagues discovered that the protein Orthopedia (Otp), which is expressed in parts of the brain associated with stress adaptation, modulated CRH gene expression and was required for stress adaptation. The researchers went on to show that Otp regulates production of two different receptors on the neurons' surface. The receptors, which receive and relay CRH production instructions, essentially function as "ON" and "OFF" switches.
"This regulation of the CRH gene is critical for neuronal adaptation to stress. Failure to activate or terminate the CRH response can lead to chronic over- or under-activation of stress-related brain circuits, leading to pathological conditions," concludes Dr. Levkowitz. "Taken together, our findings identify an evolutionarily conserved biochemical pathway that modulates adaptation to stress."
Monday, 12 March 2012
Stress Levels Affected By Amount Of Green Space In The Area
Stress levels of unemployed people are linked more to their surroundings than their age, gender, disposable income, and degree of deprivation, a study shows.
The presence of parks and woodland in economically deprived areas may help people cope better with job losses, post traumatic stress disorder, chronic fatigue and anxiety, researchers say.
They found that people's stress levels are directly related to the amount of green space in their area - the more green space, the less stressed a person is likely to be.
Researchers measured stress by taking saliva samples from a group of 35-55 year olds in Dundee and gauging levels of cortisol - a hormone released in response to stress. They found that if less than 30 per cent of a person's surrounding area was green space, its population showed unhealthy levels of cortisol.
The study shows that for every one per cent increase in green space there was a corresponding steeper decline in stress levels. Where there is more green space, people tend to respond better to disruptive events, either by not getting as stressed in the first place or by coping better.
Participants were also asked to self-diagnose their stress levels and these results directly related to the percentage of local green space. People with more green space had lower levels of self-reported stress.
The research was led by the University of Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt's OPENspace research centre, working with the Universities of Glasgow and Westminster. The James Hutton Institute was the project manager. The findings have been published in the journal Landscape and Urban Planning.
Catharine Ward Thompson, director of OPENspace research centre said: "Given the increasing levels of stress and poor mental health suffered by people in Scotland, this is an exciting breakthrough. For the first time, researchers have worked with unemployed people from deprived areas and used scientific tests to show that, where there is more green space around, people's stress levels were measurably lower, while less green space was linked with signs of the body's hormones not working properly."
Exercise was another factor found to reduce stress, but it may not be related to exercising in park land. People reported feeling less stressed if they lived in areas with more green space, regardless of how much exercise they did.
Published by: MNT
The presence of parks and woodland in economically deprived areas may help people cope better with job losses, post traumatic stress disorder, chronic fatigue and anxiety, researchers say.
They found that people's stress levels are directly related to the amount of green space in their area - the more green space, the less stressed a person is likely to be.
Researchers measured stress by taking saliva samples from a group of 35-55 year olds in Dundee and gauging levels of cortisol - a hormone released in response to stress. They found that if less than 30 per cent of a person's surrounding area was green space, its population showed unhealthy levels of cortisol.
The study shows that for every one per cent increase in green space there was a corresponding steeper decline in stress levels. Where there is more green space, people tend to respond better to disruptive events, either by not getting as stressed in the first place or by coping better.
Participants were also asked to self-diagnose their stress levels and these results directly related to the percentage of local green space. People with more green space had lower levels of self-reported stress.
The research was led by the University of Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt's OPENspace research centre, working with the Universities of Glasgow and Westminster. The James Hutton Institute was the project manager. The findings have been published in the journal Landscape and Urban Planning.
Catharine Ward Thompson, director of OPENspace research centre said: "Given the increasing levels of stress and poor mental health suffered by people in Scotland, this is an exciting breakthrough. For the first time, researchers have worked with unemployed people from deprived areas and used scientific tests to show that, where there is more green space around, people's stress levels were measurably lower, while less green space was linked with signs of the body's hormones not working properly."
Exercise was another factor found to reduce stress, but it may not be related to exercising in park land. People reported feeling less stressed if they lived in areas with more green space, regardless of how much exercise they did.
Published by: MNT
Thursday, 23 February 2012
Physical Activity Yields Feelings of Excitement, Enthusiasm
People who are more physically active report greater levels of excitement and enthusiasm than people who are less physically active, according to Penn State researchers. People also are more likely to report feelings of excitement and enthusiasm on days when they are more physically active than usual.
"You don't have to be the fittest person who is exercising every day to receive the feel-good benefits of exercise," said David Conroy, professor of kinesiology. "It's a matter of taking it one day at a time, of trying to get your activity in, and then there's this feel-good reward afterwards."
Conroy added that it often is hard for people to commit to an exercise program because they tend to set longterm rather than short-term goals.
"When people set New Year's resolutions, they set them up to include the entire upcoming year, but that can be really overwhelming," he said. "Taking it one day at a time and savoring that feel-good effect at the end of the day might be one step to break it down and get those daily rewards for activity. Doing this could help people be a little more encouraged to stay active and keep up the program they started."
The researchers asked 190 university students to keep daily diaries of their lived experiences, including free-time physical activity and sleep quantity and quality, as well as their mental states, including perceived stress and feeling states. Participants were instructed to record only those episodes of physical activity that occurred for at least 15 minutes and to note whether the physical activity was mild, moderate or vigorous. Participants returned their diaries to the researchers at the end of each day for a total of eight days. The researchers published their results in the current issue of the Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology.
According to Amanda Hyde, kinesiology graduate student, the team separated the participants' feeling states into four categories: pleasant-activated feelings exemplified by excitement and enthusiasm, pleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by satisfaction and relaxation, unpleasant-activated feelings exemplified by anxiety and anger, and unpleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by depression and sadness.
"We found that people who are more physically active have more pleasant-activated feelings than people who are less active, and we also found that people have more pleasant-activated feelings on days when they are more physically active than usual," said Hyde, who noted that the team was able to rule out alternative explanations for the pleasant-activated feelings, such as quality of sleep.
"Our results suggest that not only are there chronic benefits of physical activity, but there are discrete benefits as well. Doing more exercise than you typically do can give you a burst of pleasant-activated feelings. So today, if you want a boost, go do some moderate-to-vigorous intensity exercise."
Conroy added that most previous studies have looked only at pleasant or unpleasant feelings and paid less attention to the notion of activation.
"Knowing that moderate and vigorous physical activity generates a pleasant-activated feeling, rather than just a pleasant feeling, might help to explain why physical activity is so much more effective for treating depression rather than anxiety," he said. "People dealing with anxious symptoms don't need an increase in activation. If anything, they might want to bring it down some. In the future, we plan to look more closely at the effects of physical activity on mental health symptoms."
Other authors on the paper include Aaron Pincus, professor of psychology, and Nilam Ram, assistant professor of human development and family studies and of psychology.
National Institute on Aging and the Penn State Social Science Research Institute funded this research.
ScienceDaily (Feb. 8, 2012)
"You don't have to be the fittest person who is exercising every day to receive the feel-good benefits of exercise," said David Conroy, professor of kinesiology. "It's a matter of taking it one day at a time, of trying to get your activity in, and then there's this feel-good reward afterwards."
Conroy added that it often is hard for people to commit to an exercise program because they tend to set longterm rather than short-term goals.
"When people set New Year's resolutions, they set them up to include the entire upcoming year, but that can be really overwhelming," he said. "Taking it one day at a time and savoring that feel-good effect at the end of the day might be one step to break it down and get those daily rewards for activity. Doing this could help people be a little more encouraged to stay active and keep up the program they started."
The researchers asked 190 university students to keep daily diaries of their lived experiences, including free-time physical activity and sleep quantity and quality, as well as their mental states, including perceived stress and feeling states. Participants were instructed to record only those episodes of physical activity that occurred for at least 15 minutes and to note whether the physical activity was mild, moderate or vigorous. Participants returned their diaries to the researchers at the end of each day for a total of eight days. The researchers published their results in the current issue of the Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology.
According to Amanda Hyde, kinesiology graduate student, the team separated the participants' feeling states into four categories: pleasant-activated feelings exemplified by excitement and enthusiasm, pleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by satisfaction and relaxation, unpleasant-activated feelings exemplified by anxiety and anger, and unpleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by depression and sadness.
"We found that people who are more physically active have more pleasant-activated feelings than people who are less active, and we also found that people have more pleasant-activated feelings on days when they are more physically active than usual," said Hyde, who noted that the team was able to rule out alternative explanations for the pleasant-activated feelings, such as quality of sleep.
"Our results suggest that not only are there chronic benefits of physical activity, but there are discrete benefits as well. Doing more exercise than you typically do can give you a burst of pleasant-activated feelings. So today, if you want a boost, go do some moderate-to-vigorous intensity exercise."
Conroy added that most previous studies have looked only at pleasant or unpleasant feelings and paid less attention to the notion of activation.
"Knowing that moderate and vigorous physical activity generates a pleasant-activated feeling, rather than just a pleasant feeling, might help to explain why physical activity is so much more effective for treating depression rather than anxiety," he said. "People dealing with anxious symptoms don't need an increase in activation. If anything, they might want to bring it down some. In the future, we plan to look more closely at the effects of physical activity on mental health symptoms."
Other authors on the paper include Aaron Pincus, professor of psychology, and Nilam Ram, assistant professor of human development and family studies and of psychology.
National Institute on Aging and the Penn State Social Science Research Institute funded this research.
ScienceDaily (Feb. 8, 2012)
Sunday, 19 February 2012
20 Tips To Reverse Your Trend Of Failure And Succeed Finally
1 Admit that you have failed. Make yourself a commitment to
reverse those failures. Work on it. Start with below 19 tips.
2. Attach yourself with right people.
3. Don’t ignore small tasks. Unfinished /delayed small tasks often
result in big problems.
4. Value time. No one cares your reasons for being late. Especially
your boss.
5. Don’t underestimate yourself. You are important.
6. Do what needs to be done, right now. Procrastination is not just a
problem, it can turn into a disease if you make it a habit.
7. Cultivate the habit of verifying your work. 5 more minutes of
verification can save your hours of re-work.
8. Don't judge anyone by their first impression. Instead, analyze the
pattern.
9. Be honest. This tip might have been shared a million times, but
there is a reason for it. It makes you great person.
10. Do smart work rather than hard work. Smart work is not shying away
from hard work, but finding the real reasons why you are working so
hard and automating/simplifying your hard work.
11. Don’t hurry to learn advanced topics. First make your basics strong.
Advanced topics are just extensions of basics. If your foundation is
weak, you might understand/relate things in a wrong way which is
worst than not understanding the things.
12. Try not to push yourself too hard for achieving many things at same
time. Just focus on one goal and put your quality efforts towards it.
13. Make your work environment less distracting. Clean your desk, put
headphone,or put an away status in messenger. Do whatever it takes
to give yourself a productive hour. A focused hour is much better
than a 8 hours of distracted efforts.
14. Don't put hopes on luck, instead have faith in your efforts. Luck is
nothing but known outcome for your hard work.
15. Negative people are more attractive than positive people, because
they speak lots of interesting non-factual things. Best way to deal
with negative people is to stay away from them or make yourself
immune to their thoughts.
16. Always validate your important achievements with your peers. You
might surprisingly receive few valuable tips for improvements.
17. Be consistent in your efforts. Don’t expect results or appreciations
overnight.
18. Don’t be a busy man. Instead, have proper work life balance. Being
always busy robs your beautiful years from life.
19. Stop being a consumer always. Instead, try creating something of
your own.
20. Personal development blogs wont change you. They can only inspire
you. What brings the real change is your determined action.
by Naveen Kulkarni
reverse those failures. Work on it. Start with below 19 tips.
2. Attach yourself with right people.
3. Don’t ignore small tasks. Unfinished /delayed small tasks often
result in big problems.
4. Value time. No one cares your reasons for being late. Especially
your boss.
5. Don’t underestimate yourself. You are important.
6. Do what needs to be done, right now. Procrastination is not just a
problem, it can turn into a disease if you make it a habit.
7. Cultivate the habit of verifying your work. 5 more minutes of
verification can save your hours of re-work.
8. Don't judge anyone by their first impression. Instead, analyze the
pattern.
9. Be honest. This tip might have been shared a million times, but
there is a reason for it. It makes you great person.
10. Do smart work rather than hard work. Smart work is not shying away
from hard work, but finding the real reasons why you are working so
hard and automating/simplifying your hard work.
11. Don’t hurry to learn advanced topics. First make your basics strong.
Advanced topics are just extensions of basics. If your foundation is
weak, you might understand/relate things in a wrong way which is
worst than not understanding the things.
12. Try not to push yourself too hard for achieving many things at same
time. Just focus on one goal and put your quality efforts towards it.
13. Make your work environment less distracting. Clean your desk, put
headphone,or put an away status in messenger. Do whatever it takes
to give yourself a productive hour. A focused hour is much better
than a 8 hours of distracted efforts.
14. Don't put hopes on luck, instead have faith in your efforts. Luck is
nothing but known outcome for your hard work.
15. Negative people are more attractive than positive people, because
they speak lots of interesting non-factual things. Best way to deal
with negative people is to stay away from them or make yourself
immune to their thoughts.
16. Always validate your important achievements with your peers. You
might surprisingly receive few valuable tips for improvements.
17. Be consistent in your efforts. Don’t expect results or appreciations
overnight.
18. Don’t be a busy man. Instead, have proper work life balance. Being
always busy robs your beautiful years from life.
19. Stop being a consumer always. Instead, try creating something of
your own.
20. Personal development blogs wont change you. They can only inspire
you. What brings the real change is your determined action.
by Naveen Kulkarni
Tuesday, 14 February 2012
Social media can create 'fear of missing out'
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- As the constant need for communication is becoming the social norm, it's increasingly difficult for people to differentiate their virtual life from their real social life, leading to ballooned social anxiety.
That need for constant communication may stem from something being dubbed the "fear of missing out," a sense that people think there is something better going on than the activity they are participating in at the moment. That need turns into a compulsion to be constantly connected.
People have traditionally had "downtime. They didn't need to be connected 24/7 to email, to the phone or to other people. Now, people never have to be alone and even when they are with other people, there is still this fear that maybe something better is going on," said John Grohol, psychologist and founder of Psychcentral.com.
"We have people who basically don't want to wait anymore, who need instant gratification. Technology has enabled that."
Society's relationship with technology is still new, he added. "We take it for granted because the Internet has been around for [years] so we think it should come naturally."
However, "the truth of the matter is that humans aren't built with the skills in place to incorporate all this new technology readily without some stress."
In a New York Times article last year, one writer documented her own experience with FOMO.
"As the alerts came in, my mind began to race," Jenna Wortham wrote. "Three friends, I learned, had arrived at a music venue near my apartment. But why? What was happening there? Then I saw pictures of other friends enjoying fancy milkshakes at a trendy restaurant. Suddenly, my simple domestic pleasures paled in comparison with the things I could be doing."
Grohol said that fear is "a legitimate sense that some people have. But I think it's sort of a false dichotomy. There is always something better that we could be doing instead of what we are doing. We are just setting ourselves up for constant disappointment."
He added that technology now thrusts those alternate plans into our faces, which can make some people who already have self-esteem issues feel insecure about their social interactions.
In 2011 at the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, Larry D. Rosen, who has done extensive research on the psychology of technology, said "while nobody can deny that Facebook has altered the landscape of social interaction, particularly among young people, we are just now starting to see solid psychological research demonstrating both the positives and the negatives."
His talk, titled "Poke Me: How Social Networks Can Both Help and Harm Our Kids," suggests that daily overuse of media and technology has a negative effect on the health of all children, preteens and teenagers by making them more prone to anxiety and depression as well as making them more susceptible to future health problems.
Marshal University professor Stephen D. Cooper, who specializes in computer-mediated communication, said social studies about the impact of social media aren't conclusive and vary by user.
By Kathryn Gregory
That need for constant communication may stem from something being dubbed the "fear of missing out," a sense that people think there is something better going on than the activity they are participating in at the moment. That need turns into a compulsion to be constantly connected.
People have traditionally had "downtime. They didn't need to be connected 24/7 to email, to the phone or to other people. Now, people never have to be alone and even when they are with other people, there is still this fear that maybe something better is going on," said John Grohol, psychologist and founder of Psychcentral.com.
"We have people who basically don't want to wait anymore, who need instant gratification. Technology has enabled that."
Society's relationship with technology is still new, he added. "We take it for granted because the Internet has been around for [years] so we think it should come naturally."
However, "the truth of the matter is that humans aren't built with the skills in place to incorporate all this new technology readily without some stress."
In a New York Times article last year, one writer documented her own experience with FOMO.
"As the alerts came in, my mind began to race," Jenna Wortham wrote. "Three friends, I learned, had arrived at a music venue near my apartment. But why? What was happening there? Then I saw pictures of other friends enjoying fancy milkshakes at a trendy restaurant. Suddenly, my simple domestic pleasures paled in comparison with the things I could be doing."
Grohol said that fear is "a legitimate sense that some people have. But I think it's sort of a false dichotomy. There is always something better that we could be doing instead of what we are doing. We are just setting ourselves up for constant disappointment."
He added that technology now thrusts those alternate plans into our faces, which can make some people who already have self-esteem issues feel insecure about their social interactions.
In 2011 at the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, Larry D. Rosen, who has done extensive research on the psychology of technology, said "while nobody can deny that Facebook has altered the landscape of social interaction, particularly among young people, we are just now starting to see solid psychological research demonstrating both the positives and the negatives."
His talk, titled "Poke Me: How Social Networks Can Both Help and Harm Our Kids," suggests that daily overuse of media and technology has a negative effect on the health of all children, preteens and teenagers by making them more prone to anxiety and depression as well as making them more susceptible to future health problems.
Marshal University professor Stephen D. Cooper, who specializes in computer-mediated communication, said social studies about the impact of social media aren't conclusive and vary by user.
By Kathryn Gregory
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