Narcolepsy

Would you like to have a sudden sleep attack for about fifteen through twenty-five seconds every time you fall asleep, several times a day? No right. Well, actually that’s a disease in which many people suffer from it for their entire lives. Narcolepsy is a neurological disorder that affects the control of sleep and wakefulness. It is thought to be that narcolepsy is due to the deficiency in production of chemical and is either caused by genetic or biological. Its symptoms are excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) in which a person experiences extreme fatigue and possibly falls
asleep at inappropriate times, such as while at work or at school, cataplexy in which sudden loss of muscle tone leads to feeling of weakness and a loss of voluntary and also visual hallucinations. As well as sleep paralysis which is a temporary ability to move or speak while falling asleep or waking up. In the video we saw on class about narcolepsy, Mohammad couldn’t be normal like the
rest. He fell on the streets and a science museum being very flexible at the time he had the sudden sleep attack. It seems like Mohammad was really suffering, he was overwhelming the entire day as the compulsion to sleep increased. From the moment he awakes he fight not to sleep during the day but it’s almost impossible to him. I noticed how people who suffer from narcolepsy required the
company of someone who will be by their side since they can suddenly fall.

Dreams

               Most of the people comment about how sleeping is so difficult to them or that they have insomnia. Well, I suppose that the advanced technology that we have at our disposal now in days have impacted some people’s sleeping hours turning them into horrible nights of pain. But I wonder this all my life… why do we dream? Do we always dream? With all the experiments made, they concluded that we dream to recharge the brain and yes, indeed we always dream just that most of the time we don’t remember. Sleeping enables the brain opportunity to recognize data to help solution problems and process newly information and information received months and days ago. Some facts I didn’t knew about dreams is that there are four different stages when your body is resting. The stage in which you are actually dreaming is REM which is a kind of sleep that occurs at intervals during the night and is characterized by rapid eye movements, more dreaming and bodily movement, and faster pulse and breathing. I didn’t knew that sleep lowers a person’s metabolic rate and energy consumption, body has a chance to replace chemicals and repair muscles, cardiovascular system rests, and that growth hormones are released while we sleep. Its incredible to know we spend 1/3 of our lives sleeping! 

Sensory Deprivation

At the beginning of the video I didn’t knew anything about what sensory deprivation was. Now I know it is a process, which deprives someone of normal external stimuli such as sight and sound for an extended period of time. Imagine how would it be if you could see, smell, taste, touch or hear? AWFULL.

This way of being is sensory deprivation on most cases. Reducing the mental ability to process information is part of the harsh treatment on people with sensory deprivation, though it is known to have an impact on memory, language, social interaction, and vision. Scientists use this experimental technique in to prove these effects it has on people. On this video “alone”, six individuals volunteer them selves for scientists to make their experiment that took 48 hours. These people were locked in individual dark rooms with no one to talk to and they were being recorded throughout their isolation and suffering. Some walked back and forth after several hours, another was hallucinating things that were not there, and they began to talk in a hilarious way. This is all cause of a lack of stimulation. In my opinion we all need to be grateful for who we are since we have no problems with our body and we complain about insignificant things while others are really suffering.

Synesthesia

1. Synesthesia

“A condition in which the real information collected by one sense results additionally in a sensation or perception in a sense other than the one being stimulated. Thus, sounds can be perceived to have colors, colors can be perceived to have taste or smell, etc.”






2. Grapheme-color synesthesia

“Grapheme → color synesthesia is a form of synesthesia in which an individual's perception of numbers and letters is associated with the experience of colors. Like all forms of synesthesia, grapheme → color synesthesia is involuntary, consistent, and memorable. It is one of the most common type of synesthesia and one of the most studied as well.”

3.Ordinal-linguistic personification   

"Ordinal-linguistic personification is a form of synesthesia in which ordered sequences, such as ordinal numbers, days, months and letters are associated with personalities."  

4. Number-form synesthesia

"Number-form synesthesia consciously experience numbers in spatially defined locations. For non-synesthetic individuals, a similar association of numbers and space appears in the form of an implicit mental number line as signified by the distance effect–reaction time decreases as the numerical distance between compared numbers increases."




5. Sound-color synesthesia

"Is when individuals experience colors as a response to music/sounds."   

     6.Lexical-gustatory synesthesia

"Lexical → gustatory synesthesia is one of the unusual forms of synesthesia, in which spoken or written words evoke vivid sensations of taste, sometimes including temperature and textures."

http://www.untitledtheater.com/glossary.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grapheme–color_synesthesia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordinal_linguistic_personification

http://undacovabear.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/sound-colour-synesthesia/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexical-gustatory_synesthesia

1. Explain in detail what "savant syndrome" means?

      Savant Syndrome: a condition that when people with mental disorders develop some kind of expertise or have abilities in certain areas. Not yet proven, it is said that this syndrome may be either genetic or acquired.

2. What does genius mean?  Explain the difference between genius and savant Genius:  is an extraordinary capacity of intellect, mainly displayed in creative and original work. The difference is that a genius person is someone embodying exceptional intellectual ability while a savant is someone who has difficulties in learning, thought becomes talented in a specific are such mathematics, music, science, etc.

3. What is a stroke and how could it affect your mental functioning?

      A stroke medical emergency which causes permanent damage and can lead to death The affected area of the brain is unable to function, leading to inability to move one or more limbs on one side of the body, inability to understand or formulate speech, or an inability to see one side of the visual field.

4. What is a functional MRI and how does it help us understand brain activity? Functional MRI is a noninvasive medical test that helps physicians diagnose and treat medical conditions. It helps examine the anatomy of the brain, monitor the growth of brain tumors, determine how well the brain is functioning after a stroke or diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease and find out where in the brain seizures are originating.

5. What is the corpus callosum and what role does it play in your brain's activity?

      Corpus Callosum: is a wide, flat bundle of neural fibers beneath the cortex in the  brain at the longitudinal fissure. It role in the brain is to connect the left and right cerebral hemispheres and enables better communication.

6. What is epilepsy and how might it affect your brain's abilities?

      Epilepsy: is a common chronic neurological disorder characterized by seizures. These are caused for an excessive electrical activity in the brain. People who have epilepsy have tremendous memory difficulties that may impact their life either at home, work or school.

7. What is autism?

      Autism is a disorder of neural development characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior. 

8.  What is Asperger's Syndrome?

        Asperger’s Syndrome is an autism spectrum disorder that is characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, along with restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savant_syndrome

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genius.

http://www.blurtit.com/q201695.html

http://biology.about.com/library/organs/brain/blcorpus.htm

http://www.radiologyinfo.org/en/info.cfm?pg=fmribrain

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autism

Make Genius

Most of the people think that those who are genius are born with it when they certainly are not. Intelligence is not something that comes with you… it is something you acquire when you begin to practice since early age. For example, when you exercise since you are 2 to 4 years old until you are a grown up, of course you’ll be a genius on that topic, and that is what it is being proven.  Developing your preferences will make you outstanding in your life in comparison to someone that began in his/her teenage years. Interacting with other helps to make a genius since you can look around and realize mistakes you won’t ever do, though it is important to have a well education and have a strong affection or like to that certain area you want to succeed on. Practice from early age is the solution to genius results!

Genius

Can you imagine how there are many little children all over the world who are born genius and have the ability to do things that aren’t known for people in that age to do!?!? Well there is and I don’t believe it either. I learned in this video that when stimulation is developed at an early age its is proven for that person’s intelligence to be high. I am amazed by Mark’s story!! He is about five or six years old and he really is a gifted musician because he can hear any melody and will be able to play it in the piano. Marks know 40 classical melodies by memory. Another thing that I learned form this video was that if some people practiced music in their daily routine, they would develop a bigger cerebellum and achieve excellent results in some other areas. I found very interesting the story about the 12 year-old-girl, which her father kept her in her room for her entire life, twelve years being destitute from knowledge and everything!! How awful could it be? Not knowing anything… her brain being in the status of weakness couldn’t develop her brain for years and it lead to her death.

Accidental Genius

I never imagine that people who had an accidental mental change where ever capable to be genius. Whenever I hear “mental accident” in my mind I picture some kind of distortion or something similar. These people are called savants, which they start to develop their abnormal brain before they are born (they actually do have a disability). The left-brain is fully damage leading the right brain to function better and more efficiently. This means that by the right brain functioning excellent you will have outstanding talents in certain area… it is AMAZING. What I learned from the video is the existence of these weird humans. One story example in which by now I still can’t believe is 100% true and for my opinion is one of the most shocking is Kim’s, he was mentally retarded but could read 500 or more book pages in simply and hour when I can barely read abour 15-20 pages in an hour. He also had memorized 9,000 books, that isn’t retardation to me!! For some part, it is good these people have some kind of abilities after being different from people in your surroundings, but my question is... would in the inside want to be NORMAL?

Nature vs. Nurture

Many scientists are still searching answers for such controversial questions like: does homosexuality comes from family genes or is it the way we react to our surroundings? But what traits does human inherit by these reactions? They are developing studies from twins to see if homosexuality is natured or nurtured. In this video of Nature vs. Nurture I learned many things. For example, that childhood gender nonconformity is when the child acts like the opposite sex, indicating that he/she may grow up being gay, but not necessarily. Also, that the more older brothers one has, the more probability there is for him being gay, each time being increased by 1/3 and that this only works for boys. What I found interesting about this video are the identical twins having totally different characteristics and tastes. One of them liking white horses, getting his nails done, pink room, dolls, girly stuff everywhere! Meanwhile, the other one having GI JOE collection, guns, dark room, and military stuff. Although, I don’t know why his mom didn’t do anything to change any of this so they could both have boy stuff. In my opinion, these people are born this way and if you don’t change their taste since little, it will be very difficult to change it. Though, I don’t have any problem with them , but my it doesn’t follow my religion. 

Criminal Minds

Criminal minds and normal minds work totally different. Criminal minds have this thought which becomes a illness or a necessity of using violence against other people and in my opinion they do this because when they were little kids they had a bad experience or they grew up in a place where it occurred frequently and now the found it simply normal. But usually they think in this way because their brain is damaged. The brain could say what things do or what things not to do, but since it is some how damaged it has difficulties making the right decision in saying NO to violence. Not only this may cause violence, but also feelings or emotions. When you are kind of mad or sad you are just thinking on what has happened so it makes you do incorrect things. I learned that the majority of the killers have this trauma or illness since their brain has been damaged. Al though it is known that criminal’s mind and normal people’s mind are more likely the same, scientist have proven wrong. They scanned some brains and found some differences in the images. Now, the behavior and their capacity of recognizing what’s wrong or what’s right convinced me even more that brain damage may lead to violence and end being a serious killer. I believe these people develop illness while growing, looking at their surroundings or traumatic experiences.

Traumatic Brain Injuries

Have you ever wondered how people with brain injuries feel when they see others being capable of everything? Well, they might feel different and it could damage their lives forever. Brain injuries are caused when force is applied to the skull, causing deformity, and this enables the brain the capacity to function well. If a person recently had a brain injury, he or she might be suffering of correct spoken language and having difficulties thinking and understanding problems. These people may have issues adapting to their new world, but recovery is the most important thing and it is a long process. In my opinion, it is also important to have friends and family members present to help them feel like they were before since they may start thinking about solutions in which actually aren’t solutions but they find them the most efficient way of recovering and it is by committing suicide. I found interesting many things, like the three types of brain injuries there are: contusion, Axonal injury and bleeding in the brain. I strongly believe that although persons with traumatic brain injury have some kind of deformity they could still achieve goals and continue with their life with success!

Mind Reading

It is amazing how technology advances every day! There exist ways to look your brain, but is there something in which actually recognizes what you are thinking?  Yes there is, I learned it in psychology last week. I couldn’t believe it. This machine called MRI is a machine used to look inside your brain scanning all your thoughts while you are thinking and then it even analyze and recognizes in which parts of your brain the information appears!  It is similar like an x-ray, but way more advanced. What I learned about this video is that several parts of the brain work together to produce your thoughts when you think of something. What I found interesting was the way the computer scanned every item the person was thinking about and that it could notice some of the places you have been before in your life time, I can’t imagine how it would be some day it was improved. Maybe it would be proficient in recognize everything your brain is thinking about, but also consider the risks people could have after going through the scanning of MRI. 

Inside the Teenage Brain

Teenagers tend to struggle through their emotions for years. We have different kinds of mood most of the time and sometimes it feels like if we have to do what we wish for whenever we wish for it. Now, I understand why sometimes I change humor very quickly and without a reason. Throughout this video, I found and learned many interesting facts about the teenage brain. The frontal lobe is the one in which controls our personality and reasoning, but since it is not completely developed it affects the way we react towards others or affects in the future by the decisions we make and our parents don’t seem to understand us. The most interesting fact of what I learned was if teenagers don’t get enough hours asleep their capability of learning will decrease. It happens to me all the time, I only sleep 6 hours a day and I know I have I higher potential of learning in school and doing better in my grades but because I do not get at least 8 hours of sleep I can’t. It is very important for teenagers to have a fulfilling sleep since lack of sleep makes it more difficult for students to concentrate in school, especially during those early-morning classes, affects memory and learning.