Brain and Behavior
What is the Brain?
Of all the organs in the human body, the brain is one of the most largest and most complex. It is one that scientists have been trying to study and understand for years. Only recently have they been to really look inside and see what exactly is going on. Matthew Hoffman MD explains that "it is made up of more than 100 billion nerves that communicate in trillions of connections call synapses." It functions off of so many separate specialized areas such as the cortex, the brain stem, the basal ganglia, and the cerebellum. The cortex, which is the most outer layer of the brain, controls our thinking and voluntary movements. However the involuntary movements, such as breathing or sleeping, is caused by the brain stem located between the spinal cord and the rest of the brain. The basal ganglia functions in clusters in the center of the brain and sends messages to other brain areas while the cerebellum, which is at the base and back of the brain, focuses it's attention on coordination and balance. Within the brain, there are several functioning lobes which are as follows: frontal, parietal, temporal and occipital. The frontal lobe deals with problem solving, judgment, and motor function. I have always remembered this one the most because of the stories my fiancee would tell me about her and her mom. She said they used to have fights all the time when she was in high school and one of the biggest issues was my fiancee's ability to make smart, thoroughly-thought decisions. Her mom always told her she would never be able to make a logical and stable decision until her frontal lobe was fully developed which wouldn't happen until she was in her early 20's. Though she hated hearing that over and over again, the function of a frontal lobe was burned into her memory and now, by association, is burned into mine. Anyway, to continue, the parietal lobe controls one's sensation, handwriting, and body position. Because theses go hand in hand, I feel like someone who has bad body position in turn has bad handwriting as well. Though I had heard that people with bad handwriting are usually smarter because the words are flowing faster than their hands can write. I don't know if it's true or not but I like to believe it; it makes me feel better about my bad handwriting. The temporal lobe is in charge of memory and hearing. This makes a lot of sense that they're linked together because when someone's hearing or memory begins to fade, the other one usually goes with it. Finally, the occipital lobe controls visual processing which is for the most part self-explanatory.
https://www.tes.com/lessons/QrtssK80gWqDSw/brain-anatomy
How does it function and behave?
Did you know that the brain is the only thing to ever name itself? I always love that one; sometimes it really makes people think. Anyway, everyone's brain consists of two hemispheres and in between those hemispheres there is such thing as a corpus callosum which is a "thick brand of nerves that connects both the left and right sides" (lecture ppt). Interestingly enough, each hemisphere controls the opposite side of the body. For example, if the left side of your brain was damaged, the right side of your body would, in some way, be damaged as well and vice versa. As far as their functions goes, the right side of the brain deals with creativity and imagination. People who are "right-brained" people per se, have holistic thought, are intuitive, and most of the time love art and music while the left side is more logical. Those who identify with the left side of the brain have analytical thought, are better with science and math, and do well in problem solving. It also deals with one's language and speech. So in an instance that one damages their left side of the brain, they could possibly have speech problems or, inevitably, lose the ability to speak all together. I, personally, identify more with the left side because I'm more of a math and science guy. Creativity doesn't exactly come easy for me making this blog a real challenge in my book.
What happens when the brain pays attention?
Considering I have ADHD, I really enjoyed this TED talk given by Medhi Ordikhani. In the video, I learned that there are two ways to pay direct attention. The first is overt attention where in order to really focus, you have to keep eye contact and move your eyes with that specific object. The second kind of attention is called covert attention where you pay attention with out moving your eyes; you can in a sense, pay attention to something by just thinking about it. For example, in a class lecture where we must take notes, students have to learn to use covert attention in order to write what the professor is saying while he is saying it. The teacher won't pause so that all the students may write down what they need to. They must write while still covertly listening to the professor in loo of new information. One example Ordikhani gives is the essence of driving where you must drive by the laws while also paying attention to you surroundings. These examples show that you are constantly shifting your attention not with your eyes but with your thoughts in more than one setting whether you know it our not. Along with me, many have the disorder ADHD which is caused by these lack of distractors in the brain making it a hard for us to focus on a single task. Ordikhani has hopes that one day he can help people with this disorder improve by building computer models that will help train their brain and these distractors.
Another thing that stood out to me while searching through this information, is that fact that the brain is constantly changing it's structure. No one even knew what the inside structure looked like until recently either. Even under the most powerful microscope, the brain just looked gray and spongey. When scientists used the Golgi stain to find that structure, it stained about one percent of the entire brain. It did, however, show the basic structure of the nerve cells but thats the key word, basic. When you learn, your brain become more and more complex creating more nerve passage ways for cells to travel; therefore, concluding that the brain is is never the same. "Learning is so important in order from the brain to be active" (lecture ppt). Even know as I'm learning about this, my brain is changing it's structure which is honestly pretty astounding. No one will ever know what the exact structure of our brains are because as we continue to learn, they continue to grow.
Sources:
https://www.webmd.com/brain/picture-of-the-brain#1
https://www.ted.com/talks/mehdi_ordikhani_seyedlar_what_happens_in_your_brain_when_you_pay_attention
https://www.ted.com/talks/carl_schoonover_how_to_look_inside_the_brain#t-119897
https://youtu.be/BdA2NgneGhQ (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.
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