Tracking Health and Wellness Applications of Brain Science

awe

On Awe, Wonder, Biofeedback, CBSM, Virtual Reality, Privacy, Being Wrong, and more

by

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, this time fea­tur­ing eleven time­ly resources and research find­ings for life­long brain health and men­tal well-being.

#1. “Awe is the feel­ing we expe­ri­ence when encoun­ter­ing vast things that we don’t under­stand. Around the world and in cul­tur­al­ly vary­ing ways, stud­ies show, we expe­ri­ence awe in response to oth­ers’ kind­ness and courage, nature, music, reli­gious or spir­i­tu­al prac­tice, the visu­al and dra­mat­ic arts, and epiphany … It leads us to share, col­lab­o­rate, and won­der. In expe­ri­ences of awe, peo­ple often speak as if they have found their soul.”

Some­times it IS awesome to learn how the sausage was made: How Pixar’s “Soul” met the Sci­ence of Awe

#2. Here are six sug­ges­tions to incor­po­rate awe into dai­ly rou­tines and improve men­tal well-being, based on the new book Awestruck: Linger, Slow down, Appre­ci­ate your sens­es, Unplug, Awe walks, Awe journaling.

#3. Speak­ing of Awe and Won­der, why not take a few min­utes to appre­ci­ate our most pre­cious nat­ur­al resource via these
five brain teasers?

A few won­derful news for many with unmet mental/ brain health needs:

#4. Pre­dic­tion: In just a few years we’ll look back at today and won­der, why did­n’t we all, of all ages, access biofeed­back tools and games designed to mea­sure and retrain heart rate vari­abil­i­ty? Grow­ing research sup­ports Heart Rate Vari­abil­i­ty (HRV) biofeed­back train­ing to low­er stress and anx­i­ety, increase sports performance

#5. Blue Note Ther­a­peu­tics rais­es $26M to help treat can­cer-relat­ed dis­tress via cog­ni­tive behav­ioral stress man­age­ment (CBSM): “Near­ly half of all can­cer patients expe­ri­ence psy­choso­cial dis­tress, anx­i­ety, or depres­sion. If left untreat­ed, these feel­ings can low­er a can­cer sur­vivors’ qual­i­ty of life and may neg­a­tive­ly affect survival.”

#6. Applied­VR rais­es $29M to help make vir­tu­al real­i­ty the stan­dard of care for treat­ing chron­ic pain: “Chron­ic pain is one of the most com­mon med­ical con­di­tions in the world, yet it still is incred­i­bly debil­i­tat­ing to patients, cost­ly to the sys­tem and com­plex to treat. While our mis­sion has always been to demon­strate that VR can be a pow­er­ful anal­gesic in any set­ting, the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic has cre­at­ed a surge in demand for dig­i­tal med­i­cines like VR that can be deliv­ered safe­ly to patients in their own homes” — Matthew Stoudt, co-founder and CEO of AppliedVR

#7. Hap­pi­fy Health rais­es $73M to deep­en part­ner­ships with phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies and insur­ance pay­ers: “We are also work­ing with five lead­ing phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal part­ners on dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tic solu­tions and four out of the five nation­al pay­ers to help sup­port their mem­bers’ men­tal health and chron­ic ill­ness needs. We look for­ward to reach­ing an even big­ger audi­ence with the sup­port of our new part­ners.” — Tomer Ben-Kiki, cofounder and CEO of Happify

This grow­ing num­ber and range of inno­v­a­tive dig­i­tal health tools demands more and bet­ter research, smarter reg­u­la­tions, and more trans­par­ent pri­va­cy policies:

#8. Con­sumer Reports finds unclear, ques­tion­able pri­va­cy prac­tices and poli­cies among pop­u­lar men­tal health apps. “In gen­er­al, these men­tal health ser­vices act­ed like many oth­er apps you might down­load. For instance, we spot­ted apps shar­ing unique IDs asso­ci­at­ed with indi­vid­ual smart­phones that tech com­pa­nies often use to track what peo­ple do across lots of apps. The infor­ma­tion can be com­bined with oth­er data for tar­get­ed adver­tis­ing. Many apps do that, but should men­tal health apps act the same way? At a min­i­mum, Con­sumer Reports’ pri­va­cy experts think, users should be giv­en a clear­er expla­na­tion of what’s going on.”

#9. Tip for dig­i­tal health start-ups: To nav­i­gate reg­u­la­to­ry gray areas, “engage ear­ly and engage often” with the FDA. Impor­tant advice as “…a grow­ing num­ber of com­pa­nies are find­ing them­selves in a gray area of enforce­ment dis­cre­tion, a term the FDA uses for low­er-risk prod­ucts that meet the def­i­n­i­tion of a med­ical device, but do not require reg­u­la­to­ry sub­mis­sion, review and autho­riza­tion before head­ing to market”

#10. Inno­va­tion in COVID times: Otsu­ka and Click Ther­a­peu­tics announce ful­ly vir­tu­al clin­i­cal tri­al, lever­ag­ing Verily’s Project Base­line: “We do believe that the treat­ment land­scape in men­tal dis­ease is going to evolve in a way where obvi­ous­ly phar­ma­cother­a­py will always play a role, but we do think dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics can play an addi­tion­al role, and to some extent, sub­sti­tute as well as aug­ment phar­ma­co­log­i­cal inter­ven­tion.” — Otsu­ka Chief Med­ical Offi­cer Christoph Koenen

#11. Final­ly, much of the oppor­tu­ni­ty around applied neu­ro­science and neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty relies not on tools but on mind­sets, as dis­cussed in this fan­tas­tic inter­view (To pre­vent “cog­ni­tive entrench­ment,” think like a sci­en­tist and be wrong often):

“JS: You write that being wrong is tied to a more joy­ful life. Why is that?

AG: I had noticed Dan­ny Kah­ne­man [the Nobel prize–winning behav­ioral econ­o­mist] just lights up with joy when he finds out that one of his hypothe­ses is false … In some ways, the joy of being wrong is the free­dom to keep learn­ing. If you can embrace the joy of being wrong, then you get to anchor your iden­ti­ty more in being some­one who’s eager to dis­cov­er new things, than some­one who already knows every­thing or is expect­ed to know everything.”

Wish­ing you a healthy and stim­u­lat­ing month of April,

The Sharp­Brains Team

How Wonder and Awe help us transcend self, regulate stress, and improve well-being

by

What is awe?

We have all expe­ri­enced it, even if we didn’t know what to call it. Whether we’re over­look­ing a beau­ti­ful view after a chal­leng­ing hike or watch­ing a new leaf grow on the plant we’ve been nur­tur­ing in lock­down, the feel­ing we get in that moment—amazed, inspired, transported—is what researchers call awe.

In his new book, Awestruck, psy­chol­o­gist Jon­ah Paque­tte explains the process under­ly­ing the expe­ri­ence of awe and uncov­ers both its com­plex­i­ty and its val­ue to our well-being. Walk­ing read­ers through var­i­ous sci­en­tif­ic find­ings, he shows that awe helps improve our rela­tion­ships, decrease our stress, and make us hap­pi­er. By illus­trat­ing awe’s many ben­e­fits, Paque­tte gives us a rea­son to seek more awe expe­ri­ences in our lives—and then shows us how to do it. [Read more…] about How Won­der and Awe help us tran­scend self, reg­u­late stress, and improve well-being

How Pixar’s “Soul” met the Science of Awe

by

Five years ago, I (Dacher) received a call from Pixar writer and direc­tor Pete Doc­ter to talk about his new film. The last time I said yes to such a request, I served as a sci­en­tif­ic con­sul­tant for his film Inside Out. So, I was intrigued.

Before my vis­it, Pete offered a brief sketch of the film. The main char­ac­ter, Joe, is a mid­dle-aged jazz pianist in a rut as a mid­dle school band teacher in Queens. Just before his break­through show with a famous quar­tet, he falls into a man­hole and dies, enter­ing into anoth­er realm of con­scious­ness. There he encoun­ters “The Great Beyond”—but escapes to a pre-life realm, the “Great Before,” where he befriends a cyn­i­cal “new soul” named 22. The sto­ry is about their respec­tive quests: for 22 to find her rea­son for liv­ing, and for Joe to get back to life in his body for a once-in-a-life­time gig. [Read more…] about How Pixar’s “Soul” met the Sci­ence of Awe

On neurons, lifelong learning, meditation, humility, “empty brain calories” and more

by

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing 12 fas­ci­nat­ing neu­ro­science find­ings and open questions–and the beau­ti­ful image above.

#1. “With this image I want to illus­trate the large advances made in imag­ing meth­ods over the past cen­tu­ry, allow­ing mod­ern neu­ro­sci­en­tists to look at neu­rons in ways that Cajal could have only dreamed of.” – Sil­via Rodriguez-Roza­da, Cen­ter for Mol­e­c­u­lar Neu­ro­bi­ol­o­gy, Ham­burg. Award-win­ning image shows neu­roimag­ing progress in a century

#2. One more rea­son why life­long learn­ing mat­ters: Study: High Cog­ni­tive Reserve (CR) seen to sig­nif­i­cant­ly low­er demen­tia risk even in the pres­ence of high Alzheimer’s Dis­ease (AD) neuropathology

#3. It’s Fri­day; per­fect time to make some fun and healthy week­end plans: How feel­ing awe in nature can spur men­tal well-being and per­son­al growth

#4. Not a bad idea either: On cut­ting “emp­ty brain calo­ries” by read­ing a book instead of social media

#5. “…humil­i­ty helps peo­ple let go of defen­sive­ness, take in infor­ma­tion that chal­lenges their polit­i­cal views, and see the human­i­ty in peo­ple on the oth­er side of the polit­i­cal spec­trum. Though it’s not always easy to embrace—especially for those who wrong­ful­ly equate it with weak­ness or a lack of conviction—humility may be what we des­per­ate­ly need right now in the Unit­ed States.” On per­cep­tion, cog­ni­tive bias and cul­ti­vat­ing humil­i­ty ahead of next week’s vote

#6. “When it feels like the world is crash­ing down around them, giv­ing young peo­ple a moment to feel, express, and receive grat­i­tude can help—and that in itself is some­thing to be grate­ful for.” Study: A com­bined teach­ing + app grat­i­tude pro­gram helps ado­les­cents address anx­i­ety and improve men­tal health

#7. To hon­or ADHD Aware­ness Month, let’s address this most impor­tant ques­tion: What should come first to treat ADHD in chil­dren, behav­ior ther­a­py or stim­u­lant medication?

#8. Debate: Can mind­ful­ness and med­i­ta­tion be harm­ful? Two new stud­ies answer the ques­tion in appar­ent­ly oppo­site but actu­al­ly quite com­ple­men­tary ways.

#9. Study: Over-the-counter “brain enhance­ment” sup­ple­ments in the US found both to a) con­tain mul­ti­ple unap­proved drugs and b) lack some ingre­di­ents list­ed on the label. Your take?

#10. “…new study fund­ed by the Nation­al Insti­tutes of Health that aims to recruit 30,000 vol­un­teers to par­tic­i­pate in a mem­o­ry train­ing study that com­pares mul­ti­ple approach­es to train work­ing mem­o­ry”: Giv­en cog­ni­tive strengths and needs are diverse, what brain train­ing may work best for each per­son and under which conditions?

#11. “Vir­tu­al real­i­ty is a promis­ing skills-based behav­ioral med­i­cine that has been shown to have high patient engage­ment and sat­is­fac­tion,” said Beth Dar­nall, PhD, AppliedVR’s chief sci­ence advi­sor. “How­ev­er, chron­ic pain patients to date have had very lim­it­ed access to it, so we’re excit­ed to con­tin­ue work­ing with the FDA to devel­op our plat­form and get it into the mar­ket faster.” The FDA clears Applied­VR head­set to help treat fibromyal­gia and chron­ic pain

#12. “Hav­ing run a media com­pa­ny in a tough mar­ket with a young, mil­len­ni­al work­force, we wit­nessed first-hand how there was a com­plete lack of invest­ment in help­ing this gen­er­a­tion with their men­tal health in a way that they’re used to: a com­mu­ni­ty prod­uct that is mobile-first and video-led. We want to make the world a hap­pi­er place by mak­ing work­ing on your men­tal health as nor­mal as going to the gym.” — Adnan Ebrahim, co-founder and CEO of Mind­Labs. What will the ‘Pelo­ton for men­tal health’ look like five years from now? And, who will devel­op it?

Wish­ing you a safe and healthy November,

Alvaro Fer­nan­dez and the Sharp­Brains Team

How feeling awe in nature can spur mental well-being and personal growth

by

You might enjoy ski­ing or hik­ing. But do you feel at home in the moun­tains? Do you feel con­nect­ed to the wilder­ness? Accord­ing to a new study, that sense of being “home” in nature could be linked to your life sat­is­fac­tion and per­son­al growth, at least for young peo­ple. Anoth­er new study of old­er peo­ple finds that a con­nec­tion to nature seems to make them hap­pi­er and more will­ing to help others.

In the first study [Read more…] about How feel­ing awe in nature can spur men­tal well-being and per­son­al growth

Awesome: Brain scans shed light on the brain networks supporting Awe

by

_______________

When was the last time you expe­ri­enced awe?

Per­haps you were stopped in your tracks by a beau­ti­ful vista on a recent hike, or cap­ti­vat­ed by a paint­ing at your local art muse­um, or moved to tears at a con­cert or church. Or maybe you were just sit­ting on your couch breath­less­ly watch­ing an episode of Plan­et Earth. What­ev­er it was, you prob­a­bly weren’t think­ing much about your­self or your to-do list.

What makes awe so trans­port­ing, over­whelm­ing, even mys­ti­cal at times? Researchers explored this ques­tion in a recent study pub­lished in the jour­nal Human Brain Map­ping (details below) by exam­in­ing what the brain is doing when peo­ple have an awe expe­ri­ence. [Read more…] about Awe­some: Brain scans shed light on the brain net­works sup­port­ing Awe