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pandemic

On uncertainty, stress, emotion regulation, and carpe diem

September 9, 2021 by Greater Good Science Center

Ros­ale­da at Par­que del Oeste in Madrid, Spain

Ever since it began, the pan­dem­ic has been a crash course in uncer­tain­ty. Safe behav­iors, school open­ings, vac­ci­na­tion time­lines, the job mar­ket, new variants—these have all seemed to change on a week­ly basis, threat­en­ing our sense of secu­ri­ty and stability.

Uncer­tain­ty is stress­ful and per­haps even harm­ful to our health, research sug­gests, and it can dri­ve us to cling to our social groups to the exclu­sion of oth­ers. But a new study has uncov­ered a sur­pris­ing upside to feel­ing uncer­tain: It might dri­ve us to appre­ci­ate the lit­tle things in life.

In one exper­i­ment, researchers sta­tioned on a side­walk hand­ed out fly­ers that said one of two things: “Life is unpre­dictable: Stop and smell the ros­es” or “Life is con­stant: Stop and smell the ros­es.” A short dis­tance away was a table with a dozen red ros­es on it and a sign match­ing the fly­er they’d just received. [Read more…] about On uncer­tain­ty, stress, emo­tion reg­u­la­tion, and carpe diem

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: emotion regulation, Gratitude, pandemic, savoring, Stress, uncertainty

Using Reddit as a population-level “mental health tracker” during the COVID pandemic

November 9, 2020 by SharpBrains

Fig­ure 1. Men­tion of COVID-19–related words across men­tal health sup­port groups. Time­line land­marks were cho­sen from NBC News time­line giv­en that US users are the most preva­lent across Red­dit. Glob­al, Chi­na, and US con­firmed COVID-19 cas­es are dis­played. Low et al (2020).

Using machine learn­ing to track the pandemic’s impact on men­tal health (MIT News):

Deal­ing with a glob­al pan­dem­ic has tak­en a toll on the men­tal health of mil­lions of peo­ple. A team of MIT and Har­vard Uni­ver­si­ty researchers has shown that they can mea­sure those effects by ana­lyz­ing the lan­guage that peo­ple use to express their anx­i­ety online. [Read more…] about Using Red­dit as a pop­u­la­tion-lev­el “men­tal health track­er” dur­ing the COVID pandemic

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Filed Under: Technology & Innovation, Uncategorized Tagged With: anxiety, machine-learning, mental health, natural language processing, pandemic

Study: A combined teaching + app gratitude program helps adolescents address anxiety and improve mental health

October 16, 2020 by Greater Good Science Center

Stu­dents and edu­ca­tors have start­ed a new school year in the midst of a pan­dem­ic, an eco­nom­ic cri­sis, a reck­on­ing with racial injus­tice, and a divi­sive polit­i­cal cli­mate. Everyone’s men­tal health is at risk, and schools are search­ing for ways to sup­port young people’s well-being in addi­tion to their aca­d­e­m­ic learn­ing. [Read more…] about Study: A com­bined teach­ing + app grat­i­tude pro­gram helps ado­les­cents address anx­i­ety and improve men­tal health

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Filed Under: Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: academic learning, educators, GiveThx, Gratitude, gratitude program, improve mental health and wellness, mental health and wellness, pandemic, Positive-Psychology, resilience, social-emotional-learning, students, well-being

Study: Meditation practice, both formal and informal, helps develop equanimity over time

August 20, 2020 by Greater Good Science Center

We are liv­ing through a time of uncer­tain­ty, a sky-high pile of ques­tion marks. It has become increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult to make plans because the state of our world today is so volatile due to the coro­n­avirus pan­dem­ic. Some peo­ple are adapt­ing to their homes becom­ing their offices indef­i­nite­ly, or in dan­ger of los­ing their jobs, while oth­ers long to embrace loved ones they are stuck six feet away from. [Read more…] about Study: Med­i­ta­tion prac­tice, both for­mal and infor­mal, helps devel­op equa­nim­i­ty over time

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health Tagged With: anger, anxiety, body scan meditation, boredom, breathing meditation, coronavirus, equanimity, meditation, mental habits, mind, mindfulness-meditation, pandemic, state-of-mind, Stress

Mental health for digital natives in the covid era: Shouldn’t remote counselling be the first line of engagement & treatment?

July 28, 2020 by SharpBrains

The ben­e­fits of remote con­sul­ta­tion for men­tal health treat­ment (Health Europa):

Thor­b­jorg Vig­fus­dót­tir, a cog­ni­tive psy­chol­o­gist by train­ing, spent 12 years as a politi­cian in her native Ice­land with the goal of direct­ing her knowl­edge on the devel­op­ment of the brain into edu­ca­tion and pub­lic pol­i­cy. After leav­ing pol­i­tics to form a com­pa­ny pro­vid­ing remote speech ther­a­py in Ice­landic schools, she was found­ed Kara Con­nect, an online con­sul­ta­tion plat­form enabling ther­a­pists and clin­i­cians to pro­vide remote care and treat­ment, which was recent­ly adopt­ed by the Nation­al Uni­ver­si­ty Hos­pi­tal of Ice­land (Land­spí­tali).

[Read more…] about Men­tal health for dig­i­tal natives in the covid era: Shouldn’t remote coun­selling be the first line of engage­ment & treatment?

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Technology & Innovation Tagged With: anxiety, cognitive psychologist, depression, digital natives, Kara Connect, mental health, pandemic, remote consultation, therapists, Thorbjorg Vigfusdóttir

Reading science fiction can help children build critical thinking and resilience

June 9, 2020 by The Conversation

Young peo­ple who are hooked on watch­ing fan­ta­sy or read­ing sci­ence fic­tion may be on to some­thing. Con­trary to a com­mon mis­per­cep­tion that read­ing this genre is an unwor­thy prac­tice, read­ing sci­ence fic­tion and fan­ta­sy may help young peo­ple cope, espe­cial­ly with the stress and anx­i­ety of liv­ing through the COVID-19 pandemic.

I am a pro­fes­sor with research inter­ests in the social, eth­i­cal and polit­i­cal mes­sages in sci­ence fic­tion. In my book [Read more…] about Read­ing sci­ence fic­tion can help chil­dren build crit­i­cal think­ing and resilience

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Filed Under: Education & Lifelong Learning, Peak Performance Tagged With: anxiety, COVID-19, creativity, Critical-thinking, depression, literature, mental health, pandemic, reading, resilience, science fiction, Stress

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