Reelin can reverse the main pathological processes associated with Alzheimer’s, other tauopathies – News-Medical.net

January 23, 2020 medical

Promoting the signaling pathway of reelin -an essential extracellular protein for the neuronal migration and synaptic plasticity- could be an effective therapeutical strategy to counterbalance the main cognitive, biochemical and behavioral alterations seen in Alzheimer's and other pathologies associated with Tau protein, as shown in a new study with animal models -published in the journal Progress in Neurobiology.

The study proves the determining role of reelin in the modulation of pathological processes associated with Alzheimer's and other tauopathies (accumulation of amyloid plaques, aberrant distribution of Tau phosphorylated, synaptic dysfunction and memory loss), and opens a new perspective to design future therapeutical targets and drugs to fight these disorders.

The first author of this study is the researcher Daniela Rossi, and it is led by Eduardo Soriano and Llus Pujadas, members of the Faculty of Biology and the Institute of Neurosciences (UBNeuro) of the University of Barcelona, the Network Center for Biomedical Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases (CIBERNED) and the Vall d'Hebron Research Institute (VHIR).

Other participants are the experts Agns Gruart, Jos M Delgado and Gerardo Contreras-Murillos (University Pablo de Olavide), Jess vila (Center for Molecular Biology Severo Ochoa, CBM), and Ashraf Muhaisen (UB-UBNeuro-CIBERNED-VHIR). This new study on neurosciences counts on the support of the Research Challenges program (Biomedicine) from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) and La Marat de TV3.

Alzheimer's disease is a neurodegenerative disease known for the loss of connection between neurons and neuronal death. It is largely linked to the creation of senile plaques (formed by the amyloid-beta peptide, or A), and the presence of neurofibrillary balls (insoluble deposit of Tau).

In the adult brain, the loss of reelin has been related to an increase in the phosphorylation of Tau protein -a factor which is related to the microtubules mainly expressed in neurons- which ends up in neurofibrillary ball form -typical from Alzheimer's.

Therefore, the different states of phosphorylation and dephosphorylation of Tau represent a determining factor in the stability of the cell cytoskeleton and, as a result, of the synaptic and dendritic stability. Hyperphosphorilation and accumulation of Tau causes neuronal death.

In this context, the function of the reelin protein to promote synaptic plasticity and reduce Tau phosphorylation was considered a potential mechanism to reduce the consequences of the neurodegenerative process and protect the brain from neuronal damage.

In previous studies, experts had affirmed the alteration of reelin in Alzheimer's disease and its role in intracellular signaling pathways related to neuronal survival and the physiology of the adult brain. Researchers had described the active role of reelin in the recovery of cognitive functions and the reduction of fibers of the A peptide in vitro and amyloid deposit in the brain in animal models with Alzheimer's (Pujadas et al. Nature Communications, 2014).

The published study in Progress in Neurobiology describes new molecular data on the signaling pathway of reelin and reveals how this protein can reverse the main pathological affectations of Alzheimer's at different levels in animal models affected by tauopathies. In particular, the results reveal that overexpression of reelin is able to modulate levels of phosphorylation of the Tau protein in in vivo models.

Moreover, the in vitro studies confirm the ability of reelin to modulate the anomalous distribution of neurofilaments and Tau protein in dendrites, which is shown in the first phases of these neuropathologies. Last, regarding the cognitive and physiological fields, overexpression of reelin revealed an improvement of deficits that affected a new animal model of tauopathy.

Source:

Journal reference:

Rossi, D., et al. (2019) Reelin reverts biochemical, physiological and cognitive alterations in mouse models of Tauopathy. Progress in Neurobiology. doi.org/10.1016/j.pneurobio.2019.101743.

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Reelin can reverse the main pathological processes associated with Alzheimer's, other tauopathies - News-Medical.net

Neuroscience

The Spinal Cord Organizes Locomotion Like a Three-gear Engine – Technology Networks

January 23, 2020 medical

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have revealed a new principle of organisation which explains how locomotion is coordinated in vertebrates akin to an engine with three gears. The results are published in the scientific journal Neuron.

A remarkable feature of locomotion is its capacity for rapid starts and to change speed to match our intentions. However, there is still uncertainty as to how the rhythm-generating circuit - the locomotor engine - in the spinal cord is capable of instantaneously translating brain commands into rhythmic and appropriately paced locomotion.

Using zebrafish as a model organism, researchers at Karolinska Institutet reveal in detail a full reconstruction of the rhythm-generating engine driving locomotion in vertebrates.

"We have uncovered a novel principle of organisation that is crucial to perform an intuitively simple, yet poorly understood function: the initiation of locomotion and the changing of speed," says Abdel El Manira, Professor at the Department of Neuroscience at Karolinska Institutet, who led the study.

The researchers performed a comprehensive and quantitative mapping of connections (synapses) between neurons combined with behavioural analyses in zebrafish. The results revealed that the excitatory neurons in the spinal cord which drive locomotion form three recurrent, rhythm-generating circuit modules acting as gears which can be engaged at slow, intermediate or fast locomotor speeds. These circuits convert signals from the brain into coordinated locomotor movements, with a speed that is aligned to the initial intention.

"The insights gained in our study can be directly applicable to mammals, including humans, given that the organising principle of the brainstem and spinal circuits is shared across vertebrate species," says Abdel El Manira. "Understanding how circuits in the brainstem and spinal cord initiate movements and how speed is controlled will open up for new research avenues aimed at developing therapeutic strategies for human neurological disorders, including traumatic spinal cord injury, and motoneuron degenerative diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)."

Reference: Song, J., Pallucchi, I., Ausborn, J., Ampatzis, K., Bertuzzi, M., Fontanel, P., Picton, L. D., & Manira, A. E. (2020). Multiple Rhythm-Generating Circuits Act in Tandem with Pacemaker Properties to Control the Start and Speed of Locomotion. Neuron, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2019.12.030

This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

Neuroscience

In Today’s Hyper-Connected Workplace, Nearly Half of Professionals Think Vacation Is More Stressful Than It’s Worth – Yahoo Finance

January 23, 2020 medical

In a survey commissioned by Neuvana the South Florida-based neuroscience company at the intersection of wellness and technology - working professionals in the U.S. open up about the stress associated with constant connectivity in the workplace and beyond.

For professionals in corporate America, work-life balance is nearly non-existent. As a result, many find themselves in a constant state of [work] stress, with no "clocking out" in sight.

While nearly 6 in 10 working professionals work remotely once per month or more frequently, 51% of this group say working from home adds to their feelings of stress and 43% agree working from home is more stressful than working at the office. Nearly one-third of all respondents state they always work more than the hours expected of them per week, which can primarily be attributed to the stress of meeting deadlines (26%) and a desire to get ahead (26%).

A little over half feel stressed when disconnected from work-related communication while out of the office:

Leaving work emails behind at the end of the day is a thing of the past, as 61% feel pressure to respond to work-related communications outside of working hours.

While switching off the computer may have signaled the workday was done in prior years, these days, the number of communication platforms that are always on is taking its toll on corporate America.

In terms of the various communication channels used to communicate with colleagues day-to-day, 39% use 3 or 4 different platforms, with email and text topping the list, followed by personal phones and Skype. Quantity in this case is not a pro, with 47% noting that having multiple methods of communication makes it harder to focus and 43% saying multiple communication platforms often makes them feel less productive.

Think youre off the hook when you miss a work email? Not so fast. Most working professionals (82%) have been contacted by a colleague via a personal channel about a work-related matter 35% of this group say these messages come through once or more per day! Overall, 64% feel that constant work-related alerts from communication platforms adds to stress, and at the end of the day, nearly 7 in 10 would prefer to return exclusively to email for work-related communication.

While at one time a vacation or some time off was often the key to avoiding long-term burnout, the pressure of todays connected workplace has made "de-stressing" nearly impossible.

Sadly, 48% say taking time off for vacation causes more work-related stress than its worth, with 23% unable to completely disconnect from work while on vacation.

For many, taking time off presents an array of challenges such as falling behind at work (23%), the amount of work to get done prior to leaving (21%) and getting work covered by colleagues (19%).

"If todays corporate America doesnt even have time for vacation, how are we supposed to bake stress-relief into our daily lives?" says Neuvana founder and inventor, Dr. Richard Cartledge. "The last decade saw us 'busier' than ever at the expense of our health and wellness, but awareness of this problem is only the first step to changing work-life balance in the decade ahead. At Neuvana, were making it easy to add some stress-relief to your day, simply through listening to the music or podcast you already love. Xen by Neuvana was designed to electronically provide added wellness benefits, including reducing stress, and improving your mood through Vagus Nerve stimulation

For more information on Vagus Nerve stimulation and Neuvana, visit: NeuvanaLife.com.

Click here for the raw data and other assets.

*This survey was fielded on January 3, 2020 and included 1,076 working professionals in the U.S. Consumer sample was provided by Pollfish.

About NeuvanaNeuvana is a South Florida-based brand at the intersection of wellness and technology, continually striving to improve peoples lives through accessible Neuroscience. Founded in 2014 by Dr. Richard Cartledge, an avid inventor and Chief of Cardiovascular Surgery at Boca Raton Regional Hospital, the company is made up of physicians, intellectual property experts, engineers, experienced business professionals and a world-class scientific advisory board with a shared goal: a platform to make the necessary benefits of neuroscience safe, easy and accessible to everyone.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200123005111/en/

Contacts

Hanna Thornton305-298-0249

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In Today's Hyper-Connected Workplace, Nearly Half of Professionals Think Vacation Is More Stressful Than It's Worth - Yahoo Finance

Neuroscience

Former Shuswap residents head to Mars habitat for brain research – Pentiction Western News

January 23, 2020 medical

When Olav Krigolson was five years old, he told his mom he was going to be an astronaut.

Turns out, he wasnt too far off.

In December, Krigolson and Kent Hecker, who both grew up in Salmon Arm, took part in a unique trip to outer space to measure how fatigue affects the brain function of astronauts. The men were part of a five-member Canadian research team taking part in a project on a Mars simulation on the Big Island of Hawaii.

The site is called the HI-SEAS or Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation and is used by space agencies.

There they donned bulky spacesuits and lived in the Hab, or Mars habitat, a golf ball-like dome, for eight days, collecting data, eating freeze-dried food and, at times during their 16-hour days, venturing outside on exploratory trips of lava flows.

So if youd told us both in high school wed get PhDs in neuroscience and be going to Mars together, we would have fallen over laughing, remarked Krigolson.

It was awesome, enthused Hecker. We got to put on space suits and explore lava caves. We reverted back to being kids again.

The purpose of the mission, which was spearheaded by Krigolson, was actually a proof of concept or test run of brain-testing software that is both mobile and fast, as opposed to a typical EEG (electroencephalogram).

It uses the commercially available Muse EEG headband which evaluates electrical activity in the brain.

Then, via software developed by Krigolsons lab at the University of Victoria, brain waves are translated into scores measuring characteristics such as fatigue.

To do that, the researchers would play simple games on an iPad three times per day to test their brain function.

Although both men have PhDs in neuroscience, Krigolson says hes really a mathematician.

I wrote the algorithm that takes the brain wave data and gives you fatigue scores, he explained.

Accompanying them were PhD students Chad Williams and Tom Ferguson, as well as Gord Binsted, Dean of the Health and Social Development Faculty at UBCO in Kelowna, who was instrumental in the mission.

Binsteds sister Kim is a professor at the University of Hawaii and runs the Mars simulation for NASA.

One highlight came about when the heating in the Hab broke down.

In order to empty the dome to facilitate the repair, the researchers were told a solar flare had occurred and they would have to go down into a lava tube to escape the radiation.

One of the students mentioned he had Star Wars, the movie, on his laptop, so there they were, in a lava tube, watching Star Wars.

Now that, I believe, is a fairly unique experience, said Krigolson.

4 Universal Principles That Drive Our Behavior, According To A Neuropsychologist – mindbodygreen.com

January 23, 2020 medical

Every day, most of us have moments when we think, "Why did I say that?" or, "If I had just..." We're sharp with our kids or partners over small things. We criticize our teammate in front of the others. We agree to a deadline we know isn't realistic. Or maybe the issues are bigger. Maybe we've lied about something important. Maybe we've taken an unethical shortcut, cheated, or lied.

The good news? These behaviors don't make us bad; they simply make us human. They are the coping strategies we use to survive in lifeand they've been with us a long time. Often they are grounded in good intentions that are turned upside down by our less-than-effective coping strategiesall because we have connected to fear. We all can be afraid, and much of the time we don't even realize what we're doing, let alone why.

But every day, we also make our best intentions a reality. Within 10 minutes of wishing we could pull words back into our mouths or make a different choice, we can be supportive, focused, honest, patient, and committed. How quickly the heart can shift from selfish to selfless, from judging to compassionate, motivated to depressed, constructive to destructive, full of doubt to confident. We can be effective one minute and ineffective the next.

We are all an and. Life is an and. Ineffective, below-the-line behavior coexists with effective, above-the-line behavior, and we are all able to switch from one to the other and back again in the blink of an eye.

That and is the essence of the line that exists within our heart and the four universal principles of life that drive our behavior. They are:

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4 Universal Principles That Drive Our Behavior, According To A Neuropsychologist - mindbodygreen.com

Human Behavior

To find intelligent alien life, humans may need to start thinking like an extraterrestrial – Livescience.com

January 23, 2020 medical

HONOLULU Our hunt for aliens has a potentially fatal flaw we're the ones searching for them.

That's a problem because we're a unique species, and alien-seeking scientists are an even stranger and more specialized bunch. As a result, their all-too human assumptions may get in the way of their alien-listening endeavors. To get around this, the Breakthrough Listen project, a $100-million initiative scouring the cosmos for signals of otherworldly beings as part of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), is asking anthropologists to help unmask some of these biases.

"It's kind of a joke at Breakthrough Listen," Claire Webb, an anthropology and history of science student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said here on Jan. 8 at the 235th meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) in Honolulu. "They tell me: 'We're studying aliens, and you're studying us.'"

Related: 9 Strange, Scientific Excuses for We Havent Found Aliens Yet

Since 2017, Webb has worked with Breakthrough Listen to examine how SETI researchers think about aliens, produce knowledge, and perhaps inadvertently place anthropocentric assumptions into their work.

She sometimes describes her efforts as "making the familiar strange."

For instance, your life might seem perfectly ordinary maybe involving being hunched over at a desk and shuttling electrons around between computers until examined through an anthropological lens, which points out that this is not exactly a universal state of affairs. At the conference, Webb presented a poster looking at how Breakthrough Listen scientists use artificial intelligence (AI) to sift through large data sets and try to uncover potential technosignatures, or indicators of technology or tool use by alien organisms.

"Researchers who use AI tend to disavow human handicraft in the machines they build," Webb told Live Science. "They attribute a lot of agency to those machines. I find that somewhat problematic and at the worst untrue."

Any AI is trained by human beings, who present it with the types of signals they think an intelligent alien might produce. In doing so, they predispose their algorithms to certain biases. It can be incredibly difficult to recognize such thinking and overcome its limitations, Webb said.

Most SETI research assumes some level of commensurability, or the idea that beings on different worlds will understand the universe in the same way and be able to communicate about it with one another, Webb said. Much of this research, for example, presumes a type of technological commensurability, in which aliens broadcast messages using the same radio telescopes we have built, and that we will be able to speak to them using a universal language of science and math.

Related: Greetings, Earthlings! 8 Ways Aliens Might Contact Us

But how universal is our language of science, and how inevitable is our technological evolution? Do alien scientists gather in large buildings and present their work to one another via slides and lectures and posters? And what bearing do such human rituals have on the types of scientific knowledge researchers produce?

It was almost like trying to take the perspective of a creature on another planet, who might wonder about humanity and our odd modern-day practices. "If E.T. was looking at us, what would they see?" Webb asked.

The assumptions and anxieties of alien-hunters can creep in in other ways. Because of the vast distances involved in sending a signal through space, many SETI researchers have imagined receiving a message from an older technological society. As astronomer and science popularizer Carl Sagan famously said in his 1980 book and television series "Cosmos," that might mean E.T. has lived through a "technological adolescence" and survived nuclear proliferation or an apocalyptic climate meltdown.

But those statements are based on the specific anxieties of our era, namely nuclear war and climate change, and we can't automatically assume that the history of another species will unfold in the same way, Webb said.

Veteran SETI scientist Jill Tarter has told Webb that, in some ways, we are looking for a better version of ourselves, speculating that a message from the heavens will include blueprints for a device that can provide cheap energy and help alleviate poverty.

The ideal of progress is embedded in such narratives, Webb said, first of scientific and technological progress, but also an implicit assumption of moral advancement. "It's the idea that, as your technology develops, so does your sense of ethics and morality," she said. "And I think that's something that can be contested."

Even our hunt for organisms like ourselves suggests "a yearning for connectivity, reflective to me of a kind of postmodern loneliness and isolation in the universe," she said.

Webb joked that SETI researchers don't always understand the point of her anthropological and philosophical examinations. But, she said, they are open to being challenged in their ideas and knowing that they are not always seeing the whole picture.

"One thing Jill [Tarter] has said many times is, 'We reserve the right to get smarter,'" she said. "We are doing what we think makes sense now, but we might one day be doing something totally different."

Ultimately, the point of this work is to get SETI researchers to start "noticing human behavior in ways that could push SETI to do novel kinds of searches," Webb said. "Inhabiting other mindscapes is potentially a very powerful tool in cultivating new ways to do science."

Perhaps beings on another planet might use gravitational waves, or neutrinos, or even some other unknown aspect of reality we have yet to come across to send messages into the heavens.

Originally published on Live Science.

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Human Behavior

A Stanford behavior strategist on three moments to save money – Quartz

January 23, 2020 medical

Every now and then, a media story will propose another wild or surprising reason that millennials arent saving for retirement. Weve been told that some young adults dont believe civilization will exist by the time theyre ready to stop working, and that some are counting on a socialist future to save them from capitalisms indifference.

Whatever the spin, the common underlying theme is that millennials feel doomed by the circumstances of their time, which is fair enough. The pressures of student loan debt, stagnant wages, and job insecurity have led young people to feel that buying a home or saving for retirement are not real options. Many young and middle-aged adults have accepted that they cant expect the same kind of comfortable (and expensive) retirement that previous generations have financed for themselves, a problem that has economic implications for every generation.

In light of these realities, shaming millennials about their pathetic retirement savings or expensive lattes is slowly falling out of fashion. But it still happens. And Wendy De La Rosa, a PhD candidate at Stanford Universitys Graduate School of Business, and a millennial herself, believes we should push back.

Weve moved into the world where the onus is always on the individual. We expect the individuals to be an expert in all things related to financial matters, she says. However, she adds, If you start to see the individual as a human, as an imperfect human being, and not expect the superhuman of the human, now you can start to create environments that meet people where they are.

De La Rosa is also the co-founder of Common Cents Lab, a research group that tests behavioral solutions for low and middle-income earners who need to better manage their money. (Its part of the Center for Advanced Hindsight at Duke University, which is run by the famed behavioral economist Dan Ariely.)

Some of her work has tested ideas that build on the well-known and successful Save More Tomorrow concept, created by Nobel prize-winning behavioral economists Richard Thaler and Shlomo Benartzi more than 15 years ago.

It says, look, fine. I know people arent going to save much for retirement today, she explains. But I can get them to enroll in something today where next time you get a raise in the future, then youre going to increase your retirement allocation.

In other words, rather than fight the well-documented tendency we have to see our future selves as more perfect and capable of saving than our present-day selves, the Save More Tomorrow idea works with it. Your future self gets to strut its superior self-discipline and commit now to an automatic increase tied to an event down the road.

According to De La Rosa, there are three golden moments, as she calls them, when people can easily harness this particular nudge.

First, theres tax refund time. In 2019, the average taxpayer got back about $2,700, which is meaningful, because 40% of Americans dont have $400 to cover an emergency savings fund, says De La Rosa, referring to a recent Federal Reserve survey. For many families its the largest payout they ever get at one time. She wants to help people save a large part of it.

Next is what she calls Five Fridays. The vast majority of Americans get paid on a weekly or biweekly basis, she points out, and [t]here are months that just naturally have five Fridays in them, meaning that in those months youre essentially going to get an extra paycheck. Meanwhile, the majority of your necessary expenses like rent or mortgage or loan payments are done on a monthly basis.

The third opportunity? Anytime people get unexpected bonuses, raises, gifts, or inheritance money.

To test ideas around the first moment, a few years ago De La Rosas lab conducted a randomized control experiment with a company called Digit, an app that automatically saves money for its users. In one condition, they texted people when they received their tax refund. (Digits technology recognized when the tax refund arrived in someones checking account.) The message said something like: Hey there! You just got your attached refund. What percentage would you like to save? In another condition, Digits clients were texted early in the tax season, hopefully before they even filed their taxes. This time the message said something like: You might get a tax refund. If you do, what percentage of it would you like to save?

Now thats a question thats much harder, right? says De La Rosa. People dont know if theyll get a refund or how much it might be, but they may have an inkling based on the previous years returns.

Still, the lab saw a sizable difference in responses. On average, people who were contacted the day they got the refund said they wanted to save 17% of it. People who were asked how to allocate a future, hypothetical bounty were prepared to save 27% of the total, agreeing to let the app automatically move that portion over to a savings account when the time came.

Customers had the opportunity to back out of their pledge, but most didnt. What we found was that two months out after an experiment, 85% of the savings were still in the account, says De La Rosa.

I think this is the crux of how were to be able to help young people save for retirement, she adds.

De La Rosas team has also experimented with messaging around major life milestones to see whether reaching people at symbolic junctions can help them pay more attention to their financial situation.

Recently, they partnered with a company called Silver Nest, which she compares to a modern day Golden Girls: The platform matches seniors who own a home with other older adults who need affordable accommodation. Both parties gain from the arrangement, whether as an owner who earns an extra income, or a renter who pays less for housing. Both also benefit from the health-boosting companionship that comes from living with a housemate. But, says De La Rosa, As you can imagine, asking an older adult to open up their home to a stranger is not an easy ask.

The team ran several trials to see what kind of message might get more attention. In the main test, they ran two ads on Facebook, both of which were targeting 64-year-olds. In one condition, the ad said, Hey, youre getting older, are you ready for retirement? House sharing can help. In the second condition, the message was: Hey, youre 64 turning 65. Are you ready for retirement? House sharing can help.

Those people who were reminded that they were hitting a significant birthday were more likely to click through on the ad and ultimately sign up. All it took was that reminder that they were aging.

Again, the idea takes a fault and turns it into a tool. Aging milestones can be depicted as life-crisis points, says De La Rosa, but what we did was sort of flip it on its head and say, because theres this motivation to make a change, we can essentially nudge people into making what we think is a positive change by highlighting that this change is happening.

Now, she believes, companies need to step up to use the same types of strategies. We know every employer has their employees birthdays. It would be great if, yes, you got a party, but also maybe you got a reminder to increase your retirement allocation when youre 39, turning 40, or about to turn 30.

HR departments could ping employees with a reminder to increase their savings well ahead of every new year, too, she adds, because people associate January 1 with a fresh start.

By plugging into our natural biases, every business, every store is getting faster, smarter, and better at getting us to spend our money, De La Rosa points out, adding, Its only getting more treacherous.

The institutions that want us to put more cash aside need to be just as wily and opportunistic.

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Human Behavior

Google’s new ‘Digital Wellbeing’ tools, ranked from ingenious to offensive – Fast Company

January 23, 2020 medical

Since 2018, Google (and Apple) have been addressing the 4.5-inch glass elephant in the room: that while smartphones have become essential to modern life, theyre sucking all the attention from the people around us, and making us measurably less happy in the process. Google launched a tool inside Android called Digital Wellbeing, which allows you to track your usage across apps and even set limiters. Then last year, it released a series of experiments, like a paper phone that has all the critical information from your smartphone, but none of the distractions. According to Google, the experiments are a showcase of ideas and tools that help people find a better balance with technology.

This week, the Google Creative Lab released three new experiments, all aimed to curb our smartphone addiction, and they range from inspired to downright insulting work. Lets take a look at each new experiment, ranked from best to worst.

Screen Stopwatch

So you want to use your phone less, but the minutes add up to hours fast. Screen Stopwatch replaces your wallpaper with a full-screen counter that literally ticks by every second that you are on your phone. Its a stupid-obvious idea, but, boy, does this wallpaper add a tension to my chest that makes checking Twitter for news on the impeachment feel like Im literally diffusing a bomb as quickly as possible. One nice touch is that the number count is an animated old split flap display, a touch of reviled skeuomorphism, sure, but the whimsy does help temper the core tension of the countdown . . . err . . . I should say, the count up!

Screen Stopwatch quickly illustrates that theres no number thats a good number, and all Im left wanting is for this clock to stop ticking as soon as possible. Im not sure what the longitudinal effect of using Screen Stopwatch would be; its only been on my phone for a couple of hours today. Would I learn to ignore it or learn to ignore my phone? I cant say for sure, but thats what makes the project such a reasonable experiment in a user interfaces impact on human behavior.

Activity Bubbles

When I saw the screenshots of Activity Bubblesanother wallpaper that depicts each app you open as its own gray bubble, with a volume that represents time spent insideI thought it would be a winner. Sure, people are terrible at weighing the numerical values depicted in radial graphics, but the idea seemed so delightful! I would be able to see my bad habits stacked up in front of me as infographic evidence of my lack of self-control! Neat!

It is neat. It is delightful. Too much so. I found myself opening more apps just to create a bigger stack of circles. And to make matters worse, each new circle plops into the pile like a satisfying raindrop. Its truly a wonderful little bit of UI, giving positive reinforcement to my terrible habits. I need Activity Bubbles for running, reading to my children, and consuming vegetables, not for stalking what frenemies are eating for brunch on Instagram.

Lest you think Im alone in this assessment, the first user comments about Activity Bubbles are all asking for more delight: more bouncy ball effects, and more colors! Make Activity Bubbles [even more] fun! People seem to be recognizing the core experience of joy that the experiment offers, but not the end effect. My feedback? No, dont make them any prettier, Google. Make them look like a pustule rash that has infected my phone.

Envelope

Having talked to several Google designersabout digital health, I know its a real concern to people inside the company. But every now and then, a little voice in my head chimes in: Google doesnt want you to give up your phone; they make billions of dollars a year off of the things you do on it. These Digital Experiments are just a red herring, lousy solutions doomed to fail, to put the onus on the user for their smartphone addiction, rather than taking responsibility as a sprawling monopoly to address it instead.

And its hard to silence that voice as I look at the third solution, Envelope. Its a paper phone that wraps around your real phone, designed by the U.K. studio Special Projects. The clever idea still allows you to dial, and even check the time. But you do miss very important things like text messages.

The idea is to try to last as long as possible before opening the envelope and getting your phone back, the team explains in the video above.

In another era, before smartphones took over our lives, I wouldve loved this idea for its wonky, playful UX. (Special Projects produced Googles printable phone that I mentioned above.) But the more I think about it, the more Envelope feels like an insult to those of us who rely on our smartphones, and the damage those phones are causing in the process.

Were addicted to screens, in part because theyre fun, in part because theyre essential, in part because theyre addictive by design. Imagine Molson Coors Brewing Company teasing an alcoholic with a koozie that locked booze inside a game, with a tagline like, The idea is to try to last as long as possible before opening the envelope and getting your Miller Lite back. The humor turns cruel pretty quickly.

The lives of everyday people are not a joke, and digital health is a real concern of our era. So Google, please, lets not turn phone addiction into a game that tests self-control. And dont even float an idea as infeasibly idiotic and downright condescending as using a piece of paper that you have to print out and wrap around your phone to defeat the active efforts of countless companies with unlimited budgets to get us back onto it. Its not helpful. And its not funny.

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Google's new 'Digital Wellbeing' tools, ranked from ingenious to offensive - Fast Company

Human Behavior

An Exploration Of Elevator Music At The Blanton – KUT

January 23, 2020 medical

SoundSpace, the ongoing hybrid art series produced by Steve Parker at UTs Blanton Museum of Art, returns this weekend withNot Bad Muzak,a new installment inspired by elevator music and its close cousin, telephone on-hold music.

It aligns with a current exhibition by Ed Ruscha at the museum, Parker says. [Ruscha] uses text a lot in his work, and he often paints landscapes in the back. The text is the subject but the landscape in the back he refers to as elevator music."

Ruschas work inspired Parker to delve into the world of Muzak.

Elevator music was originally developed to manipulate behavior, Parker says. To soothe nerves in the elevator, to increase worker productivity in the factory, and also to get people to buy more things at the shopping malls. And were just looking at the different ways in which sound and music is used to manipulate human behavior.

To that end, Parker has partnered with radio producer Yowei Shaw to create what they callReally Good Elevator Music.

Weve commissioned a few different artists to create new elevator music for the Blantons elevator, Parker says. As you are travelling up and down on the Blantons elevator, youll experience new elevator music [that] at time has verbal prompts. Im most looking forward to audience reactions and what this new elevator music gets people to do, and what sort of interactions are facilitated as a result.

Among the other artists taking part inSoundSpace: Not Bad Muzakis choreographer Jennifer Sherburn, who is devising a new piece inspired by her complicated reaction to on-hold music.

When we started talking about elevator music or call center hold music, I realized that theres two versions of myself when Im on hold. One is, I quickly get mad and want to rebel and break things," she says. "And the other is, I just allow myself to get tugged away to a dream state, much like [when] you plunge into a pool of water and everything just kind of changes. So Im going to play with both of those things with movement.

Sherburns piece will be set to a new piece of music created by her brother Justin Sherburn, with whom she frequently collaborates.

Hes stoked about elevator music, Jennifer says. [And] whats cool is that if he goes into the direction Im thinking, its something he doesnt normally make, period. So itll be pretty refreshing for the both of us.

"SoundSpace: Not Bad Muzak" is Sunday, January 26 at 2:00 pm at the B;lanton Museum of Art.

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An Exploration Of Elevator Music At The Blanton - KUT

Human Behavior

Resolving to Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions – Daily Utah Chronicle

January 23, 2020 medical

Its easy to boil down something such as a New Years resolution to a cliche. You can imagine a peer or family member telling you as such, that by February theyll have already forgotten what their resolutions even were. For myself, New Years Eve is not a remarkable or enjoyable holiday. Perhaps Im overly practical in that I see no point in missing out on good sleep to watch celebrities make television commentary on the New York City ball drop or dragging out a party for hours longer than it should last. The date simply changes, I think, and why should that be nearly as big of a deal as when any other day passes? Life goes on and progression is not linear burdening one week in January to an entire years worth of goal-making cant be a sustainable model for accomplishment. Can it?

Salt Lake City Sticks to Resolutions

Well, according to a recent study put out recently by WalletHub, from a variety of major cities across the United States, members of the community of Salt Lake City were the ninth most likely to achieve their New Years Resolutions. Why did Salt Lake do so well compared to other places across the nation? What is it that we are doing right, and that other cities are doing better than us? Some immediate answers one might think of to explain this success might include our own hardiness and determination. I mean, come on. Utahns are pretty scrappy on the whole. Could the explanation be that we take New Years as an occasion to take more seriously than other cities do? Though it could be easy to jump to such conclusions, the fact remains that other cities which are likewise well known for these traits didnt do so well in keeping their resolutions. New York City, for instance, which is again perhaps one of the most thrilling places to celebrate the new year with glitter and pizzazz, ranks quite a bit below Salt Lake in 30th place.

Financial writer Adam McCann, a contributor to WalletHubs study, instead determined the success of different resolutions according to outside environmental factors. Your location may be setting you up for failure, he wrote, adding that If you live in a neighborhood with no sidewalks or fitness centers nearby, for example, you may not feel as encouraged to exercise. The same goes if most of your restaurant options are limited to fast food you may be less likely to eat healthy on days you dine out. The statistics highlight interesting trends. For instance, cities with higher employment rates, highest median incomes and the least number of adults with health problems like smoking, obesity and alcoholism were the most likely to keep their resolutions. Other factors, such as parkland acreage and success of public schools also played into this, and the places with some of the most favorable factors were generally those at the top of the studys overall rankings, from San Francisco, California, to Gilbert, Arizona.

In the meanwhile, cities that generally fell at the bottom of the list most struggled across these areas or with certain problems to an extreme. Taken simply, goalkeeping isnt at all as simple as what a person is able to determine in the first few weeks of January, but what happens around oneself throughout the entirety of the year. Our success in our decisions about our own betterment cannot lie in instantaneous decisions. What we determine to surround ourselves by in our personal lives and our communities, in the long run, makes the difference.

Environment Matters

It might seem discouraging to imagine that it might not so much be our selected goals which matter to our growth than our surroundings. After all, most of us arent city planners or local government leaders, nor do any one of us make for the entirety of a consistently fluctuating economy. A city with more restaurants or nightlife than another is more likely to aid your start-of-the-year goal to socialize more often better than one which doesnt without your having to think so much about it. Yet, what can one do who does not live in such a place? Even Salt Lake City certainly has its sparse, financially underprivileged and more spread-out areas where community engagement is less accessible from the most well off parts of downtown. In response to WalletHubs research, Zlatan Krizan, a University of Iowa professor of psychology, suggested a solution. People are creatures of habit, and cues in our environment sustain them, he wrote. Not going to the mall will certainly eliminate any purchasing; you cannot spend if you are not there. As much as our world may change beyond the sense of individual control, consciously making what we are able to of our habits in relation to our surroundings is within reach.

As phrased by the iconic cleaning expert Marie Kondo, whom I adore, By starting with the easy things first and leaving the hardest for last, you can gradually hone your decision-making skills, so that by the end, it seems simple. Theres nothing wrong with writing out a five-year plan. However, as one of my favorite fictional characters once put it, you first have to choose a font to write it in. As well as it may do to outline grand hopes for ourselves we must remain mindful of how we curate our habits, to nurture the seeds that we decide to plant. As author James Clear explains in his New York Times bestselling book Nuclear Habits, In many cases, the environment matters more than motivation and skill alone, his calling it the invisible hand that shapes human behavior.

Clear recommends three important steps to shaping the spaces in which we live that I find quite effective, which includes automating good decisions, getting in the flow or remaining conscious of our behaviors and, lastly, avoiding negative influences that might distract us. Suppose I want to eat healthier. While this idea is a good resolution on its own, how can I affect my environment and daily living to achieve it? Following Clears suggestions, I could begin by proving myself with healthy ingredients and memorizing recipes I can make easily to support my new goal. My next step might be to keep a budget Im aware of and a plan I can check with intervals. Finally, I can quit purchasing so many Ramen cups as I currently do, since Ive come to notice that too strict a diet of vitamin-lacking noodles in salty water will make me feel drowsy and worn out.

With practice, I can change my simple hope for improvement into a real long-time track by immersing myself in a conducive environment in my habits, and supposing I take my goal a step further to organize and clean my kitchen, my physical environment as well. Remember, even though we treat New Years as a special day, its the ordinary days we tend not to pay attention to which count the most. After all, as Clear wrote, It is important to remember that the environment drives our good behaviors as well as our bad ones.

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Resolving to Keep Your New Year's Resolutions - Daily Utah Chronicle

Medical School

Monthly Archives: January 2020

Reelin can reverse the main pathological processes associated with Alzheimer’s, other tauopathies – News-Medical.net

The Spinal Cord Organizes Locomotion Like a Three-gear Engine – Technology Networks

Former Shuswap residents head to Mars habitat for brain research – Pentiction Western News

4 Universal Principles That Drive Our Behavior, According To A Neuropsychologist – mindbodygreen.com

To find intelligent alien life, humans may need to start thinking like an extraterrestrial – Livescience.com

A Stanford behavior strategist on three moments to save money – Quartz

Google’s new ‘Digital Wellbeing’ tools, ranked from ingenious to offensive – Fast Company

An Exploration Of Elevator Music At The Blanton – KUT

Resolving to Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions – Daily Utah Chronicle