Mind Matters Volume 1

ISSUE NO 1 | VOLUME 1

MIND MATTERS A Psychology & Neuroscience magazine

JULY 2020

PAGE 1 LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

C O N T E N T S

PAGE 4 RECENT HISTORY OF THE NEUROSCIENCES

PAGE 7 CAN WE TRUST OUR MEMORY?

PAGE 10 DREAMS

PAGE 12 LUCID DREAMING

PAGE 15 WHY DO WE DREAM?

PAGE 18 SLEEP ON IT.

PAGE 21

MIND MATTERS

THE STORY OF ANGER

PAGE 24 BRAIN GAMES

PAGE 27 LET'S DISCUSS!

PAGE 32 CLOSING CREDITS

Letter from the editor This magazine is a potato.

To our readers, I have just one question to ask you: if you could choose just one food to eat for your entire life, what would that be?

I read a brilliant essay recently where the writer decided not on a decadent bowl of mac and cheese or a steaming plate of lobsters, but on potatoes. If you think about it, their answer makes perfect sense: while bland and tasteless upon first glance, a skilled hand can turn this starchy tuber into an array of phantasmagoric delicacies. Craving something salty? - you’ve got potato chips … dying for a rich, sinful meal? Mashed potatoes do the job.

Now, why is that discussion even relevant? Well, just like potatoes, this issue of Mind Matters is diverse in terms of the discussions it has and the ideologies framing each article. If you are like us, you hear a lot of talk about the future of neuroscience, but you don’t quite recognize yourself in these discussions. If you are like us, this magazine is for you. The main aim of Mind Matters is to provide students interested in learning more about the cognitive sciences with amusing and up to date knowledge in the world of neuroscience and psychology.

Many of my generations heard a valuable piece of wisdom when we were younger: Leave to your imagination. For instance, when winter days forced us to remain indoors, I remember playing big shot office executive. My sister sat at the table opposite to mine- playing my rival. We were connected by a thin wire stuck into two paper cups.

Reception was perfect.

And this is what I thought Imagination was. My personal definition of imagination, simply put, was anything made up. Now how I got this idea, I have no clue, but this ideology painted the way I view this volume of our magazine.

PAGE 1 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

With this being our first issue, we tried to make it as interesting as possible, which led us to choose a theme where we could delve into the brain using the imagination as our leeway. Surprisingly enough- the path to imagination for many of our writers ( as you will see in the ensuing pages ) was through none other than Dreams.

Dreams - this went against all my conception of what Imagination entailed. Dreams proved to be the defining motive for almost every article in this volume, and correctly so as it highlights man’s most rewarding activity (or at least I like to think so) - sleep.

So join us, readers, as we venture into the mind and explore the ravaging course of the neurosciences. Join us as we take on the challenge of seemingly impossible riddles and intriguing discussions. Join us for a deep dive into the brain … and don’t forget to use your imagination!

Nikita Nambiar, Founder and Editor in chief nnikita@tisb.ac.in

PAGE 2 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

Letter from the editor Dear readers,

During quarantine, the editorial process has been both joyful and difficult. Our only companions during isolation have been our imaginations: what do we hope the future will hold? What does the world look like in five months, ten, twenty? Our perceptions of things outside our field of comprehension and memory are based on our past experiences, but this period is uncharted territory. Hope and imagination keep us afloat and anchored. The theme for the Met Gala in 2018 was fashion and the Catholic imagination, reinterpreting existing religious motifs from a neocultural standpoint.

Art and fashion, in fact, are nothing without the incredible power of human imagination. In this first edition, creative work about the act of imagination dreaming, visualising and creating - are featured heavily.

We have highlighted not only the complex role of cognitive sciences, but also the small processes that define our lives.

Mind Matters Magazine revolutionises the way cognitive sciences have been traditionally learnt, taught and interacted with. Our aim is and has been to create an engaging, dynamic publication unlike anything TISB has ever seen. With that, I hope you are as enthralled and impressed with this edition’s student work as I am.

Armaan Bamzai Head Editor and proofreader barmaan@tisb.ac.in

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I have a confession to make: I have always been, and still am, eternally fascinated by the apparently incomprehensible machine of the human imagination.

Welcome to Mind Matters’ first edition! It has been such a pleasure to read the vast and varied selection of writing that the TISB community has submitted, and it is an honour to feature a portion of it in our magazine.

THE RECENT JOURNEY OF THE NEUROSCIENCES A

TIMELINE

OF

EVENTS

FROM

1990

TO

2020

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CONSTANTLY EVOLVING

1990

U.S. President George Bush declares the decade starting in 1990 the "Decade of the Brain"

1991

Giacomo Rizzolatti describes mirror neurons in area F5 of the monkey premotor cortex

1993

The gene responsible for Huntington's disease is identified

1994

Erwin Neher and Bert Sakmann share the Nobel Prize for their work on the function of single ion channels

1992

National Institute on Drug Abuse becomes part of the National Institutes of Health

1992

The recent journey of the neurosciences

Alfred G. Gilman and Martin Rodbell share the Nobel Prize for their discovery of G-protein coupled receptors and their role in signal transduction

2000

Arvid Carlsson, Paul Greengard and Eric Kandel share the Nobel Prize for their discoveries concerning signal transduction in the nervous system

2013 James Rothman, Randy Schekman, and Thomas Sudhof share the Nobel Prize for their discoveries about the machinery regulating vesicle traffic

Start of the human brain project announced

2013 PAGE 5 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

2013

US President Barack Obama announces the Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative

2014

2018

An Infectious side to Alzheimer's disease found

2018

Electrical implant restores walking in paralyzed patients

2018

CRISPR barcodes map brain development in exquisite detail

2020

John O'Keefe, Edvard Moser, and MayBritt Moser share the Nobel Prize for their discoveries about cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain

Bigger, Better Mini brains using stem cell technology

2020

Artificial intelligence and neural pathway development enhanced

2020

2021

COVID-19 observed to have detrimental impacts on the human brain

PAGE 6 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

SANCHI SUBBIAH, GRADE 12 While children testifying in court are perceived to be more honest than adults, their limited communication skills and memory creates a greater scope of suggestibility of them being less reliable witnesses than adults. However, many believe that children provide authentic information, which in turn mislead judges and jurors in criminal cases as claimed by a scientific review published in October, 2013.

Neuroscience and behavioural research into memory cuts directly against confidence in eyewitness testimony expressed by police and jurors in surveys, wrote psychologist Mark L. Howe of City University London.

"MEMORY OFTEN SERVES AS THE KEY OR ONLY EVIDENCE IN THE COURTROOM." Howe wrote in Nature Reviews Neuroscience. Yet many police officers, judges, and jurors across North America and Europe "are naive when it comes to understanding how memories are formed, how they become distorted over time, and how stress and emotion affect remembering."

Until the age of 8 or 10, most people do not have a sense of memory that is reliable enough to recall evets as their brains are not fully developed. One such example involving issues of dubious childhood eyewitness testimony is the infamous McMartin Preschool trial of the 1980s. The case involved sexual abuse accusations at a Manhattan Beach, California, day-care facility. However, all charges were dropped at the end of the trial in 1990.A psychologist suggested that memories of abuse had been implanted in the minds of children by investigators, a view that swayed most of the jurors. Nevertheless, despite what research and past experiences have shown about the malleability of memory, law enforcement officials are still alarmingly overconfident about testimony from childhood.

Furthermore, according to a study by the Centre for Memory and Law, 40 people out of a sample of 100 individuals are likely to have a first memory that is fictional. The Scientists asked 6,641 adults to describe their first memory, along with their age at the time, and discovered that 2,487 first memories were unlikely to be true because they were captured before the age of two. An astonishing 14 percent said they remembered an event before their first birthday — some even saying they remembered their birth. This additionally shows the how unreliable an adult’s recall of past events are.

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CAN WE TRUST OUR MEMORY?

Behavioural research shows that memory develops slowly through infancy, where most memories before 18 months are completely lost from people later in life, a phenomenon known as "infantile amnesia.” That means that honest courtroom testimony by adults about early childhood events would contain only a few reliable details. A richly detailed recounting of events is more likely to have been embroidered or created by the witness, perhaps unconsciously. Although very young children or adults recalling certain events in their faraway pasts are frequently correct in the basic facts of what happened or in providing basic details such as the colour of someone’s clothes or the weather on a particular day, their narratives do not contain many of the additional vital details. Many children create fictional memories by building on events from different timelines where Martin Conway, director of the centre and leader of the study, gave an example of someone who recalled being in their pram.

“This type of memory could have resulted from someone saying, ‘Mother had a large green pram,’ and the person then imagines what it would have looked like,” he said. “Over time, these fragments become a memory, and often the person will start to add things in, such as a string of toys along the top.” Additionally, the idea of memories being fixed and stable is wrong according to Howe because as time passes and as a child matures, his or her perception of the event changes. This in turn results in uncertainty of using children as eye witnesses or in trusting adults with childhood events.

explained Brock Kirwan, an associate professor at Brigham Young University’s Psychology Department and Neuroscience Center. “What seems to happen in the brain is that when you reactivate these representations, they become malleable and can be modified. This allows you to update your memory representations and link them to new, similar events. It also means that your memories change over time.”

PART 2: ON JUDGES AND THEIR TRAINING OF HOW TO CONSIDER THE RECOLLECTION OF PAST EVENTS .A multi-disciplinary research led by Queen's University Child and Family Law scholar Nick Bala, claimed that all new judges should be trained in how children as well as adults recalling past memories should be questioned, and about the types of questions that should be asked in order for children to understand. Especially for children, effective communication with them and developmentally appropriate questions which children can reasonably be expected to answer makes them far more reliable witnesses. To minimize the deterioration in children's memories, the delay between the reporting of an offense and the trial should be shortened. Several meetings between a child witness and the prosecutor before testifying will also help minimize a child's anxiety, the study noted. The same should be applied for adults, especially when they are remembering traumatic events.

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PART 1: CHILDHOOD AMNESIA AND THE MALLEABILITY OF CHILDHOOD MEMORIES

"RATHER THAN REEXPERIENCING AN EVENT, WE RECONSTRUCT IT BASED ON REPRESENTATIONS STORED IN OUR BRAINS."

PART 3: ARE OUR FONDEST MEMORIES FROM OUR CHILDHOOD UNREAL?

“Memory is about the past, but it allows us to bond with one another and can act like social glue,” Conway said. “Instead, it’s more efficient to remember the gist of what happened, and if something different happens this time, it makes sense to update that gist-like representation with the new information.”

In this way, memories change over time and are updated as we incorporate new knowledge of how the world works. “I suspect that these fictional early memories are a by-product of that updating process,” Kirwan added. “We learn something about our own infancy, or infancy in general, and later mistake that information for an actual episodic memory because of its episodic-like qualities.”

"MEMORY IS ABOUT THE PAST, BUT IT ALLOWS US TO BOND WITH ONE ANOTHER AND CAN ACT LIKE SOCIAL GLUE.” While many have fictionalized their cherished memories, which has angered the participants in Conway’s study, it is important to remember the happy days in an exaggerated fashion even if they were not really that rosy as it helps people to survive. As Oscar Wilde said, “The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

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.Fictional memories seem just as real as those that people have evidence of and therefore know to be true. Brain scans have shown that the neural activity for false memories in adults looks incredibly similar to the activity for a real memory and involves the same regions of the brain, including the hippocampus. This means it could be questionable whether we have any “real memories” that can be relied upon at all, because to some degree all our memories are reconstructions. As Howe states, “it is difficult to say for certain but my guess is that we should treat many of these memories with a (rather large) grain of salt. There is considerable evidence showing that memory does not always serve us well if what we are trying to do is recapture an accurate or verbatim glimpse of the past.

Indeed, we can often misremember even the core of events that have happened to us.” These fond memories that people have may be real or fake but they serve an evolutionary purpose. They allow people to make better decisions in the future. If individuals can draw on similar events from the past, they can make a good prediction of what will happen next.

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DREAMS

Salvador Dali

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WHEN WE ARE ASLEEP IN THIS WORLD, WE ARE AWAKE IN ANOTHER.

LUCID DREAMS “The phenomenon of dreaming is quite familiar to many. It’s where your mind creates and synthesizes stories from the most bizarre tales to simple recollections of a day’s account. These successions of images hardly last for over several minutes and the content of dreams are not truly understood either by philosophers or scientists. Perhaps they are representative symbols, where common dreams such as falling is suppose to be a suggestion that something troublesome is happening in your life.

Or having dreams where you are being chased from an attacker is an indicator of a desire to escape from someone or something. Or maybe they are mere electrical brain impulses that pull random thoughts and imagery from our memories.

While everyone dreams on a regular basis, very few have experienced lucid dreaming consistently. According to a 2017 study published in the journal Imagination, Cognition and Personality: Consciousness in Theory, Research, and Clinical Practice, “around 51% of individuals have experienced a lucid dream once in their lives, and an estimate of 20% experienced lucid dreams once a month. This rare occurrence that lays the foundation of many popular blockbuster movies like Inception and Vanilla Sky is quite fascinating as well as terrifying. So, buckle up your seatbelt as we dive into the inner realms of the brain where subconsciousness meets consciousness.

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Sanchi Subbiah, Grade 12

Starting off with the basic most question, what is lucid dreaming? Lucid dreaming is where you’re aware that you’re dreaming and you have scarce or a vast amount of control over your thoughts and emotions during the lucid dream. You have the ability to change the people, the environment, and even the storyline. While this offers you a platform to experience a different reality, this type of dreaming often reduces to nightmares which causes anxiety.

WHO IS MORE LIKELY TO EXPERIENCE THIS OCCURRENCE? A survey conducted at Bonn University tested 790 children between the ages of six to nineteen in their ability to lucid dream, and from the results did it state that children who were younger were more likely to lucid dream than those who were older. The reason for this is because younger children, especially those between the ages of six to nine, are more likely to remember their dreams than adults who have more developed brains. One of the major necessities to harness the power of lucid dreaming is to remember dreaming incidences vividly. This helps the dreamer recognize patterns and thus identify when they’re having a normal or lucid dream.

Apart from age being a contributing factor to this ability, researchers from Universities of Mannheim and Heidelberg investigated whether or not personality traits could help predict a person’s likelihood to lucid dream. The study found that openness to an experience positively correlates with lucid dreaming frequency. The study additionally identified that neuroticism – a personality factor that results in a person to express and feel strong sentiments like anxiety and depression – had associations with a higher frequency of lucid dreams. On the other hand, a personality trait of agreeableness and friendliness does not.

HOW DOES IT OCCUR? Dr. Denholm Aspy, who is a researches lucid dreaming, spoke to MNT and suggested that certain neurophysiological or neurochemical factors may also render a person more likely to experience spontaneous lucid dreams.

When you sleep, your brain cycles through rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and nonREM sleep. Non-REM sleep is where your brain waves, heartbeat, and eye movements gradually slow down, however in REM sleep, your brain and heart rate are extremely active. More often than not, lucid dreaming occurs during the REM phase of sleep, which is also when many regular dreams occur. It is possible that neurochemical peculiarities may play a role in “switching on” parts of our consciousness when they would generally be “switched off.” “You might have some random variation in neurology or neurochemistry […] I know that people with narcolepsy tend to have a lot of more lucid dreams than the average person, and they’re having a lot of sleep disturbances,” Aspy said.

Similarly, based on some anecdotal experiences and studies, lucid dreaming is more common for people who have sleep paralysis as the brains frequently cycles the REM phase than the non-REM stage, allowing their minds to be consciously awake to a certain degree. For instance, a 2017 study — featured in the Journal of Sleep Research — found a significant positive correlation between sleep paralysis and lucid dreaming frequency in a cohort of 1,928 adult participants.

But what happens in the brain when a person experiences a lucid dream? In a study conducted by Julian Mutz and AmirHomayoun Javadi and was published in Neuroscience of Consciousness, they looked at previous studies concerning brain activity during sleep and, more specifically, during periods of regular dreaming versus lucid dreaming. The two researchers found that during lucid dreaming, there is increased activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the bilateral frontopolar prefrontal cortex, the precuneus, the inferior parietal lobules, and the supramarginal gyrus. These are all brain areas related to higher cognitive functions, including attention, working memory, planning, and self-consciousness.

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THE FUNDAMENTAL QUERY

In the last 20 years, psychophysiologist Dr. Stephen LaBerge has become the pioneer of lucid dreaming research. Not only did he invent one of the most popular lucid dreaming techniques, but he has led many scientific studies on the subject.

LaBerge’s work has helped researchers discover therapeutic benefits of lucid dreaming. It may be useful in treating conditions like PTSD, recurring nightmares, and anxiety. It’s possible to learn how to lucid dream through various methods recommended by LaBerge which includes conducting a reality test when you’re awake. Reality testing, or reality checking, is a form of mental training. It increases metacognition by training your mind to notice your own awareness.

According to Cognitive Neuropsychiatry Source, your level of metacognition is similar in your waking and dreaming states. So, higher metacognition when you’re awake could lead to higher metacognition when you’re dreaming. This may be related to the brain’s prefrontal cortex, which plays a role in both reality testing and lucid dreaming. To enhance your metacognition, you can do reality tests while you’re awake. For reality testing, several steps to follow are to ask yourself “Am I dreaming?” or to check your surroundings for anything strange. For instance, if you look at a clock when you’re lucid dreaming, the time will appear to change constantly, however in reality, time proceeds more slowly. It’s recommended to pick one reality check and do it multiple times a day. This will train your mind to repeat the reality checks while dreaming, which can induce lucid dreaming. Another technique is to keep a dream journal. Keeping a dream journal, or dream diary, is a popular method for initiating lucid dreaming.

When you write down your dreams, you’re forced to remember what happens during each dream. It’s said to help you recognize dream signs and enhance awareness of your dreams.

Sources: https://www.healthline.com/health/what-is-lucid-dreaming#takeaway https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02164/full https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2737577/ https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/326496#What-happens-in-the-brain?

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HOW TO LUCID DREAM?

WHY DO WE DREAM? ISHA SINGH, GRADE 11

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For centuries people have pondered the meaning of dreams.

While many of us believe that our dreams have special meaning or a useful purpose, some have considered dreaming to be an unintended consequence of sleep.

So are dreams some kind of message from our unconscious, a stress relief mechanism or just unintentional?

WE DREAM OF OUR DESIRES

DREAMS AS A DATA DUMP?

One of the least glamorous explanations for our dreams is that it serves as a data dump — a process the brain initiates to clear out the day’s useless memories and storing the valuable ones.

Researchers had long suspected that, if this process exists in actuality, takes place between the hippocampus (which controls memory) and the neocortex. A study at the Max Planck Medical Institute in Heidelberg discovered that during sleep the neocortex signals various regions in the hippocampus to transfer the information collected during the day. The hippocampus is then cleared to gather more information the next day, while the neocortex decides which information is transferred to long-term memory.

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Sigmund Freud considered dreaming as an expression of our deeply hidden desires or repressed emotions. He proposed that while all of our dreams are formed from images from our daily lives, these images had bigger symbolic meanings which are fueled by our subconscious wishes. Freud theorized that a dream is a symbolic representation of our unconscious thoughts and desires. He believed that analyzing the elements of a person’s dream, the unconscious content would be revealed to our conscious mind and the repressed emotions or desires could be realized and addressed.

ENHANCING YOUR CREATIVITY AND MEMORY

HOW IS COVID-19 AFFECTING OUR DREAMS? A recent survey conducted by Deirdre Leigh Barrett, a professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School, confirmed that as the virus has spread around the world, people have begun to remember their dreams more vividly. Due to the stress and anxiety induced by the coronavirus pandemic, people are experiencing more vivid nightmares.

Research has shown that increased anxiety during the day can lead to more nightmares. Moreover, stress and anxiety can also cause us to remember more of our dreams, because they disrupt our sleep.

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Sleep is also speculated to be a time when memories that can be fused and blended together in unique and creative ways. During the dreaming state, your brain is suspected to study the vast amount of stored knowledge and then create overarching commonalities. These similarities drawn up by the brain help us draw connections and enhance memory by linking several memories under a common thread. In one study, where participants who had not dreamt and those who had were given very short tests: solving anagram puzzles and unscrambling letters to form a word. Those who had not dreamt, they were not particularly creative—they could solve only 30% of the puzzles. However, the participants who had dreamt were able to solve 65% of the puzzles

SLEEP ON IT DHRUVA IYER,GRADE 12

magine this: you are being chased by a polar bear on the highway.

Frightened, you run as fast as you can.

But alas, the polar bear is catching up and you are slowly giving up all hope.

Just as it is about to pounce on you, you realize your school bus is right next to you. You jump into the bus frantically just as it is about to leave.

The bus then flies you home as you breathe a sigh of relief.

Seems a bit too… fantastical, right?

Well, although this situation is obviously impossible in real life, it is most definitely possible in your mind.

After all, you were able to imagine it!

You may also be thinking that this is something that would happen in a dream. Dreams are one of the best examples in the discussion of what is real and what is not. They act as a way of connecting your real life and your fantasies into one cinematic experience. Humans have been studying this intriguing phenomenon for years with the earliest records of dreams being from the Mesopotamian civilization. They all had the overall goal of answering these questions: what are dreams, why do we dream, and how do we dream?

As of now, these questions have been answered using many theories, some more plausible than others, but we must be cautious before we conclusively support one theory over the other as none of these theories have been empirically proven yet.

This lack of evidence has a good reason to it. Neuroscience and the study of the brain is a relatively new field. Each person has his or her own unique experiences, changing their brain structure, thus making it difficult to apply one concept to every person’s mind around the world. Furthermore, it is quite unethical to directly test on a brain of a living human being as any small mistake could lead to permanent damage.

In this article, we will be exploring some of the theories on dreams that have gained a lot of traction since its conception.

SLEEP CYCLES Before diving into the theories of dreams, let us first understand sleep cycles and when dreaming takes place in them.

Most of the time we are awake and when we go to bed, our body’s first response is to go into a stage of brief waking, usually marked when you feel drowsy or sleepy. The body then goes through a sequence of NREM stages (non-rapid eye movement) before entering a stage of REM sleep (rapid eye movement) which then eventually returns to the first NREM stage.

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I

Now that we know when dreaming takes place, let us look at some of the theories on dreams.

DREAMING TO FULFILL ThSigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, revolutionized psychology by introducing the idea that our mental processes can be driven by “unconscious thought” (also known as our subconscious). He also introduced psychoanalytical methods such as dreaming and projection which allows repressed feelings to be expressed. This expression leads to self-discovery of oneself and thereby, he suggested that we could cure mental disorders after gaining a better insight into the mind of the patient.

He published all his findings in his book ,“The Interpretation of Dreams”, where he gave his own inferences of his patients’ dreams; he said that objects in the dreams were symbolic of certain desires in their life, which in turn allowed him to handle his patients better. His methods are still used today while treating patients with mental disorders and it is an accepted theory that images in our dreams can relate to our deepest desires..

If we had to apply this theory to our example of the dream in the introduction, it is possible that the polar bear chasing you is symbolic of your desire to see snow or to escape a cold place. Of course, this may not be true, but feel free to make interpretations of your own dreams!

DREAMING TO FORGET To understand it better, we have to gauge the concept of neuroplasticity.

Each neuron is capable of making up to 10,000 connections with other neurons, if not more. In total, there are around 10,000 trillion connections between neurons in your brain. These connections are made when you learn something new: skating, singing, or finding out that your grandfather was part of a war. This is done through a process called dendritic branching.

Over time, these connections need to be repeated and rehearsed in order for them to sustain. If they are not rehearsed frequently, these connections tend to weaken in a process called synaptic pruning that can leave you forgetting the things you learned previously.

The reverse learning theory of dreaming, proposed by Francis Crick and Graeme Mitchison, states that after dendritic branching takes place in the neocortex of the brain (the area of the brain associated with higher levels of cognition), the network in the brain becomes less efficient and without due regulation of the formation of these connections, false memories or “parasitic memories” could form, where real memories are connected to false sensory organs, leading to bizarre thoughts, hallucinations and obsessions. Crick and Mitchison proposed that this regulation of connections is done during the REM stage of sleep,

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This cycle repeats 5 to 6 times during regular sleep (before returning to a state of brief waking) and one sleep cycle lasts around 90 minutes on average. The REM phase of sleep characterized by low delta-wave activity of the brain, a lot of eye movement (as the name suggests), high heart rate variability, and almost no muscle activity. These characteristics are similar to when you are awake. Therefore, scientists came to the conclusion through a lot of research that dreaming mostly takes place during the REM phase of sleep.

Many theories of dreams rely on this fact.

where the neocortex is cut off from the real world stimuli and instead the brain sends it random stimuli that results in the elimination of the parasitic memories, that come in the form of dreams. This explains the bizarre nature of some dreams as they represent what those parasitic memories are and is also a possible explanation to why we are not able to remember some of our dreams even right when we wake up, and it most definitely applies to our dream since it is quite atypical to find a polar bear on Varthur Road!

DREAMING TO REHEARSE

Thus, we finish exploring some of the main theories that try and explain the reason of dreaming. What do you think? Do you agree with these theories? Do you think dreaming has a specific purpose or is it a mix of all these different theories? Pondering upon these questions allows us to unlock the deep intricacies of the brain and the processes that govern it.

My advice to you would be to have a “dream journal” in which you record all of your dreams that you remember.

Recount the events of the day and try to relate it to anything in the dream using the theories that I have explored in this article. If you are unable to make sensible connections, sleep on it!

The primitive instinct rehearsal theory (PIRT), proposed by Antti Revonsuo and Katja Valli postulates that our dreams, which are often intimidating and frightening, help us to better our responses to situations in our real life situation thus preparing us to be sharp in our environment and warier of our surroundings. In our very own dream, it is possible we are preparing to catch the school bus tomorrow right before you miss it so you run as fast as possible as though a polar bear was chasing you.

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Ever heard of Spidey-sense? Well, that is analogous to the fight-or-flight response in your brain. If your instincts tell you something is wrong, then you start to breathe quickly, your heart rate increases, and your pupils dilate.

All of this is to prepare yourself in case something wrong actually happens and you have to either “fight” it or run away “flight” from it. This instinct is known to improve with age as people experience more of these situations as they grow older. However, dreaming could be another factor that improves our instincts.

Viha Thumar, Grade 10

At least once , we would have definitely shared a series of angry emojis to our friends or would have banged the door after our parents shouted at us (that is another story when your parents shout even more after the loud bang.), let us agree to the fact that we all have gone through this universal phase of Anger.

Fighting ,breaking things, arguing in a vociferous tone , and yelling in all caps on Instagram :this is how we express our rage.

Anger puts on different robes and interferes into our lives-I agree, anger is a complex emotion.In fact , it is a conundrum of complexities . It can damage relationships in fraction of a second, can affect our mental health , and in some cases might also open a violent chapter.Some people fear the anger, some enjoy it- (when a teacher gets mad at a student ,it is like a free entertainment show for the other fellows), some are saddened ,some are frustrated and well sometimes people are also horrified!

We are triggered by the smallest opposition to our wishes for example- when your wifi stops working in the middle of your college essay submission.This goes back to an idea as simple as-provocation.

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THE STORY OF ANGER

When do you get angry ?We are infuriated when people repel against our will like when our loved ones are insulted or hurt.Moreover, anger infuses into your brain when your self esteem or your dignity is brought down-when someone blames you for an illicit action which you never performed.

With the list of examples above we can extract some common themes- anger is magnified in unpleasant or unfair situations and as mentioned before when events occur against our wills or goals. One thing researchers say is that anger doesn’t happen in vacuum but is a recipe with ingredients like-fear or sadness mixed with it.

If we all get mad at similar events then why do we react at different levels?

This is because the provocation is not the sole reason for our anger. Or else we all would get mad over the same events. It is the how we interpret the provocation. There is something called the PRE-ANGER STATE for example- are you running late for your job interview or are you tired; these provocations feel much worse during this state.

Imagine that something happened to you, right after that, your brain will start analysing if it is good or bad; is it fair or unfair; is it punishable or blameworthy .This is the core evaluation of the action. Then , we advance to the secondary appraisal that is - is this the worst thing that has happened to me . You place the event in your mind and analyse how badly has it affected you or will affect you in your future. Will you be loosing anything precious because of the event ?If the answer is yes, you invite anger.You start thinking of that action as heinous and devilish without placing the background information to it.This action is called catastrophizing -where we make the worst of things.It is one of the primary thoughts that we know is associated with Chronic Anger.There are others toomisattributing causation. Anger will force us to direct blame on innocent people or even items.

Angry people place their wills in front of others and start inflammatory blaming ,you all know it as swearing .They tend to use profane or overgeneralised terms like “every single time”, “always,” “never,” “everybody,” “nobody,” etc.

Psychologists make reference to these as cognitive disorders and even irrational beliefs.

The higher the intensity of the anger the more irrational our thoughts become.We tend to solely look at the negative side and partition ourselves form the others and put solely them to blame.

Moreover, as you know anger also relies on personality traits - level of temperament , levels of frustrations, level of ignorance, calmness , competitiveness, narcissism etc.The more you invite the event to affect you the more angered you get. Anger triggers a ‘fight or flight’ response. When people get mad their heart and breathing rate increases and they start sweating :this is sympathetic nervous system playing its role.At the same time-digestive system slows down:the brain shunts the blood away from the gut and to the muscles .This conserves energy for the response and prepares our body muscles for physical exertion.The body temperature increases and our skin perspires . Our mouth goes dry and our face becomes red.These effects are a part of the complex pattern of physiological experience .Also, our mind becomes highly focused and attentive during these situations.The adrenal gland releases stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU GET MAD? Anger leads to changes in autonomous nervous system, which controls the cardiovascular response, and even in the endocrine system.Cerebral activity undergoes changes, especially in the frontal and temporal lobes.The left hemisphere of the brain becomes more stimulated as the cardiovascular and hormonal responses in the brain is activated. Also, our rational prefrontal lobes shut down and the reflexive areas at the back of the brain plays its role.

Amygdala- a part of the brain- responds to this emotion at the very beginning .It is located deep within the temporal lobe of the brain. Its function is to control the emotions during ‘fight or flight’ situation.The amygdala activates the hypothalamus, which then signals the pituitary gland by releasing corticotrophin releasing hormone -CRH. Th pituitary activates the adrenal glands by releasing adrenocorticotrophic hormone -ACTH.The adrenal secretes stress hormones:cortisol ,adrenaline(epinephrine ) ,and noradrenaline.These hormones impact our neurons and cells.

ENIZAGAM SRETTAM DNIM • 22 EGAP

When inanimate objects like your brand new IPad stops working you might get infuriated ; on the other hand animate objects say your friend does not follow what you say, then perhaps you might be angered by that opposition. In simple terms when there is an opposition to your will or demand ,you get angered.

WHAT CHANGES OCCUR IN YOUR BRAIN? Elevated cortisol will cause the neurons to accept a high quantity of calcium through their membranes and top much of it can make cells fire very frequently and die.The hippocampus and the PFC-Prefrontal cortex are specifically vulnerable to cortisol. A suppressed activity in the PFC prevents us from using our best discernment . In the hippocampus it might disrupt the formation of new neurons.The suppressed activity in this part of the brain might weaken the short term memory while it also prevents the retainment of the new ones. A high concentration of cortisol will decrease the level of serotonin- a hormone that makes us happy.This might make us angry easily . The first model, 'of emotional valence', claims that the left frontal region of the brain is involved in experiencing positive emotions, while the other is more involved with negative emotions. The second model, 'of motivational direction', suggests that the left frontal region is involved in experiencing emotions related to closeness, whilst the right is involved with the emotions that provoke withdrawal.

Given the facts above, it is possible for us to regulate our emotions .Ryan Martin believes that anger is a motivator .Just like thirst motivates us to drink water ,the same way, anger motivates us to respond to the injustice . We have to turn the anger switch off before the situation goes out of control. We have to take anger as a warning for further damage! Getting angry will not solve the problem of -bullying ,racism ,sexism etc. Anger does not always have to be associated with fights and wars - which is highly unproductive and pessimistic.Anger explosions and anger repressions are inappropriate and harmful ways of handling anger.Let us channel that emotion into optimistic and productive expressions -art, music ,drama and others.

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ENIZAGAM SRETTAM DNIM • 32 EGAP

A researcher claims that when we get angry we show a natural tendency to get closer to who or what made us angry and we try to eradicate it .Â

ENIZAGAM SRETTAM DNIM • 42 EGAP

Riddle Time!

DEAR DEPARTED

TASK:TWO GRANDMOTHERS WITH THEIR TWO GRANDDAUGHTERS, TWO HUSBANDS WITH THEIR TWO WIVES, TWO FATHERS WITH THEIR TWO DAUGHTERS, TWO MOTHERS WITH THEIR TWO SONS, TWO MAIDENS WITH THEIR TWO MOTHERS, TWO SISTERS WITH THEIR TWO BROTHERS, YET ONLY SIX LIE BURIED HERE, ALL BORN LEGITIMATE, FROM INCEST CLEAR.

ENIZAGAM SRETTAM DNIM • 52 EGAP

AIM :THIS IS A RATHER TRICKY LOGIC PUZZLE BASED ON AN ACTUAL EPITAPH DATING FROM 1538. SEE IF YOU CAN WORK OUT THE RELATIONSHIPS INVOLVED.

Riddle Time!

HERE ARE THE NUMBERS FROM ONE TO NINE POSITIONED IN A THREE-BY-THREE SQUARE.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

THESE WORDS MAY APPEAR TO BE QUITE UNRELATED BUT THEY HAVE SOMETHING COMMON. WHEN YOU WORK OUT WHAT IT IS YOU WILL BE ABLE TO SPOT THE THAT DOESN'T FIT.

Start

APRIL HOLLY CHARITY DANDELION SANDY INDIA

ENIZAGAM SRETTAM DNIM • 62 EGAP

YOUR JOB IS TO REARRANGE THEM SO THAT EACH ROW, COLUMN AND DIAGONAL ADDS UP TO 15.

HELA CELLS COVID AND CONSCIOUSNESS A BRIEF DISCUSSION

NIKITA NAMBIAR PAGE 27 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

WHY DO WE NEED THIS? HERE WE WILL UNCOVER SOME INTERESTING CONCEPTS IN A REALLY SIMPLISTIC WAY . IMAGINE THIS TO BE A CONCISE INFORMATION PACKET .

THIS SECTION AIMS TO BRIEFLY DISCUSS TOPICS PERTINENT TO THE EVER CHANGING WORLD OF THE COGNITIVE SCIENCES AND THE BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES.

SO READ. ENJOY. AND SEND US YOUR QUERIES ON OUR WEBSITE! PAGE 28 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

HeLa Cells ABOUT HeLa cells refer to a line of cells belonging to a strain that has been continuously cultured since 1951. Compared to other human cells, HeLa cells were (and still are) the only cells to survive in vitro. As such, they are often regarded as the first (and thus far, only) immortal human cells ever cultured.

THE HISTORY OF HELA CELLS In 1951, a 31-year-old African-American woman by the name of Henrietta Lacks was brought to John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore regarding a lump in her abdomen.The diagnosis revealed that Lacks was suffering from an aggressive type of cancer (adenocarcinoma of the cervix or adenoepidermoid tumor) which doctors tried to treat using radiation-tube inserts (Brachytherapy). During her treatment, her doctor also removed a piece of her cancer tumor for culture studies without her knowledge or consent.

For years, the surgeon had been collecting tissue samples from other patients for cancer research studies (led by the then Director of the Tissue Culture Laboratory at John Hopkins, Dr. George Gey) with the aim of finding a cure for cancer. Although many other cancer tissues had been cultivated, they failed within a few generations.In vitro cultivation of Lacks' tissue, however, proved successful with millions of her cells, known as HeLa cells, still alive today.

Source :https://www.microscopemaster.com/hela-cells.html1

PAGE 29 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

CONTEXT

Consciousness in our synapses?

I read this really interesting theory on research gate that suggested that consciousness could lie in our synapses. I have learnt the basics of philosophy and one of the biggest questions that arises in philosophy is where consciousness lies, so I thought it would be nice to share this theory with all of you. I was also shocked to find that a lot of neuroscientists believe that consciousness could lie in the synapse.

THE PROPOSED THEORY Chemical synapses are clearly necessary to the operation of Earth brains as they have been conserved omni-presently and refined and differentiated for hundreds of millions of years.

1) The synaptic gap is only on the order of ten times the size of a neurotransmitter molecule, and anchored to hold its dimension. This means the gap is a tightly-controlled busy place with dense chemistry going on. That supports the possibility that the "neural" correlate of consciousness is entirely disconnected from the neuron, and an effect of molecular goings-on in the gap. We know that some neurons correlate to consciousness and some do not, and that different neurotransmitters are used by different neuron types, and that some neural circuits produce pain and others, pleasure.

We consider consciousness as the result of the growing complexity of connectome activities. Loss of consciousness due to a damage to the cerebrum is often recoverable, while loss due to damage to the brainstem is not. Major damages to the brain may be recovered and consciousness regained through the brain capacity for physical and functional change. However, when there is a vast damage to the brain and the brainstem (the major pathway from the external world to the internal world), consciousness is completely and permanently lost.

Brain death and unrecoverable coma with unconsciousness are among these terminal cases, in which neuroplasticity is mostly absent. We can conclude that consciousness favors brain plasticity.

If you are interested in learning more about this, I suggest you read this paper https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC 1296508/

2) The actions between the neurons means there will also be electric potential swings across the gap (which also influence the closely-spaced molecules therein).

3) The scales and densities involved also suggest the possibility of multimolecular quantum effects. For consciousness to both arise from and affect electrochemical brain activity, there must be a locus of rich enough physics and with sufficient opportunity for continued evolution.

Source : https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.20 13.00412/full#:~:text=Synapses%20are%20generate d%20and%20dissolved,when%20it%20is%20mostl y%20absent https://www.researchgate.net/post/Synaptic_gap_a s_site_of_consciousness PAGE 30 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

COVID ON THE BRAIN Context Indian headlines everywhere focused on the impact COVID-19 may have on our brains, and seeing as this is a relevant topic , it is definitely great to have a discussion on this.

COVID-19 and brain damage?

The study done by researchers at University College London (UCL) and published in the journal Brain said there appeared to be a ‘concerning increase’ of a rare and sometimes fatal brain inflammatory condition, called acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM), known to be triggered by viral infections. According to the study, nine COVID-19 patients with brain inflammation were diagnosed with ADEM, which is typically seen in children and can affect both the brain and spinal cord, reported .

The researchers aid that some of the 43 patients included in the study did not show respiratory symptoms.

Scan of a brain with acute disseminated encephalomyelitis

Scan of a 'normal 'brain

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/health/article/coronavirus-and-neurological-complicationsscientists-warn-of-brain-damages-linked-to-covid/618200

PAGE 31 • MIND MATTERS MAGAZINE

The Team Core Team - Nikita Nambiar , Founder and Editor in chief - Armaan Bamzai, Head editor and Proof reader - Venya Naidu, Social Media director - Rohini Sarkar, Head of creative design - Astha Deep, Head of creative design - Diya Ranga, Head of creative design - Gaayen Saghal, Chief content curator - Hemajashri Reddy, Chief content curator - Maanya Medapa, Chief content curator - Pranav Venugopal, Head of public relations - Dhruva Iyer, Head of public relations

The Team Secondary Team - Sanchi Subbiah , Chief article writer - Sreya Bulusu, Social media team - Samyuktha Kumar, Social Media Team - Isha Singh, Intern and article writer - Anandita Kapoor, Intern and Article writer - Gautam Nambiar, Intern and article writer - Sunethra Shanta Raman, Content curator - Viha Amit Thumar, Intern and article writer

We would like to give a special Thanks to The International School Bangalore for supporting us in this endeavour.

We are grateful for the support from Dr.Caroline Pascoe, Ms.Nyree Anne Clayton, Mr.Santanu Paul, Mr.Tarun Biswas and all other senior staff involved in the process.

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ISSUE NO 1 | VOLUME 1

MIND MATTERS

JULY 2020