The Power of Pretending

Researchers have recently been trying to discover if pretending has implications for child development. When we see kids at play we are reminded that children live in a far more wondrous, whimsical world than the rest of us. A pile of wooden blocks is a vast city, and some sticks the inhabitants. Indeed, often about the time babies begin to walk and talk, they also begin to pretend--giving a stuffed animal a sip from their cup or covering up a doll for sleep. There are definite indications that having a good imagination translates into more creativity as an adult but is it possible to connect pretend play and the ability to get along socially in the world? Researchers are specifically looking at whether pretend play facilitates the development of children’s theory of mind- the ability to understand that others have thoughts and feelings all their own. "It's been a big focus of research recently and some of the work is really fascinating," says developmental psychologist Alison Gopnik, PhD, of the University of California at Berkeley. "The only downside is, no one has an answer yet." There are studies being done examining how well and at what stage children distinguish reality from fantasy and theories are being developed about the role of imagination and pretend play in child development. For now, the questions are mainly academic, but some day the answers could lead to a better grasp of how imaginative play influences how well children get on in the world.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/mar02/pretend.aspx

Research finds firstborns gain the higher I.Q.

A study found that firstborn children have higher IQs than younger sibling. The difference was only about three points the difference between a high B average and a low A, for instance. Researchers have long had evidence that firstborns tended to be more dutiful and cautious than their siblings, and some previous studies found significant I.Q. differences. The researchers found that this difference was probably not due to biological factors by also looking at people who had become the oldest after the death of an older sibling. They found the same results for this group. One theory social scientists have about this effect is that the older sibling gets more parental attention before other siblings are born that can never be made up for by other children, who must always share their parents' attention. Older children may also gain from teaching younger siblings, benefitting more from the lessons than their students. Younger siblings may be more likely to excel in other areas not measured by intelligence tests, such as Darwin, Copernicus, and Descartes who all had older siblings.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/22/science/22sibling.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1257541222-owB847dFELv8zZEl2IuU0Q

Is lying really part of an entrepreneur's job description?

Well is it, an entrepreneurship professor at Babson College in Wellesley, named Daniel Isenber, Mass., recently wrote that a veteran venture capitalist told him "if a person does not know how to seriously twist the truth from time to time, he (or she) cannot be an entrepreneur." "All are against it in theory, but in reality, most practice it to some degree," he says. "Some don't like the term lying, they prefer to call it stretching the truth, or even marketing. the scary idea is that truthfully many entrepreneurs feel they have to embellish or fabricate some truths, to help level the playing field in thier business ventures. How does one tell a harmless little white lie, from a dangerous one?

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/todays-paper/Twisting+truth+tempting+some+entrepreneurs/2982473/story.html

Flame retardants impact on fertility

Up until 2004 Polybrominated diphenyl ethers were mostly used as flame retardants in furniture, carpets, and plastics. these PBDE's may be the same cause for impaired fertility in women and the disruption of cognitive development in children. Up to 97 percent of Americans have PBDEs in their blood, higher concentrations of PBDEs in umbilical cord blood at birth were associated with imparied psychomotor, mental and verbal development later in childhood. IQ at the age of three years was significantly lower for children with higher levels of the chemical in their cord blood, than those with not. Even though production of most PBDE's ended in 2004, there are still millions of people exposed from old carpets, bedding and plastic consumer goods.

http://newmexicoindependent.com/53150/flame-retardants-impact-fertility-childrens-iq-new-studies-suggest-epa-improves-access-to-chemical-risks-data

‘Patients’ who act like the real thing

Albert "Skip" Rizzo, PhD, a psychologist at University of Southern California, is working on a project that could possibly change the future of psychology training: creating virtual patients. He draws upon artificial intelligence research to design realistic-looking and –acting patients that will be used primarily in the training of new clinicians. By using principles from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (Fourth Edition) and input gathered from clinicians and users, the team is programming these AI patients to respond to questions with realistic answers that will help students to learn the right information from real patients. The “patients” are viewed on a computer screen or are projected onto a screen to be life-sized. The project team has already created two patient models, one is a treatment-resistant boy named Justin and the other is a girl programmed as the victim of a sexual assault named Justina. "I think at first people say, 'This is whacked,'" says Rizzo, "but all of a sudden when they get a legitimate answer to a question or two or three, they start acting like it's the real thing." He wants to someday create models of patients that represent all diagnoses in the manual of mental disorders and have students use them regularly as training tools. "Based on a person's training needs, you could then drag and drop any model onto a specific patient," he says.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/2009/09/patients.aspx

Anesthesia: What if you regain consciousness much earlie

A new phenomenon called intra-operative awareness or anesthesia awareness, has developed in our hospitals lately. It is when the patient's anesthesia wears off before surgery is finished, according to experts accidents of awareness occur once or twice per 1,000 surgeries performed under general anesthesia. Intra-operative awareness remains an undesirable complication with potential for the development of post-traumatic stress disorder. The patient must engage in a program of psychological rehabilitation to reduce long-term consequences, if intra- operative awareness ever occurs. Medical history or knowledge of the patients family records of this occurrence can help in any to prevent this problem form happening, or at least prepare doctors better for this unforeseen outcome.

Epilepsy

Epilepsy has been found in 3 million americans, with 200,000 new cases popping up every year. Epilepsy symptoms are usually caused by types of seizures, which can be detected by an EEG or electroencephalogram machine, that detects any electrical activity, that creates seizures. in the brain. DNA also plays a major role in epilepsy, especially if people are missing large portions of chromosome 16 in their DNA. However this doesn't apply to everyone, in a study, only 23 people were recorded to be epileptic from the 3,800 that researched.

http://www.empowher.com/news/herarticle/2010/05/03/genetics-and-risk-epilepsy

Baby Signing

Experts have called baby signing or symbolic gesturing, a non verbal system that is based on the same hand gestures used by the hearing- impaired. Researchers have noticed that babies used simple gestures to communicate before they could talk, many industries have even sprung up educating the practices of baby signing for parents. Some doctors however, believe that this system might actually slow down cognitive processing, and limit their learning of new words, when being dependent on gestures. Motor skills develop from seven to nine months, whereas verbal intellect takes 12 to even 18 months of development. The idea of pre verbal communication is just a misconception researchers believe their fellow colleagues have.

http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100504/LIFE/705039978/1196

Drama Drama Drama

Emotionality is defined as an urgent longing, to experience joy, sadness, anger, infatuation or any high intensity of feeling. Drama addicts are people who have the tendency to feed off of emotional melodramas, like a drug. Some love debating and getting people worked up, others get hooked on sadness, loss and nostalgia. These feelings, like drugs, can be very life threatening to a persons career, relationships, and even mental health.

http://www.jsonline.com/features/health/92687229.html