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How PTSD Affects Cognitive Function

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PTSD doesn’t just impact emotions, it can really affect how your brain works day-to-day. People with PTSD often struggle with memory, focus, and decision-making. This happens because trauma changes how the brain processes information, especially in areas like the amygdala (which controls fear), the hippocampus (which helps with memory), and the prefrontal cortex (which helps with reasoning and emotional control). For example, someone with PTSD might have trouble remembering details from a conversation or find it hard to concentrate in class. They may also overreact to small triggers, like a loud sound or a certain smell, because their brain is stuck in “survival mode.” Their memory might also become selective, remembering the traumatic event very clearly but struggling with day-to-day memory. I read that PTSD can actually shrink the hippocampus, which helps explain why memory issues are so common. According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, this cognitive impact can interfere...
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The Best Medicine for Your Brain is SLEEP!

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          Every job that our brain serves needs sleep. Whether it is for memory formation, understanding the world around us, or learning! All of these jobs require rest, just like the rest of our body. So, how does not getting enough sleep have impacts on these things, more specifically on our brain and learning? Cornell University included some positive impacts of sleep on learning. This includes decreased forgetting, greater athletic performance, and improved insight. The negative impacts of sleep deprivation includes cognitive impairments and susceptibility to memory errors. In the area of learning, this means that if you don’t sleep enough, you will have a very hard time learning, encoding, and remembering new information. For college students, many times at the end of the semester, it is accepted that the most important thing for them to do is study for finals, stay up all night writing papers, and not prioritize your sleep. However, students should k...
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The Phenomenon of TikTok Trends

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  Have you ever caught yourself repeating a trending sound, buying something that everyone is talking about, or even attempting to learn a TikTok dance? This might be due to the idea of observational learning theory. This theory describes how people learn new behaviors just by merely watching others. On an app like TikTok, when a video goes viral, viewers may be motivated to attempt to copy it in hopes of becoming viral too. A psychological term to describe this would be vicarious reinforcement, in which a person learns a behavior by watching another person being rewarded for it. The topic of observational learning explains exactly why trends catch on. It’s very interesting to see how fast a trend can build up and grow to which then leads to the end of it. This can even be seen with music as the start everyone loves, and then eventually, when it becomes overplayed, everyone suddenly hates it. Trends are a never-ending cycle, it feels like, as one dies off and another one is created...
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The Cognitive Benefits of Giving Compliments

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       If you have ever given someone a compliment on their shoes, or on their hairstyle, you may have noticed that you feel really good afterwards. Why is that? The easy way to understand this would be that you take pride in making someone else's day better. But what is the cognitive science behind it? In a post by PhD candidate Suzanne van de Groep, she included that a recent study attempted to answer this question. Through the use of MRI, they found that " receiving compliments led to similar activation in reward areas of the brain, such as the striatum, as receiving monetary gifts" (Groep, 2018). She explains how this describes why people will choose to give back to others rather than receive monetary rewards, because it gives the individual similar cognitive experiences.      Receiving praise has also shown to help us learn better. When you were in grade school and your teacher told you to "keep up the good work" or "I love how you wrote that para...
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The Digital Addiction and It's Effect on our Lives

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    There is no doubt that in the past decade there has been a huge increase in how often we are looking at a screen. Whether this is on our computers or our phones, digital addiction is a very real problem experienced by many. The increase use of social media also plays a big role in this addiction. Our brains are wired to continue to do things that we are rewarded for (positive reinforcement). Social media leverages our brain's reward system which keeps us engaged for hours each day.      This is especially concerning when looking at how many teenagers are addicted to their phones. This may have effects on our brains development which we still are not away of. Jefferson health writes "a   recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) revealed that teens who use social media more than three hours per day may be at heightened risk for mental health problems" (Miller, 2022). Teenagers are more at risk because their bra...
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Are Celebrities Brainwashing Us: Higher-Order Conditioning in Action

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  Do you ever see an item of clothing that only looks luxurious when a celebrity is wearing it, or maybe why a certain sneaker brand only looks cool when an athlete endorses it? It’s not just about marketing, it’s all about the idea of higher-order conditioning. This occurs when a potential brand attaches a product to a certain celebrity's face that we are a fan of. Eventually, we end up liking the product or even buying it just because of this. It could be anything like makeup, watches, shoes, or even food products, but we only feel drawn to it due to who it’s associated with. For instance, there are Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty and SKIMS by Kim Kardashian. Many might not even have an interest in any of these products, but the endorser is the one that lures them in. This has become even more heightened due to TikTok and influencers attempting to well … influence you to buy certain things. When we see a famous face or even just the face of someone we love, our brain ends up wanting to d...
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How to Actually Stick to Your Goals!

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  Everyone makes goals in their life, whether they’re weekly goals or New Year’s resolutions that they might actually follow through with if they don’t forget. Whether the goal is “go to the gym” or “be more productive,” a goal is a goal, and whether you stick to it is up to you. That brings us back to the question at hand: how do you actually stick to your goals? Goal success comes down to managing your environment, consequences, and expectations around your behavior. Certain goals, like losing weight, take time, which can be difficult when one lacks patience. It’s important to use immediate reinforcers. For example, after working out, treat yourself to your favorite snack. This ties into the concept of operant conditioning, which involves using positive reinforcement to shape behavior. It’s also important to avoid temptation and take action early through the process of precommitment. For instance, if your goal is to study more, it’s best to eliminate distractions by placing you...
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