Cog Blog 5: Problem Solving

When I have to solve a given problem, how I approach it depends on what the problem is. If it's something I've had experience with before, I might have an idea where to start when trying to solve it. For example, if my cat got something in her fur that needed to get washed out, past experience tells me that trying to get her clean using a bathtub will only result in an angry, writhing cat and my arms becoming covered in scratches. So if I'm in a situation like this, past experience tells me to try something different due to a previously attempted method not working very well (using a washcloth works much better for the record, much less angry animal attacks). If a problem is completely foreign to me, then trying to figure out how to solve it could become harder. I’ve had multiple problems occur in my everyday life and  while some issues were quick to fix, others took time to figure out. I would believe that most people like me prefer the quick to solve problems a lot easier, but sometimes you get thrown a problem that you have to think on to try and solve in life. In other words, it's far from simple.

I have good story about how I’ve used different tactics to try and solve a complex problem. Fitting for Halloween, it's something of the bizarre mystery kind that might scare some people. Something I've had a long trial and error process with figuring out how to solve is a certain issue I have with my health. I noticed many years ago that at random times at night (and only at night), I would get these horrible stomach aches that made me feel as if I had swallowed a ton of needles. I unfortunately still have them happen today. The only way I can make the pain go away is to lay down on my back and press something weighted like a pillow down on my stomach. I have to stay in this position for at least a half an hour and if I get up too fast the pain returns quickly.

What my stomach pain feels like

I couldn't figure out why this was happening, so I started thinking. Looking back on this issue now, I realize I was using analytical transfer to try and solve this problem. Based on how I have gotten stomachs in the past, I first tried to apply knowledge of my past source problems to my current situation to solve the new target problem. My past experiences would say that I would be having the stomach pain because I had gotten sick, I had food poisoning or it was a symptom of my period arriving soon. However, none of these source problems were behind why the pain was occurring and my attempt to use analytical transfer failed. When I realized none of my past experiences could explain what was happening, I started paying attention to what I was doing right before the stomach aches started up to see what new elements that were not factors in my past experiences could be in play.

Eventually, I noticed a pattern occurring. The stomach aches only happened when I drank water later at night. It wasn’t caused by drinking any other liquid such as juice, milk, or even tea (which is just water infused with leaves!), just normal water caused the stomach aches. Back then when I figured this out it baffled me (and it still does). I tried applying more information from past source problems to try and explain this bizarre occurrence, but again nothing made sense when up against the target problem. The water wasn’t contaminated with bacteria, water from different sources had the same effect and it was a consistent occurrence only at night (this has never once happened during the day). So when I couldn't figure out what was causing it, I switched gears to “how can I prevent this?” as an attempt to solve the problem.

According to my stomach after a certain hour,  it is deadly

It took more trial and error to figure out, but eventuality I found that to prevent the stomach aches I had to do one of two things. I have to either constantly eat small snacks as the night goes on because even if it was something as small as a cracker, the pains would not occur if I drank water right after. Or I would have to make sure I constantly drink water all night around every fifteen minutes to half an hour to "keep my body used of drinking water" (that is the best term I can come up with to describe it. I don't really know what else to label it as). 

I have talked to doctors about this issue and none so far can tell me why this could be happening (as soon as I mention how tea doesn't cause the aches, they have no idea what to tell me). So to spare myself nights of pain, I had to be my own problem solver and find a solution to it myself. Realizing now that there is name to the process I used to try and solve this issue makes me feel a little bit accomplished with how the problem was solved the best it could be. While this experience was unlike anything I had dealt with before, figuring out that my past knowledge wasn't helping me assisted me in solving the bigger picture by making me develop new problem solving skills. Sometimes when it comes to solving problems, especially the complex ones, you never know what information will help you solve it whether it be known or unknown.

CogBlog 4: Attention

I grew up in the generation that had a half and half childhood. We grew up having to entertain ourselves with both the outdoors and the constantly evolving technology of the world. As I grew up, the bounds in technology in the terms of computers, cell phones, AI, video game systems and other technology based advances were being made. I remember watching as using the internet involved cutting off the functioning of the phones in the house thanks to dial up (and causing a lot of yelling from my parents about it) to it being virtually everywhere we go at the use of a router and a password. Technology has helped create better ways of treating illnesses, working more efficiently in both office and blue collar settings, education, television, video games and movies and how we get news and information about what's going on in the world around us.

Along with the advances in technology, there have also been a fair share of cognition-related issues with it. Personally I believe that technology is a double-edged sword when talking about cognition. On one hand, there have been major developments in using technology to not only learn better but there are programs out there that are designed to help people strengthen their cognition. Whether they are online classes, tests or brain games like Luminosity, there are technology based creations out there designed to help people improve cognition in some way. The technology evolution has also benefited the medical world, giving us better and more efficient techniques and tests that involve using or testing cognition. Some of these breakthroughs include concussion tests, vision and hearing tests and the development of different body/brain scans that have helped shed light on how our bodies function in many ways well past just cognition.

On the other and, some technology has become a bigger hindrance in parts of cognition like attention. In this modern era of many people owning personal cell phones and TV’s in every room, I think it has become harder to use the skill of attention. It’s harder to pay attention to what is going on around you when you have a movie playing in the background or your phone that’s connected to the internet is in arm's reach. So many people are so obsessed with using their personal technology devices that they fail to notice what is happening in the world around them. Students on their phones miss parts of their classes or are constantly using them while doing homework or studying which could affect their grades and knowledge base. Someone walking down the street while looking at their phone isn't fully paying attention to what is in front of them and they could very well walk into something or have someone hit them on accident from their obliviousness and divided attention. Someone who decided to text and drive is committing an extremely hazardous behavior by taking their eyes off the road which could cause an accident from the divided attention of the phone and their surroundings.

I'm not a fan of texting and driving. I get upset and paranoid when I'm in a car with a driver who uses their phone at the wheel.

What has happened in the evolution of technology that has caused cell phones and other mobile devices to become such large beacons of  attention that those using them forget to actually pay attention to what is around them? I think much of it has to do with the multiple types of social media that we have access to today. Depending on who you ask, the creation of social media is one of the best or worst things to befall our society. While they allow us to literally talk to people all over the world, they have shown to be very addicting and people can spend disproportionate amounts of time on them. There are social media accounts for everything these days from networking with employers and friends to looking for relationships and hookups on a Friday night. Especially in my age group and younger, I've noticed how much of a distraction these apps can cause in students when they are trying to study or when they are talking to someone else at the same time. Their attention becomes transfixed on the social media post they are on and whatever is going on in the background becomes secondary to them.

This constant divided attention can have overall negative effects on a person because you aren’t fully taking in your whole environment. When you divide your attention between multiple things, you won't be able to attend to them each as easily versus if you focused on one thing at a time. It’s this distracted behavior that is so problematic to people who are glued to social media, or technology in general. Its very easy to miss something when you aren't directly focused on it. You could have read a chapter in detail that would help you give a good response to that essay question on your upcoming test, but instead you briefly skimmed over a section in the textbook because you wanted to see what your favorite celebrity just posted on Facebook. Or someone might be asking you an important question and you either don't register what they said or give a simple “uh huh” because you are checking how many likes you got on your last post (which depending on the situation could be very offensive and show a lack of care to the other person).

I’ll admit that sometimes it's hard to balance the two out. I catch myself rationing out study time versus checking my phone (read one chapter for five minutes of phone time for example) so sometimes I have to remove my phone completely when I know I have to get stuff done so my attention is kept on the material I need to to be focused on. But I don’t feel like everyone else tries to utilize some kind of technique to help them pay attention. It has become such a norm in modern society to be glued to our electronics that some people actually undergo extreme stress when separated from their phones for too long. I believe that because technology has become so prevalent in our lives that the disconnection of attention it causes has slipped under the radar due to it being considered “a norm” by some. This is a bad habit to have for proper working cognition (not to mention general life skills) and I feel that over time it’s just going to get worse unless there is another interference from technology itself. Technology is causing this issue in attention, so it would make sense if it was the only thing that could stand a chance at trying to reverse it.

Technology isn't everything. Use it wisely.

CogBlog 3: Perception

Duck or rabbit? It's all in how you perceive it.

Perception as a whole is caused by our senses being stimulated. Everything we touch, see, hear, smell or taste from our environment has to be perceived by the brain for us to identify what is going on around us. In some situations, all or most of our senses are used to accurately perceive a single or multiple stimuli we are presented with. With complex environments that require this kind of perception, it can be like a multi-piece puzzle. For example, entering a busy restaurant invokes multiple different stimuli that can be perceived as soon as walking through the establishment’s door. You can see the restaurant's decor, hear music and people chattering, and smell the aroma of the food. When all theses different stimuli  are perceived together, we get a picture of what the restaurant is overall as an environment.

So what would it be like to encounter an experience where one or more of your senses was unable to work properly? How would these missing senses affect how you perceived the environment? I am a very active concert goer in the hard rock and heavy metal scene. I love going to live music performances and I attend multiple concerts a year. For me, concerts are full-sensory experiences, with all of my senses typically being stimulated in someway during the course of the event. Taking away even one of my senses during an event like this would impact my ability to accurately perceive what is going on around me, although differently with each individual sense.   

Without sight, I couldn't see the band, the crowd of attendees or the venue the show is being held at. This is a huge impairment that would require my hearing and touch to work overtime to make sure I was going in the right direction when walking around, or even worse; making sure I don't walk straight into a mosh pit or a spot where one is likely to occur.

Without being able to see or hear, staying clear of mosh pits at concerts could become more difficult.

Without the ability to hear, attending a concert would be completely redundant. I could visually perceive the band on stage, the lights, the crowd, and the venue, but without knowing the tune of the music, a large part of the entertainment of the concert is gone. Not being able to hear the crowd is also a disadvantage at metal shows in particular as the sounds that come from a crowd can be warning signs of where mosh pits are opening up or where crowd surfers are traveling in the mass of people (trust me, that is an element you always want to be aware of at shows so you and the others around you don't get injured on accident). My perception of sight would become my most important asset in this situation as it would be the next best sense to use for detecting what is happening around me.

Without the ability to touch/feel, I might not know if I am getting uncomfortable by where/how I am standing or if I have gotten injured by a multitude of possible things such as other people or flying objects from others in the crowd. Smell and taste might not always apply to a concert I am attending, so losing my ability to perceive these senses would be the least damaging to my experience. That being said, being able to smell different things in the air such as food, smoke and various scents wafting around (especially at outdoor concerts) and being able to distinguish if you are drinking water or alcohol from a cup can be important stimuli to perceive if the situation calls for it. In that case, my perceptions of sight and hearing would be utilized more to make up for a lack in these senses.

Overall, losing any sense that contributes to overall perception would have a negative effect on a concert setting. In this particular setting, the inability to see and hear would cause the most sensory impairment which would alter someone's perception greatly towards the event. Even some senses such as taste and smell that don't seem readily important in an environment like this could be crucial to have in case something happens. The perceptions we perceive with full sensory experiences such as concerts use up more factors than some realize we use in everyday life. It's amazing how the removal of just one sense that we use to interpret our environments can alter our entire perception of something. This alteration could mean that our other senses have to go into overdrive to compensate for the holes in our perceptive field. It is also important to keep in mind that everyone perceives their environments differently. Something that might be an annoyance to one person might not even phase another. So many elements go into creating our own perception abilities and you never know how it all could change until part of your sensory abilities aren't there anymore to contribute to the forming the big picture.