Cognitive bias is a distortion in the way we perceive reality. No matter how clever we are, we can't get rid of cognitive biases. They're thought to be instances of evolved mental behaviour.
Here's a list of the most common ones: - Bandwagon effect: we often do and believe things because many other people do and believe the same things... It's related to groupthink, herd behaviour, and manias.
- Confirmation bias: a tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions, leading to statistical errors.
- Hindsight bias: the inclination to see events that have occurred as more predictable than they in fact were before they took place. It's related to believing in prophecies..
- Hawthorne effect: the tendency of people to perform or perceive differently when they know that they are being observed. Problem when it comes to research...
- Anchoring: describes the common human tendency to rely too heavily, or "anchor," on one trait or piece of information when making decisions.
- Exposure effect: (also known as the mere exposure effect) a psychological phenomenon by which people tend to develop a preference for things merely because they are familiar with them.
- Self-fulfilling prophecy: a prediction that directly or indirectly causes itself to become true, by the very terms of the prophecy itself, due to positive feedback between belief and behaviour.
- Choice-supportive bias: the tendency to remember one’s choices as better than they actually were.
- Post-purchase rationalization: the tendency to persuade oneself through rational argument that a purchase was a good value.
- Fundamental attribution error: the tendency for people to over-emphasize personality-based explanations for behaviours observed in others while under-emphasizing the role and power of situational influences on the same behaviour. For example: I passed the test because I'm clever! He was successful due to good luck!
Well, I was too busy the last few months but now I'm back. I'm back with the post I'd promised you about bipolar disorder or as it's more commonly known manic depression. Bipolar disorder is not a single disorder, but a category of mood disorders defined by the presence of one or more episodes of abnormally elevated mood, clinically referred to as mania. Apart from manic episodes people suffering -maybe that's the wrong word, but you get the point- also commonly experience depressive episodes or symptoms, or even mixed episodes in which features of both mania and depression are present at the same time. The onset of symptoms usually occurs in young adulthood. According to the DSM-IV-TR there are four types of mood disorders which fit into the bipolar categories: Bipolar I, Bipolar II, Cyclothymia, and Bipolar Disorder NOS (Not Otherwise Specified). Bipolar I is the most serious. An individual in order to be diagnosed with bipolar 1 must experience one or more manic episodes with or without major depressive episodes. A manic episode is characterized by extremely elevated mood, energy, unusual thought patterns and sometimes psychosis. People experiencing mania can stay awake for days and take many risks. They tend to buy many things they don't need, find themselves in debt or engage in risky behaviour. Often these individuals need to be hospitalized. Symptoms of mania in a snapshot: - Distractibility
- Indiscretion
- Grandiosity
- Flight of ideas
- Activity increased
- Sleep (decreased need for)
- Talkativeness (pressured speech)
Bipolar II is characterized by hypomanic as well as at least one major depressive episode. Bipolar II is more difficult to diagnose because of the nature of hypomanic episodes. Hypomania may simply appear as a period of successful high productivity and is reported less frequently than a distressing depression. Cyclothymia involves a presence or history of hypomanic episodes with periods of depression that do not meet criteria for major depressive episodes. Cyclothymia may interfere with a person's functioning but not as much as the previous two types. Bipolar Disorder NOS is used as a diagnosis when the present condition of an individual doesn't fit into the other categories. What causes bipolar disorder? There are no certain answers. The genes play an important part because bipolarity seems to be running in families. Psychological factors are also important. They seem to be the trigger of the disease. Abnormalities in the brain may also contribute to the disorder. In a few words more research needs to be done. For now bipolar disorder is considered multifactorial; that is, many genes and environmental factors conspire to create the disorder. Treatment? It cannot be cured but it is treatable. The success of the treatment depends on the type and the severity of the symptoms. Treatment methods include pharmacological and psychological techniques. A variety of medications is used in most of the cases and mood stabilizers such as lithium play an important part. Anticonvulsant drugs and antipsychotic drugs are often used. Psychotherapy can help as well in combination with the meds. I'll get to that sometime in the future.
Bipolar Disorder: Underdiagnosed or overdiagnosed?
Mental health professional used to diagnose depression much more easily than bipolar disorder. They tend to ignore hypomanic symptoms because they are seen as rather pleasant by the individual and aren't mentioned as often. On the other hand, many clinical psychologists and psychiatrists today diagnose even children with bipolar disorder and prescribe meds at a very young age. Are all these kids bipolar or just kids being kids? Overdiagnosing patients with bipolar disorder can be really dangerous because of the meds' side-effects. Mood stabilizers are known to have many side effects that implicate the quality of individual's life.
...to be continued
Links: 1, 2, 3, 4
(next bipolar disorder and creativity)
Have you ever heard of the great ape project? It's the name of an international organization formed to advocate the declaration of the rights of the non-human great apes. Primatologists, psychologists, ethicists, and other experts take part in it and suggest that three basic interests are established for the great apes: the right to life, the protection of individual liberty, and the prohibition of torture. The Great Ape Project was founded by Italian philosopher Paola Cavalieri and Australian philosopher Peter Singer and has many famous supporters as the British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and popular scientist writer ("The Selfish Gene", "The God Delusion" etc) Richard Dawkins and Jane Goodall. The great apes are: chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans. It's scientifically indisputable that these animals not only share more than 99% of our DNA but they also experience emotions such as fear, anxiety and happiness. They share the intellectual capacity to create and use tools, learn and teach other languages. They remember their past and plan for their future. Recent research revealed that chimps are smarter than humans when it comes to short memory tests. Interesting findings that make us doubt our so called superiority...
Here's the video from The Great Ape Project (GAP) official website:
To find out more info check the following links: 1, 2, 3
If you've ever been depressed you should know the feeling. Your friends that you haven't seen for a while call you and ask you to meet them, to go out, to socialize because they miss you, they long to see you and catch up. You honestly want to see them, you care about them and of course you value the relationship but being depressed going out seems like a living nightmare... You have no desire to leave your room, you despise the idea of meeting anyone... You hardly look yourself at the mirror. "I'm sorry... I can't come..." Then things go tricky... You try to come up with a reasonable and feasible excuse. Your friends feel rejected, unwanted and there's nothing you can do about it. I've attempted to say "I'm depressed, I don't feel like going out" but it's of no help. The coclusion of all these: you end up losing most of your friends because of bloody depression...What is depression though? Do you really know? Most people have a vague idea.Clinical depression is a mood disorder and can present with a variety of symptoms, however almost all patients display a marked change in mood, a deep feeling of sadness, and a noticeable loss of interest or pleasure in favourite activities. Other recurrent symptoms are: insomnia or oversleeping, loss or in certain cases increase of appetite, feelings of worthlessness, guilt, thought of death and suicide, decreased energy and fatigue (especially in the morning), physical symptoms that can't be connected to a health problem. Symptoms must be present for at least two weeks for depression to be diagnosed.Depression affects 7-18% of the population on at least one occasion in their lives. It's more common in women. I won't go on analyzing all the types of depression, you can find more info here or just google it! Long live the digital Web.Depression can be co-morbid with anxiety. Depression if accompanied by periods of mania or hypomanic episodes is defined as bipolar disorder. I'll dedicate one of my next posts to manic depression or more appropriately called bipolar disorder.Suggested links for further reading: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Sleep Paralysis - Demons, Aliens or just a sleeping disorder?
Sleep paralysis is a peculiar but very interesting sleep disorder. Being a sufferer of sleep paralysis I can assure you that it's a frightening experience that makes you avoid going to bed like hell and staying awake till the early morning hours in order to avoid falling in such a state.
The symptoms of this specific disorder involve complete or partial paralysis, a feeling of heavy pressure on the chest area and sometimes visual or audio hallucinations. Usually, these episodes occur before falling asleep (hypnagogic form) or before waking up (Hypnopompic form). Sleep paralysis isn't as rare as you may think. Many people experience such episodes but dismiss them as vivid dreams. Sometimes sleep paralysis is associated with narcolepsy (a neurological condition characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness), but there are many sufferers of sleep paralysis without signs of any other neurological condition. Actually paralysis normally occurs in REM sleep, thus preventing preventing the body from manifesting movements made in the dreams.
Stress, the sleeping position, sleep deprivation, environmental changes are factors that increase the likelihood of sleep paralysis.
Sleep paralysis cannot be cured but there are techniques that someone can try to break an episode or even prevent it (more info here).
You may wonder what's in common with sleep paralysis and aliens or demons and such spectres. As aforementioned audio and visual hallucinations can coexist with sleep paralysis. As a result it's possible for a person that claims to be abducted by aliens or have a nocturnal encounter with a fantasy night creature to be in fact a sufferer of sleep paralysis. If you're interested in some sleep paralysis related explanations of paranormal phenomena check out the following links: 1, 2, 3
Cognitive bias is a distortion in the way we perceive reality. No matter how clever we are, we can't get rid of cognitive biases. They're thought to be instances of evolved mental behaviour.
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