tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/memory-162/articlesMemory – The Conversation2024-02-16T13:18:39Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2234192024-02-16T13:18:39Z2024-02-16T13:18:39ZCandidates’ aging brains are factors in the presidential race − 4 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575373/original/file-20240213-24-9ifh6w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C0%2C4247%2C2971&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Joe Biden and Donald Trump are two of the three oldest people ever to serve as president.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Election2024ChinaUnitedStates/46152c599dd14340abc0595fca447682/photo">AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The leading contenders in the 2024 presidential election are two of the three oldest people ever to serve as president. President <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/11/27/how-old-is-joe-biden/71479875007/">Joe Biden is 81</a>. Former President <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/11/27/how-old-is-joe-biden/71479875007/">Donald Trump is 77</a>. Ronald <a href="https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/arts-culture/3744771-here-are-the-oldest-us-presidents-to-ever-hold-office/">Reagan took office at 69</a> and left it at age 77.</p>
<p>Both Biden and Trump have faced criticism about what can appear to be obvious signs of aging, including <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2024/02/10/memory-lapses-brain-biden-trump/">questions about their memory</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/age-mental-capacity-dominates-presidential-campaign-trail-after-report-questions-2024-02-10/">cognitive abilities</a>.</p>
<p>Scholars writing for The Conversation U.S. have discussed various aspects of how aging affects people’s brains. Here we spotlight four articles that collectively explain why there is cause for concern, why there is no clear statement to be made about any specific person’s cognitive power as they age, and ways people can preserve their brain power into their golden years. </p>
<h2>1. Decline in thinking can come with age</h2>
<p>Brandeis psychology professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=KL6sulQAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Angela Gutchess</a>, who studies brain activity to understand human thought, said there is a body of work documenting a cognitive decline in aging people:</p>
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<p>“<a href="https://theconversation.com/aging-brains-arent-necessarily-declining-brains-33574">Past behavioral data</a> largely pointed to loss in cognitive – that is, thinking – abilities with age, including poorer memory and greater distractibility.”</p>
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<p>But her work has also found that “aging brains can reorganize and change, and not necessarily for the worse.”</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/aging-brains-arent-necessarily-declining-brains-33574">Aging brains aren't necessarily declining brains</a>
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<h2>2. Some people age faster than others</h2>
<p>Aging is an individual experience, explained <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=tqI8C_UAAAAJ&hl=en">Aditi Gurkar</a>, a geriatric medicine scholar at the University of Pittsburgh:</p>
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<p>“<a href="https://theconversation.com/are-you-a-rapid-ager-biological-age-is-a-better-health-indicator-than-the-number-of-years-youve-lived-but-its-tricky-to-measure-198849">Although age is the principal risk factor</a> for several chronic diseases, it is an unreliable indicator of how quickly your body will decline or how susceptible you are to age-related disease. This is because there is a difference between your chronological age, or the number of years you’ve been alive, and your biological age – your physical and functional ability.”</p>
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<p>Gurkar’s work has been focused on the latter, noting that some people with the same chronological ages can have very different cognitive and physical abilities. Key factors include the strength of a person’s social connections, as well as their sleeping habits, water consumption, exercise and diet.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/are-you-a-rapid-ager-biological-age-is-a-better-health-indicator-than-the-number-of-years-youve-lived-but-its-tricky-to-measure-198849">Are you a rapid ager? Biological age is a better health indicator than the number of years you've lived, but it's tricky to measure</a>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">As University of Pittsburgh geriatric scholar Aditi Gurkar notes in her TED Talk, aging is not just a number.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>3. Even cells age differently inside the body</h2>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DDc-okgAAAAJ&hl=en">Ellen Quarles</a>, who teaches cellular and molecular biology of aging at the University of Michigan, explained that aging is so individualized that it varies even at the cellular level:</p>
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<p>“<a href="https://theconversation.com/aging-is-complicated-a-biologist-explains-why-no-two-people-or-cells-age-the-same-way-and-what-this-means-for-anti-aging-interventions-202096">There is no single cause of aging</a>. No two people age the same way, and indeed, neither do any two cells. There are countless ways for your basic biology to go wrong over time, and these add up to create a unique network of aging-related factors for each person that make finding a one-size-fits-all anti-aging treatment extremely challenging.”</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/aging-is-complicated-a-biologist-explains-why-no-two-people-or-cells-age-the-same-way-and-what-this-means-for-anti-aging-interventions-202096">Aging is complicated – a biologist explains why no two people or cells age the same way, and what this means for anti-aging interventions</a>
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<h2>4. There is a way to preserve abilities</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/brian-ho-1466332">Brian Ho</a> and
<a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=kFenpZ4AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Ronald Cohen</a>, University of Florida scholars who study brain health in aging people, have found that physical activity makes a real difference in cognition:</p>
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<p>“<a href="https://theconversation.com/aerobic-and-strength-training-exercise-combined-can-be-an-elixir-for-better-brain-health-in-your-80s-and-90s-new-study-finds-212433">People in the oldest stage of life</a> who regularly engage in aerobic activities and strength training exercises perform better on cognitive tests than those who are either sedentary or participate only in aerobic exercise.”</p>
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<p>Specifically, they found:</p>
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<p>“(T)hose who incorporated both aerobic exercises, such as swimming and cycling, and strength exercises like weightlifting into their routines – regardless of intensity and duration – had better mental agility, quicker thinking and greater ability to shift or adapt their thinking.”</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/aerobic-and-strength-training-exercise-combined-can-be-an-elixir-for-better-brain-health-in-your-80s-and-90s-new-study-finds-212433">Aerobic and strength training exercise combined can be an elixir for better brain health in your 80s and 90s, new study finds</a>
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<p>Whether it’s for Biden and Trump or anyone else, these scholars advise staying active, deepening connections with family and friends and recognizing that not everyone ages the same way.</p>
<p><em>This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223419/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Both men have faced criticism about what can appear to be obvious signs of aging, including questions about their memory and cognitive abilities.Jeff Inglis, Politics + Society Editor, The Conversation USLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2232842024-02-14T15:20:06Z2024-02-14T15:20:06ZWhy forgetting is a normal function of memory – and when to worry<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575599/original/file-20240214-22-ktb21p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=73%2C98%2C8106%2C5359&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/disappointed-forgetful-young-woman-tired-cramming-1887098245">Cast Of Thousands/Shutterstock</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Forgetting in our day to day lives may feel annoying or, as we get older, a little frightening. But it is an entirely normal part of memory – enabling us to move on or make space for new information. </p>
<p>In fact, our memories <a href="https://theconversation.com/are-memories-reliable-expert-explains-how-they-change-more-than-we-realise-106461">aren’t as reliable</a> as we may think. But what level of forgetting is actually normal? Is it OK to <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-68257586">mix up the names of countries</a>, as US president Joe Biden recently did? Let’s take a look at the evidence.</p>
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<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/audio-narrated-99682">narrated by Noa</a>.</em></p>
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<p>When we <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6853990/">remember something</a>, our brains need to learn it (encode), keep it safe (store) and recover it when needed (retrieve). Forgetting can occur at any point in this process. </p>
<p>When sensory information first comes in to the brain we can’t process it all. We instead <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2718243/">use our attention</a> to filter the information so that what’s important can be identified and processed. That process means that when we are encoding our experiences we are mostly encoding the things we are paying attention to. </p>
<p>If someone introduces themselves at a dinner party at the same time as we’re paying attention to something else, we never encode their name. It’s a failure of memory (forgetting), but it’s entirely <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00841/full">normal and very common</a>. </p>
<p>Habits and structure, such as always putting our keys in the same place so we don’t have to encode their location, can help us get around this problem. </p>
<p>Rehearsal is also important for memory. If we don’t use it, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0033-2909.102.3.403">we lose it</a>. Memories that last the longest are the ones we’ve rehearsed and retold many times (although we often adapt the memory with every retelling, and likely remember the last rehearsal rather than the actual event itself).</p>
<p>In the 1880s, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus <a href="https://www2.open.ac.uk/openlearn/CHIPs/data/accessibility/nodes/231.html">taught people nonsense syllables</a> they had never heard before, and looked at how much they remembered over time. He showed that, without rehearsal, most of our memory fades within a day or two. </p>
<p>However, if people rehearsed the syllables by having them repeated at regular intervals, this drastically increased the number of syllables that could be remembered for more than just a day. </p>
<p>This need for rehearsal can be another cause of every day forgetting, however. When we go to the supermarket we might encode where we park the car, but when we enter the shop we are busy rehearsing other things we need to remember (our shopping list). As a result, we may forget the location of the car. </p>
<p>However, this shows us another feature of forgetting. We can forget specific information, <a href="https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/news/2021/memory-details-fade-over-time-with-only-the-main-gist-preserved">but remember the gist</a>. </p>
<p>When we walk out of the shop and realise that we don’t remember where we parked the car, we can probably remember whether it was to the left or right of the shop door, on the edge of the car park or towards the centre though. So rather than having to walk round the entire car park to find it, we can search a relatively defined area. </p>
<h2>The impact of ageing</h2>
<p>As people get older, they <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1123445/">worry about their memory more</a>. It’s true that our forgetting becomes more pronounced, but that doesn’t always mean there’s a problem. </p>
<p>The longer we live, the more experiences we have, and the more we have to remember. Not only that, but the experiences have much in common, meaning <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780121025700500100">it can become tricky</a> to separate these events in our memory.</p>
<p>If you’ve only ever experienced a holiday on a beach in Spain once you will remember it with great clarity. However, if you’ve been on many holidays to Spain, in different cities at different times, then remembering whether something happened in the first holiday you took to Barcelona or the second, or whether your brother came with you on the holiday to Majorca or Ibiza, becomes more challenging. </p>
<p>Overlap between memories, or interference, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-memory-clutter-makes-it-harder-to-remember-things-as-we-get-older-176767">gets in the way</a> of retrieving information. Imagine filing documents on your computer. As you start the process, you have a clear filing system where you can easily place each document so you know where to find it. </p>
<p>But as more and more documents come in, it gets hard to decide which of the folders it belongs to. You may also start putting lots of documents in one folder because they all relate to that item. </p>
<p>This means that, over time, it becomes hard to retrieve the right document when you need it either because you can’t work out where you put it, or because you know where it should be but there are lots of other things there to search through. </p>
<p>It can be disruptive to not forget. Post traumatic stress disorder is an example of a situation in which people can not forget. The memory is persistent, doesn’t fade and often interrupts daily life. </p>
<p>There can be similar experiences with persistent memories in grief or depression, conditions which can <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3518852/">make it harder to forget</a> negative information. Here, forgetting would be extremely useful. </p>
<h2>Forgetting doesn’t always impair decision making</h2>
<p>So forgetting things is common, and as we get older it becomes more common. But forgetting names or dates, as Biden has, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/health/bidens-memory-issues-draw-attention-neurologists-weigh-rcna138135">doesn’t necessarily impair decision making</a>. Older people can have deep knowledge and <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-it-rational-to-trust-your-gut-feelings-a-neuroscientist-explains-95086">good intuition</a>, which can help counteract such memory lapses.</p>
<p>Of course, at times forgetting can be a sign of a bigger problem and might suggest you need to speak to the doctor. Asking the same questions over and over again is a sign that forgetting is more than just a problem of being distracted when you tried to encode it.</p>
<p>Similarly, forgetting your way round very familiar areas is another sign that you are struggling to use cues in the environment to remind you of how to get around. And while forgetting the name of someone at dinner is normal, forgetting how to use your fork and knife isn’t. </p>
<p>Ultimately, forgetting isn’t something to fear – in ourselves or others. It is usually extreme when it’s a sign things are going wrong.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223284/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexander Easton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Can’t remember where you put your keys? It’s normal.Alexander Easton, Professor of Psychology, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2221952024-02-01T16:03:02Z2024-02-01T16:03:02ZPlaying a musical instrument or singing in a choir may boost your brain – new study<p>Generations of parents have told their children to practice their musical instruments. Parents have good reason to keep on top of their children’s musical education, since learning an instrument is not only associated with <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-6237.2009.00598.x">better educational attainment</a> but also <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnins.2013.00279/full#B43">cognition (thinking)</a> and even <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0003566">intelligence scores</a> in children. But does this musicality translate to better cognition later in life?</p>
<p>A <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/gps.6061">recent study</a> in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry investigated this question by asking middle-aged and older people to complete a questionnaire on their lifetime musical experience before completing cognitive (thinking) tests. The results showed that musical people had better memory and executive function (the ability to stay focused on tasks, plan and have self-control) than those with less or no musicality. </p>
<p>A good memory is important for playing a musical instrument, such as playing music from memory, and this seems to translate to people’s cognitive performance. Similarly, executive function is required when playing an instrument, and this too translated to improved cognitive performance. </p>
<p>This finding was similar, regardless of which instrument people played or the level of musical proficiency people acquired – although most people in the study played an instrument for only a few years of their lives. </p>
<p>What made a difference, however, was whether people still played an instrument or only played in the past, with current amateur musicians showing the highest cognitive performance of participants. </p>
<p>This makes sense as continued engagement in cognitively stimulating activities, such as playing an instrument, should result in continued brain health benefits, whereas having played the recorder for three years at primary school might not have that big an impact on our cognitive performance later in life. But how about being musical without playing an instrument?</p>
<p>Singing is a very popular musical activity as it allows joining musical groups, such as choirs, without the need to learn a musical instrument. But does singing provide the same cognitive benefit as playing an instrument? </p>
<p>According to the study findings, singing can result in better executive function but not memory, suggesting that playing an instrument has additional brain health benefits. </p>
<p>Why singing would help us with our executive function is not clear and requires further investigation. However, singing has a strong social benefit when done in choirs, and there is good evidence that being engaged in social activity is good for our brain health. </p>
<h2>The ‘Mozart effect’</h2>
<p>How about just listening to music? Does it also improve our cognition and potentially brain health? </p>
<p>Many people might remember the famous “Mozart effect”, which was based on a study published in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/365611a0">Nature</a> in 1993 showing that when students were played Mozart, they scored higher on intelligence tests. </p>
<p>This led to a whole industry promising us that playing such music to ourselves or even our babies could lead to cognitive benefits, even though the evidence for the original study is still controversially discussed to this day. </p>
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<span class="caption">Playing Mozart won’t make your baby smarter.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/pregnant-women-listening-music-mozart-effect-1278569506">comzeal images/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>Sadly, the current study found no association between listening to music and cognitive performance. Cognitive stimulation depends on us being actively engaged in activities, so passively listening to music doesn’t seem to provide any cognitive benefits. </p>
<p>Playing an instrument or singing seems to have benefits to our brain health in ageing, according to the study. What is yet to be established is whether this would also help prevent future cognitive decline or dementia. </p>
<p>The study provides no evidence for this yet and it is also not clear how the findings apply to the general population, since most people in the study were female, well-educated and well-off. </p>
<p>Still, considering the overall cognitive and social benefits of learning an instrument or singing in a choir, it might be worth engaging in such cognitive stimulation as we age. Our parents would be proud of us.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-music-heals-us-even-when-its-sad-by-a-neuroscientist-leading-a-new-study-of-musical-therapy-214924">How music heals us, even when it's sad – by a neuroscientist leading a new study of musical therapy</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222195/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Hornberger does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Listening to music, though, doesn’t have the same benefits.Michael Hornberger, Professor of Applied Dementia Research, University of East AngliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2185102024-01-09T19:15:38Z2024-01-09T19:15:38ZWanting to ‘move on’ is natural – but women’s pandemic experiences can’t be lost to ‘lockdown amnesia’<p>The COVID-19 pandemic was – and continues to be – hugely disruptive and stressful for individuals, communities and countries. Yet many seem desperate to close the chapter entirely, almost as if it had never happened. </p>
<p>This desire to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/03/13/brain-memory-pandemic-covid-forgetting/">forget and move on</a> – labelled “<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/be70b24e-8ca0-4681-a23b-0c59c69a2616">lockdown amnesia</a>” by some – is understandable at one level. But it also risks missing the opportunity to learn from what happened.</p>
<p>And while various official enquiries and royal commissions have been established to examine the wider government responses (including in New Zealand), the experiences of ordinary people are equally important to understand.</p>
<p>As researchers interested in women and gender roles, we wanted to capture some of this. For the past three years, our research has focused on what happened to everyday women during this period of uncertainty and disruption – and what lessons might be learned.</p>
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<h2>Pandemic amnesia</h2>
<p>Individual memory can become vague as time goes on. But this can also be affected by broader narratives (in the media or official responses) that overwrite our own recollections of the pandemic.</p>
<p>Political calls to “<a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/11/8/340">live with the virus</a>”, and <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/mediawatch/audio/2018849569/sick-and-tired-of-the-sickness">media hesitancy</a> to publish COVID-related stories due to perceived audience fatigue, can create a collective sense of needing to “move on”. Looking back can be seen as questionable, or even attacked.</p>
<p>Indeed, misinformation and disinformation have been used, <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Risk/Lupton/p/book/9781032327006">in the words</a> of leading pandemic social scientist Deborah Lupton, to “challenge science and manufacture dissent against attempts to tackle [such] crises”.</p>
<p>But as the memory scholar <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/17506980231184563?casa_token=Wrs8pMKoFqcAAAAA:N9DN9rb9XNopHSIF2af2q8z4Ue457oW6l-mqPtBlmUQSy6dw53DYhQWxgk8BLe3SyWIzlkXTnvAPrYw">Sydney Goggins has put it</a>, such “public forgetting leads to a cascade of impacts on policy and social wellbeing”.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/jacinda-arderns-resignation-gender-and-the-toll-of-strong-compassionate-leadership-198152">Jacinda Ardern's resignation: gender and the toll of strong, compassionate leadership</a>
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<h2>A gendered pandemic</h2>
<p>Responding to the rapidly changing social, cultural and economic impacts of the pandemic, feminist scholars have highlighted the particular <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/Articles/10.3389/Fgwh.2020.588372/Full">physical and emotional toll</a> on women worldwide.</p>
<p>This has included <a href="https://academic.oup.com/biomedgerontology/article/77/Supplement_1/S31/6463712">social isolation and loneliness</a>, increased <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15487733.2020.1776561?src=recsys">domestic and emotional labour</a>, the rise in <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7262164/">domestic and gender-based violence</a>, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13545701.2021.1876906">job losses and financial insecurity</a>. Black, Indigenous, minority and migrant women have <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/08912432211001302">felt these impacts</a> particularly keenly.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/abs/10.3316/informit.777013552598989">same trends</a> have been observed in Aotearoa New Zealand. And whereas some countries embraced pandemic recovery strategies that recognised these gender differences, this <a href="https://theconversation.com/nz-budget-2021-women-left-behind-despite-the-focus-on-well-being-161187">hasn’t been the case</a> in New Zealand.</p>
<p>The gendered abuse of women leaders – former prime minister <a href="https://theconversation.com/jacinda-arderns-resignation-gender-and-the-toll-of-strong-compassionate-leadership-198152">Jacinda Ardern</a> and scientist <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/atthemovies/audio/2018913516/review-ms-information">Siouxsie Wiles</a>, for example – have been well documented. But the experiences of ordinary women, their struggles and strategies to look after themselves and others, have had much less attention.</p>
<h2>Experiences of everyday women</h2>
<p>Our study involved 110 women in Aotearoa New Zealand. We set out to understand how they adapted their everyday practices – work, leisure, exercise, sport – to maintain or regain wellbeing, social connections and a sense of community.</p>
<p>Despite many differences between the women in our sample, there were also shared experiences. We referred to the ruptures in the patterns, rhythms and routines of their lives as “<a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/gwao.12987">gender arrhythmia</a>”.</p>
<p>The women responded to the psycho-social and physical challenges, such as disrupted sleep or weight changes, by creating counter-rhythms – taking up hobbies, exercising, changing diet.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-pandemics-disproportionate-impact-on-women-is-derailing-decades-of-progress-on-gender-equality-180941">The pandemic’s disproportionate impact on women is derailing decades of progress on gender equality</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The pandemic also prompted many to reflect on how their pre-pandemic routines and rhythms had caused various forms of “alienation”: from their own health and wellbeing, meaningful social connections, ethical and sustainable work practices, and pleasure.</p>
<p>The disruption of the pandemic caused many to reevaluate the importance of work in their lives. As one reflected: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>COVID-19 has made me reassess what is the most important thing. Is it making money? Actually, no, not at all.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Others were prompted to question and challenge the gendered demands on women to “do everything” and “be everywhere” for everyone:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think as women, because we’re so good at multitasking, we just put so much on our plates. I think we need to learn just to say no, because we’re not superhuman. And ultimately, all of this responsibility is weighing us down.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Our research also highlighted how the pandemic affected women’s relationships with <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1755458623000270?casa_token=KcmGBPnpKLQAAAAA:MmQhDue20CoR0f6lK8rjWfxtBSHsjpzjbJu8tIc03StdccyCvduAs3CUVPwk18rPbklx3_j8DEo">familiar spaces and places</a>. Leaving home for a walk, run or bike ride became important everyday practices that proved highly beneficial for most women’s subjective wellbeing. </p>
<p>Some came to <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/01937235231200288">appreciate physical activity</a> for the general joys of movement and connection with people and places, rather than simply to achieve particular goals like fitness or weight loss. </p>
<h2>Special challenges for young women</h2>
<p>As part of our overall project, we also <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13668803.2023.2268818?needAccess=true">focused on 45 young women</a> (aged 16 to 25). This highlighted the importance of recognising how gender, ethnicity and socioeconomic circumstances intersect. </p>
<p>Listening to their <a href="https://www.tepunahamatatini.ac.nz/2023/11/07/the-invisible-glue-holding-families-together-during-the-pandemic/">pandemic stories</a>, we found young women played important roles in supporting their families and communities. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/covid-19-has-laid-bare-how-much-we-value-womens-work-and-how-little-we-pay-for-it-136042">COVID-19 has laid bare how much we value women's work, and how little we pay for it</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>In particular, Māori, Pacific and others from diverse ethnic or migrant backgrounds carried increased responsibilities in the home, including childcare, cleaning, cooking and shopping. While many did so willingly, these extra burdens took a toll on their schooling, mental health and wellbeing.</p>
<p>For many young women, the pandemic was a radical disruption to their everyday lives and routines during a critical stage of identity development. They missed key milestones and events, and crucial phases of education and social development. </p>
<p>Many still grieve for some of those losses. And some are struggling to rebuild social connections, motivation and aspirations.</p>
<p>For example, some described being passionate and aspiring athletes before the pandemic. But social anxieties and body-image issues left over from lockdowns have been hard to shake, and have seen them <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2673-995X/3/3/55">struggle to return</a> to sport. </p>
<h2>The invisible work of migrant women</h2>
<p>We also looked deeply at the experiences of <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-38797-5_9">12 middle-class migrant women</a>, and how prolonged border closures created real anxiety about “not being there” for families overseas. </p>
<p>As one nurse working on the front line of COVID care in NZ explained:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>About a year ago, the cases of COVID in my homeland were increasing so rapidly. My family were not very well and I was depending on social media […] trying to reach out to them. I was really scared at that time, not being able to see your family when they really need you, not being able to be with them.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Some of the women in our sample also experienced <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14649365.2023.2275761">increased anti-immigrant sentiments</a> which further affected their health and wellbeing – and their feelings of belonging. As one said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’ve become extremely sensitive. I cry about small things. My doctor said “go and get some fresh air, it’s good for you” […] I went outside for a walk, and someone shouted at me, screamed at me. I got terrified for my life. How do you expect me to have wellbeing when no one in the society accepts you?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This arm of the research suggests a real need for <a href="https://www.belong.org.nz/migrant-experiences-in-the-time-of-covid">investment in policies and support strategies</a> specifically for migrant women and their communities in any future global health emergency.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/new-zealanders-are-learning-to-live-with-covid-but-does-that-mean-having-to-pay-for-protection-ourselves-219698">New Zealanders are learning to live with COVID – but does that mean having to pay for protection ourselves?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Communities of care</h2>
<p>A key feature of our study was the highly creative ways women cultivated “<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2043820620934268">communities of care</a>” during the pandemic. Even when they were struggling themselves, they reached out to friends and family – and particularly other women. </p>
<p>The majority of our participants were prompted to think differently about their own health and wellbeing, and what is important in their lives (now and in the future). </p>
<p>Throughout the pandemic, women have worked quietly, behind the scenes, in their families, communities and workplaces, supporting their own and others’ health and wellbeing. This invisible labour is rarely acknowledged or celebrated. </p>
<p>Many still feel the toll of economic hardship, violence and exhaustion. And less tangible feelings of disillusionment remain in a society that has so quickly “moved on” from the pandemic.</p>
<p>Acknowledging and addressing pandemic amnesia – personal and collective – is an important first step in documenting, learning from, and using these experiences to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953622008176">better prepare for future events</a>. Next time, we need to ensure the necessary support is available for those most in need.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>The authors wish to acknowledge the other members of the research team: Dr Nikki Barrett, Dr Julie Brice, Dr Allison Jeffrey and Dr Anoosh Soltani.</em></p>
<hr><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218510/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Holly Thorpe receives funding from a Royal Society Te Apārangi James Cook Research Fellowship.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Grace O'Leary, Mihi Joy Nemani, and Nida Ahmad do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>COVID was a ‘gendered pandemic’, with women carrying very different burdens to men. A three-year New Zealand research project aimed to overcome the urge to forget, and provide lessons for the future.Holly Thorpe, Professor in Sociology of Sport and Gender, University of WaikatoGrace O'Leary, Research Fellow, University of WaikatoMihi Joy Nemani, Senior Lecturer, Te Huataki Waiora School of Health, University of WaikatoNida Ahmad, Research Fellow, University of WaikatoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2172552024-01-04T13:48:42Z2024-01-04T13:48:42ZThe chickadee in the snowbank: A ‘canary in the coal mine’ for climate change in the Sierra Nevada mountains<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564542/original/file-20231208-19-uw3l7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C148%2C4139%2C2775&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mountain chickadees struggle with snow extremes.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Benjamin Sonnenberg</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Wet snow pelts my face and pulls against my skis as I climb above 8,000 feet in the Sierra Nevada of eastern California, tugging a sled loaded with batteries, bolts, wire and 40 pounds of sunflower seeds critical to our mountain chickadee research.</p>
<p>As we reach the remote research site, I duck under a tarp and open a laptop. A chorus of identification numbers are shouted back and forth as fellow behavioral ecologist <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=KfEtp4gAAAAJ&hl=en">Vladimir Pravosudov</a> and I program <a href="https://youtu.be/a69lKv65mZk?feature=shared">“smart” bird feeders</a> for an upcoming experiment.</p>
<p>I have spent the past six years <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=PBLRszkAAAAJ&hl=en">monitoring a population of mountain chickadees</a> here, tracking their life cycles and, importantly, their memory, working in a system <a href="https://chickadeecognition.com/">Pravosudov established in 2013</a>. The long, consistent record from this research site has allowed us to observe how chickadees survive in extreme winter snowfall and to identify ecological patterns and changes. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A ring of tall, rectangular metal bird feeders mounded high with snow on top." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564534/original/file-20231208-19-4f18vw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Snow piles up on the experiment’s bird feeders. Each chickadee has a radio frequency identification tag that opens its assigned feeder, allowing scientists to track its movements and memory.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Vladimir Pravosudov</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In recent history, intense winters are often followed by drought years here in the Sierra Nevada and in much of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-95979-4">the U.S. West</a>. This teeter-totter pattern has been identified as one of the unexpected symptoms of climate change, and its impact on the chickadees is providing an early warning of the disruptions ahead for the dynamics within these coniferous forest ecosystems. </p>
<p>Our research shows that a mountain chickadee facing deep snow is, to borrow a cliche, like a canary in a coal mine – its survivability tells us about the challenges ahead.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A chickadee sits on a man's finger as the two look at each other." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564900/original/file-20231211-17-53wkl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The author, Benjamin Sonnenberg, and one of his research subjects − a young chickadee with a transponder tag on its leg.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Benjamin Sonnenberg</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The extraordinary memory of a chickadee</h2>
<p>As Pravosudov calls out the next identification number, and as my legs slowly get colder and wetter, a charming and chipper “<a href="https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Mountain_Chickadee/sounds#">DEE DEE DEE</a>” chimes down from a nearby tree. How is it that a bird weighing barely more than a few sheets of paper is more comfortable in this storm than I am?</p>
<p>The answer comes down to the chickadees’ incredible spatial cognitive abilities.</p>
<p>Cognition is the processes by which animals acquire, process, store and act on information from <a href="https://doi.org/10.1006/anbe.2000.1606">their environment</a>. It is critical to many species but is often subtle and difficult to measure in nonhuman animals.</p>
<p>Chickadees are food-storing specialists that hide tens of thousands of individual food items throughout the forest under edges of tree bark, or even between pine needles, each fall. Then, they use their specialized spatial memory to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110512-135904">retrieve those food caches</a> in the months to come.</p>
<p>Conditions in the high Sierras can be harsh, and if chickadees can’t remember where their food is, they die.</p>
<p>We measure the spatial memory of chickadees using a classic associative learning task but in a very atypical <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2015.10.015">location</a>. To do this, we hang a circular array of eight feeders equipped with radio-frequency identification and filled with seed in several locations across our <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2019.00257">field site</a>. Birds are tagged with “keys” – transponder tags in leg bands that contain individual identification numbers and allow them to open the doors of their assigned feeders to get a food reward.</p>
<p>The setup allows us to measure the spatial memory performance of individual chickadees, because they have to remember which feeder their key enables them to open. Over eight years, our findings demonstrate that chickadees with better spatial memory ability are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2019.01.006">more likely to survive</a> in the high mountains than those with worse memories. </p>
<p>However, chickadees may be facing increasing challenges that will shape their future in the high mountains. In 2017, a year with record-breaking snow levels, adult chickadees showed the lowest probability of survival <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-020-2817-2">ever measured at our site</a>. This exceptionally extreme winter came with recurrent storms containing cold weather and high winds, making it difficult for even the memory savvy chickadees to forage and survive. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, triumphant populations have persisted in high-elevation mountain environments, but their future is becoming uncertain.</p>
<h2>What’s the problem?</h2>
<p>“It’s weather whiplash,” says <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=iEEye1UAAAAJ&hl=en">Adrian Harpold</a>, a mountain ecohydrologist. Harpold works to understand variations in climate patterns within forest environments, and one of his field sites lies alongside our chickadee research site. </p>
<p>The Sierra Nevada and other mountain ranges in western North America have been experiencing more <a href="https://statesummaries.ncics.org/chapter/ca/">extreme snow years and drought years</a>, amplified by climate change. Extreme snow linked to global warming might seem counterintuitive, but it’s basic physics. Warmer air can hold more moisture – <a href="https://climate.nasa.gov/explore/ask-nasa-climate/3143/steamy-relationships-how-atmospheric-water-vapor-amplifies-earths-greenhouse-effect/">about 7% more for every degree Celsius</a> (every 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) that temperatures rise. This can result in heavier snowfall when storms strike.</p>
<p><iframe id="VfiF9" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/VfiF9/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>In 2023’s record winter, over 17 feet (5 meters) of snow covered the landscape that our chickadees were using every day. In fact, these intense storms and cold temperatures not only made it difficult for birds to survive the winter but made it almost impossible for them to breed the next summer: 46% of chickadee nests at our higher elevation site failed to produce any offspring. This was likely due to the deep snow that prevented them from finding emerging insects to feed nestlings or even reaching nesting sites at all until July.</p>
<h2>The cascading harms from too much snow</h2>
<p>Even in years of tremendous snowfall, chickadees can still use their finely honed spatial memories to recover food. However, severe storms can shorten their survival odds. And if they do survive the winter, their nesting sites – tree cavities – may be buried under feet of snow in the spring. </p>
<p>It doesn’t matter how smart you are if you can’t reach your nest.</p>
<p>Extreme snow oscillations also affect insects that are critical for feeding chickadee chicks. Limited resources lead to smaller chickadee offspring that are less likely to survive high in the mountains. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A tiny baby chickadee sits in a man's hand. It's mouth below a still developing beak is bright yellow." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/565552/original/file-20231213-15-r59z40.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mountain chickadee chicks can struggle to survive during winters with extreme snow.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Benjamin Sonnenberg</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Snow cover is good for overwintering insects in most cases, as it provides an insulating blanket that saves them from dying during those freezing months. However, if the snow persists too long into the summer, insects can run out of energy and die before they can emerge, or emerge after chickadees <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/brv.12105">really need them</a>. Drought years also can drive insect population decline. </p>
<p>Extremes at both ends of the spectrum are making it harder for chickadees to thrive, and more and more we are seeing oscillations between these extremes.</p>
<p>These compounded effects mean that in some years chickadees simply don’t successfully nest at all. This leads to a decline in chickadee populations in years with worse whiplash – drought followed by high snow on repeat – especially at high elevations. This is especially concerning, as many <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.16187">mountain-dwelling avian species are forecasted to move up in elevation</a> to escape warming temperatures, which may turn out to be hazardous. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Eight little chickadees in a circle in a wooden box, their tails all together in the center to keep their bodies warm." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564540/original/file-20231208-17-vwxtfo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Baby chickadees stay warm inside a wooden box.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Benjamin Sonnenberg</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Lessons for the future</h2>
<p>Chickadees may be portrayed as radiating tranquil beauty on holiday cards, but realistically, these loud, round ruffians are tough survivors of harsh winter environments in northern latitudes.</p>
<p>Our long-term research following these chickadees provides a unique window into the relationships between winter snow, chickadee populations and the biological community around them, such as <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-007-9358-9">coniferous forests</a> and <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.2023989118">insect</a> populations. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/a69lKv65mZk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Benjamin Sonnenberg and Vladimir Pravosudov show how the feeders work to test birds’ memories in a video about the early stages of their research.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These relationships illustrate that climate change is a more complicated story than just the temperature climb – and that its whiplash and cascading effects can destabilize ecosystems.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217255/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Benjamin Sonnenberg receives funding from the National Science Foundation. </span></em></p>These tiny songbirds have extraordinary memories for the tens of thousands of spots where they hide food. But that doesn’t help when heavy snow blocks their access.Benjamin Sonnenberg, Ph.D. Candidate in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology, University of Nevada, RenoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2200442023-12-18T16:17:12Z2023-12-18T16:17:12ZA new supercomputer aims to closely mimic the human brain — it could help unlock the secrets of the mind and advance AI<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566252/original/file-20231218-15-hajmbj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=19%2C9%2C6470%2C3940&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/businessman-touching-digital-human-brain-cell-582507070">Sdecoret / Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A supercomputer scheduled to go online in April 2024 will rival the estimated rate of operations in the human brain, <a href="https://www.westernsydney.edu.au/newscentre/news_centre/more_news_stories/world_first_supercomputer_capable_of_brain-scale_simulation_being_built_at_western_sydney_university">according to researchers in Australia</a>. The machine, called DeepSouth, is capable of performing 228 trillion operations per second. </p>
<p>It’s the world’s first supercomputer capable of simulating networks of neurons and synapses (key biological structures that make up our nervous system) at the scale of the human brain.</p>
<p>DeepSouth belongs to an approach <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s43588-021-00184-y">known as neuromorphic computing</a>, which aims to mimic the biological processes of the human brain. It will be run from the International Centre for Neuromorphic Systems at Western Sydney University.</p>
<p>Our brain is the most amazing computing machine we know. By distributing its
computing power to billions of small units (neurons) that interact through trillions of connections (synapses), the brain can rival the most powerful supercomputers in the world, while requiring only the same power used by a fridge lamp bulb.</p>
<p>Supercomputers, meanwhile, generally take up lots of space and need large amounts of electrical power to run. The world’s most powerful supercomputer, the <a href="https://www.hpe.com/uk/en/compute/hpc/cray/oak-ridge-national-laboratory.html">Hewlett Packard Enterprise Frontier</a>, can perform just over one quintillion operations per second. It covers 680 square metres (7,300 sq ft) and requires 22.7 megawatts (MW) to run. </p>
<p>Our brains can perform the same number of operations per second with just 20 watts of power, while weighing just 1.3kg-1.4kg. Among other things, neuromorphic computing aims to unlock the secrets of this amazing efficiency.</p>
<h2>Transistors at the limits</h2>
<p>On June 30 1945, the mathematician and physicist <a href="https://www.ias.edu/von-neumann">John von Neumann</a> described the design of a new machine, the <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/194089">Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer (Edvac)</a>. This effectively defined the modern electronic computer as we know it. </p>
<p>My smartphone, the laptop I am using to write this article and the most powerful supercomputer in the world all share the same fundamental structure introduced by von Neumann almost 80 years ago. <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/computer-science/von-neumann-architecture">These all have distinct processing and memory units</a>, where data and instructions are stored in the memory and computed by a processor.</p>
<p>For decades, the number of transistors on a microchip doubled approximately every two years, <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/591665">an observation known as Moore’s Law</a>. This allowed us to have smaller and cheaper computers. </p>
<p>However, transistor sizes are now approaching the atomic scale. At these tiny sizes, excessive heat generation is a problem, as is a phenomenon called quantum tunnelling, which interferes with the functioning of the transistors. <a href="https://qz.com/852770/theres-a-limit-to-how-small-we-can-make-transistors-but-the-solution-is-photonic-chips#:%7E:text=They're%20made%20of%20silicon,we%20can%20make%20a%20transistor.">This is slowing down</a> and will eventually halt transistor miniaturisation.</p>
<p>To overcome this issue, scientists are exploring new approaches to
computing, starting from the powerful computer we all have hidden in our heads, the human brain. Our brains do not work according to John von Neumann’s model of the computer. They don’t have separate computing and memory areas. </p>
<p>They instead work by connecting billions of nerve cells that communicate information in the form of electrical impulses. Information can be passed from <a href="https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain-basics/brain/brain-physiology/action-potentials-and-synapses">one neuron to the next through a junction called a synapse</a>. The organisation of neurons and synapses in the brain is flexible, scalable and efficient. </p>
<p>So in the brain – and unlike in a computer – memory and computation are governed by the same neurons and synapses. Since the late 1980s, scientists have been studying this model with the intention of importing it to computing.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Microchip." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566265/original/file-20231218-25-yjbwxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The continuing miniaturisation of transistors on microchips is limited by the laws of physics.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/close-presentation-new-generation-microchip-gloved-691548583">Gorodenkoff / Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Imitation of life</h2>
<p>Neuromorphic computers are based on intricate networks of simple, elementary processors (which act like the brain’s neurons and synapses). The main advantage of this is that these machines <a href="https://www.electronicsworld.co.uk/advances-in-parallel-processing-with-neuromorphic-analogue-chip-implementations/34337/">are inherently “parallel”</a>. </p>
<p>This means that, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.95.3.933">as with neurons and synapses</a>, virtually all the processors in a computer can potentially be operating simultaneously, communicating in tandem.</p>
<p>In addition, because the computations performed by individual neurons and synapses are very simple compared with traditional computers, the energy consumption is orders of magnitude smaller. Although neurons are sometimes thought of as processing units, and synapses as memory units, they contribute to both processing and storage. In other words, data is already located where the computation requires it.</p>
<p>This speeds up the brain’s computing in general because there is no separation between memory and processor, which in classical (von Neumann) machines causes a slowdown. But it also avoids the need to perform a specific task of accessing data from a main memory component, as happens in conventional computing systems and consumes a considerable amount of energy. </p>
<p>The principles we have just described are the main inspiration for DeepSouth. This is not the only neuromorphic system currently active. It is worth mentioning the <a href="https://www.humanbrainproject.eu">Human Brain Project (HBP)</a>, funded under an <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/futurium/en/content/fet-flagships.html">EU initiative</a>. The HBP was operational from 2013 to 2023, and led to BrainScaleS, a machine located in Heidelberg, in Germany, that emulates the way that neurons and synapses work. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.humanbrainproject.eu/en/science-development/focus-areas/neuromorphic-computing/hardware/">BrainScaleS</a> can simulate the way that neurons “spike”, the way that an electrical impulse travels along a neuron in our brains. This would make BrainScaleS an ideal candidate to investigate the mechanics of cognitive processes and, in future, mechanisms underlying serious neurological and neurodegenerative diseases.</p>
<p>Because they are engineered to mimic actual brains, neuromorphic computers could be the beginning of a turning point. Offering sustainable and affordable computing power and allowing researchers to evaluate models of neurological systems, they are an ideal platform for a range of applications. They have the potential to both advance our understanding of the brain and offer new approaches to artificial intelligence.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220044/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Domenico Vicinanza does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Neuromorphic computers aim to one day replicate the amazing efficiency of the brain.Domenico Vicinanza, Associate Professor of Intelligent Systems and Data Science, Anglia Ruskin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2180092023-12-07T18:29:49Z2023-12-07T18:29:49ZHolocaust comparisons are overused – but in the case of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel they may reflect more than just the emotional response of a traumatized people<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562232/original/file-20231128-17-5wy2xb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C9%2C3285%2C2183&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">On Oct. 12, a sign in Tel Aviv says in Hebrew, 'No more words,' near candles lit both in memory of those killed in the Hamas massacres and for the hostages taken to the Gaza Strip. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/sign-saying-in-hebrew-no-more-words-near-candles-that-were-news-photo/1720743293?adppopup=true">Amir Levy/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many observers have referred to the massacre of Israelis by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, as the deadliest attack against the Jewish people in a single day “since the Holocaust.” </p>
<p>As scholars who have spent <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=AJ+Patt&btnG=">decades studying the history</a> of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=3-F0XCoAAAAJ&hl=en">Israel’s relationship with the Holocaust</a>, we have argued that the Holocaust should remain unique and not be compared with other atrocities. We have written against <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/06/19/holocaust-education-museum-greene/">simplistic Holocaust analogies</a>, like comparing mask and vaccine mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic to the Nazi persecution of the Jews, or the practice of labeling political opponents “Nazis.” Both seem to trivialize the memory of what is known as the Shoah, the Hebrew word for “catastrophe.”</p>
<p>But the <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R47754">Oct. 7 massacres perpetrated by Hamas</a> changed our thinking.</p>
<h2>Israeli identity and the Holocaust</h2>
<p>Over the past 75 years, the collective memory of the Shoah has assumed a central place in Israeli national identity. The memory of the Holocaust has increasingly become the prism through which Israelis understand both their past and their present relationships with the Arab and Muslim world. </p>
<p>Israelis saw the Holocaust’s threat of annihilation echoed in many situations. In 1967, there was the waiting period before the Six-Day War, when the Egyptian leader <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/the-1967-six-day-war-and-its-difficult-legacy/a-39117590">Gamal Abdel Nasser threatened to “wipe Israel off the map</a>.” It was there in the trauma of the Yom Kippur War in 1973 and the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Yom-Kippur-War">unexpected, simultaneous attacks by Egypt and Syria</a>. When <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/israeli-raid-against-iraqi-reactor-40-years-later-new-insights-archives">Israel destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981</a>, Prime Minister Menachem Begin justified it with the explanation that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/10/world/prime-minister-begin-defends-raid-iraqi-nuclear-reactor-pledges-thwart-new.html">“there won’t be another Holocaust in history</a>.” </p>
<p>This association has only strengthened in the past 40 years with the <a href="https://www.bakerinstitute.org/events/2323/">1982 Lebanon war</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/11/20/18080066/israel-palestine-intifadas-first-second">two Palestinian uprisings, known as intifadas</a>, and with the present <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/smoldering-iran-nuclear-crisis-risks-catching-fire-2023-05-05/">threat posed by a nuclear Iran</a>. </p>
<p>All these events evoke the memory of the Holocaust and are understood within the collective memory of threats of annihilation. This phenomenon represents, for many Israelis, an inability to separate their current situation from the vulnerability of the diaspora Jewish past. And this conflation of past and present continues to play a central role in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1386/iscc.7.2.123_1">Israeli politics, foreign policy and public discourse</a>. </p>
<p>The frequent comparisons between the Oct. 7 massacres and the Shoah are more, we believe, than just the default associations of a people submerged in <a href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/the-generation-of-postmemory/9780231156523">Holocaust postmemory</a>, which refers to inherited and imagined memories of subsequent generations who did not personally experience the trauma. In seeking to describe the depths of evil they witnessed on Oct. 7, Israelis were making more than just an emotional connection between the Holocaust and the Oct. 7 massacres.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man outside holding a placard that says that 7th October was the day that the most Jews have been killed since The Holocaust." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562231/original/file-20231128-15-x8x3xx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A protester holds a placard during a demonstration on Oct. 9 in London, outside of the prime minister’s residence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/protester-holds-a-placard-which-states-that-7th-october-was-news-photo/1715821218?adppopup=true">Photo by Vuk Valcic/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To help explain the logic of that connection, specific and reasonable comparisons can be made to better understand Hamas’ traumatic and devastating massacre of Israelis. Below are a few of the many parallels:</p>
<h2>1. Ideology and identification</h2>
<p>Just as the Nazis aimed to annihilate the Jews, Hamas and affiliated terrorist organizations share the same objective: the destruction of Jews. <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hamas.asp">The 1988 Hamas charter</a> refers to “Jews” and not “Israelis” when calling for the destruction of these people.</p>
<p>While the <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/hamas-2017-document-full">2017 Hamas covenant</a> states that Hamas does not seek war with the Jews, but instead “<a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/doctrine-hamas">wages a struggle against the Zionists who occupy Palestine</a>,” the slaughter of Jews – many of whom were peace activists – in October has proven otherwise. </p>
<p>The national struggle of Hamas is predicated upon the conquest of land and elimination of the Jews. Hamas officials have subsequently promised to <a href="https://www.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/article-771199">repeat Oct. 7 again and again</a> until Israel is annihilated.</p>
<h2>2. Indoctrination</h2>
<p>While the racial antisemitism of the Nazi regime differs from the antisemitism employed in the fundamentalist Islamic version of Hamas, <a href="https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/history/articles/the-nazi-roots-of-islamist-hate?ref=quillette.com">antisemitism is a key part of the struggle for both ideologies</a>. Indoctrination from an early age aimed at the dehumanization of the Jews is a key part of both how <a href="https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/indoctrinating-youth">Nazis taught young German students during the Third Reich</a> and in how <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/04/world/middleeast/to-shape-young-palestinians-hamas-creates-its-own-textbooks.html">Hamas educates children in Gaza</a>. </p>
<h2>3. Methods of killing and survival</h2>
<p>The horrors of Oct. 7 echo the brutal tactics Nazis used during the Holocaust, including not only murder but cruel humiliation of the victims. The testimonies of Oct. 7 survivors <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-forensic-teams-describe-signs-torture-abuse-2023-10-15/">reveal the torture</a> of parents and children, sometimes in front of each other, including <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/11/17/world/israel-investigates-sexual-violence-hamas/index.html">rape and sexual violence</a>, mocking and lingering in the murder process as the terrorists <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-shows-foreign-press-raw-hamas-bodycam-videos-of-murder-torture-decapitation/">relished the atrocities</a> they committed.</p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/warsaw_ghetto_testimonies/intro.asp">Jews in the Warsaw ghetto</a> realized that the end was near, they worked for months to prepare hiding places for themselves in their homes and created improvised bunkers, doing whatever they could to avoid capture and deportation. They did not imagine that the Nazis would come to eliminate the ghetto in a different way, entering the ghetto with flamethrowers and burning down one building after another. <a href="https://www.historytoday.com/archive/feature/warsaw-flames">Some Jews were burned alive</a>, while others fled outside and fell into the hands of the Nazis. </p>
<p>On Oct. 7, victims in the kibbutzim and communities near Gaza hid in fortified safe rooms designed to protect them from rocket attacks. Hamas terrorists went from house to house, burning one after the other so that inhabitants would be forced to flee from their protected shelters. Others were <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/corpses-and-kids-bikes-burned-homes-and-death-in-kibbutz-where-hamas-butchered-100">burned in their homes</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two hooded men burning a white and blue Israeli flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/562244/original/file-20231128-24-g2qbya.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two hooded demonstrators burn a flag of Israel on the bridge linking Spain and France on Nov. 11, 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/two-hooded-demonstrators-burned-a-flag-of-israel-at-the-news-photo/1779070556?adppopup=true">Javi Julio/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>4. Using Jews in the killing process</h2>
<p>On Oct. 7, Hamas terrorists took a hostage from Nahal Oz, one of the kibbutzim in the south, and <a href="https://twitter.com/AvivaKlompas/status/1714100611572973893">forced him to go from house to house to knock on doors and lure his neighbors outside</a>. Afterward, they murdered him. Holocaust scholars have described such episodes from World War II in which Jews were forced to cooperate as “choiceless choices.”</p>
<h2>5. Terminology</h2>
<p>The word Shoah is used in the Bible to describe danger from neighboring nations, signifying distress, pain, torment, calamity and a <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/holocaust-remembrance-day/2019-05-01/ty-article/.premium/shoah-how-a-biblical-term-became-the-hebrew-word-for-holocaust/0000017f-dbbf-d3ff-a7ff-fbbf41b70000">“day of destruction</a>.” While it later came to define the total Nazi extermination of Jews in the 1940s, <a href="https://stljewishlight.org/news/israel-news/the-holocaust-all-over-again-the-massacre-at-the-israeli-rave-in-survivors-words/">multiple testimonies</a> collected from survivors of the Oct. 7 massacres use the <a href="https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/felt-like-holocaust-terrified-israelis-recount-hamas-terror-after-surprise-invasion/articleshow/104261870.cms?from=mdr">term once again today</a>, echoing the biblical definition, to signal a day of desolation, darkness, destruction and gloom.</p>
<p>The words used to describe events are often loaded with emotional associations; the power and meaning of words that attempt to convey the depths of traumatic experiences cannot be discounted.</p>
<h2>Not the same</h2>
<p>There is a difference between pointing out similarities and creating shallow comparisons. We are aware of the tendency, especially in the political sphere, to resort to simplistic, symbolic and performative comparisons to the Holocaust – such as Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/31/world/middleeast/israel-erdan-yellow-star-of-david.html#:%7E:text=Erdan%20vowed%20that%20he%20and,letters%20on%20his%20left%20breast.">donning a yellow star with the words “Never Again”</a> on Oct. 31.</p>
<p>Oct. 7 is not the same as the Holocaust. Even so, we can use the study of the Holocaust to understand the traumatic and devastating encounters between Hamas terrorists and their victims on Oct. 7.</p>
<p>It might be a trivialization of the Holocaust to simply label Hamas as the “new Nazis,” but our analysis reveals that recognizing their eliminationist antisemitism means there can be no return to the pre-Oct. 7 status quo, when <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/11/26/netanyahu-hamas-israel-gaza/">Israel’s policy was to accommodate Hamas’</a> control of the Gaza strip.</p>
<p>Despite the natural tendency to turn away from the most shocking and the most horrific manifestations of human evil, there are times when gazes must not be averted, when horror must be confronted in order to understand the motivations of the perpetrators and the responses of the victims and the survivors. </p>
<p>In this case, at what point do we ignore analogies that seem deliberate and intentional? As Holocaust scholars, we recognize why Israelis are stuck – and struck – by the traumatic nature of Oct. 7.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218009/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Holocaust is not just a memory in Israel. It’s part of how Israelis understand themselves and their country − and it’s playing a part in how the country responds to the Hamas massacres of Oct. 7.Avinoam Patt, Director, Center for Judaic Studies, University of ConnecticutLiat Steir-Livny, Associate Professor of Holocaust, Film & Cultural Studies, Sapir Academic CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2180032023-11-28T17:55:45Z2023-11-28T17:55:45ZLifestyle changes can reduce dementia risk by maintaining brain plasticity — but the time to act is now<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561624/original/file-20231125-24-4dpbbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C704%2C5714%2C3742&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Lifestyle changes may be our best hope of delaying dementia or not developing dementia at all.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/lifestyle-changes-can-reduce-dementia-risk-by-maintaining-brain-plasticity-but-the-time-to-act-is-now" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Walk 10,000 steps a day, cut back alcohol, get better sleep at night, stay socially active — we’re told that changes like these can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30367-6">prevent up to 40 per cent of dementia cases worldwide</a>. </p>
<p>Given that dementia is still one of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186%2Fs12889-023-15772-y">the most feared diseases</a>, why aren’t we pushing our doctors and governments to support these lifestyle changes through new programs and policy initiatives?</p>
<p>The truth, however, is more complex. We know that <a href="https://theconversation.com/got-health-goals-research-based-tips-for-adopting-and-sticking-to-new-healthy-lifestyle-behaviours-173740">making lifestyle changes is hard</a>. Ask anyone who has tried to keep their New Year’s resolution to visit the gym three times a week. It can be doubly difficult when the changes we need to make now won’t show results for years, or even decades, and we don’t really understand why they work.</p>
<h2>Taking control of your health</h2>
<p>Anyone who has watched a loved one <a href="https://alzheimer.ca/en/about-dementia/what-dementia/common-questions-about-dementia">living with dementia</a>, facing the small and large indignities and declines that leave them eventually unable to eat, communicate or remember, knows it is a devastating disease. </p>
<p>There are <a href="https://alzheimer.ca/en/whats-happening/events/new-dementia-drugs-therapies-what-canadians-should-know">several new drugs</a> making their way to the market for Alzheimer’s disease (one of the most common forms of dementia). However, they are still far from a cure and are currently only effective for early-stage Alzheimer’s patients.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lecanemab-experimental-drug-is-a-ray-of-hope-for-alzheimers-disease-196719">Lecanemab: Experimental drug is a ray of hope for Alzheimer's disease</a>
</strong>
</em>
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<p>So lifestyle changes may be our best hope of delaying dementia or not developing dementia at all. Actor <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2022/11/chris-hemsworth-exclusive-interview-alzheimers-limitless">Chris Hemsworth</a> knows it. He watched his grandfather live with Alzheimer’s and is making lifestyle changes after learning he has two copies of the APOE4 gene. This <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/what-is-apoe4-how-does-it-relate-alzheimers-disease-2023-04-21/">gene</a> is a risk factor for Alzheimer’s, and having two copies significantly increases his risk of developing the same condition. </p>
<p>Research has identified <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30367-6">modifiable risk factors</a> that contribute to increasing the risk of dementia:</p>
<ul>
<li>physical inactivity</li>
<li>excessive use of alcohol</li>
<li>less sleep</li>
<li>social isolation</li>
<li>hearing loss</li>
<li>less cognitive engagement</li>
<li>poor diet</li>
<li>hypertension</li>
<li>obesity</li>
<li>diabetes</li>
<li>traumatic brain injury</li>
<li>smoking</li>
<li>depression</li>
<li>air pollution</li>
</ul>
<p>Our understanding of the biological mechanisms for these risk factors is varied, with some more clearly understood than others. </p>
<p>But there is a lot we do know — and here’s what you need to know as well.</p>
<h2>Cognitive reserve and neuroplasticity</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two older men on a park bench, on of whom is straining to hear the other speaking" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561625/original/file-20231125-21-n964o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">As a person‘s hearing decreases, it can make it difficult to socially engage with others, resulting in a loss of sensory input. The brain has to work harder to compensate for this.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2019.03.022">Cognitive reserve</a> is the brain’s ability to withstand damage or neurodegenerative disease. If there is tissue or functional loss in one part of the brain, other brain cells (neurons) work harder to compensate. In theory, this means lifelong experiences and activities create a dam against the damages of disease and aging in the brain.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.3928/02793695-20100302-01">Neuroplasticity</a> is the brain’s amazing ability to adapt, learn and reorganize, create new pathways or rewire existing ones to recover from damage. The key takeaway is that neuroplasticity can happen at any time and any age, which means learning and activities should be lifelong.</p>
<p>Many of the risk factors linked to dementia likely work in combination, which is why an overall lifestyle approach is crucial. For example, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-016-0721-2">studies have shown</a> that exercise, cognitive and social engagement stimulate your brain and maintain its plasticity by growing new neural connections and building cognitive reserve.</p>
<p>The mechanism behind this is a combination of factors: increased oxygen and blood flow to the brain, stimulating growth factors that keep neurons healthy and reduced inflammation.</p>
<p>The opposite is also true. Poor sleep, diet, social isolation and untreated depression are linked to <a href="https://doi.org/10.3928/02793695-20100302-01">decreased cognitive reserve</a>. </p>
<p>The same rationale applies to hearing loss, a key emerging risk factor for dementia. As a person‘s hearing decreases, it can make it difficult to socially engage with others, resulting in a loss of sensory input. The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1097%2FWAD.0000000000000325">brain has to work harder</a> to compensate for this, potentially drawing down its cognitive reserve and leaving it less able to withstand dementia.</p>
<h2>The role of stress and inflammation</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Illustration of hand drawing a brain with multicoloured chalk on blackboard" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=222&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=222&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=222&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=279&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=279&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561626/original/file-20231125-17-6hps66.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=279&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chronic or prolonged inflammation disrupts normal function and causes damage to the brain’s cells.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Stress responses and inflammation are the body’s complex answer to injury. Inflammation is an important component of the body’s immune system, helping defend against threats and repair tissue damage. While short-term inflammation is a natural and good response, chronic or prolonged inflammation disrupts normal function and causes damage to the brain’s cells.</p>
<p>For example, one of the commonalities between dementia and untreated depression is the <a href="https://doi.org/10.17219/acem/149897%22%22">inflammatory process</a>. Prolonged exposure to stress hormones can lead to chronic inflammation. Hypertension, physical inactivity, smoking and air pollution are also associated with chronic inflammation and stress, which can damage blood vessels and neurons in the brain.</p>
<p>In a newer area of research still being explored, <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/10095898/loneliness-global-public-health-concern-who/">social isolation</a> has also been <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yfrne.2023.101061">linked to inflammation</a>. As we learned during the COVID-19 pandemic, the brain is wired to respond to social engagement as a means of bonding and emotional support, especially in times of distress. </p>
<p>With surveys showing more than <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/we-have-a-loneliness-crisis-it-s-time-to-act/article_30e6c996-a9e2-588b-a776-58addc503762.html">one in three Canadians</a> feel isolated, the lack of social connection and loneliness can trigger the body’s stress response and neuroendocrine changes, and prolonged exposure to this inflammatory process can damage the brain.</p>
<h2>Similar pathways across multiple diseases</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Three women walking in exercise clothes" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561627/original/file-20231125-27-f0h7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">While there are benefits to being physically and socially active at any age, some research shows the payoff from those gains can be higher after age 40 when the body’s metabolism slows, risk factors increase and cognitive reserve becomes even more essential to help protect against cognitive decline.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Several of these risk factors, and their biological pathways, cut across multiple chronic diseases. Accumulating evidence of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S1474-4422(19)30087-0">decades of research</a> supports the concept of “what’s good for your heart is good for your head.” </p>
<p>This means that making these lifestyle changes not only reduces your risk of dementia, but also your risk of diabetes, hypertension and heart concerns. This highlights the complex nature of dementia but also offers a united strategy to deal with multiple health concerns that may arise as people age.</p>
<h2>It’s never too late</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man asleep in bed" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561628/original/file-20231125-27-dyme8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Factors like not sleeping enough, having a poor diet and lacking social and cognitive engagement can increase the risk of developing dementia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s never really too late to change. The human brain and body have a remarkable capacity for adaptation and resilience throughout life. </p>
<p>While there are benefits to being physically and socially active at any age, some research shows the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smhs.2019.08.006">payoff from those gains can be higher</a> after age 40 when the body’s metabolism slows, risk factors increase and cognitive reserve becomes even more essential to help protect against <a href="https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000007003">cognitive decline</a>.</p>
<p>If making lifestyle changes means you can watch your child navigate adulthood, stroll 20 blocks to your favourite café every day and continue to live in your own home, perhaps walking the daily 10,000 steps, changing diets and keeping your friendship network strong is worthwhile. At worst, you’ll be healthier and more independent with or without dementia. At best, you might completely avoid dementia and other major diseases and keep living your best possible life.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218003/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura Middleton receives funding from the Public Health Agency of Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Saskia Sivananthan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Lifestyle-related dementia risks are complex, with factors like sleep, exercise, diet and social contact interacting with things like cognitive reserve, neuroplasticity and inflammation in the body.Saskia Sivananthan, Affiliate Professor, Department of Family Medicine, McGill UniversityLaura Middleton, Assistant Professor, Department of Kinesiology, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2178282023-11-28T13:24:34Z2023-11-28T13:24:34ZSharpeville: new research on 1960 South African massacre shows the number of dead and injured was massively undercounted<p>On 21 March 1960 at 1.40 in the afternoon, apartheid South Africa’s police opened fire on a peaceful crowd of about 4,000 residents of Sharpeville, who were protesting against carrying <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/pass-laws-south-africa-1800-1994">identity documents</a> that restricted black people’s movement. The police minimised the number of victims by at least one third, and justified the shooting by claiming that the crowd was violent. This shocking story has been thus misrepresented for over 60 years.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003257806">new research</a> retells the story of Sharpeville, about 70km south of Johannesburg, from the viewpoint of the victims themselves. As experienced <a href="https://www.lsu.edu/hss/history/people/faculty/clark.php">historians</a> who have undertaken archival research in South Africa <a href="https://history.ucla.edu/faculty/william-worger">since the 1970s</a> we based our <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003257806">research</a> on interviews with survivors and investigation into government records in both the <a href="https://archive.nelsonmandela.org/index.php/south-african-police-museum-and-archives">police archives</a> and the <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/soe/soe/national-archives-south-africa-nasa">national archives</a> in Pretoria. Our work reveals the true number of victims and the exact role of the police in the massacre.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">Sharpeville Massacre</a> ignited international outrage and the birth of the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/british-anti-apartheid-movement">Anti-Apartheid Movement</a> worldwide. It also led to renewed political protests inside South Africa. These were met with the total suppression of political movements that lasted for 30 years. Despite its historic importance, Sharpeville as a place and a community has remained unknown to the wider public and its residents anonymous. Yet they have a story to tell.</p>
<p>Even though the <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/trc/">Truth and Reconciliation Commission</a> chose the 1960 Sharpeville massacre as the formal beginning of its investigation of apartheid crimes, its examination of the massacre itself was perfunctory. Only three witnesses from the community were invited to testify during just part of one day (out of 2,000 witnesses during five years of hearings). </p>
<p>People in Sharpeville believe that the lack of attention to their plight since democracy in 1994 is because the original protest was organised by the rival <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/pan-africanist-congress-pac">Pan-Africanist Congress of Azania</a>, not the governing African National Congress (ANC).</p>
<h2>Changing the narrative</h2>
<p>Based on our research, the new book <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003257806">Voices of Sharpeville</a> traces the long residence of Africans in the greater Sharpeville area, as far as the <a href="https://www.maropeng.co.za/content/page/introduction-to-your-visit-to-the-cradle-of-humankind-world-heritage-site">Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site</a> 100km north. It also emphasises the crucial industrial importance of the greater <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/vaal-triangle-erupts-violence">Vaal Triangle</a> in which Sharpeville is located, from the 1930s onward.</p>
<p>Our work details the rich culture developed by urban Sharpeville residents in defiance of the attempts of <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/hendrik-frensch-verwoerd">Prime Minister HF Verwoerd’s</a> attempts to control African life. </p>
<p>Using the words of witnesses as recorded from their hospital beds within days of the shooting, and for weeks and months later, the events of 21 March 1960 are recounted in detail, increasing the number of victims to at least 91 dead, and 281 injured. The official police figures first published in 1960 and repeated endlessly ever since were 69 and 180 respectively. </p>
<p>The witness testimony places the responsibility for the shooting squarely with the police. </p>
<h2>New evidence</h2>
<p>The oral and documentary source material we used was previously off limits to researchers, insufficiently examined, or largely ignored. Access to many records held by the previous apartheid government was absolutely restricted prior to 1994, and since then many of the records have not been properly registered. This makes it challenging for researchers to find important documents.</p>
<p>But with the help of archivists and librarians, we were able to locate rare and even hidden records of Sharpeville and its history, and record the voices of many of the town’s residents.</p>
<h2>History of Sharpeville</h2>
<p>The first settlement in the Sharpeville area – <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/place/sharpeville-gauteng">Top Location</a> – was razed in the 1950s to make space for white people’s businesses and homes. Official records and aerial photographs reveal the previous existence of a large community on the now empty land. There is also an unmarked cemetery where about 3,500 residents were buried between around 1900 and 1938. </p>
<p>By the mid-20th century, apartheid officials began to plan a bigger settlement in the vicinity. Sharpeville and other places like it were designed in the 1950s to segregate Africans away from the cities, which were reserved for white people only. </p>
<p>Sharpeville’s housing construction became a “model” for the ubiquitous <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/figure/House-types-NE-51-6-and-51-9_fig4_272164901">four-roomed NE 51/9 houses</a> in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/43622104">black townships</a> throughout the country, none of which they could own outright but rent only.</p>
<p>In almost 300 witness statements taken by the police immediately following the shooting, many of the everyday details of life in Sharpeville were revealed. These statements were recorded immediately after arrest and under oath by the police to determine guilt or innocence against the charges of “public violence and incitement” brought against them. They were also provided voluntarily in 1961 and 1962, also under oath, by survivors and family members to establish a basis for the compensation the victims unsuccessfully requested.</p>
<p>Details of family life – numbers of children, occupations, wages, and health – were recorded, providing a wealth of information about Sharpeville’s residents. </p>
<p><strong>The massacre</strong>: Testimony, both from the official 1960 <a href="https://idep.library.ucla.edu/sharpeville-massacre#:%7E:text=A%20Commission%20of%20Enquiry%20was,officials%2C%20and%20residents%20of%20Sharpeville">commission of enquiry</a> into the massacre, and the criminal court trial of over 70 Sharpeville residents in 1960-1961, detailed the actions of both the crowd and the police.</p>
<p>The testimony by civilians and police alike, together with the claimants’ statements, provides a minute-by-minute narrative of the day. The testimonies of the residents, including all the Africans who worked for the municipality and as police officers in Sharpeville, unanimously attested to the fact that the crowd gathered peacefully to <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/pass-laws-south-africa">protest the pass law</a>. According to these witnesses, by the time of the shooting, almost 300 policemen had been moved into the township, including at least 13 white policemen armed with Sten machine guns. There were five Saracen armoured vehicles. </p>
<p>Police testimony makes it clear that the officer in charge gave the order to shoot, with the machine gunners firing directly into the crowd from a distance of no more than 3-5 metres. As one white official noted: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It made me think of a wheat field, where a whirlwind had shaken it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The crowd was taken utterly by surprise by the police fusillade. Over three quarters of them, dead and injured alike, were shot in the back as they fled.</p>
<p><strong>The victims</strong>: Crucial to gaining an accurate understanding of the numbers of victims – their names, families, and injuries – were the autopsy and medical records detailing the exact causes of death and injury for the over 300 victims. These forms and narrative statements, filled out by the hospital physicians who treated the injured and performed autopsies on the dead, prove conclusively that the government under-counted the victims by at least one third. </p>
<p>This new information remained embargoed in police records throughout the apartheid years to 1994. Some of it was finally transferred to the national archives in the late 1990s and early 2000s. It details the injuries.</p>
<h2>Remembrance</h2>
<p>The people of Sharpeville wonder why the world has not listened to their stories even as they have told them from the day of the shooting to the present.</p>
<p>In 2023, residents were able to use the information uncovered in our research to update the Wall of <a href="https://www.freedompark.co.za/">Names Memorial</a> (which lists the name of every person who gave their life fighting for freedom in South Africa) at <a href="https://idep.library.ucla.edu/africa/about-freedom-park">Freedom Park</a> in Pretoria to reflect accurately the number of victims killed on 21 March 1960. But still they have received no compensation for their injuries.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217828/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William H Worger receives funding from the University of California Office of the President.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nancy L Clark does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Despite its historic importance, Sharpeville itself has remained unknown and its residents anonymous, yet they have a story to tell.Nancy L Clark, Dean and Professor Emeritus, Louisiana State University William H. Worger, Professor Emeritus of History, University of California, Los AngelesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2169252023-11-20T17:32:15Z2023-11-20T17:32:15ZDevelopmental amnesia: the rare disorder that causes children to forget things they’ve just learned<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559891/original/file-20231116-15-15jbk3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5112%2C2858&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Developmental amnesia can affect children throughout their adult lives too.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/elementary-school-classroom-brilliant-caucasian-boy-1794555436?consentChanged=true">Gorodenkoff/ Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Even though it came out more than 20 years ago, many people still remember <a href="https://www.pixar.com/feature-films/finding-nemo">Finding Nemo</a> thanks to one of its beloved main characters: Dory. The blue fish is remembered not only for her happy-go-lucky personality but for the condition she has, which makes her forget things almost as soon as they’ve happened.</p>
<p>Viewers might have assumed Dory’s condition was the stuff of fantasy, crafted to spur the movie’s plot forward. What many may not realise is that Dory’s memory troubles are similar to a real but rare condition that affects children.</p>
<p>Developmental amnesia causes children to forget things almost as soon as they’ve happened. Like Dory, they are unable to recall previous conversations or events – even significant ones such as an exciting birthday party. </p>
<p>This condition can affect them throughout their adult lives too. However, research by myself and colleagues may have uncovered a new <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09602011.2023.2275825">way to support</a> these children and make the most of their memory.</p>
<p>Developmental amnesia is caused by a lack of oxygen reaching the brain. There are a number of reasons this could happen, including a traumatic birth where the baby becomes stuck in the birth canal, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/123/3/499/348744?login=false">unable to breathe</a>. Respiratory failure and cardiac arrest after birth are other potential causes.</p>
<p>It’s long been known that a lack of oxygen can cause brain damage. But in the late 1990s, Faraneh Vargha-Khadem, a consultant neuropsychologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, identified three teenagers who had been <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9219696/">struggling with memory difficulties</a> since they were little. All had suffered a lack of oxygen to the brain in early life, and MRI scans showed all had damage to their hippocampus – the brain’s memory hub.</p>
<p>Based on what Vargha-Khadem observed, she outlined three main characteristics of developmental amnesia. First, spatial memory problems, such as getting lost in familiar surroundings or forgetting where they’d left their belongings.</p>
<p>Second, temporal memory problems, including needing to be frequently reminded of regularly scheduled classes or activities. And third, episodic memory problems or being unable to remember events in their lives. </p>
<p>These memory problems are lifelong and can be very disabling – meaning the children will need support for the rest of their lives.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A digital drawing of the hippocampus within the brain." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559888/original/file-20231116-18-feuw5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children with the condition have damage to their hippocampus.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/3d-rendered-medical-illustration-hippocampus-plain-2256118539">SciePro/ Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s not known how common developmental amnesia is. Like Dory from Finding Nemo, children with developmental amnesia have good language skills, motor skills and cognitive abilities. So, at first glance, they don’t appear to have a problem. </p>
<p>This means doctors can miss their memory problems and the children don’t get referred to a specialist. Some are also misdiagnosed with attentional problems instead. </p>
<h2>Memory help</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, it’s not possible to repair the hippocampus once its damaged. As such, treatments for developmental amnesia focus on supporting children to make the most of their abilities. </p>
<p>Despite this support, children with developmental amnesia are at a considerable disadvantage in school. If they ask a question in class, they’ll soon forget the answer. When they get home from school, they can’t remember what their lessons involved. </p>
<p>However, one remarkable feature of developmental amnesia is that <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0028393209000438">recognition memory</a> – the ability to recognise something that has been encountered before – is not impaired. </p>
<p>So, if you showed someone with developmental amnesia pictures of faces, then later gave them a memory test of those faces, they’d be able to identify the ones they’d seen before. </p>
<p>While they wouldn’t remember where they’d seen the faces, they’d be able to say a face feels familiar – and correctly judge they’d seen it previously. This shows us that some aspects of memory can still function well in children with this condition.</p>
<p>We wondered if the ability to recognise familiar things could be key to helping children with developmental amnesia learn. To <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09602011.2023.2275825">test this idea</a>, we set up a case study with eight-year-old “Patient H”. </p>
<p>Patient H watched four different educational videos six times each. After each watch, he was immediately given a memory test.</p>
<p>For half of the videos, he was asked open-ended questions such as: “Where did the Egyptian nomads live?” This sort of test is very difficult for children with developmental amnesia. Even though he’d watched each video six times, he performed very poorly in the test.</p>
<p>For the other videos, he was given a multiple-choice test. This allowed him to use his recognition memory to identify which of the answers felt familiar.</p>
<p>Patient H performed far better in this test, getting 18 out of 20 answers right, compared with only six out of 20 in the first test. In fact, he performed as well in the recognition test as children without developmental amnesia. </p>
<p>A week later, Patient H returned to the lab and was given another memory test based on the videos he’d previously watched. Remarkably, he was able to recall twice as much information from the videos he’d been tested on using multiple choice, compared with the first time he was tested – even when he was asked open-ended questions. Crucially, he wasn’t only able to recognise the information but could recall details.</p>
<h2>How new memories are formed</h2>
<p>Our conclusion was that multiple-choice tests allowed Patient H to use intact parts of his brain’s memory system to process and consolidate information. This helped him learn information more efficiently and build a stable memory.</p>
<p>This finding is encouraging, but further research is needed to understand if recognition memory can support learning in the classroom and over longer delays than one week. The fact that developmental amnesia is so rare makes it difficult to study and test interventions in larger groups of people. </p>
<p>We also need to do more work to understand the learning processes that occur in developmental amnesia, and how new memories are formed. Understanding this may help develop better learning techniques for people with the condition.</p>
<p>But these results are promising nonetheless, showing that multiple-choice tests may be an easy and helpful tool for children with developmental amnesia in forming stable memories and potentially keeping up in class.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216925/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachael Elward does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Our latest research may have found a way of helping children with this condition to learn.Rachael Elward, Senior Lecturer, Neuroscience and Neuropsychology, London South Bank UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2179712023-11-20T17:32:09Z2023-11-20T17:32:09ZHow movies use music to manipulate your memory<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560360/original/file-20231120-21-67ekqj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=143%2C78%2C8531%2C5696&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> </figcaption></figure><p>Around one in five American adults manage to squeeze in <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/935493/movies-watching-streaming-frequency-us-by-age/">watching a movie</a> on a daily basis. It’s a great way to escape the daily grind and unwind with loved ones. But, what can you actually remember about last night’s film? </p>
<p>You may be able to remember the title, the rough story outline or the Hollywood star who acted in it. But dig a little deeper. How easily does a specific movie sequence come to mind right now? And more importantly, can you hear or recognise the film’s musical score? </p>
<p>Filmmakers have long used music to try to make movies, scenes and characters more memorable. Now psychological research has started to uncover the science behind this process. </p>
<p>Music is so closely ingrained in our cinematic experience that we sometimes end up having false memory for it. One study showed that, after watching a brief movie sequence, up to two-thirds of participants believed that the sequence was accompanied by a musical score – even when <a href="https://doi.org/10.1525/MP.2007.25.2.135">it wasn’t</a>. Scientists call this “expectancy bias”. </p>
<p>A successful musical score often involves <a href="https://theconversation.com/earworms-why-some-songs-get-stuck-in-our-heads-more-than-others-68182">earworms</a> – songs that stick in our minds. These <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000090">tend to be songs</a> that have achieved great success and recent runs in the music charts.</p>
<p>When paired with a movie sequence, fresh takes on old hits help <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735613483848">keep audiences entertained</a>. Their sing-along, foot-tapping familiarity reflect the huge exposure they’ve had for decades. They are therefore <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2012.07.004">readily exploited</a> as an effective marketing hook, especially in movie trailers – where there’s little time to make an impact on viewers. </p>
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<p>Music also helps us interpret characters. Research shows that listening to a 15 seconds segment of fearful music <a href="https://doi.org/10.1525/MP.2007.25.2.135">can act as an important cue</a> to look for signs of fear in the facial expressions of the characters on the screen. </p>
<p>But how are deeper emotional connections made? Filmmakers rely on a range of techniques to try to create enduring and distinctive movie scenes. They often home in on the emotional properties of the pairing between sound and images. But is there any firm evidence that music can actually influence visual memories in this way? </p>
<p>Research into music and memory has unveiled that the two are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/03057356211033344">strongly linked</a>. People are more accurate in recalling the actions, characters and final outcome of a positive or negative film scene if it <a href="https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197154">is accompanied by music</a> with a similar positive or negative emotional quality, respectively.</p>
<p>This match between the emotional content of the film and music is called a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/mood-congruence">mood-congruency effect</a>. It enhances our memory of what was previously viewed by “<a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29698045/#:%7E:text=Chunking%20is%20the%20recoding%20of,of%20working%20memory%20(WM).">chunking</a>” memory fragments into a quick, easy and more manageable whole in our minds.</p>
<h2>Irony and incongruency</h2>
<p>Irony is linked to the ability to say one thing while meaning the opposite. Often considered a linguistic device, it is also apparent in sound and image pairings. In the ironic contrast technique, scenes that depict negative events or emotions such as sadness, anger and fear are paired with emotionally positive music. </p>
<p>The outcome of this pairing is that the incongruous background disrupts the emotional tone of the film scene, often creating a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/pmu0000242">sarcastic or melancholic effect</a> that is memorable. </p>
<p>The movies Bowling for Columbine and A Clockwork Orange provide examples of violent episodes that are accompanied by incongruent music. </p>
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<p>Mood-incongruency effects represent yet another twist in viewers’ expectations. We rely on our own personal experiences and associations with musical conventions to help shape our understanding of what happens next. </p>
<p>Watching a brief clip of a wedding party set against a backdrop of slow-paced, sad music, for example, alerts us to a mismatch between the visual content and our previous (direct or indirect) experiences of wedding parties. The movie script in our mind might be asking, “where is the upbeat music for the party guests to dance to?” Searching for the answer makes us notice the mood-incongruency effect conveyed by the music even more. </p>
<p>This enables us to develop a more distinctive image in our memory. In fact, we’ve <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/03057356211033344">tested this in the lab</a>. We asked 60 participants to view a romantic comedy trailer to either sad, happy or no music. When we tested their memory of the trailer later on, we found that people who had heard the sad music had a better visual memory of the film scene than those who watched it with happy music or without any music at all. </p>
<p>Mood-incongruency effects are not limited to audio-visual pairings. They can be found <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/chemse/bjx081">with other senses too</a>, such as odours, and serve to alert us quickly and efficiently to expectancy violations in our immediate environment. This is almost like a “<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-science-of-the-plot-twist-how-writers-exploit-our-brains-95748">what’s coming next</a>” setting in our brain that makes us pay more attention – and therefore remember the event better. </p>
<p>These effects appear to be relatively short-lived and whether they can exert any longer-term impact beyond the few minutes of a movie trailer or a film scene is yet to be fully determined. Ultimately, they are informed by our previous experiences and <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315194738">stored in our long-term memory</a>, ready and on standby for the next plot twist. </p>
<p>So what happens if our previous experiences of these music-induced emotions are fragmented or missing altogether, as might be the case in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/0907676X.2019.1631362">individuals who are deaf or hearing-impaired</a>? </p>
<p>Can captioning a piece of music as “ominous” elicit similar ironic contrast effects on memory as actual, ominous-sounding music, for example? And if the unexpected becomes the expected, is the irony lost? Answers to these questions might just open up a new portal into our movie-viewing universe.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217971/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Libby Damjanovic receives funding from Lund University, Thora Ohlsson stiftelsen. </span></em></p>A sad song coupled with a happy movie scene can become strangely memorable.Libby Damjanovic, Research Fellow of Psychology, Lund UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2126562023-10-11T15:43:16Z2023-10-11T15:43:16ZHow collective memories fuel conflicts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/553231/original/file-20231011-23-6jaxvp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=47%2C53%2C3874%2C1940&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/create/editor/CiQwYTkwYWExOS1lMDI5LTQwYWItODJjYS0zNTRkNDk3YTM1N2E">Pictrider/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When a group of youths <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40972055">attacked shops and buildings</a> in Tallinn, Estonia, on the evening of April 26, 2007, it sparked two days of civil unrest. This resulted in the death of a young man, injuries to 100 people, including 13 police officers, and the arrest of over 1,000 people. </p>
<p>The unrest was due to a disagreement between two communities – ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians – <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40972055">over how they should remember the events</a> of the second world war and the Soviet period. These disagreements stemmed from contentious “collective memories” of events and narratives. </p>
<p>Such <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3377910">shared recollections</a> of past events can arise among a group or nation – whether factual or fabricated. As I have shown in a paper, <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2313-5778/7/3/45">published in Genealogy</a>, collective memories among individuals in a community, passed down through generations, are often at the heart of conflicts.</p>
<p><a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fpac0000144">Collective memory</a> is a social representation of the past. It ultimately explains how people’s shared recollections are formed within the social groups they belong to. But it <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fpac0000144">also explains</a> how they are formed against the social groups of people they do not consider themselves members of.</p>
<p>This creates a shared, collective past among each group that can be <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12124-018-9463-5">reignited in the present</a> to retain the memory of the past.</p>
<p>This may seem to be just another word for history. But memory <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1750698017720256?casa_token=uTleRWim814AAAAA%3Adyt_CubxQv-oUf9WxiJPaFjduyUgszMJ9YfUW8fzHFARNFx-rBOfJf8Y0uEBvKh0bdPWEvWyAUgB">is not history</a>. Ultimately, history views events with depth and from multiple perspectives. </p>
<p>Collective memory, on the other hand, <a href="https://openlibrary.org/works/OL12600W/The_Holocaust_in_American_Life?edition=holocaustinameri00novi">simplifies the events</a> – viewing them from a single perspective and reducing them to myths. </p>
<p>This is much like how our individual memories work. They are often faulty and <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-real-you-is-a-myth-we-constantly-create-false-memories-to-achieve-the-identity-we-want-103253">driven by</a> how we want to view ourselves. As such, collective memory <a href="https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/SEMI.2009.009/html">is fundamentally tied to identity</a> in ways that history aspires not to be, even though the latter may drive the former.</p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-62621-5">Collective memories</a> can be shared in many ways. This includes family tales, folklore, institutionalised education, social media, sanctioned narratives, propaganda and education.</p>
<h2>A glimpse into Nigeria</h2>
<p>In my paper, I argue that contentious historical accounts shape collective memories as well as collective behaviour. The research is based on case studies conducted in April 2018 and May 2022 in Benue State, Nigeria, aiming to understand the persistence of conflicts there over time.</p>
<p>The paper explores how historical events in pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial Nigeria resonate today. This has reignited collective memories, influencing collective behaviour towards violence. That’s because people seek to redress current grievances through the lens of past events.</p>
<p>Nigeria’s <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2313-5778/7/3/45">history</a> is marked by persistent violence, through the eras of European imperialism, independence, the Nigeria-Biafra war (1967–70), military dictatorships and multi-party politics. </p>
<p>One problem is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09546553.2022.2129015">eco-violence</a> – conflict over water and other agricultural resources between contending groups: nomadic herders and farmers. These conflicts have persisted for decades, from colonial times to independence and the present day. </p>
<p>Collective memories influence people’s collective behaviour in several ways. First, they provide <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ejsp.2420180303">historical contexts to contemporary issues</a>. Second, they link a known and collectively <a href="https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/37454">shared past emotion to a current event</a>. And third, they associate <a href="https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/37454">current issues with societal contradictions</a> of previous events, such as colonial efforts to divide and conquer.</p>
<p>The convergence of these three factors is shaping the persistence of conflicts between the nomadic herders and farmers. There are <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10402659.2017.1344527">conflicting narratives</a> between the two groups regarding the ownership of communal land. There are also differing opinions on who should have access to it – and how. </p>
<p>Among the farmers in the region, the conflicts <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14678802.2016.1200314">are perceived</a> as a resurgence of the 1804 jihad, a military and religious attack by an Islamic army, aimed at claiming their land. They now feel attacked again.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Fulani herdsman in Togo." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/553232/original/file-20231011-17-wdtv30.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fulani herdsman in Togo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">wikipedia</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The nomadic Fulani herders, on the other hand, assert their rights to access agricultural resources <a href="https://asq.africa.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/168/Ochonu-Vol10Issue23.pdf">by citing their lineage to the Sokoto Caliphate</a>, which was created as a result of the jihad and once governed parts of the north-central region.</p>
<p>These contentious collective memories between the two groups shape people’s perceptions and their collective actions. And this transfer of emotions from past events to new ones complicates the peaceful resolution of conflicts. It ultimately leads to persistent violent disputes.</p>
<p>The ongoing violent conflicts between farmers and nomadic Fulani herders in Nigeria, similar to the 2007 unrest in Tallinn, Estonia, are shaped by differing narratives of the past. The effect of collective memories in intensifying these violent confrontations is undeniable. </p>
<h2>Conflict resolution</h2>
<p>Embedding collective memory within conflict resolution strategies is crucial for realising sustained peace. One way to so this is by using “cognitive reappraisal techniques”. Such techniques involve <a href="https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=1488dbc63973d268e9918fc16844f468221d42fd">exposing individuals</a> to emotionally charged situations to change their emotional reactions.</p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10902-016-9779-0">Temporal distancing</a>, for example, is a cognitive reappraisal technique that occurs when you imagine a stressful event from your future self’s perspective rather than your current self’s. </p>
<p>Another technique, self-distancing, entails stepping back from your immediate reactions to see emotionally charged events from a broader perspective. The <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0956797612452572">cognitive reappraisal technique</a>, when applied to a conflict situation, aims to lessen group hostility, encourage peaceful responses to past violent incidents, and reduce aggressive behaviour in group interactions.</p>
<p>It <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022002713492636">could therefore</a> reduce disagreements between two communities. Although adapting this approach to fit the Nigerian context may require additional studies, it holds potential.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212656/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Olumba E. Ezenwa does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>We need to embed collective memory in conflict resolution strategies.Olumba E. Ezenwa, Doctoral Research Fellow, Conflict, Violence, & Terrorism Research Centre, Royal Holloway University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2139962023-10-01T19:16:20Z2023-10-01T19:16:20ZAvoid cramming and don’t just highlight bits of text: how to help your memory when preparing for exams<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550776/original/file-20230928-15-m58d1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C23%2C5168%2C3422&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/library-high-angle-photro-159775/">Pixabay/Pexels</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>With school and university exams looming, students will be thinking about how they can maximise their learning.</p>
<p>Memory is a key part of how we learn.</p>
<p>If students understand how memory works, they can prioritise effective study habits. This will help for exams as well as their learning in the longer term. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-how-can-we-concentrate-on-study-without-getting-distracted-146572">Curious Kids: how can we concentrate on study without getting distracted?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What is memory?</h2>
<p>According to cognitive psychology (the study of our mental processes), there are <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0079742108604223?via%3Dihub">three</a> distinct types of memory. Each plays a different role in effective study:</p>
<ol>
<li><p><strong>sensory memory</strong> temporarily holds vast amounts of new information <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/sensory-memory">from our senses</a>. This includes everything we have just seen, heard, touched or tasted. If we pay attention to that information, it moves into working memory for processing. If we don’t pay attention, it is discarded. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>working memory</strong> is our brain’s control centre. All conscious <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/B9780123943934000066">cognitive activity</a>, including remembering, calculating, planning, problem-solving, decision-making and critical thinking happens in our working memory. However, if we have too much on our minds, working memory can easily become <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2864034/">overloaded</a>. This makes it important to offload knowledge and skills to long-term memory. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>long-term memory</strong> is our brain’s library. When new knowledge or skills are well practised, they are “encoded” from working memory and into <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/long-term-memory">long-term memory</a>. Here they are stored in vast networks called schemas. To use those knowledge and skills again, we retrieve those schemas back into working memory. The more we encode and retrieve knowledge and skills, the stronger those memory pathways become. Well-learned schemas can be retrieved automatically, which creates space in working memory for new thinking and learning. </p></li>
</ol>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1706139868416356588"}"></div></p>
<h2>How to help your memory when preparing for exams</h2>
<p>Not everyone likes exams and educators <a href="https://theconversation.com/should-we-do-away-with-exams-altogether-no-but-we-need-to-rethink-their-design-and-purpose-67647">often debate</a> their advantages and disadvantages. </p>
<p>But if you are a student who is studying for exams right now, here are some tips to help you use your time well: </p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>create the conditions for attention</strong>: put your phone away and remove distractions. Remember, <a href="https://journalofcognition.org/articles/10.5334/joc.58">your attention is needed</a> to bring information into working memory and keep it there. Loss of attention, or mind wandering, can result in poorer learning. Harvard professor of psychology Dan Schachter calls absent-mindedness one of the “<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8285452/">seven sins of memory</a>”. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>consider your subject area</strong>: different disciplines ask different kinds of questions and you should study with these in mind. In a Year 12 English exam, for example, you might be asked to write a response about your interpretation of a particular text. So don’t just re-read the text; effective study involves drawing out themes and insights, practising your arguments and seeking feedback. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>minimise “shallow” study</strong>: most students report <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1529100612453266">re-reading and highlighting</a> text when studying. But these are less effective than other study techniques. Shallow study or <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S002253717280001X?via%3Dihub">encoding</a> focuses more on surface features and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Fergus-Craik-2/publication/11066090_Levels_of_processing_Past_present_and_future/links/0a85e5374cd5c4aebb000000/Levels-of-processing-Past-present-and-future.pdf">less on meaning</a>. This encourages rote recall over genuine understanding and leads to poorer learning. In <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0361476X08000477?via%3Dihub">one study</a>, re-reading a textbook twice in a row offered no advantage over reading it for the first time. </p></li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A textbook with sticky notes and a highlighted passage." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550811/original/file-20230928-23-9i311a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Just highlighting bits of text is unlikely to lead to deep understanding of a topic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/close-up-of-photo-of-books-327882/">Lum3n/Pexels</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>maximise “deep” study</strong>: this involves actively using the information you are studying. Depending on your discipline, this might include <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fa0019902">answering practice questions</a>, constructing your own questions, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0361476X79900699?via%3Dihub">summarising</a>, identifying themes, evaluating existing arguments, <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/tea.3660250103">making decisions</a>, or explaining concepts to others. This deep encoding results in stronger schematic networks, which are more easily reactivated when you need them. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>move beyond worked examples</strong>: worked examples are step-by-step illustrations of the processes to solve a problem. They can be <a href="https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-1-4419-1428-6_20">powerful starting points</a> because they show you how to use a particular strategy. They also help to reduce working memory load. But as you <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225767816_Expertise_Reversal_Effect_and_Its_Implications_for_Learner-Tailored_Instruction">become more expert</a>, it is more effective to draw those strategies from long-term memory yourself.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>take breaks</strong>: research with Australian <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/371689526_Rest_breaks_aid_directed_attention_and_learning">university students</a> shows even a five-minute rest break can support attention – the gateway to learning. Research <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1745691612447308">using brain scans</a> also shows rest can help you consolidate memories. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>don’t cram</strong>: the so-called “spacing effect” shows memory and <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10734-010-9366-y">conceptual understanding </a> both benefit from <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010028510000332?via%3Dihub">distributed</a> rather than massed learning. This means six half-hour sessions are better for learning than one three hour block. </p></li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A woman naps with a dog. Spectacles are folded on a book." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550812/original/file-20230928-19-ijedgp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Make sure you take breaks and get sleep.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/planner-and-eyeglasses-placed-on-table-near-anonymous-woman-and-dog-sleeping-on-sofa-6588937/">Meruyert Gonullu/Pexels</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>mix up your study</strong>: this could mean <a href="https://www.retrievalpractice.org/interleaving">varying</a> questions and activities, so your brain is forced to compare, contrast, refine, and draw distinctions between concepts and approaches. This is known as “<a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-interleaving-effect-mixing-it-up-boosts-learning/">interleaving</a>”, and has been shown to boost learning in subjects such as maths, music and medicine. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>don’t skip sleep</strong>: sleep is crucial for the <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23589831/">consolidation</a> of memory or <a href="https://www.bostonneuropsa.net/PDF%20Files/Stickgold/Nature_review_2005.pdf">solidifying</a> new connections or insights you have made. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>give yourself enough time</strong>: unfortunately, there are no shortcuts here! Each time you <a href="https://link.springer.com/epdf/10.1007/s10648-021-09595-9?sharing_token=BJGF9HIhylvkFTp44loJ1fe4RwlQNchNByi7wbcMAY68gwFdG3aL3p8m-poI08AnooDPXDRsIbGbAcSfq37HR20RLLZlZUjmOElg_wpKZL36zS0i5zcLfJ5UXBlFREIOi0tNigRAfr47nlSb4RA4e37qH_hZV4z4RSb4Ky31i40=">practise</a> drawing specific knowledge and skills from long-term memory into working memory, you are etching a memory super-highway. The <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2005-13307-006">more you do this</a>, the better and quicker you become – which is what you will need come exam time. </p></li>
</ul>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/preparing-for-exam-season-10-practical-insights-from-psychology-to-help-teens-get-through-189439">Preparing for exam season: 10 practical insights from psychology to help teens get through</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213996/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Penny Van Bergen receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Association for Psychological Science, and the NSW Department of Education. </span></em></p>According to cognitive psychology there are three distinct types of memory. Each plays a different role in effective study.Penny Van Bergen, Head of School of Education and Professor of Educational Psychology, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2139822023-09-24T20:02:03Z2023-09-24T20:02:03ZHow to manage exam season: don’t forget to take regular breaks and breathe<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549261/original/file-20230920-21-nb1q6o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=57%2C57%2C4192%2C2752&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-closing-her-eyes-against-sun-light-standing-near-purple-petaled-flower-plant-321576/">Oleksandr P/Pexels </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Around Australia, Year 12 students are heading into the final stretch of study before exams start in early term 4. This is typically seen as a very intense period of preparation. But, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/20590776.2023.2225700">as our research shows</a>, it is also important to rest during this time if you want to maximise your performance. </p>
<p>Intuitively, we understand breaks are important. We can take rest breaks across different times in our lives. They include <a href="https://hbr.org/2023/02/research-the-transformative-power-of-sabbaticals">sabbaticals</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/study-links-a-gap-year-to-better-university-grades-18275">gap years</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-a-holiday-is-good-for-you-even-before-you-take-time-off-209406">holidays</a>, weekends and nightly <a href="https://theconversation.com/screen-time-is-contributing-to-chronic-sleep-deprivation-in-tweens-and-teens-a-pediatric-sleep-expert-explains-how-critical-sleep-is-to-kids-mental-health-204436">sleep</a>. </p>
<p>But rest breaks can be beneficial on even shorter time frames, during study sessions and even during exams themselves. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/self-compassion-is-the-superpower-year-12-students-need-for-exams-and-life-beyond-school-192086">Self-compassion is the superpower year 12 students need for exams ... and life beyond school</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Firstly, try and get some sleep</h2>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="An alarm clock on a shelf." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=801&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=801&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=801&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1006&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1006&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549258/original/file-20230920-19-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1006&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Use an old-school alarm clock, so you are not tempted to mindlessly scroll through TikTok before sleep.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/close-up-photo-of-teal-digital-clock-2397363/">Oladimeji Ajegbile/ Pexels</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Students may be tempted to stay up late, trying to cram for an exam the following day. The big risk here is that lack of sleep can do more harm than good. </p>
<p>Sleep plays an important role in a range of brain functions, including <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12683469/">maintaining attention</a> and <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3768102/">consolidating memories</a>. So getting a poor night of sleep before an exam may mean the topics you’ve tried to cram aren’t well-formed in your long-term memory. Even if they were, the brain fog from lack of sleep means you may not recall what you’ve learned under the pressure of exam conditions. </p>
<p>In the lead-up to your exams, here are some specific things to consider:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>try and keep all screens out of the bedroom:</strong> people often struggle with sleep because they’re tempted to check their phone at bedtime.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>screens also emit <a href="https://www.sleepfoundation.org/bedroom-environment/blue-light">blue light</a>:</strong> this can interfere with your body’s circadian rhythms. Blue light during the day enhances attention, but too much of it in the evening can interfere with sleep quality. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>so don’t use a smartphone as an alarm:</strong> get an old-fashioned alarm clock instead. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>For more information about sleep, the Sleep Health Foundation has <a href="https://www.sleephealthfoundation.org.au/quick-facts-and-faq-about-sleep-for-high-school-students.html">specific advice</a> for high school students. </p>
<h2>You need study breaks</h2>
<p>When we study, we’re using our <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4207727/">working memory</a> (processing of small amounts of information, needed for things like comprehension and problem-solving). This builds our understanding of a topic. We then want to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2657600/">encode that understanding into long-term memory</a> for use later, such as in an exam. </p>
<p>Without breaks, over time, these working memory resources become depleted and we notice it’s harder and harder to concentrate. </p>
<p>In our <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/20590776.2023.2225700">2023 study</a>, we found that a short (five minute) break following a period of difficult cognitive work (solving mental arithmetic problems) made a substantial difference to how much students learned during a lesson on a mental mathematics strategy. </p>
<p>Students who took a “do nothing” break performed 40% better than the no-break students on a subsequent test. Students who watched a first-person perspective video of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHZ3rV6TzMs">a walk in an Australian rainforest</a> for five minutes also performed better (57%) than the no-break students. </p>
<p>This suggests building in short rest breaks during study can help you learn. </p>
<h2>How do you build in breaks?</h2>
<p>Here are some specific strategies to help you get the rests you need: </p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>when you plan your <a href="https://education.nsw.gov.au/student-wellbeing/stay-healthy-hsc/resources/hsc-exam-tips-for-the-lead-up-to-exams#Tip0">study schedule</a> build in short breaks:</strong> drawing on the <a href="https://francescocirillo.com/products/the-pomodoro-technique">Pomodoro</a> time management technique, we recommend using a timer (but not one on a smartphone). Aim to take a five-minute break after 25 minutes of study. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>again, don’t use a smartphone:</strong> many of the features of a phone are purpose-built to <a href="https://www.google.com.au/books/edition/Stolen_Focus/3L1UEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0">capture and keep your attention</a>, which you need for studying! These short breaks could take many forms: getting a cup of tea, playing with a pet, getting some sun outside, doing some star jumps to wake yourself up, or some breathing exercises (I explain these below). </p></li>
<li><p><strong>longer breaks are important too:</strong> following the Pomodoro technique, aim to take a longer break (15-30 minutes) after four rounds of 25 minutes study/five minutes rest. Use at least some of these longer breaks for your physical and mental health away from your desk (and screens) – such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/exercise-the-body-build-the-brain-3294">exercise</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/its-not-all-in-your-mind-how-meditation-affects-the-brain-to-help-you-stress-less-97777">meditation</a>, or a <a href="https://theconversation.com/short-naps-can-improve-memory-increase-productivity-reduce-stress-and-promote-a-healthier-heart-210449">20-30-minute nap</a>. </p></li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A young woman holds a cup." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549257/original/file-20230920-21-y20eo4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Have regular breaks as part of your study timetable.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/HycIct9V-DM">Anh Nguyễn/ Unsplash</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Also take breaks during exams</h2>
<p>It’s reasonable to think we should be using every minute of an exam for answering questions. But just as rest breaks during study can help restore attention, breaks during exams themselves may also be helpful. </p>
<p>Breaks are a common part of exams for students with <a href="https://educationstandards.nsw.edu.au/wps/portal/nesa/11-12/hsc/disability-provisions/provisions/rest-breaks">disability provisions</a>, but with some planning, all students might benefit from breaks.</p>
<p>A common strategy you can use to prepare for Year 12 exams is to complete past exam papers. When you do this, use the same “short break” study strategy described above. When it seems like a good break point (for example, in between finishing one section of the paper and starting another), stop for a few minutes and practise taking a short break. </p>
<p>Under exam conditions, you’re more limited in what type of break you can take. But simple controlled breathing routines such as “<a href="https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/321805">box breathing</a>” or the “<a href="https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/324417">4-7-8 method</a>” can help you refocus. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/tEmt1Znux58?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Box breathing.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These routines can also activate the “<a href="https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/using-the-relaxation-response-to-reduce-stress-20101110780">relaxation response</a>” – the opposite of the “flight-or-flight” response we experience under stressful conditions (including exams). </p>
<p>An even shorter form of breathwork to reduce stress in the moment is the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBdhqBGqiMc">physiological sigh</a> – two inhales, followed by an exhale. </p>
<p>When it comes to the actual exam, you’ll be using the reading time to plan how you’ll complete the various sections. Take this time to also think carefully about when you’ll take some short breaks. When the exam begins, you might even write “take a two-minute break now” at suitable points in the exam booklet. </p>
<p>There is so much to think about in the lead-up to and during exams. If you schedule in and practise taking breaks, you will get better at doing it and give yourself and your brain a really important rest. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-beat-exam-stress-106065">How to beat exam stress</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213982/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Ginns does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Final school exams are typically seen as a very intense period of preparation. But it is also important to rest during this time if you want to maximise your performance.Paul Ginns, Associate Professor in Educational Psychology, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2133212023-09-22T11:51:06Z2023-09-22T11:51:06ZWhat would you take with you? Why possessions matter in times of war and displacement<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/547573/original/file-20230911-23-xg0zbj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4550%2C2529&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Refugees from Ukraine arrive in the Czech Republic. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/bohumin-czech-republic-march-17-2022-2137055843">Tomas Vynikal/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 2022, Russia’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/russia-ukraine-72684">invasion of Ukraine</a> resulted in Europe’s largest refugee crisis since the second world war. By March of that year, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2022/03/21/europe/ukraine-russia-conflict-10-million-refugees-intl/index.html">about a quarter</a> of the country’s total population had fled to safer locations in Europe.</p>
<p>The speed with which the war has escalated has seen <a href="https://theconversation.com/help-for-ukraines-fleeing-refugees-shows-the-power-of-support-when-the-political-will-is-there-178207">Ukrainian citizens needing to flee</a>, hurriedly and by any means available – including on foot. As is most often the case for those who find themselves displaced, most Ukrainian refugees could only take with them what they could carry. </p>
<p>The things that people are able to bring with them, therefore, often take on a heightened significance, reflecting their old and new lives following the severe interruption of war. The collection, display and engagement with these objects can transform otherwise unremarkable artefacts into sacred symbols, demonstrative of resistance and survival. </p>
<p>I spoke to Anna, a young Ukrainian currently living and working in Warsaw, Poland. She shared the items that she’d brought from her last visit to her family, who still live in Ukraine: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I have Ukrainian symbols – a magnet that says ‘Ukraine is my home’ and another with a sunken Russian ship as a reminder that the Russian state will go down, like its ship. Everything connected with my country is important to me, because it is my heart and soul. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 2022, a Ukrainian culture magazine <a href="https://birdinflight.com/en/inspiration/experience/20220405-vazhlive-nevazhlive.html">Bird in Flight</a> produced a feature entitled Unnecessary Necessities, which documented the things taken by those evacuating their homes. Similar initiatives have emerged from the <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/photography/precious-objects-comfort-syrian-refugee-camp-unicef-war-photos-a8817476.html">Syrian refugee crisis</a>, and <a href="https://www.tomkiefer.com/">Tom Kiefer</a>, who worked as a janitor at Customs and Border Protection, photographed the discarded objects of those attempting to cross from Mexico into the US. </p>
<h2>Objects and memory</h2>
<p>The notion of objects associated with war and genocide assuming the role of symbols or talismans has been <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501720079/objects-of-war/">widely researched</a>. For several years, my own research has focused on material memories of the Holocaust. I am deeply moved by the items that survivors or descendants were able to carry or save, recover or reclaim, in order to provide a tangible bridge between the past and the present.</p>
<p>For instance, a gold wedding band unearthed close to the gas chamber area of the former Sobibor death camp in eastern Poland, inscribed with the Hebrew message: “With this ring, you are bound to me.” These items, so significant of the Jewish faith and of the loving relationships that the victims enjoyed before their murders, stand in place of their owners who lay silently in mass graves.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ukraine-refugees-six-practical-steps-to-rise-to-the-challenge-179792">Ukraine refugees: six practical steps to rise to the challenge</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>My participation in archaeological excavations at <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/2012-08-21/ty-article/israeli-digs-up-sobibor-death-camp/0000017f-dc3e-d3ff-a7ff-fdbef3020000">former killing sites</a> also emphasised the importance of objects in restoring memory to the victims of political and historical brutality. </p>
<p>While much attention has been paid to the memorial culture of the second world war, lesser-acknowledged genocides still demand our attention. The crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing campaign throughout areas controlled by the army of Republika Srpska during the Bosnian War of 1992–95, for example, are often overlooked. </p>
<p>During the invasion of the town of <a href="https://srebrenica.org.uk/what-happened/history/happened-srebrenica">Srebrenica</a>, around 8,000 Muslim men, and boys over 12 years old, were murdered, resulting in one of the largest incidences of genocide in Europe. Over the course of the war, 100,000 people were killed, countless women and girls were raped and more than 2 million people were displaced.</p>
<p>One of those displaced people was <a href="https://www.bget-uk.org/smajobeso">Smajo Bešo</a>. He was eight in 1993, and had already lived in the middle of a war zone for over a year. Between June 1992 and March 1993, the Bešo family fled their home village of Barane, moving back and forth between 14 locations in an attempt to stay safe.</p>
<p>As the violence against Muslims progressed towards genocide, Smajo’s father became targeted by Bosnian-Croat soldiers and was arrested. A number of Smajo’s closest relatives were killed, and, after several life-threatening situations, Smajo was eventually reunited with his father, who had survived in a concentration camp. </p>
<p>In 1994, his family arrived in Newcastle-upon-Tyne as refugees and Smajo has continued to share his story, recently <a href="https://www.ncl.ac.uk/apl/news/item/smajo-beso-obe/">receiving an OBE award</a> for services to genocide education.</p>
<p>As part of my wider research into the material memories of genocide, Smajo informed me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We didn’t bring many things with us, we pretty much had to leave everything behind. We had one photo album, with some of the most precious photographs, our house key and my mam kept her watch that my father gave her when they got engaged. The home is the most personal part of your life, where you feel safe, so having any trace of that was really important. It’s proof that your previous life was real, especially when there is denial. We existed, and our previous life existed, and it’s part of the healing process too. We left a part of us in Bosnia and this is how I connect to my past, but also how I rebuild myself.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Ultimately, Smajo’s story, in addition to those who suffered during the Holocaust or in the current war on Ukraine, serves as a reminder of why seemingly ordinary things matter in the context of war and displacement. </p>
<p>Not only are objects evidence of an event, but they facilitate activism and contribute towards memory making, both for the people who experienced it and those who seek to learn from them. As Auschwitz-Birkenau survivor and author Primo Levi <a href="https://echoesandreflections.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/05-02-03-02_StudentHandout_Excerpt-SurvivalAuschwitz-1.pdf">concluded</a> in his 1959 memoir, If This is a Man: “These things are part of us, almost like limbs of our body.”</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/something-good-156">Sign up here</a>.</em></p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hannah Wilson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The things that people are able to bring with them often take on a heightened significance, reflective of both their old and new lives.Hannah Wilson, Teaching Fellow in Holocaust History, Nottingham Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2109012023-09-08T01:11:58Z2023-09-08T01:11:58ZThe science of dreams and nightmares – what is going on in our brains while we’re sleeping?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545455/original/file-20230830-27-ozyppi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=35%2C0%2C5946%2C3979&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/photo-of-a-woman-sleeping-near-fluffy-clouds-8264248/">Pexel/Ron Lach</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last night you probably slept for <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352721816301292">seven to eight hours</a>. About one or two of these was likely in deep sleep, especially if you’re young or physically active. That’s because <a href="http://apsychoserver.psych.arizona.edu/jjbareprints/psyc501a/readings/Carskadon%20Dement%202011.pdf">sleep changes with age</a> and <a href="https://www.hindawi.com/journals/apm/2017/1364387/">exercise</a> affects brain activity. About three or four hours will have been spent in light sleep. </p>
<p>For the remaining time, you were likely in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. While this is not the only time your brain is potentially dreaming – we also dream during other sleep stages – it is the time your brain activity is most likely to be recalled and reported when you’re awake. </p>
<p>That’s usually because either really weird thoughts or feelings wake you up or because the last hour of sleep is nearly all <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Elizaveta-Solomonova/publication/320356182_Dream_Recall_and_Content_in_Different_Stages_of_Sleep_and_Time-of-Night_Effect/links/5a707bdb0f7e9ba2e1cade56/Dream-Recall-and-Content-in-Different-Stages-of-Sleep-and-Time-of-Night-Effect.pdf">REM sleep</a>. When dreams or your alarm wake you, you’re likely coming out of dream sleep and your dream often lingers into the first few minutes of being awake. In this case you remember it.</p>
<p>If they’re strange or interesting dreams, you might tell someone else about them, which may further <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00426-022-01722-7">encode</a> the dream memory.</p>
<p>Dreams and nightmares are mysterious and we’re still learning about them. They keep our brains ticking over. They wash the thoughts from the day’s events at a molecular level. They might even help us imagine what’s possible during our waking hours. </p>
<h2>What do scientists know about REM sleep and dreaming?</h2>
<p>It’s really hard to study dreaming because people are asleep and we can’t observe what’s going on. Brain imaging has indicated certain <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1087079216300673#sec3">patterns of brain activity</a> are associated with dreaming (and with certain sleep stages where dreams are more likely to occur). But such studies ultimately rely on self-reports of the dream experience. </p>
<p>Anything we spend so much time doing probably serves multiple ends. </p>
<p>At the basic physiological level (indicated by <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1053810021001409">brain activity, sleep behaviour and studies of conciousness</a>), all mammals dream – even the platypus and echidna probably experience something similar to dreaming (provided they are at the <a href="https://www.wired.com/2014/07/the-creature-feature-10-fun-facts-about-the-echidna/#:%7E:text=It%20was%20long%20thought%20that,re%20at%20the%20right%20temperature.">right temperature</a>). Their brain activity and sleep stages align to some degree with human <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1053810021001409#b0630">REM sleep</a>. </p>
<p>Less evolved species do not. Some <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2468867319301993#sec0030">jellyfish</a> – who do not have a brain – do experience what could physiologically be characterised as sleep (shown by their posture, quietness, lack of responsiveness and rapid “waking” when prompted). But they do not experience the same physiological and behavioural elements that resemble REM dream sleep. </p>
<p>In humans, REM sleep is thought to occur cyclically every 90 to 120 minutes across the night. It prevents us from sleeping too deeply and being <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4972941/">vulnerable to attack</a>. Some scientists think we dream in order to stop our brains and bodies from getting too cold. Our core body temperature is typically <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laneur/article/PIIS1474-4422(22)00210-1/fulltext">higher while dreaming</a>. It is typically easier to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.2147/NSS.S188911">wake from dreaming</a> if we need to respond to external cues or dangers. </p>
<p>The brain activity in REM sleep kicks our brain into gear for a bit. It’s like a periscope into a more conscious state, observing what’s going on at the surface, then going back down if all is well. </p>
<p>Some evidence suggests “fever dreams” are far less common than we might expect. We actually experience <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00053/full">far less REM sleep</a> when we have a fever – though the dreams we do have tend to be <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3830719/">darker in tone and more unusual</a>. </p>
<p>Spending less time in REM sleep when we’re feverish might happen because we are far less capable of regulating our body temperature in this stage of sleep. To protect us, our brain tries to regulate our temperature by “skipping” this sleep stage. We tend to have fewer dreams when the weather is hot <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/23744731.2020.1756664">for the same reason</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="bed in pink landscape" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545459/original/file-20230830-17-n6ash3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Dreams are when our brain washes itself clean.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/bed-on-colorful-flowers-on-cape-10079452/">Pexels/Mo Eid</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A deep-cleaning system for the brain</h2>
<p>REM sleep is important for ensuring our brain is working as it should, as indicated by studies using <a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(17)31329-5.pdf">electoencephalography</a>, which measures brain activity. </p>
<p>In the same way deep sleep helps the body restore its physical capacity, dream sleep “<a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(17)31329-5.pdf">back-flushes</a>” our neural circuits. At the molecular level, the chemicals that underpin our thinking are bent out of shape by the day’s cognitive activity. Deep sleep is when those chemicals are returned to their unused shape. The brain is “<a href="https://www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1126/science.1241224">washed</a>” with cerebrospinal fluid, controlled by the <a href="https://theconversation.com/on-your-back-side-face-down-mice-show-how-we-sleep-may-trigger-or-protect-our-brain-from-diseases-like-als-181954">glymphatic system</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/on-your-back-side-face-down-mice-show-how-we-sleep-may-trigger-or-protect-our-brain-from-diseases-like-als-181954">On your back? Side? Face-down? Mice show how we sleep may trigger or protect our brain from diseases like ALS</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>At the next level, dream sleep “tidies up” our recent memories and feelings. During <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC534695/">REM sleep</a>, our brains consolidate procedural memories (of how to do tasks) and emotions. <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC534695/">Non-REM sleep</a>, where we typically expect fewer dreams, is important for the consolidation of episodic memories (events from your life). </p>
<p>As our night’s sleep progresses, we produce more cortisol - the <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2005-01907-021">stress hormone</a>. It is thought the amount of cortisol present can impact the type of memories we are consolidating and potentially the types of dreams we have. This means the dreams we have later in the night may be <a href="https://learnmem.cshlp.org/content/11/6/671.full.pdf">more fragmented or bizarre</a>. </p>
<p>Both kinds of sleep help <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jb-Eichenlaub/publication/313545620_Daily_Life_Experiences_in_Dreams_and_Sleep-Dependent_Memory_Consolidation/links/5c532b0ba6fdccd6b5d76270/Daily-Life-Experiences-in-Dreams-and-Sleep-Dependent-Memory-Consolidation.pdf?ref=nepopularna.org">consolidate</a> the useful brain activity of the day. The brain also discards less important information. </p>
<h2>Random thoughts, rearranged feelings</h2>
<p>This filing and discarding of the day’s activities is going on while we are sleeping. That’s why we often dream about things that happen <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0264574">during the day</a>. </p>
<p>Sometimes when we’re rearranging the thoughts and feelings to go in the “<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3921176/">bin</a>” during sleep, our level of consciousness allows us to experience awareness. Random thoughts and feelings end up all jumbled together in weird and wonderful ways. Our awareness of this process may explain the bizarre nature of some of our dreams. Our daytime experiences can also fuel nightmares or anxiety-filled dreams after a <a href="https://www.sleepfoundation.org/dreams/how-trauma-can-affect-dreams">traumatic event</a>.</p>
<p>Some dreams appear to <a href="https://rai.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1111/j.1467-9655.2010.01668.x">foretell the future or carry potent symbolism</a>. In many societies dreams are believed to be a window into an <a href="https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1050&context=ijts-transpersonalstudies">alternate reality</a> where we can envisage what is possible.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545460/original/file-20230830-29-3jrotm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Memories can be cemented by and fuel dreams and nightmares.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/assorted-photos-on-table-1989747/">Pexels/Suzy Hazelwood</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/sleeping-on-it-helps-you-better-manage-your-emotions-and-mental-health-heres-why-179156">‘Sleeping on it’ helps you better manage your emotions and mental health – here’s why</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What does it all mean?</h2>
<p>Our scientific understanding of the thermoregulatory, molecular and basic neural aspects of dreaming sleep is <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn2716">good</a>. But the psychological and spiritual aspects of dreaming remain largely hidden. </p>
<p>Perhaps our brains are wired to try and make sense of things. Human societies have always interpreted the random – birds wheeling, tea leaves and the planets – and looked for <a href="https://brill.com/display/book/edcoll/9789047407966/B9789047407966-s003.xml">meaning</a>. Nearly every human society has regarded dreams as more than just random neural firing. </p>
<p>And the history of science tells us some things once thought to be magic can later be understood and harnessed – for better or worse.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210901/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Dreams keep our brains ticking over. They wash the thoughts from the day’s events at a molecular level. They might even help us imagine what’s possible during our waking hours.Drew Dawson, Director, Appleton Institute, CQUniversity AustraliaMadeline Sprajcer, Lecturer in Psychology, CQUniversity AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2115302023-08-16T18:02:37Z2023-08-16T18:02:37ZWhy bilinguals may have a memory advantage – new research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542978/original/file-20230816-17-dvfign.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=89%2C35%2C3880%2C2446&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/student-shouting-by-megaphone-over-flags-281242769">Luis Molinero/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Think about being in a conversation with your best friend or partner. How often do you finish each other’s words and sentences? How do you know what they are going to say before they have said it? We like to think it is romantic intuition, but it’s just down to how the human brain works.</p>
<p>In any communication, we generate myriad predictions regarding what we are about to hear. It’s just like when we play the game hangman, where we try to predict the target word based on a few letters. To begin with – when we only have one or two letters to go on – the pool of potential candidate words is massive. The more letters we guess correctly, the more the pool of candidate words narrows down, until our brain clicks and we find the right word. </p>
<p>In natural communication, we rarely wait to hear the entire word before we begin to plan what to say back. As soon as we hear the first sounds of a word, our brain uses this information, and together with other clues – such as frequency, context and experience – fills in the blanks, cutting down from a vast list of potential candidate words to predict the target word. </p>
<p>But what if you are a bilingual with languages that have similar sounding words? Well, then, the list of candidate words is much larger. This may sound negative – making it more difficult to predict words. But a new study, <a href="http://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adh0064">published in Science Advances</a>, has revealed that this may actually give bilinguals an advantage when it comes to memory.</p>
<p>The languages of a bilingual are interconnected. The same neural apparatus that processes our first language also processes our second language. So it is easy to see why, upon hearing the first sounds of a word, potential candidate words are activated, not only from one language, but from the other one as well. </p>
<p>For instance, upon hearing the sounds “k” and “l”, a Spanish-English bilingual will automatically activate both the words “clock” and “clavo” (nail in Spanish). This means the bilingual has a tougher cutting down job to do in order to settle on the correct word, simply because there is more to cut down to get to the target. It is not surprising then that bilinguals usually take more time to retrieve or recognise words in psychological and linguistic experiments. </p>
<h2>Experimental set up</h2>
<p>Consistently having to access competing words from a large pool of candidates may have long-term cognitive consequences. In the new study, Spanish-English bilinguals and English monolinguals heard a word and had to find the correct item among an array of object images, while their eye movements were recorded.</p>
<p>The other objects in the array were manipulated so that they resembled the corresponding word sound of the target item. For instance, when the target word was “beaker”, there were images of objects such as a beetle (whose sounds overlap with beaker) or a speaker (that rhymes with beaker). Participants looked longer at those images than at ones with no overlap (such as carriage). </p>
<p>Increased looking time reflected the fact that observers activated a larger pool of competing labels, which happens when words sound similar. Not surprisingly, bilinguals looked longer at images that overlapped both within and across their languages – meaning they looked longer at more objects than monolinguals.</p>
<p>The study examined whether this kind of cross-language competition leads to better ability in remembering objects. This is because the more objects you look at, the more likely you are to remember them later on. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Los Angeles sign in English and Klallam as a way to honor the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542977/original/file-20230816-25-63ashs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Los Angeles sign in English and Klallam as a way to honor the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/low-angle-view-bilingual-english-klallam-2186364953">365 Focus Photography/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Participants were required to identify the correct object image after hearing a prompt word. They were then tested on their recognition memory of objects they had previously seen. Participants had to click on a box labelled “old” if they recognised the item and on a box labelled “new” if they did not.</p>
<p>The findings showed that recognition memory for objects with many competitors (such as beaker, beetle, speaker) was enhanced relative to items with low competitors (such as carriage) in both monolinguals and bilinguals. In addition, bilinguals showed the effect for cross-language competitors as well (for example clock, clavo) – giving an overall memory advantage. </p>
<p>Interestingly, second language proficiency played a crucial role. The memory advantage was most profound in bilinguals with high second language proficiency than in bilinguals with low second language proficiency and monolinguals. Clearly, to play bilingual hangman efficiently, you need to develop high proficiency in the second language, so that its words become competitors alongside those of the first language. </p>
<p>The eye tracking data confirmed that items with more competitors were looked at the longest, which led to the memory advantage for those items later on. These findings show that the bilingual cognitive system is highly interactive and can impact other cognitive components such as recognition memory.</p>
<p>Other studies <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797614567509">also show</a> enhanced memory processing in bilinguals relative to monolinguals in categorisation tasks that require suppressing distracting information. This could certainly indicate that bilinguals are more efficient at multi-tasking and more able to focus on the task at hand, especially when the task requires ignoring irrelevant information (think trying to work in a noisy cafe). </p>
<p>The picture that emerges is one where bilingualism is a cognitive tool that enhances basic cognitive functions, such as memory and categorisation. Bilingual hangman is a tougher game, but one that, ultimately, pays off.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211530/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Panos Athanasopoulos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Bilinguals may struggle with hangman but they excel at remembering and categorising objects.Panos Athanasopoulos, Professor of Linguistics and English Language, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2041672023-08-14T14:56:29Z2023-08-14T14:56:29ZThe science of why you can remember song lyrics from years ago<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/534865/original/file-20230629-22632-ez2qiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=42%2C71%2C9447%2C6245&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The science behind rhyme, rhythm and repetition.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/young-african-american-woman-singing-song-2137952063">Krakenimages.com/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Why is it that many people can’t remember where they put their car keys most mornings, but can sing along to every lyric of a song they haven’t heard in years when it comes on the radio? Do song lyrics live in some sort of privileged place in our memories?</p>
<p>Music has a long history of being used as a mnemonic device, that is, to aid the memory of words and information. Before the advent of written language, music was used to <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1995-97902-000">orally transmit stories and information</a>. We see many such examples even today, in how we teach children the alphabet, numbers, or – in my own case – the names of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-h44uaNXEQI">50 states</a> of the US. Indeed, I’d challenge even any adult reader to try and recall the letters of the alphabet without hearing the familiar tune or its rhythm in your mind.</p>
<p>There are several reasons why music and words seem to become intricately linked in memory. Firstly, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.20.6.1471">features of music</a> often serve as a predictable “scaffold” for helping us to remember associated lyrics. </p>
<p>For instance, the rhythm and beat of the music give clues as to how long the next word in a sequence will be. This helps to limit the possible word choices to be recalled, for instance, by signalling that a three-syllable word fits with a particular rhythm within the song. </p>
<p>A song’s melody can also help to segment a text into meaningful chunks. This allows us to essentially remember longer segments of information than if we had to memorise every single word individually. Songs also often make use of literary devices like rhyme and alliteration, which <a href="https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197096">further facilitate memorisation</a>. </p>
<h2>Sing it</h2>
<p>When we have sung or heard a song many times before, this song may become accessible via our implicit (non-conscious) memory. Singing the lyrics to a very well-known song is a form of <a href="https://www.simplypsychology.org/procedural-memory.html">procedural</a> memory. That is, it is a highly automatised process like riding a bike: it’s something we are able to do without thinking much about it. </p>
<p>One of the reasons music is so deeply ingrained in memory in this way is because we tend to hear the same songs many, many times <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-were-obsessed-with-music-from-our-youth-154864">throughout our lifetimes</a> (more so, than say, reading a favourite book or watching a favourite film). </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Woman with pink hair singing into music device with headphones on." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/534867/original/file-20230629-25452-718jfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘I just can’t get you out of my head’: we tend to remember songs and lyrics quite easily.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/portrait-active-stylsh-teenage-girl-pinkish-1765476086">Anatoliy Karlyuk/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>Music is also <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-sad-songs-say-so-much-to-some-people-but-not-others-65365">fundamentally emotional</a>. Indeed, research has shown that one of the main reasons people engage with music is because of the diversity of emotions it conveys and evokes. </p>
<p>A wide range of research has found that <a href="https://theconversation.com/making-a-mark-on-the-brain-how-emotion-colours-memories-15872">emotional stimuli are remembered better than non-emotional ones</a>. The task of trying to remember the ABCs or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXtpjBzPMeY">the colours of the rainbow?</a> is inherently more motivating when set to a catchy tune – and we can remember this material better later on when we make an emotional connection.</p>
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</figure>
<h2>Music and lyrics</h2>
<p>It should be noted that not all previous research has found that music facilitates memory for associated lyrics. For instance, upon the first encounter with a new song, memorising both the melody and associated lyrics is <a href="https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03198404">harder than memorising just the lyrics</a>. This makes sense, given the multiple tasks involved. </p>
<p>However, after getting over this initial hurdle and being exposed to a song several times, more beneficial effects seem to kick in. Once a melody is familiar, the associated lyrics are generally <a href="https://doi.org/10.2466/pms.106.3.927-957">easier to remember</a> than if you tried to memorise these lyrics without a tune behind them. </p>
<p>Research in this area is also being applied to assist people with various neurodegenerative disorders. For instance, music seems to help those with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1525/mp.2012.29.5.521">Alzheimer’s disease</a> and <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00395/full">multiple sclerosis</a> to remember verbal information. </p>
<p>So, the next time you put your car keys in a new spot, try creating a catchy song to remind you of their location the next day – and, in theory, you shouldn’t forget where you’ve put them so easily.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204167/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kelly Jakubowski does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Music creates powerful memories and emotional connections in our brains.Kelly Jakubowski, Associate Professor in Music Psychology, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2099702023-07-19T04:03:59Z2023-07-19T04:03:59ZAlzheimer’s drug donanemab has been hailed as a ‘turning point’ for treatment. But what does it mean for people with the disease?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538167/original/file-20230719-29-ns8anb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=97%2C67%2C4895%2C2739&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/amyloid-plaques-forming-between-neurons-3d-2271276029">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Trial results of a new drug to treat Alzheimer’s disease, donanemab, shows it can <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2807533">slow cognitive decline</a> by 35%. The drug has been hailed as a “turning point” in Alzheimer’s treatment.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1680945583383539713"}"></div></p>
<p>But as usual, there’s <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02321-1">more to the story</a>. The study only included people with early or mild disease, not more advanced symptoms. Donanemab is not a cure for Alzheimer’s. Nor is it 100% safe. </p>
<p>So what did the trial actually find? And how might this drug affect the lives of people with Alzheimer’s disease? </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/new-alzheimers-drug-what-you-need-to-know-about-donanemabs-promising-trial-results-205156">New Alzheimer’s drug: what you need to know about donanemab’s promising trial results</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What is Alzheimer’s disease?</h2>
<p>There are more than 100 types of dementia, but Alzheimer’s disease is the most common, accounting for <a href="https://alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/alz.12068">around 70%</a> of cases. </p>
<p>The disease is caused by the accumulation of two proteins: amyloid and tau. Amyloid can accumulate for at least 20 years prior to the onset of symptoms, forming clumps in the brain. </p>
<p>Once symptoms have started and are progressing, tau, a marker of cell damage, also begins to accumulate.</p>
<p>Clinical symptoms progress, on average, over <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaneurology/fullarticle/783112">seven to ten years</a> after diagnosis. But in Australia, there is a lag of <a href="https://www.dementia.org.au/sites/default/files/2022-12/Dementia-Australia-annual-report-2021-2022.pdf">up to three years</a> from the point at which people first develop symptoms before a diagnosis is typically made.</p>
<h2>What have drug treatments aimed to do?</h2>
<p>The “<a href="https://www.embopress.org/doi/pdf/10.15252/emmm.201606210">amyloid hypothesis</a>”, which suggests amyloid is the key cause of the disease, has driven Alzheimer’s research for more than 25 years. </p>
<p>Multiple drugs targeting amyloid have, however, failed in clinical trials over most of that period, casting doubt on the validity of amyloid as a target – until recently.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-allegations-of-alzheimers-research-fraud-mean-for-patients-187911">What allegations of Alzheimer's research fraud mean for patients</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Our bodies produce antibodies in response to the presence of a foreign invader such as a bacteria or virus. Mimicking the approach taken by our immune systems, scientists have developed antibodies in the lab that recognise amyloid as such an invader. </p>
<p>Specifically targeting amyloid, these drugs are known as monoclonal antibodies. Donanemab is one of three monoclonal antibodies targeting amyloid that have shown various degrees of success in clinical trials in slowing decline in people with early stage disease.</p>
<h2>OK so what did the donanemab trial find?</h2>
<p>The manufacturer’s clinical trial included 1,736 patients with very mild memory loss due to Alzheimer’s disease, and with early clinical Alzheimer’s disease. </p>
<p>Half received donanemab by intravenous infusion over an 18-month study, the remainder were treated with a placebo (a “dummy” version). </p>
<p>The results were analysed by dividing the study population into two further groups: those with low to intermediate levels of tau; and those with high tau levels (high tau correlates with the presence of more advanced brain cell damage).</p>
<p>Those with low and intermediate tau declined by 35% less than those treated with placebo. About half of the treatment group cleared amyloid from their brains below the threshold used to diagnose the disease, over 12 months of treatment. </p>
<p>The high tau group did far less well.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="older couple holding hands with man looking confused" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538163/original/file-20230719-27-f0bjsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People may be delaying diagnosis because they think nothing can be done.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/retired-couple-holding-hands-looking-each-1272275779">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Participants aged under 75 and those showing only mild cognitive impairment (rather than the full clinical picture of Alzheimer’s disease) had their progression slowed by around 50% over the same period.</p>
<p>Patients were assessed using both cognitive measures and measures of daily function, such as the ability to do personal and household tasks. The results translated into the treatment group showing levels of decline at 18 months that were experienced by the placebo group at 10.5 to 13.6 months, depending on the participant subgroup studied.</p>
<p>Important examples may be that they continue to be able to drive, pay bills, or attend activities outside of the home independently.</p>
<p>But both the treatment and the placebo groups declined overall. In other words, it doesn’t stop the decline, it slows it, in people with mild or early disease. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lots-of-breakthroughs-still-no-cure-do-the-new-dementia-drugs-bring-us-any-closer-195095">Lots of 'breakthroughs', still no cure. Do the new dementia drugs bring us any closer?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What are the downsides?</h2>
<p>At least two patients in the trial died from complications of brain swelling caused by donanemab. Around one-quarter of the treatment group showed some degree of swelling, most of which didn’t cause symptoms. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="CT scan films displayed" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/538165/original/file-20230719-15-c6fftb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two patients in the study died from complications from brain swelling.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/alzheimers-disease-on-mri-2-664361179">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The cost of donanemab will be significant, at <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2023/07/17/alzheimers-drug-lilly-donanemab/">US$26,500</a> or around A$39,000 per year. </p>
<p>Donanemab has already been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration.
Eli Lilly, the drug’s manufacturer, has applied to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) for approval for use in Australia. </p>
<p>But TGA approval is only the first step to making the drug available here. A further assessment will determine whether the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme subsidises the drug to make it affordable.</p>
<p>It’s likely any PBS listing would restrict the drug’s use to people whose disease state mirrors that of those included in the clinical trial population – people with early symptoms, who have had PET scans showing the presence of amyloid (and low and intermediate tau). </p>
<p>This is not a drug for everyone with Alzheimer’s disease.</p>
<h2>Preparing for early detection and treatment</h2>
<p>People have tended to delay seeking assessment of their memory symptoms because “nothing can be done anyway”. GPs may have been reluctant to refer to other specialists for assessment for the same reason. </p>
<p>The potential for early treatment means this needs to change. We also need to develop our diagnostic and treatment infrastructure (building the necessary PET scanners and infusion centres) that will be necessary to facilitate timely diagnosis and treatment when the drug does become available locally.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-sundowning-and-why-does-it-happen-to-many-people-with-dementia-208005">What is 'sundowning' and why does it happen to many people with dementia?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209970/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steve Macfarlane has been paid to attend a number of Australian medical advisory board meetings for Eli Lilly, the manufacturer of donanemab, most recently last year. He receives funding from a number of drug companies for conducting pharmaceutical trials. He is affiliated with the RANZCP.</span></em></p>The drug has been hailed as a ‘turning point’ in Alzheimer’s treatment. But keep in mind the trial only included participants with early or mild disease. And while it slowed decline, it’s not a cure.Steve Macfarlane, Head of Clinical Services, Dementia Support Australia, & Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2081142023-06-22T20:06:52Z2023-06-22T20:06:52ZCan a daily multivitamin improve your memory?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533349/original/file-20230622-17-8fpk5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=135%2C358%2C8107%2C4918&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/middle-aged-woman-holding-glass-fresh-2260639755">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/research-check-25155">Research Checks</a> interrogate newly published studies and how they’re reported in the media. The analysis is undertaken by one or more academics not involved with the study, and reviewed by another, to make sure it’s accurate.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Don’t we all want to do what we can to reduce the impact of age-related decline on our memory?</p>
<p>A new study suggests a daily multivitamin and mineral supplement is a simple and inexpensive way to help older adults slow the decline in some aspects of memory function.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1668634337254989826"}"></div></p>
<p>The <a href="https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)48904-6/fulltext">new study</a>, which comes from a <a href="https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02422745?term=NCT02422745&draw=2&rank=1">long-running clinical trial</a>, shows there may be a small benefit of taking a daily multivitamin and mineral supplement for one type of cognitive task (immediate word recall) among well-functioning elderly white people. At least in the short term.</p>
<p>But that doesn’t mean we should all rush out and buy multivitamins. The results of the study don’t apply to the whole population, or to all types of memory function. Nor does the study show long-term benefits.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-much-memory-loss-is-normal-with-ageing-193217">How much memory loss is normal with ageing?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>How was the study conducted?</h2>
<p>The overarching COSMOS study is a well-designed double-blind randomised control trial. This means participants were randomly allocated to receive the intervention (a daily multivitamin and mineral supplement) or a placebo (dummy tablet), but neither the participants nor the researchers knew which one they were taking.</p>
<p>This type of study is considered the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5654877/">gold standard</a> and allows researchers to compare various outcomes. </p>
<p>Participants (3,562) were older than 64 for women, and 59 for men, with no history of heart attack, invasive cancer, stroke or serious illness. They couldn’t use multivitamins or minerals (or <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2216932120">cocoa extract</a> which they also tested) during the trial. </p>
<p>Participants completed a <a href="https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04582617?term=NCT04582617&draw=2&rank=1">battery of online cognitive tests</a> at the start of the study (known as baseline), then yearly for three years, of which only three were reported in this paper:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>ModRey, measuring immediate recall. Participants were shown “a list of 20 words, one at a time, for three seconds each,” and then had to type the list from memory</p></li>
<li><p>ModBent, measuring object recognition. Participants were given 20 prompts with a shape and then had to select the correct match from a pair of similar prompts. After this, they were prompted with 40 shapes in turn, and had to indicate whether each was included in the original 20 or not</p></li>
<li><p>Flanker, measuring “executive control”. Participants had to select a coloured block that corresponded to an arrow in a matrix of arrows, which could have the same (or different) colour to the surrounding arrows, and the same (or different) direction as the prompt block.</p></li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Question mark made of multivitamins on a yellow background" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533392/original/file-20230622-21-i9io5k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Participants took a daily supplement or placebo and undertook memory tests over three years.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/medication-pills-isolated-on-yellow-background-3683096/">Pexels/Anna Schvets</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What did the researchers find?</h2>
<p>Of all the tests the researchers performed, only immediate recall (ModRey) at one year showed a significant effect, meaning the result is unlikely to just be a result of chance. </p>
<p>At two and three years, the effect was no longer significant (meaning it could be down to chance).</p>
<p>However they added an “overall estimate” by averaging the results from all three years to arrive at another significant effect. </p>
<p>All the effect sizes reported are very small. The largest effect is for the participants’ immediate recall at one year, which was 0.07 – a value that is <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jpepsy/article/34/9/917/939415">generally considered very small without justification</a>.</p>
<p>Also of note is that both the multivitamin and placebo groups had higher immediate word recall scores at one year (compared to baseline), although the multivitamin group’s increase was significantly larger. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10.1073/pnas.2216932120">In the researchers’ prior study</a>, the increase in word recall scores was described as a “typical learning (practice) effect”. This means they attributed the higher scores at one year to familiarisation with the test. </p>
<p>For some reason, this “learning effect” was not discussed in the current paper, where the treatment group showed a significantly larger increase compared to those who were given the placebo.</p>
<h2>What are the limitations of the study?</h2>
<p>The team used a suitable statistical analysis. However, it did not adjust for demographic characteristics such as age, gender, race, and level of education.</p>
<p>The authors detail their study’s major limitation well: it is not very generalisable, as it used “mostly white participants” who had to be very computer literate, and, one could argue, would be quite well-functioning cognitively. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Older man looks at vitamin bottle" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533351/original/file-20230622-15-kimrtz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The study isn’t generalisable to a wider population.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/senior-man-taking-prescription-medicine-home-1768003628">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Another unmentioned limitation is the advanced age of their sample, meaning long-term results for younger people can’t be assessed. </p>
<p>Additionally, the baseline diet score for their sample was abysmal. The researchers say participants’ diet scores “were consistent with <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/1899558">averages from the US population</a>” but the cited study noted “the overall dietary quality… [was] poor.” </p>
<p>And they didn’t measure changes in diet over the three years, which could impact the results. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-make-your-diet-more-sustainable-healthy-or-cheap-without-giving-up-nutrients-170522">How to make your diet more sustainable, healthy or cheap – without giving up nutrients</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>How should we interpret the results?</h2>
<p>The poor dietary quality of the sample raises the question: can a better diet be the simple fix, rather than multivitamin and mineral supplements? </p>
<p>Even for the effect they observed, which micronutrient from the supplement was the contributing factor? </p>
<p>The researchers speculate about vitamins B12 and D. But you can find research on cognitive function for any arbitrarily chosen <a href="https://www.centrum.com/content/dam/cf-consumer-healthcare/bp-wellness-centrum/en_US/pdf/lbl-00000775-web-ready-centrum-silver-adults-tablets-(versio.pdf">ingredient</a>, including <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=selenium+cognitive+function">selenium</a>, which can be <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969720378608">toxic at high levels</a>.</p>
<h2>So should I take a multivitamin?</h2>
<p><a href="https://newsinhealth.nih.gov/2013/08/should-you-take-dietary-supplements">Health authorities advise</a> daily multivitamin use isn’t necessary, as you can get all the nutrients you need by eating a wide variety of healthy foods. However, supplementation may be appropriate to meet any specific nutrient gaps an individual has.</p>
<p>Using a good quality multivitamin at the recommended dose shouldn’t do any harm, but at best, this study shows well-functioning elderly white people might show some additional benefit in one type of cognitive task from using a multivitamin supplement. </p>
<p>The case for most of the rest of the population, and the long-term benefit for younger people, can’t be made. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Young woman in a mask read a label at a pharmacy" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533398/original/file-20230622-17-m0w8rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Health authorities advise that daily multivitamins aren’t necessary.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/young-woman-looking-product-store-wearing-2135565945">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<h2>Blind peer review</h2>
<p><strong>Clare Collins writes:</strong></p>
<p>I agree with the reviewer’s assessment, which is a comprehensive critique of the study. The key result was a small effect size from taking a daily multivitamin and mineral (or “multinutrient”) supplement on memory recall at one year (but not later time points) and is equivalent to a training effect where you get better at taking a test the more times you do it.</p>
<p>It’s also worth noting the study authors received support and funding from commercial companies to undertake the study. </p>
<p>While the study authors state they don’t believe background diet quality impacted the results, they didn’t comprehensively assess this. They used a brief <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22513989/">diet quality assessment score</a> only at baseline. Participants may have changed their eating habits during the study, which could then impact the results.</p>
<p>Given all participants reported low diet quality scores, an important question is whether giving participants the knowledge, skills and resources to eat more healthily would have a bigger impact on cognition than taking supplements. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-taking-vitamins-and-supplements-help-you-recover-from-covid-182220">Can taking vitamins and supplements help you recover from COVID?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208114/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clare Collins AO is a Laureate Professor in Nutrition and Dietetics at the University of Newcastle, NSW and a Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI) affiliated researcher. She is a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Leadership Fellow and has received research grants from NHMRC, ARC, MRFF, HMRI, Diabetes Australia, Heart Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, nib foundation, Rijk Zwaan Australia, WA Dept. Health, Meat and Livestock Australia, and Greater Charitable Foundation. She has consulted to SHINE Australia, Novo Nordisk, Quality Bakers, the Sax Institute, Dietitians Australia and the ABC. She was a team member conducting systematic reviews to inform the 2013 Australian Dietary Guidelines update and the Heart Foundation evidence reviews on meat and dietary patterns.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jacques Raubenheimer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>No, we shouldn’t all rush out to buy multivitamin supplements. Here’s what this new study actually found.Jacques Raubenheimer, Senior Research Fellow, Biostatistics, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2069032023-06-07T16:43:41Z2023-06-07T16:43:41ZFlavanols are linked to better memory and heart health – here’s what foods you can eat to get these benefits<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530367/original/file-20230606-27-luw7mn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C0%2C4243%2C2822&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Two-and-a-half cups of green tea contain the recommended daily amount of flavanols.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/white-man-drinking-green-tea-porcelain-569390533">granata68/ Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There are plenty of good reasons to make sure you’re eating enough fruit and vegetables each day. Not only do fruit and vegetables contain many of the important vitamins and minerals our body needs to function at its best, they also keep our gut healthy and may even help maintain a healthy weight.</p>
<p>But some plant foods may be more beneficial for health than others, thanks to a group of compounds called flavanols.</p>
<p>For instance, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2216932120">a recent study</a> I helped conduct showed that people who eat a diet high in flavanol-rich foods may have better memory compared to those who have a low intake. A previous study also found that people with a low intake of flavanols were at <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002916522002751">higher risk of heart disease</a>. Overall, there’s convincing evidence that <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9776652/">consuming enough flavanols</a> has health benefits. </p>
<p>But while research shows that flavanols have many health benefits, it’s important for consumers to know that not all flavanol-rich foods contain the same amount of flavanols – meaning some may be more beneficial to health than others. </p>
<h2>Plant compounds</h2>
<p>Flavanols are a group of compounds that are found in many plants – including apples, berries, plums and even beverages such as tea. </p>
<p>There are <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20854838/">two main groups of flavanols</a>, with many different subgroups. Each plant will contain different combinations of flavanols, as well. These compounds each have different structures and different effects on the body. That means that not all flavanols are created equal. </p>
<p>For example, a portion of blueberries and a cup of tea may contain the same amount of total flavanols – but they are made up of completely different types of flavanols, which may have completely different health effects.</p>
<p>So in order to investigate the health effects of flavanols, it’s therefore important to use a source which includes a wide range of different types. This is why flavanols extracted from cocoa are an ideal model, as they contain the <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35080238/">two main types of flavanols</a>. It also allows researchers to calculate which other foods are likely to have benefits based on how similar the compounds they contain are to cocoa flavanols.</p>
<p>Since foods such as cocoa, berries and tea contain a combination of many types of flavanols, it’s currently not clear which individual compounds generate health benefits. But some research has linked the specific flavanol epicatechin with <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16418281/">better vascular function</a>. Cocoa and tea both contain epicatechin.</p>
<h2>Many different types</h2>
<p>Another thing to know is that even if a food contains flavanols, it may contain lower amounts compared to others.</p>
<p>To better understand how flavanol intake affects health, a few years ago we developed a test that uses urine to <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-whole-new-way-of-doing-nutrition-research-148352">measure flavanol intake</a>. The test is based on the way the human body processes flavanols and tells us whether someone has eaten large amounts, small amounts or no flavanols at all.</p>
<p>Using this test, we were able to show that people with high flavanol intake <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33087825/">had lower blood pressure</a> and <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2216932120">better memory</a> than those with lower intake. </p>
<p>When we developed the urine test, we also investigated how it is affected by <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29959422/">different types of flavanols and foods</a>. This allowed us to estimate what amount of different flavanol-rich foods a person needs to consume to achieve approximately 500mg of flavanols per day – similar to the amount used in studies, which has been shown to have clinical benefit.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A table showing the number of servings of certain foods which are needed to get 500mg of flavanols a day." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530346/original/file-20230606-27-qki0ut.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Number of servings needed from different flavanol-containing foods to obtain 500 mg per day.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Gunter Kuhnle</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>According to our research, only two-and-a-half cups of green tea are needed daily to get the recommended 500mg of flavanols. Just under a cup of millet (sorghum grain) can also provide you with the recommended daily amount.</p>
<p>But if you were to try and get your flavanols from one type of fruit and vegetable, our research shows you’d need to consume large amounts of each to achieve the recommended amount. For example, you’d need to consume nearly 15 cups of raspberries alone to get 500mg of flavanols.</p>
<p>As such, the best way to get enough flavanols daily is by consuming a combination of different fruits and vegetables. For example two apples, a portion of pecan nuts and a large portion of strawberries can achieve the 500mg target – or a salad made with millet and fava beans. </p>
<p>It’s also important to note that while the flavanols used in many studies were extracted from cocoa, unfortunately chocolate (even dark chocolate) is a very <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8372115/">poor source of flavanols</a> – despite what <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-12135965/Six-squares-dark-chocolate-day-memory-loss-bay.html">some headlines might claim</a>. This is because these flavanols are <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18412367/">lost during processing</a>.</p>
<p>Although there’s still much we don’t know about flavanols – such as why they have the effect they do on so many aspects of our health – it’s clear from the research we do have that they are very likely beneficial to both memory and heart health.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206903/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gunter Kuhnle has received research funding from Mars, Inc., a company engaged in flavanol research and flavanol-related commercial activities. </span></em></p>Many plants contain flavanols – but some contain more than others.Gunter Kuhnle, Professor of Nutrition and Food Science, University of ReadingLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2058952023-05-24T17:01:45Z2023-05-24T17:01:45ZTime Shelter: International Booker’s first Bulgarian winner is a rich experiment in style, structure and ideas<p>A philosophical exploration of memory and nostalgia, about forgetting and trying to hold on to our past and make sense of our present and future, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/may/23/international-booker-prize-first-bulgarian-winner-georgi-gospodinov-time-shelter-angela-rodel">Georgi Gospodinov’s Time Shelter</a> is a worthy winner of this year’s <a href="https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/prize-years/international/2023">International Booker prize</a>.</p>
<p>If ours is an age of privation, this expansive novel symbolises opulence: of ideas, meanings, utopian aspirations and the bizarre brilliance of the human mind. The author convenes memory, nostalgia and history together with the individual and the nation, to chart a narrative arc over the territories of remembrance and oblivion. Above all, it is a book about time, in its fragments and in its perpetuity.</p>
<p>As with so many prize-winning novels, Time Shelter conjures up episodes of human history to make us ponder what we have gone through and what we are living with. It is a book that forces the reader to go slow, given the sheer amount of stimulation for the senses and ideas that it has to offer. </p>
<p>The author’s use of history is masterful and central to the narrative. The novel is a great experiment in terms of narrative style, structure and ideas, and can only come from a <a href="https://blogs.bl.uk/european/2016/06/an-introduction-to-bulgarian-literature.html">literary culture</a> that is not bogged down by canons and rules. </p>
<p>Gospodinov is an acclaimed poet, playwright and writer both in Bulgaria and in Europe, and is the recipient of several national and international literary prizes. The work is beautifully translated by Angela Rodel, who shares in the prize.</p>
<p>Judges’ chair <a href="https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/judges/leila-slimani">Leila Slimani</a> called Time Shelter – the first Bulgarian work to win the prize – a “brilliant novel” describing it:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>A profound work that deals with a very contemporary question: what happens to us when our memories disappear? … Time Shelter is a great novel about Europe, a continent in need of a future, where the past is reinvented and nostalgia is a poison. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The land of Time Shelter is inhabited by just two main characters: the unnamed narrator and their friend Gaustine, a geriatric time-travelling psychiatrist who darts in and out of the narrative, at times claiming his space with profound quotes and observations.</p>
<p>In an interview, Gospodinov said that he, the narrator and Gaustine flow into one another, making him feel like he is being invented by his character Gaustine. With such unstable narrative entities, what readers are left with are voices that merge and lapse, but endure.</p>
<p>The structure of the novel itself gives the feeling of slowly losing one’s grip over time and narrative as the story becomes increasingly fragmented. The author clarifies that since it is a novel about Alzheimer’s, the collapsing narrative gives the idea of the characters and the narrator losing their memory, and the fading effect is transmitted to the reader. </p>
<h2>The past is contagious</h2>
<p>The narrator and Gaustine create what they call a “clinic for the past” that offers a hopeful treatment for people with Alzheimer’s. Each floor carefully recreates a period from the patient’s past, transporting them back to a more comforting time when life was good. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A cover of a book called Time Shelter showing five different rooms in different colours." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=914&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=914&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=914&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1148&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1148&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/526895/original/file-20230517-22717-7w0x3f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1148&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.weidenfeldandnicolson.co.uk/titles/georgi-gospodinov/time-shelter/9781474623070/">Weidenfeld & Nicholson / Orion</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The “discreet monster of the past” is brought back with a “therapeutic aim” in these rooms. The nostalgia rooms become more and more important and effective in providing the patients with a slice of familiarity and memory. </p>
<p>Gospodinov explores the different aspects of remembering. While preserved memories can bring solace for some, there are characters like Mrs Sh., whose shower phobia is traced back to her experiences of the Auschwitz concentration camp. </p>
<p>Memories that she has forcefully repressed surface overwhelmingly in the phase of dementia and become a part of her “inescapable reality”. Some memories of inhumanity simply do not fade away but lurk in a corner ready to pounce in a moment of weakness.</p>
<p>In this onslaught of memories, nostalgia is inescapable. And it is in nostalgia that the personal and the historical, the individual and the nation, find refuge. </p>
<p>What starts with Alzheimer’s patients recreating their “happy times”, re-enacting their histories and escaping into the past begins to gain momentum. As the solace provided by these rooms becomes apparent, healthy people without memory loss are increasingly drawn to the clinic as a way of escaping the troubled present.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/MwVbxFdfTYs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>The unsustainability of nostalgia</h2>
<p>In Time Shelter’s world, each European country holds a referendum about recreating history and slipping back into better times, transforming themselves into nostalgia nations with temporal borders. With tongue-in-cheek humour, the UK does not take part due to Brexit. </p>
<p>This is a modern-day utopia and dystopia rolled into one. Anarchy creeps in even amid the contentment of collective nostalgia, and “the world has become a chaotic open-air clinic of the past, as if the walls had fallen away”.</p>
<p>Gospodinov reveals the unsustainability of nostalgia, even though it can be a source of comfort, and the danger of dwelling on our histories. What starts off as therapeutic ultimately brings chaos and fragmentation.</p>
<p>The art of good storytelling demands fresh perspectives, reinvention, and yet a close tie to one’s narrative heritage. Time Shelter is all of that and much more.
Gospodinov’s deft brewing of European history, utopian ideals and the devastating reality of neurological disorders will continue the conversation on human fragility well beyond the pages of this book.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205895/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sukla Chatterjee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Judges called it a profound novel that asks the contemporary question: what happens to us when our memories disappear?Sukla Chatterjee, Lecturer in Anglophone Literatures and Cultures, University of AberdeenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2026702023-05-16T19:32:50Z2023-05-16T19:32:50ZWe’re just starting to learn more about aphantasia, the inability to picture things with the mind’s eye<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523564/original/file-20230501-28-l8bw6m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4833%2C3219&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Some people don’t have the ability to create mental images, a condition called aphantasia, but can still experience visual imagery in their dreams. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When asked to close their eyes and imagine a sunset, most people can bring to mind an image of the sun setting on the horizon. Some people may experience more vivid details, such as vibrant colours, while others may produce a mental image that is blurry or lacks detail. But recent research has found that some people don’t experience mental imagery at all. </p>
<p>This <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2015.05.019">lack of mental imagery is called aphantasia</a>. People with aphantasia are often surprised when they learn others see mental images in their minds. Many people with aphantasia have said they assumed others were <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-821377-3.00012-X">speaking metaphorically when they described seeing something in their “mind’s eye.”</a></p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a man watches the sun set on the horizon" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523633/original/file-20230501-22-o9l9a0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When asked to imagine a sunset, most people can visualize it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Viresh Thakur/Unsplash)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is because our internal mental processes are not visible to others, so it is easy to assume everyone’s minds operate in the same way. It is estimated that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2021.103243">roughly four per cent of people have aphantasia</a>. </p>
<p>People with aphantasia report a lack of visual imagery, and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/03010066211042186">97 per cent also report deficits in at least one other modality of imagery</a>, like being unable to imagine certain sounds or tastes.</p>
<h2>Everyday mental imagery</h2>
<p>Mental imagery is involved in many other everyday cognitive processes. For example, visual and spatial imagery may play an important role in autobiographical memory. One study found that people with a tendency to generate vivid high-resolution mental images of objects and scenes can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211.2015.1018277">recall personal memories more quickly and in greater detail</a>. </p>
<p>People with aphantasia are able to remember autobiographical facts, but when recalling life events they report <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2022.105192">fewer details and a less emotional experience</a>, despite describing the events as important or personally relevant. </p>
<p>Mental imagery is also experienced when dreaming. Interestingly, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2020.04.003">60 per cent of people with aphantasia report visual imagery in their dreams</a>, although the quality of their experience is different from that of people with typical imagery ability. When dreaming, people with aphantasia report reduced experience across all senses, lower overall awareness and less sense of control.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a person asleep in bed wearing a blue satin sleeping mask" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523635/original/file-20230501-926-dufq7m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People with aphantasia are still able to have visual dreams, although with reduced sensory experiences.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The fact that people with aphantasia have some preserved mental imagery while dreaming suggests that aphantasia could be a deficit in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2015.08.003">voluntary mental imagery</a> — the ability to deliberately bring images to mind — rather than involuntary mental imagery. </p>
<h2>Imagery and reading</h2>
<p>Many people also use mental imagery when reading. When we read, we create mental models to help make sense of the words and sentences, and research shows that we create these models using mental imagery. </p>
<p>For example, after reading a sentence such as “the ranger saw the eagle in the sky,” <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0051382">people tend to be faster to recognize a picture of an eagle with outstretched wings, rather than a picture of an eagle sitting</a>. This is because they visualize or simulate the situation described in the sentence, and this can help them quickly identify a picture that matches the imagined situation. </p>
<p>Aphantasia seems to affect whether or not people build mental models while they read. One study found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.0267">when reading descriptions of scary scenarios, people with aphantasia showed less emotional or physiological responses</a>, suggesting their comprehension was less affected by imagined or simulated sensory experience. </p>
<p>These simulations can also occur subconsciously when we read single words and can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/xlm0001039">help us access word meanings more quickly</a>. For instance, when reading words related to sensory experiences such as vision, action and smell, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2022.104994">the brain areas responsible for these senses are also active</a>. However, there is currently no research on whether this is also true for people with aphantasia, so we don’t know if they subconsciously simulate sensory or motor information when reading single words. </p>
<h2>Different modes</h2>
<p>People with aphantasia do not always consider their lack of mental imagery to be a negative thing. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-821377-3.00012-X">Some even credit their lack of imagery for success in other areas such as science and mathematics</a>.</p>
<p>People with aphantasia also pursue creative vocations in fields such as visual art or writing, so mental imagery is not the same as imagination. In fact, <a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/cspe/engagement/extreme-imagination/">the University of Glasgow curated an art exhibition featuring work by artists with aphantasia and those with hyperphantasia (extremely vivid mental imagery)</a>. </p>
<p>Discovering conditions like aphantasia tells us there may be different “modes” of cognition. For some people, thinking may involve simulating past sensory experiences both consciously and unconsciously. For others, and for people who have aphantasia, thinking may involve accessing facts. </p>
<p>Aphantasia shows us there is diversity in human cognition — despite our assumptions, our minds do not all work the same way. Research on aphantasia is just beginning, but it is a promising avenue to better understand the inner workings of the human mind.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202670/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Penny Pexman receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emiko Muraki does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People with aphantasia are unable to deliberately bring to mind mental images. Understanding the mechanisms of aphantasia reveals that different types of cognition exist.Emiko Muraki, PhD Candidate, Brain & Cognitive Science, University of CalgaryPenny Pexman, Professor of Psychology, University of CalgaryLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2009812023-05-09T12:24:22Z2023-05-09T12:24:22ZMemories may be stored in the membranes of your neurons<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524523/original/file-20230504-21-f51zke.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2130%2C1406&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Changes in the synapses between neurons is responsible for learning and memory.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/nerve-cells-and-electrical-pulses-royalty-free-illustration/758308889">KTSDESIGN/Science Photo Library via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Your brain is responsible for controlling most of your body’s activities. Its information processing capabilities are what allow you to learn, and it is the central repository of your memories. But how is memory formed, and where is it located in the brain? </p>
<p>Although neuroscientists have identified <a href="https://courses.lumenlearning.com/waymaker-psychology/chapter/parts-of-the-brain-involved-with-memory/">different regions of the brain</a> where memories are stored, such as the hippocampus in the middle of the brain, the neocortex in the top layer of the brain and the cerebellum at the base of the skull, they have yet to identify the specific molecular structures within those areas involved in memory and learning.</p>
<p>Research from our team of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=o_qJUYIAAAAJ&hl=en">biophysicists</a>, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=lFqiBd4AAAAJ&hl=en">physical chemists</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=2mXI8mUAAAAJ&hl=en">materials scientists</a> suggests that memory might be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2212195119">located in the membranes of neurons</a>.</p>
<p>Neurons are the fundamental working units of the brain. They are designed to transmit information to other cells, enabling the body to function. The junction between two neurons, called a synapse, and the chemistry that takes place between synapses, in the space called the synaptic cleft, are <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-are-memories-stored-in-the-brain-new-research-suggests-they-may-be-in-the-connections-between-your-brain-cells-174578">responsible for learning and memory</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Diagram of neuronal synapse" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524518/original/file-20230504-1253-pu06u5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=698&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The space between two neurons is called a synapse.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://openstax.org/books/anatomy-and-physiology/pages/1-introduction">OpenStax</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At a more fundamental level, the synapse is made of two membranes: one associated with the presynaptic neuron that transmits information, and one associated with the postsynaptic neuron that receives information. Each membrane is made up of a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2017.10.017">lipid bilayer</a> containing proteins and other biomolecules. </p>
<p>The changes taking place between these two membranes, commonly known as <a href="https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain-basics/brain/brain-physiology/what-synaptic-plasticity#">synaptic plasticity</a>, are the primary mechanism for learning and memory. These include changes to the amounts of different proteins in the membranes, as well as the structure of the membranes themselves.</p>
<p>Synaptic plasticity can be classified as either being short term, lasting from milliseconds to a few minutes, or long term, lasting from minutes to hours or longer. The chemical processes occurring between the presynaptic and postsynaptic membranes in short-term plasticity eventually lead to long-term synaptic plasticity.</p>
<figure>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Long-term potentiation is thought to be the physiological mechanism behind learning.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Since scientists think the main way the brain processes and stores information is through these <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-019-0048-y">long-term changes to the synapses</a>, we wondered if memory might be stored in the membrane’s lipid bilayer.</p>
<p>We found that exposing a model of a simple lipid bilayer to electrical stimulation – not unlike the stimulation used in studies of the brain – can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2212195119">trigger long-term changes</a>. What made this result unique was that we were able to generate changes in our simple membrane model without the neuronal proteins typically associated with it. Furthermore, long-term plasticity persisted in our model for almost 24 hours without any further electrical stimulation. This suggests that the neuronal membrane may be responsible for memory storage.</p>
<p>Our findings support the use of the lipid bilayer as a model for understanding the molecular basis of biological memory. It may also serve as a platform for <a href="https://theconversation.com/neuronlike-circuits-bring-brainlike-computers-a-step-closer-146659">neuromorphic computing</a>, in which the memory components of a computer are modeled after the structure and function of the human brain.</p>
<p>Finally, the lipid bilayer may also be a potential therapeutic target to treat different neurological conditions. Pinpointing where and how memory is stored in the brain will not only revolutionize how we understand learning and memory, it can also guide the development of new therapies for diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200981/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles Patrick Collier receives funding from the Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) program at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Center for Nanophase Sciences (CNMS).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dima Bolmatov receives funding from the National Science Foundation, Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences (MCB).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Katsaras does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Pinpointing where memories are stored in the brain and how they are transmitted could provide new targets to treat neurological diseases and serve as models for neuromorphic computing.John Katsaras, Senior Scientist in Biological Systems at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Joint Faculty Professor in Physics and Astronomy, University of TennesseeCharles Patrick Collier, Research Scientist in Nanophase Materials Sciences, University of TennesseeDima Bolmatov, Ph.D., Research Assistant Professor in Physics, University of TennesseeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2042162023-04-26T16:37:57Z2023-04-26T16:37:57ZWe need memory to learn – but not the way we currently use it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/522548/original/file-20230424-22-glqbep.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=24%2C8%2C5439%2C3628&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">shutterstock</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/es/image-photo/frustrated-stressed-female-student-learning-difficult-1079701121">Shutterstock / fizkes</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Sometimes we remember things that we did not even know we had memorised and sometimes the opposite happens – we want to remember something that we know we’ve learned but are not able to recall it.</p>
<p>Faced with an exam, students only ask themselves about decontextualised exam content: in this situation, they may not be able to bring back the answer, even if they think they know it. It may even seem to them that they have forgotten everything they have studied. Perhaps not everything, but a large part of it. Had they really ever even learned it? </p>
<h2>There is no learning without memory</h2>
<p>Memory and learning go hand in hand. As much as it may not sound innovative in this day and age, and even if new methodologies reject the idea, it is impossible to separate learning from memory.</p>
<p>In order to defend this categorical statement, we need to understand what memory consists of, the different types of memory that we have and are familiar with, and their involvement in learning processes. It should also be clarified that language often betrays us and that “learning things by heart” (something which is sometimes necessary) is not the same as involving memory to achieve learning.</p>
<h2>Memory types</h2>
<p>There is more than one memory. We could classify the types of memory as sensory memory, working memory and long-term memory.</p>
<p>Sensory memory is unconscious, made up of information gathered by the senses and sent permanently to the brain. When we direct our attention to a piece of information, that memory becomes conscious. This is a short-term memory (our “working” memory).</p>
<p>We are always using our working memory. To understand how this memory type operates, it is useful to think of it as a small space in which we can store only a certain amount of information simultaneously – information that we gather from the outside or information that we bring to our consciousness.</p>
<h2>Working memory in class</h2>
<p>The functioning of working memory depends, then, on where we focus our attention and also on how quickly we process the information with which we are working.</p>
<p>To this end, there are students whose processing speed (that is, the time they require to store the information in their working memory) may be greater. This does not mean that they do not have the capacity to work with the information, but rather that they cannot accumulate so many things at the same time in working memory. And vice versa: other students can handle more information faster.</p>
<p>Working memory is what <a href="https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/articulo?codigo=7824293">allows us to learn</a>. It processes the information in our brain almost physically – organising it, comparing it with prior knowledge, imagining contexts. When we become aware of our thinking, we are putting our working memory into play. So, should teachers teach with memory in mind? In the case of working memory, there is no doubt that the answer is yes. </p>
<h2>Long-term memory</h2>
<p>Long-term memory is what we are normally referring to colloquially when we talk about “memory”, and we can observe it when we remember things we have learned, different meanings, etc.</p>
<p>In terms of long-term memory, we can differentiate between what we call explicit and implicit memory. Explicit long-term memory corresponds to the type of memory that is the result of conscious learning and it can come about quite quickly. This is semantic and meaningful learning or autobiographical and contextual learning. Once the knowledge has been processed in the working memory, one could say that it is transferred to the long-term memory. While working memory is limited, long-term memory is <a href="https://www.portalesmedicos.com/publicaciones/articles/4494/1/Neuropsicologia-de-la-memoria.htmlhttp://lema.rae.es/drae/?val=gerundio175">infinite</a>.</p>
<p>Implicit long-term memory is unconscious and is acquired through repetition and through experience. Also known as procedural memory, it is essential in everyday life since it helps us to <a href="http://aulavirtual.iberoamericana.edu.co/repositorio/Cursos-Matriz/Psicolog%C3%ADa/Morfofisiologia-del-sistema-nervioso-central/MD/edoc.site_fisiologia-de-la-conducta-neil-r-carlson.pdf">learn skills</a>. This includes motor skills, such as riding a bicycle or sewing, but also (and closely related to the educational field) cognitive skills, such as learning to read.</p>
<p>Without automatic learning, reading would be impossible as a cognitive skill. Also, the ability to solve problems, plan, etc.</p>
<h2>Memorising by thinking</h2>
<p>So, why do we say that we should abandon a learning system based on memory if memory is so important for learning? Because “learning by heart” or “rote learning”, as we colloquially understand the expression, inevitably leads to the information being forgotten. It does not make learning conscious, it does not use working memory, and it teaches without a clear understanding of what the meaning behind that memorising is.</p>
<p>We need to learn by thinking. If we only ask students to “do things” without making them think about what we want them to learn – if we do not focus their attention and make them process the information – there will be no meaningful learning.</p>
<p>Teaching students to use and work with their memory implies activating prior knowledge through questions, setting out real or familiar contexts, bringing past experiences and memories back into working memory. And not only activating this knowledge, but also really making sure that they have it. Without this prior step, the student’s reaction is to memorise in a meaningless way. </p>
<p>And that is why they forget: they cannot reactivate what they thought they had memorised when it is put into other contexts because they have no context and the knowledge has not been connected to the information that long-term memory already had in it.</p>
<p>For this reason, it is necessary to go deeper into the different topics (very different from adding more and more content), offering multiple situations and different schemes to form connections, all the while consolidating with more and more prior knowledge.</p>
<h2>Having a ‘good’ memory or a ‘bad’ memory</h2>
<p>When we say that someone has a “good” memory, we usually refer to their ability to remember, to call up what has been kept in long-term memory. And, thus, we say that someone who is capable of remembering many things has a “good memory”.</p>
<p>The more ingrained the information is in the mind and the better we have learned it, the easier it will be for us to <a href="https://www.planetadelibros.com/libros_contenido_extra/29/28398_Aprender_Recordar_Olvidar.pdf">remember it</a>. But it is also necessary to facilitate this memory from the educational perspective, to make it sound familiar to us and give clues for contextualisation.</p>
<p>In exams, what we are measuring is the ability to remember. When we ask students to “study”, what we should be asking them is to “practice to see if they remember”. Repeating and trying to “learn by heart” causes them to not be able to remember the information later, even despite saying that they “knew it”. For this reason, it is necessary to practice memory, work with the information and its meanings, and not just read while trying to memorise.</p>
<p>Thus, memorising is not learning. Learning is remembering.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204216/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Las personas firmantes no son asalariadas, ni consultoras, ni poseen acciones, ni reciben financiación de ninguna compañía u organización que pueda obtener beneficio de este artículo, y han declarado carecer de vínculos relevantes más allá del cargo académico citado anteriormente.</span></em></p>Of the three types of memory (sensory, working and long-term), the last two are indispensable for learning. Students must be taught to work on them in class in order to avoid meaningless memorisation.Sylvie Pérez Lima, Psicopedagoga. COPC 29739. Profesora asociada Master Dificultades del Aprendizaje y Trastornos del Lenguaje., UOC - Universitat Oberta de CatalunyaJordi Perales Pons, Profesor asociado Estudios Psicología y Ciencias de la Educación, UOC - Universitat Oberta de CatalunyaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.