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Improving Memory For Learned Material
It is the beginning of the academic year. It will soon be time to slog it out with those never ending chapters, long notes and innumerable details to know and remember. I wish to share with you few ways that could make our efforts more effective and worthwhile.
HOW TO STOP THINKING EXCESSIVELY: OVERTHINKING PART II
Most of us have experienced or rather suffered rumination at some time, either temporarily or more chronically. Hence, we are here reading more about it. Now that we have understood what rumination is and why it doesn’t work for us more clearly, how do we stop this process?
WHY THINKING A LOT DOESN’T HELP: OVERTHINKING-PART I
Some people complain that “I just can’t seem to think” but a larger number, perhaps, find themselves trapped because they just can’t stop thinking! They find themselves thinking all the time – while watching TV, while working, eating and even in sleep! Psychology has a name for it. Rumination.
Rumination is the process of pondering or thinking over something repetitively. It’s pretty much like a cow chewing over her food incessantly. Where rumination may help the cow’s health, it isn’t really helpful for our mental health.
TOUCH – A POWERFUL SENSE INDEED!!
“What’s in a touch?” one may ask. I came across an article on ‘psyblog’ ( read it here) that seemed to convey, “what is NOT in a touch?” The potency of touch as a means of communication is often underestimated. We often use ‘conversation’ or ‘talking’ and ‘communication’ synonymously, even while we surely have read about facial expressions and body language as being more powerful than spoken content while in interaction. Going one step ahead, body language immediately brings to our mind elements of body posture such as slouching, stooping, standing upright, having hands folded etc. Well, what we miss out on, possibly due to cultural norms, is that body language also involves touch.
YOUR STRUGGLE WITH YOURSELF: COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
What happens when what you think does not agree with what you also think?
Whether you are aware of it or not, it happens all the time! That’s the phenomenon sophisticatedly known in psychology as cognitive dissonance. Let’s take an example we knew in our childhood. Haven’t we all heard of the story of the fox and the sour grapes? In the story the fox has two conflicting thoughts: -“the grapes are sweet’. “I cannot have them.”
The fox’s resolution of the conflict is inducing the belief “the grapes are sour”. What the fox technically does is resolves its state of cognitive dissonance because it is too difficult to accept the two conflicting thoughts.
Much as we laugh and scorn at this silly fox, we do similar things all the time.
EFFECT OF REEL AGGRESSION: DESENSITIZATION
Desensitization to aggression is a much discussed issue. It refers to a psychological state where the impact of aggression fails to rub off on the mind, when we are “not affected” when we watch scenes of violence. While this could be great news for a good night’s sleep, experiencing it repeatedly could slowly begin to erode empathy out of our systems when such a situation occurs in real life.
