--Original published at CatherinesCollegeBlog

Researchers recently studied the effects of caffeine on the human brain, specifically looking for an increase in entropy that would make brains better able to handle this unpredictable world. Since people often rely on coffee or tea to keep them focused on a task or give them an energy boost of ideas when they feel stuck, it was originally believed that caffeine must have a lowering effect on entropy levels, creating a more ordered brain system. After performing the study, researchers instead proved the opposite effect.

Researchers began their study by recruiting participants from Hangzhou Normal University in China, as well as from the local community in Hangzhou. Sixty participants formed the sample for the study, including thirty males and thirty females. These participants were required to meet a certain criteria in order to be admitted into the study. They could not have had abnormal structural MRI, they had to be within 20-26 years of age, they could not have any neuropsychological issues or magnetic objects in their bodies, and they could not be taking medications that would affect central blood flow to the brain. Researchers used MRI scans of the brain to detect changes in brain entropy levels of each participant before and after ingesting caffeine. The study was performed over two days and participants were randomly assigned to two groups, A and B, each containing fifteen males and fifteen females. Researchers chose for participants to ingest a caffeine pill instead of having them drink a cup of coffee or tea. This allowed for more control in the experiment, as they knew the exact amount of caffeine each person was ingesting in the 200mg pill. Both groups received a brain scan each day to use as comparison images. Group A received a scan and a caffeine pill on the first day, then returned for another scan the following day so the caffeine had 24 hours to digest. Group B only received a scan on the first day, then was given the caffeine pill the next day along with another scan thirty minutes after ingestion.

What they found was not only an increase in brain entropy, but also a decrease in central blood flow after participants had caffeine within their systems. While central blood flow was reduced across the entire brain, entropy levels only experienced an increase in certain regions of the brain. These regions of increased brain entropy included the default mode network with a 16.09 percent spike, the visual cortex with a 14.48 percent jump, the motor network with an 8.13 percent rise, and the lateral prefrontal cortex with a 7.70 percent growth. Since caffeine is known to have the largest effect on cognitive functions of awareness, movement, and alertness, it made sense that the areas of the brain responsible for the operation of these functions experienced a rise in entropy levels with a little help from caffeine. Including these increased levels of entropy in terms of percentages more clearly operationalized the dependent variable of brain entropy levels, instead of simply stating whether or not they went up; however, the individual data was not provided regarding the increase each participant experienced, which may have been useful. The caffeine pill was the independent variable in the experiment, operationalized based on the amount of caffeine it contained and to some degree, the timing of when participants ingested the pill.

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between caffeine and the human brain entropy levels, not whether or not caffeine helps us write a better essay or complete tasks more efficiently. Many people look for the quick fix to a problem or challenge. After reading about a study like this, they likely jump to the conclusion that coffee allows for a higher capacity of the brain to process information. It is important to remember that this was strictly performed as a correlational study, searching for relationships between caffeine and entropy levels, while stumbling upon the effect on central blood flow levels. The increase in entropy and decrease in central blood flow had a correlation ranging from -0.5 to -0.4. Caffeine and entropy were clearly found to have a positive correlation, as participants increased caffeine levels in their bodies and, shortly after, experienced an increase in entropy levels. This correlation currently only allows for suggestions and assumptions, as this study did not specifically experiment with cognitive functions or data relating to this. Correlation does not allow for causation, so while it is acceptable to credit a rise in entropy levels to the ingestion of caffeine, it is not yet scientifically supported to state that caffeine ingestion directly leads to an increase in the brain’s capability to process more complex information.

Reflection:

I first made sure to include more information about the participants, as the news article did not mention any details aside from the number of participants the study used. When data is collected from a group of people, regardless of the study, there will be different results depending on the characteristics of each group. In this case, if the study was performed on people with previous brain injuries or people who are regular coffee or tea drinkers, the results would have likely been different. After only reading the news article at the beginning of this project, I had no idea whether I should be comparing myself and the possible personal effects I would experience as a result of caffeine with the effects and results experienced by the participants. After reading the scholarly article, which included the age, gender, health background, and previous caffeine use of the participants, I can better compare the results to myself and decide how intensely I would like to apply the findings to my own routine. I also made sure to mention the correlational aspect of this study, as it was solely looking for a relationship between the variables. News articles tend to produce more flashy and intriguing writing that sometimes alters the truth a bit. The simple proven fact that caffeine increases brain entropy levels does not also conclude that caffeine increases the information processing abilities of the brain. This was an important distinction that I felt was necessary to include. I left out diagrams of brain scans and their explanations from the scholarly article, simply because they were difficult to understand. A normal person reading this should not have to have a background in psychology or scientific brain imaging techniques in order to understand the main idea. My summary includes what I felt were the most important aspects of the five critical questions for reading research. The news article failed to mention details about the sample group, the timing of the study, and that this was strictly a correlational study. I made these aspects more clear for the reader, so the information could be more accurately applied to his or her personal circumstances. I did not feel that it was critical to include whether or not conclusions are generalized to the right population, since this is still not entirely clear. There need to be further studies done in this same manner, as well as adding the cognitive functioning aspect to collect data about this effect of caffeine before it can be applied to certain groups of people or an entire population.

With the restrictions this assignment involved in terms of word count, I can see why journalists have trouble including every aspect of a research study, especially one like this. There was also a lot of complex scientific data and information included in the scholarly article that would have been difficult to incorporate into a news article. This is likely why journalists of news articles focus more on any attention-grabbing information they can find from the research. People do not necessarily care about caffeine as an antagonist to adenosine, especially since most would not even know what that means. What people are looking for in a news article is any groundbreaking findings they can apply to their own lives, such as how the coffee they drink each day might be making them smarter. I would definitely give credit to journalists who find a way to keep the story intriguing without leaving out critical details of research that establish credibility.

Works Cited

Chang, Da, et al. “Caffeine Caused a Widespread Increase of Resting Brain Entropy.” Scientific

Reports, vol. 8, no. 1, 2018, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-21008-6.

McDonald, Hal. “A Little Chaos With Your Coffee?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 2

July 2018, http://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/time-travelling-apollo/201807/little-chaos-your-coffee.

News Article: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/time-travelling-apollo/201807/little-chaos-your-coffee

Scholarly Article: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-21008-6

--Original published at KatieMillerPSY105

Mental health services on college campuses have become more prevalent in recent years due to the implementation of Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and increased media attention. Most colleges highlight their student wellness services in an effort to attract and support students. While institutes of higher education spend significant resources to aid the student population in mental health issues, little was known of the extent of mental disabilities in faculty and staff. Most information on faculty mental health came from self-disclosure in papers and at conferences. Four researchers, Margaret Price, Mark S. Salzer, Amber O’Shea, and Stephanie L. Kerschbaum, decided to study faculty members with mental health histories and the support they receive on campus.

Their article “Disclosure of Mental Disability by College and University Faculty: The Negotiation of Accommodations, Supports, and Barriers” addresses faculty mental health in the first large group survey across higher education institutions in the United States. This comprehensive survey provides more detail into previous conclusions or “hunches” based on small-scale studies and first-person accounts, including personal experiences by the researchers.

This innovative survey compiled the results of 267 college and university faculty members who self-identified as having mental illness, mental-health histories or mental disabilities. Participants were solicited through electronic communications in Listservs, direct emails to college human resources departments and outreach to professional organizations. The survey was designed to be anonymous to allow for greater participation without possible stigma attached to respondents.

The primary objectives of the survey were to determine the familiarity of faculty to mental health accommodations available under the law and the extent of accommodations and support they received. Almost 70% of respondents indicated that they had no or limited familiarity with the accommodations available at their institution. More interesting, only 13% of respondents actually requested accommodations, while the majority (87%) did not. Some reasons given for not requesting accommodations included not needing any special accommodations, not being aware of accommodations, negative impact to tenure/promotion, or personal privacy reasons. Respondents were concerned about the stigma of mental illness and the impact on credibility as faculty. These results mirror the personal experiences of the authors in their respective college settings.

Another interesting finding of the survey was that about half of the faculty disclosed their mental health history to a colleague even though they did not avail themselves of college services. Only 10% of participants had disclosed the information to a dean, provost or the Office of Disability Services. Some of the reasons provided for not disclosing information to college administration were personal privacy or negative impacts to promotion/tenure, contract renewal or even employment.

From a support perspective, the study found that the majority of respondents found much more mental health support from family, friends and outside professionals than with services provided on campus or with colleagues and supervisors.

This study provides more insight into faculty members seeking support for their mental health issues and indicating that most faculty do not use available college services. As fear and stigma are cited by many as a reason to not seek accommodations at their college, the authors believe more work is needed in both practical accommodations and in ideological change in recognizing psychiatric disabilities in the academic workplace. While further studies are needed to determine the extent of faculty mental health issues across college campuses, these results demonstrate that current college and university mechanisms for dealing with mental disabilities in faculty are inadequate.

Work Cited

Flaherty, Colleen. “Study of Faculty Members with Mental Health Issues Finds Mix of Attitudes on Disclosing and Seeking Assistance.” Esports Quickly Expanding in Colleges, Inside Higher Ed, 8 June 2017, www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/06/08/study-faculty-members-mental-health-issues-finds-mix-attitudes-disclosing-and.

Price, M., Salzer, M. S., Oshea, A., & Kerschbaum, S. L. (2017). Disclosure of Mental Disability by College and University Faculty: The Negotiation of Accommodations, Supports, and Barriers. Disability Studies Quarterly, 37(2). doi:10.18061/dsq.v37i2.5487

http://dsq-sds.org/article/view/5487/4653

Reflection:

One of the most challenging aspects of summarizing academic research is to determine what information to include for the readers. Since this academic study was based on survey questions rather than scientific experiment, the results are more easily presented to the public since definition of scientific terms and methodology are not needed. However, some of the survey results need to be left out of the article for sake of length and readability. I was also concerned to present the survey results in a manner that preserves the academic summary rather than persuade readers by selectively disclosing pieces of information.

I decided to remove some of the detailed demographic information for the respondents as the details of type of professor (assistant, associate, full or non-tenure-track) or type of institution (graduate school, four-year undergraduate, community colleges) may not be as important to the readers of the article. By highlighting the main objectives of the study, I feel that I can convey the findings without dedicating too much space to specific figures. As in the original pop culture article, I did not reproduce the tabular summary of results. However, I did want to incorporate some of the survey results into the summary by highlighting the lack of awareness of accommodations, reasons for not requesting accommodations and the resources faculty uses for support.

As the scientific study was based on survey responses rather than a scientific experiment with control groups, I attempted to address the five critical questions for reading research as best as possible. I wanted to disclose the variables used in the study including the definition of self-identified mental health issues and describing the method for selecting participants, the correlations from the study results and the opportunities for further studies. Since these results are based on survey responses rather than a scientific experiment with control groups, my media report does not make any casual claims or generalizations.

There are some similarities between my media production and Colleen Flaherty’s article, “Portrait of Faculty Mental Health.” Both narratives summarized the key elements of the scholarly article by addressing the stigma of disclosure of mental illness and low percentage of faculty utilizing accommodations. Both my summary and the article detailed the parameters of the study including selection of participants, the variable of mental health issues in faculty and the opportunities for further study. Neither of us made any casual claims or generalizations. Flaherty had the ability to receive direct feedback from the researchers to add additional content to her article. I had also reached out to the principal author of the study, but I was not able to receive any additional insight into the study or more recent follow up. This additional information would have aided in my summary as approximately 30% of Flaherty’s article contains direct quotes from the researchers. The news article also provided more statistical detail than my summary. I felt that the readers would still understand the overall findings of the survey with fewer numerical amounts and could reference the original study for the detailed information. My intention was to support the study findings that college faculty is generally unaware of accommodations on campus and tends not to disclose mental health issues to administration.

After reading the pop culture article and the scholarly research article, I have a much better appreciation for describing psychological research. I feel that Flaherty’s news article effectively covered the academic survey, including the parameters and results. I initially thought that I could easily summarize the academic research into a media report effectively addressing the five critical questions for reading research while making the summary enjoyable to read. It is much more difficult to summarize almost 18 pages of scholarly work into a two-page article. I first had to read through the academic report a few times to fully comprehend the major themes to be sure that I could articulate them appropriately. While I felt that the pop culture article was a nice summary, I wanted to be sure that I covered all the important issues without distorting the results by adding my own commentary or selected facts. I did not have the opportunity to interview the authors as the pop culture article did, but those insights would have been beneficial to my summary. For reporting on scientific articles, I feel that it is critically important for the author to fully comprehend the intent of the research and the appropriate findings, conclusions or generalizations. I appreciate the opportunity to create the media production, but I believe that I need much more background in technical writing and scientific theory to be an accomplished scientific journalist.

--Original published at Tiffany'sCollegeBlog

After reading “Preventing Suicide Among College Students,” by Jane Brody, the article brought back a memory that stuck with me while I was at my first college, Susquehanna University. I was told that we get our mid term break because that was a time when some college students would get suicidal. Suicide is the act or an instance of taking one’s own life voluntarily and intentionally. A college student has to deal with a lot when going away to school; the adjustment from high school to college, the amount of work given by professors, being out on their own in a new environment, and not being surrounded by the people who care about them the most. It’s often times very hard for a college student to get used to it that quickly as well and it can have a physical, emotional, and social toll on how it affects them. Often times when a student goes away, they might not tell their parents or friends everything that they should know and because technically we are “adults” now and go by the law, the colleges can not say  anything, especially if there is a lot of difficulties. The law that prevents colleges from alerting parents when their students are in trouble and having difficulties is the FERPA, or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. The article also includes a persona story of Brody, which explains how she helps someone avoid suicide. There are many places on campus that can help college students and be a nice resource when they need someone to talk to like the counseling centers. They can help students talk through things and even offer treatment for students. Most counseling centers can offer academic help as well as emotional help. Along with suicide, depression goes along with it and both have increased throughout the years. Some schools have made it a big priority to keep up with the demand so that students can continue to be happy and healthy. Many have added full-time counselors and employees to provide services for the students. There are also some websites like “Caring Community” that can help students with any health related issues that occur. Other websites like “Notice and Respond” can direct anyone who is concerned about a friend or peer by giving signs to look out for like risk taking and verbal or written threats and suggestions for how to handle a situation. While there are ways to handle situations like this on a college campus, there are ways to contact the parents, so they can assist as well. The students giving the school a grant so that they can talk to the parents is one way and the other is for a friend to contact the parents, if they have the information to do so. Being an active parent can help your student realize that you are only a phone call away and that they can always call whenever they need you.

After summarizing the article, I realize how difficult it is to get every fine and vivid detail into a summary without restating the entire article and copying all of the article. Summarizing teaches students how to discern the most important ideas in a text, how to ignore irrelevant information, and how to integrate the central ideas in a meaningful way. I think that when people do summarize we tend to hit all the main points that we can but under a word limit, it gets more complicated because you have to focus on what the readers will understand and making it simple and to the point. The process alone is kind of hard to decide what a really good details to include and what would make the summary beneficial to those who read it. I didn’t leave anything important out because I feel like this whole article is important. It’s a very touchy subject and every thing that I included is significant. Even if I did leave something out, it’s only because I don’t know how to summarize it without taking it word for word. My perspective on journalists have changed a little bit but not a whole lot. Knowing people who write for the university paper makes a difference because I see how hard it is for them to write something. I would say that the only thing that makes it hard still is the fact that you don’t know what is true and what is false with articles. The whole project itself relies on whether or not you are a good summarizer so it depends on how you were taught to summarize.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/02/well/preventing-suicide-among-college-students.html 

--Original published at Kealey's PSY105 Blog

Summary

After spending months in the safe and stoic environment of a mother’s womb, how does a baby begin to distinguish an understanding of the world around them? With no previous experience to the greater outside world and everything in it, a baby’s brain rapidly develops within its first few months of life. Aside from new surroundings, a baby also discovers itself. It is a little person with arms, legs, a mouth. Just a touch can open up a whole new world of sensation and possibilities to a baby. A study by Dr. Meltzoff at the University of Washington tracked babies’ brain activity to map the early body representation in different parts of the brain. This study has given us a better understanding of how babies learn to recognize themselves and how they begin to understand the existence of others.

Dr. Meltzoff is a developmental psychologist who has been exploring the brain structure and behavior of early life for years. In EEG scans of adults in similar studies, results have been consistent that stimulation to a body part would cause an increase in activity to a specific region on the contralateral side of the brain, and stimulation near the center of the body would show bilateral activity in both hemispheres of the brain. Studies that test for body representation through brain activity in certain parts of the brain have allowed researchers to map neural networks and design a human homunculus. These visual representations help us better understand the amount of brain tissue dedicated to each body part in our brains. In an adult homunculus, the center part of the body is small compared to the hands, mouth, and feet. Dr. Meltzoff’s goal was to test babies in the same way to reveal if their neural networks had any differences in their early developmental stage.

The researchers invited new parents to bring their babies to the study. The requirements were that the babies had to be of the desired age of about 8 weeks old, of normal birth, and born without any medical or developmental problems. 25 infants were used in the study. A stretch EEG cap with electrode sensors were placed on the baby’s head while a trained researcher would gently tap different body parts numerous times in a randomized order. The left foot and left hand were chosen to be stimulated in this experiment because these babies were in beginning the stage of grabbing and kicking. The middle of the upper lip was also tested because the mouth is essential in a newborn’s life for sucking, eating, and displaying emotional expression. The EEG captured brain activity while each part was tapped. The researchers then analyzed the trends in brain activity relating to specific parts of the brain to make conclusions about how infants’ brains represent different body parts.

What the researchers found was that when the left foot or hand was tapped, a spike in activity on the right side of the brain become apparent. When the lip was touched, bilateral activity was shown across the center of the brain. These results are fairly consistent with studies of adult brains. However, activity displayed while touching the lip was noticeably stronger. The obvious cortical magnification of the lip in babies’ brains can be explained by the importance of the mouth during infancy and babies’ limited range of motion in other regions. These results show that even in early development, the brain responds to touch the same way across the lifespan with subtle differences in strength.

Dr. Meltzoff’s article in the Journal of Developmental Science also mentions a previous study he conducted on how babies respond to watching others have different parts of their bodies touched. Learning how infants develop a social understanding of others is difficult to track, and not much research has been done on this topic in the past. What the researchers found was that the visual cortex and sensorimotor cortex was activated upon watching others’ hands, feet, and lips being tapped. The same regions in the brain that would have been activated if the infants experienced the touch themselves corresponded with watching the same body part being touched on someone else. These results indicate that infants are able to relate to others at a very early age. Understanding how others’ bodies react to touch create the connection to infants that “They are just like me.”

Though there is still more to be learned about early development of body representation in our brains, Dr. Meltzoff’s research of infants help us better understand how newborns develop a sense of bodily self and make connection to others through their shared experience of touch.

 Original New York Times Article

Scholarly Journal Article

 Take Away

              The process of summarizing the scholarly article seemed easy to me at first. After all, Perri Klass seemed to effortlessly pull out the most important aspects of the article in plain English so that any typical reader of the New York Times could understand it. While completing this series of essays, my respect for scientific journalists has changed. I appreciate the careful word choice and organizational writing skills it takes to write a summary of scientific findings in a way that is interesting and easy to understand. I found that relaying the information in the scholarly article written by Dr. Meltzoff was not as simple as I originally thought it would be. His article is written in many scientific terms, some of which I didn’t even understand. I think the most difficult part of summarizing his article was trying to rewrite his findings for a totally different audience. His article was written for other specialists in the scientific community, but I was trying to write it in a simpler way that everyone reading could understand, even if they had no experience with developmental psychology or neurology.

              Klass’s article seemed more intriguing to me than how my own summary turned out. I think this is because her article also included commentary from the researchers, which added a new level of perspective to the piece. The study did not necessarily implicate exciting new findings, but asserted predictions based on previous research. It was hard to try to write the results of the study so that they would be interesting to the average reader, so I tried to capitalize on the further implications of the study, which included how babies perceive themselves and others. I wish I could have added more information about how the trials were conducted and the limitations and future suggestions that were mentioned in the scholarly article, but I felt the information would convolute the summary. With more practice such as this, I think I could improve my summarizing skills. This activity helped me realize what I could improve on in future writing.