Teachers and students, parents and kids, colleague and colleague…wherever there’s more than one person, there will be more than one experience of the same situation. Have you ever wondered if our brain really perceives what we experience?
Why do you think this happens?
One of the great misconceptions of the contemporary world is that the brain works like a computer. Computers record, and computers have things stored in specific places that are stable. Our brains do none of that.
To test this try on glasses that have a red and a blue cellophane cover or just hold a red and blue cellophane in front of your eyes. Can you see both colours at the same time? Why not?
The answer is that one eye sees only the red and the other side sees only the blue, at the same time. Your brain cannot stand that. You do not see both of them at once, when one eye can only see one thing, and the other eye can only see another thing. Instead you alternate. Your perception alternates out of your control by this “rivalry,” as it’s called.
Your brain also recalls things we have learned already.
Are you able to read the following text?
"Aoccdrnig to a research at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteers be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe."
Chances are you also understand it. It purports that the order of the letters inside a given word doesn't matter, as long as the first and last letters of each word are in the right place.
You can read the words because the human mind reads words as a whole, and not letter-by-letter.
Why is it important to understand that the brain changes certain images? How is that transferable to our every-day life? Is it possible that we are in a situation where others might experience things differently than us? How is that possible?
Realizing how the brain sees things tells us that we should not assume that others see things the same way we do. Don’t get angry with others if they have a different perception than us- as you can see from these examples, it is quite possible to see things in a different light.
In addition, perception can also have an influence on how we feel things, in this case we want to explain perception with the help of pain (but it can also be translated into other areas of feelings).
Pain is an unpleasant yet important function for survival: warning system (but not all pain is needed for survival).
There are two different pathways to the brain on which pain can travel - information brought from free nerve endings in the skin to the brain via two different systems:
1. Fast pathways - registers localized pain (usually sharp pain) and send the information to the cortex in a fraction of a second. Eg. - cut your finger with a knife.
2. Slow pathways - sends information through the limbic system which takes about 1-2 seconds longer than directly to the cortex (longer lasting, aching/burning).
There are different factors in Pain Perception which are not an automatic result of stimulation:
Expectations - research shown that our expectations about how much something will hurt can affect our perception.
a) Believing that something will be very painful helps us prepare for it.
b) Another example - placebo effect - if we believe pain has stopped, it may.
Personality - people with negative types of personalities often have more pain.
For example - a very uptight person may experience muscle pains, back pains, etc.
Mood - bad moods, angry, unhappy, etc, can lead to the experience of increased pain.
In a research study the moods of subjects were manipulated and then they were asked to complete questionnaires of pain perception. Those in a negative mood group reported significantly more pain than other subjects.
In summary it can be seen that our brains are able to regulate, control, determine, and even produce pain and any other feeling and perception.
You might want to read about the effects that seating arrangement in class could have.
