Psychology
Image by Gerd Altmann, Pixabay, Free for commercial use
What is psychology
“Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. The discipline embraces all aspects of the human experience — from the functions of the brain to the actions of nations, from child development to care for the aged. In every conceivable setting from scientific research centers to mental healthcare services, “the understanding of behavior” is the enterprise of psychologists.”
– American Psychological Association
What is a psychologist
According to the American Psychological Association ,
Psychologists help people learn to cope more effectively with life issues and mental health problems…. [they] help a wide variety of people and can treat many kinds of problems.
Some people may talk to a psychologist because they have felt depressed, angry or anxious for a long time. Or, they want help for a chronic condition that is interfering with their lives or physical health.
…Psychologists can help people learn to cope with stressful situations, overcome addictions, manage their chronic illnesses and break past the barriers that keep them from reaching their goals.
They are trained to administer and interpret a number of tests and assessments that can help diagnose a condition or tell more about the way a person thinks, feels and behaves. These tests may evaluate intellectual skills, cognitive strengths and weaknesses, vocational aptitude and preference, personality characteristics and neuropsychological functioning.
Historical origin of psychology
Ideas relating to psychology date back to the Ancient Greeks and Egyptians.
However, there was no formal, scientific study on this topic until the late 1800’s.
Wilhelm Wundt (Germany) founded the first laboratory of psychological research in 1879
G. Stanley Hall brought scientific study of psychology to the United States from Germany in the early 1880s.
In Vienna, Sigmund Freud developed a form of psychology called psychoanalysis. Freud presented this as a scientific investigation of how the human mind works.
However, in later years most scientists have come to disavow many of Freud’s methods as well as conclusions.
Much of psychology up to the late 20th century was based on hunches and plagued with confirmation bias.
Many ideas and techniques of early psychologists like Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung are no longer considered valid by most scientists.
Progress in this psychology began accelerating with the rise of neuroscience and cognitive science.
In these fields we view the mind as something that should be described with precisely defined terminology.
The mind should be investigated by making clearly stated hypothesis, followed by properly controlled experiments, with peer review critically evaluating the results.
Today we study how the human mind works in these ways.
• functional MRI brain scans
• neurobiology
• how experience affects neural development (neuroplasticity)
• evolutionary psychology
• linguistics
• behaviorism
It is a goal of modern psychology to use the results of such experiments to better understanding how the mind works, and thus to improve the quality of life of their patients.
Psychology and pseudoscience
See The “Is Psychology a Science?” Debate, by Gregg Henriques, Psychology Today Jan 27, 2016. The introduction is as follows:
If one is a psychologist or even has a passing interest in the field, one has likely encountered the question about whether psychology is truly a science or not.
The debate flared in the blogosphere a couple of years ago, after an op-ed piece by a microbiologist in the LA Times declared definitively that psychology was not a science,
This was followed by several pieces in Psychology Today and Scientific American declaring definitively that psychology is, in fact, a science.
Just last month a long time scholar of the field authored the paper, Why Psychology Cannot Be an Empirical Science, and once again the blogosphere was debating the issue.
So what is the right answer?… binary, blanket “yes” or “no” answers to the question fail. The answer I offer is that yes, it is largely a science, but there are important ways that it fails to live up to this description….
Image by Gregg Henriques
Is psychology really just common sense?
In What is psychology’s place in modern science?, Strayphoenix6 writes
One rather strong example of the whole “it’s common sense” idea stands out to me from my first day as a neuroscience student. My professor got up in front of the entire class and told the class that “babies do not recognize the difference between an attractive and an unattractive face.”
He then asked who thought this was common sense. A significant portion of the class raised their hands, and when he asked a student why the student responded, “Duh, babies aren’t sexually active. Anyone could have told you this.”
The professor then switched to the next slide and pulled up a study that read “infants display gaze preference for faces rated as highly attractive.”
The whole room went totally silent and my professor told us, “Psychology seems like common sense. But this is a trap, because the right answer and the wrong answer may both seem to make logical sense. What matters is what we actually observe, not what we imagine to be the truth.”
Babies prefer to gaze upon beautiful faces, Anna Gosline, New Scientist, 9/6/2005
Preference for attractive faces in human infants extends beyond conspecifics
Paul C. Quinn et al, Dev Sci. 2008 Jan; 11(1): 76–83. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2007.00647.x
Damon, F., Méary, D., Quinn, P. et al. Preference for facial averageness: Evidence for a common mechanism in human and macaque infants. Sci Rep 7, 46303 (2017). [Scientific Reports is an online open access scientific mega journal published by Nature Publishing Group] https://doi.org/10.1038/srep46303
Practical psychology
How can students gain self-esteem? Myths and facts
Analyzing thinking errors – The thinking error at the root of science denial
What cognitive science teaches us about learning
Scientific definitions of psychopathy
Mysterious link between immune system and mental illness – He Got Schizophrenia. He Got Cancer. And Then He Got Cured.
False memory syndrome
One of the most important advances in practical psychology was the recognition of false memory syndrome. People with false memories had made claims which led to the imprisonment or punishment of thousands of individuals in the United States during the Satantic Ritual Abuse panic, and it was only years later, through a combination of journalistic detective work, that the dangerous phenomenon of false memories was exposed. Examples of false memories
Satanic ritual abuse (SRA) a widespread panic in the United States in the 1980s, spreading throughout many parts of the world by the late 1990s. Allegations of SRA involved reports of physical and sexual abuse of people in the context of occult or Satanic rituals. Many people eventually alleged a conspiracy of local, national, or even worldwide SRA organization in which children are abducted or bred for human sacrifices, pornography and prostitution.
Thousands of parents suddenly alleged that they “recalled” child abduction and murders by satan worshippers in their own homes, churches, or town halls, or in “secret basements.” Huge numbers of Americans came to believe that these events were real – after all, how could a person remember an event that never occurred? Yet later investigations showed that none of this ever occurred.
Speaking of Psychology: How Memory Can Be Manipulated, interview by Kaitlin Luna with Elizabeth Loftus, PhD, American Psychological Association
False memories and false confessions: the psychology of imagined crimes
How to Instill False Memories, Scientific American, Steven Ross Pomeroy, 2/19,/2013
False Memories, Psychologist World, Emma Bryce,
Clancy, S.A. (2005). Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped By Aliens. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is a serious mental illness characterized by relapsing episodes of psychosis.
Major symptoms include hallucinations (often hearing voices) and delusions (having beliefs not shared by others).
Other symptoms include disordered thinking, social withdrawal, decreased emotional expression, and lack of motivation.
Symptoms typically come on gradually, begin in young adulthood, and in many cases never resolve.
There is no objective diagnostic test; diagnosis is based on observed behavior, a history that includes the person’s reported experiences, and reports of others familiar with the person.
Many people with schizophrenia have other disorders such as panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, depressive disorder, or a substance use disorder.
About 0.3% to 0.7% of people are affected by schizophrenia during their lifetimes.
Causes
Males are more often affected and onset is on average earlier in age. The causes of schizophrenia include environmental and genetic factors. Possible environmental factors include being raised in a city, cannabis use during adolescence, infections, the ages of a person’s parents, and poor nutrition during pregnancy. Genetic factors include a variety of common and rare genetic variants.
Prognosis
About half of those diagnosed with schizophrenia will have a significant improvement over the long term with no further relapses, and a small proportion of these will recover completely. The other half will have a lifelong impairment, and severe cases may be repeatedly admitted to hospital.
Social problems such as long-term unemployment, poverty, homelessness, exploitation, and victimization are common consequences. Compared to the general population, people with schizophrenia have a higher suicide rate (about 5% overall) and more physical health problems, leading to an average decreased life expectancy of 20 years. In 2015, an estimated 17,000 people worldwide died from behavior related to, or caused by, schizophrenia.
Treatment
The mainstay of treatment is an antipsychotic medication, along with counseling, job training, and social rehabilitation. In those who do not improve with other antipsychotics, clozapine may be tried.
In situations where there is a risk of harm to self or others, a short involuntary hospitalization may be necessary.
Long-term hospitalization may be needed for a small number of people with severe schizophrenia.
Mysterious link between immune system and mental illness
External articles
Schizophrenia. NIMH
‘Cat Scratch’ Bacteria, Bartonella, Linked to Psychiatric Symptoms in People
Infection with the parasite Toxoplasma gondii has been associated with a number of neurological disorders, particularly schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
Protozoa Could Be Controlling Your Brain. Scientific American
Toxoplasma gondii and Schizophrenia, By E. Fuller Torrey, Robert H. Yolken
Emerg Infect Dis. 2003 Nov; 9(11): 1375–1380. doi: 10.3201/eid0911.030143
Learning Standards
Massachusetts Comprehensive Health Curriculum Framework
PreK–12 STANDARD 5: Mental Health. Students will acquire knowledge about emotions and physical health, the management of emotions, personality and character development, and social awareness; and will learn skills to promote self-acceptance, make decisions, and cope with stress, including suicide prevention.
Benchmarks: American Association for the Advancement of Science
Stresses are especially difficult for children to deal with and may have long-lasting effects. 6F/H1
Biological abnormalities, such as brain injuries or chemical imbalances, can cause or increase susceptability to psychological disturbances. 6F/H2
Reactions of other people to an individual’s emotional disturbance may increase its effects. 6F/H3
Human beings differ greatly in how they cope with emotions and may therefore puzzle one another. 6F/H4
Ideas about what constitutes good mental health and proper treatment for abnormal mental states vary from one culture to another and from one time period to another. 6F/H5
Psychological distress may also affect an individual’s vulnerability to biological disease. 6F/H6** (SFAA)
According to some theories of mental disturbance, anger, fear, or depression may result from exceptionally upsetting thoughts or memories that are blocked from becoming conscious. 6F/H7** (SFAA)
AP Psychology is an introductory college-level psychology course. Students cultivate their understanding of the systematic and scientific study of human behavior and mental processes through inquiry-based investigations as they explore concepts like the biological bases of behavior, sensation and perception, learning and cognition, motivation, developmental psychology, testing and individual differences, treatment of abnormal behavior, and social psychology.
The Math and Biology of Beauty: Averages and Symmetry
It is popular to believe that aesthetic judgements of physical attractiveness – beauty – are arbitrary. Many people believe popular ideas about attractiveness are mostly social constructs. However science shows that this idea is incorrect.
Attractiveness is agreed upon by most people, across cultures and history, because it is defined by evolution by natural selection. What we experience as physical attraction is our brain’s innate ability to ascertain a potential mate’s health, mental fitness, and ability to reproduce (create healthy offspring.)
Attractiveness, from this scientific point of view, turns out be a person’s desire to seek an average mate: Note we are using a mathematical, scientific definition of the word “average.”
“Averageness” describes the physical beauty that results from averaging the facial features of people of the same gender and approximately the same age.
Scientific studies use photographic overlays of human faces, in which images are morphed together.
The term “average” here is a mathematical definition = arithmetic mean, = the sum of a collection of numbers divided by the count of numbers in the collection.
It turns out that an averaged face is not unremarkable, but is, in fact, quite good looking.
Image from Koinophilia and human facial attractiveness, Aishwariya Iyengar et al. Koinophilia and human facial attractiveness, April 2015, Volume 20, Issue 4, pp 311–319
Nor is averageness typical in the sense of common or frequently occurring in the population, though it appears familiar, and is typical in the sense that it is a good example of a face that is representative of the category of faces.
The evolutionary explanation for averageness is koinophilia: animals seek mates with average features, because extreme or uncommon features indicate disadvantageous mutations.
Discerning mutations by just looking
Most humans have a good innate ability to discern whether a person has chromosomal damage just by looking at facial features. The shape of a person’s face is defined by instructions from our genes.
Thus if one has certain chromosomal mutations then other people pick up on that subconsciously.
There are characteristic changes in facial features created by Williams syndrome, Smith-Magenis syndrome, Fragile X syndrome, Jacobsen syndrome, trisomy 21 (classic mental retardation,) etc.
If one takes measurements, one can mathematically discern the existence of these chromosomal changes with a smartphone app (available only to doctors.)
Detecting genetic disorders with 3d face scans
Apps
FaceResearch.org – Make Your Own Average
Gender and faces
The human face is sexually dimorphic, with the average male face differing from the average female face in the size and shape of, and distance between, the jaws, lips, eyes, nose and cheekbones.
Even within sex, there are considerable variations in these dimensions, leading to individuals appearing more or less feminine or masculine than the prototypical gendered face. While the origin of this variability remains unclear, there has been significant interest in the influence of the most abundant androgen, testosterone, in the development of face structure.
Genetic sex is determined at conception, but gonadal hormones play a vital role in the differentiation of male and female phenotypes throughout human development.
Prenatal testosterone exposure is related to sexually dimorphic facial morphology in adulthood
Andrew J. O. Whitehouse et al. Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences 10/7/2015
Prenatal testosterone may have a powerful masculinizing effect on postnatal physical characteristics. However, no study has directly tested this hypothesis. Here, we report a 20-year follow-up study that measured testosterone concentrations from the umbilical cord blood of 97 male and 86 female newborns, and procured three-dimensional facial images on these participants in adulthood (range: 21–24 years).
Twenty-three Euclidean and geodesic distances were measured from the facial images and an algorithm identified a set of six distances that most effectively distinguished adult males from females.
From these distances, a ‘gender score’ was calculated for each face, indicating the degree of masculinity or femininity. Higher cord testosterone levels were associated with masculinized facial features when males and females were analysed together (n = 183; r = −0.59), as well as when males (n = 86; r = −0.55) and females (n = 97; r = −0.48) were examined separately (p-values < 0.001).
The relationships remained significant and substantial after adjusting for potentially confounding variables. Adult circulating testosterone concentrations were available for males but showed no statistically significant relationship with gendered facial morphology (n = 85, r = 0.01, p = 0.93).
This study provides the first direct evidence of a link between prenatal testosterone exposure and human facial structure.
https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.1351
Scientific papers
Note (1) Grammer, K.; Thornhill, R. (October 1994). “Human (Homo sapiens) facial attractiveness and sexual selection: the role of symmetry and averageness”. Journal of Comparative Psychology. 108 (3): 233–42. doi:10.1037/0735-7036.108.3.233. PMID 7924253. Retrieved 4 May 2019.
Rhodes, Gillian; Zebrowitz, Leslie A. (2002). Facial Attractiveness: Evolutionary, Cognitive, and Social Perspectives. Ablex. ISBN 978-1-56750-636-5.
Jones, B. C., Little, A. C., Tiddeman, B. P., Burt, D. M., & Perrett, D. I. (2001). Facial symmetry and judgements of apparent health Support for a “‘ good genes ’” explanation of the attractiveness – symmetry relationship, 22, 417–429.
Alison Pearce Stevens writes “Research shows that people with more symmetrical faces don’t just look nice. They also tend to be healthier than asymmetrical people. Genes provide the instructions for how a cell is to perform. All people have the same number of genes. But people with more average faces tend to have a greater diversity in the genes they are born with. And that, research has shown, can lead to a stronger immune system and better health.” What makes a pretty face? Science News for Students
Papers
Iglesias-Julios M, Munoz-Reyes JA, Pita M et al. Facial Features: What Women Perceive as Attractive and What Men Consider Attractive. PLoS ONE. 2015.
Farmer H, McKay R, Tsakiris M. Trust in Me: Trustworthy Others Are Seen as More Physically Similar to the Self. Psychological Science. 2013.
Coetzee V, Keckp S, Kivleniece I et al. Facial attractiveness is related to women’s cortisol and body fat, but not with immune responsiveness. Biology Letters. 2013.
How can students gain self-esteem? Myths and facts
What is self-esteem? The degree to which the qualities and characteristics contained in one’s self-concept are perceived to be positive. It reflects a person’s physical self-image, view of his or her accomplishments and capabilities, and values and perceived success in living up to them, as well as the ways in which others view and respond to that person.
The more positive the cumulative perception of these qualities and characteristics, the higher one’s self-esteem. A reasonably high degree of self-esteem is considered an important ingredient of mental health, whereas low self-esteem and feelings of worthlessness are common
– American Psychological Association Dictionary of Pyschology
Created by FireflySixtySeven, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia
Should families and schools raise a student’s self-esteem, and if so, how? Here it becomes essential to differential myths from facts
Exploding the Self-Esteem myth
“Boosting people’s sense of self-worth has become a national preoccupation. Yet surprisingly, research shows that such efforts are of little value in fostering academic progress or preventing undesirable behavior
A 1999 study by Donelson R. Forsyth and Natalie A. Kerr of Virginia Commonwealth University suggests that attempts to boost self-esteem among struggling students may backfire.
College students getting grades of D or F in a psychology course were divided into two groups, arranged initially to have the same grade-point average. Each week students in the first group received an e-mail message designed to boost their self-esteem [see example at left]. Those in the second group received a message intended to instill a sense of personal responsibility for their academic performance (right).
By the end of the course, the average grade in the first group dropped below 50 percent—a failing grade. The average for students in the second group was 62 percent—a D minus, which is poor but still passing. “
Quote and table from Exploding the Self-Esteem Myth, Roy F. Baumeister et al.
By Roy F. Baumeister, Jennifer D. Campbell, Joachim I. Krueger and Kathleen D. Vohs, Scientific American, January, 2005, Vol 292, Issue 1
Self Esteem Doesn’t Make Better People Of Us
Self-esteem is bad for you (and even worse for your kids).
Michael J. Formica, Psychology Today, May 17, 2008
The American philosopher and psychologist William James first coined the term self-esteem in his seminal work The Principles of Psychology. He suggested that self-esteem can be objectively measured through a simple ratio of goals and aims to attainment. What he was talking about is what we refer to today as an evidence-based measure.
Since it was first introduced in 1890, the notion of self-esteem has morphed into something entirely different than was originally intended. Our modern interpretation is no longer an objective and measurable equation of “do good/feel good”. It has, in fact, come to mean something quite the opposite. We have lost sight of the “do good” piece and now, apparently much to our detriment, focus solely on the “feel-good” piece.
…. An exhaustive 2005 study published in Scientific American by psychologist, Florida State University professor and PT Interactions Blogger Roy Baumeister demonstrated that less than 200 of the more than 15,000 articles published on self-esteem between 1970 and 2000 met any sort of standard for academic or scientific rigor.
Baumeister’s Scientific American article, in addition to both challenging and largely discrediting the existing research on self-esteem, also demonstrated that artificially boosting self-esteem actually lowers performance.
Further, high self-esteem was found to have no positive correlation with a person’s ability to have successful relationships. Quite to the contrary, Baumeister writes, “Those who think highly of themselves are more likely than others to respond to problems by severing relations and seeking other partners.”
Baumeister and his team also found that, again contrary to previous belief, low self-esteem does not cause teens to engage in earlier sexual activity. In fact, those with high self-esteem were found to be less inhibited and more likely to be sexually active.
In another contrary finding, there was no correlation of aggression and violence with low self-esteem, also a commonly held belief. In point of fact, perpetrators of aggressive and violent acts typically hold a more favorable, and possibly even inflated, view of themselves.
Self-Esteem Is Overrated
Sandra Upson, Scientific American, September 1, 2013
Scientificamerican.com Self-esteem-overrated
Self-Esteem Can Be an Ego Trap.
If your self-worth depends on success, you may be in for a fall. To feel good about yourself, think less about you and more about others
By Jennifer Crocker, Jessica J. Carnevale, Scientific American 2013
Scientific American – Self-esteem-overrated
Narcissism and Self-Esteem Are Very Different
They have very different developmental pathways and outcomes. By Scott Barry Kaufman, October 29, 2017, Scientific American
Scientific American – Narcissism-and-self-esteem-are-very-different
Why Do People Mistake Narcissism for High Self-Esteem?
Why people form such positive first impressions of narcissists. By Scott Barry Kaufman, December 3, 2018, Scientific American
Scientific American – Why-do-people-mistake-narcissism-for-high-self-esteem
How the Self-Esteem Craze Took Over America And why the hype was irresistible
By Jesse Singal, 5/2017, The Cut
Self-esteem-grit-do-they-really-help
Does High Self-Esteem Cause Better Performance, Interpersonal Success, Happiness, or Healthier Lifestyles?
By Baumeister RF, Campbell JD, Krueger JI, Vohs KD.
Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society, 2003 May;4(1):1-44.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26151640
Journals.sagepub.com – Copy of article
Related topics
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs – claims and reality
Clarifying codon wheel usage
A student is told to use a “codon wheel” to help with protein translation. What codons go with which resulting amino acid? Here I saw students come to different conclusions because many infographics were not distinctly labeled.
Some students thought that every codon wheel lets us input 3 DNA nucleotides.
Others thought that it let us input 3 mRNAs.
While others thought that it let us input the 3 anticodons on the tRNA molecule.
In other words, many students failed at step 1 because the main idea was not labeled clearly.
In this example (click link) we see mRNA codon wheel. If we input mRNA sequence then it tells us the amino acid that will be the eventual output from the translation process.
Why mention this? Because there are also tRNA codon wheels, and even DNA codon wheels! Each of these wheels can be fine – but only when we know for certain which one we are using.
Let’s follow an example through, step by step.
For the following image, the original DNA sequence must be:
TAC GCC TCT
The corresponding mRNA sequence is
AUG CGG AGA
The anticodon sequence for the tRNAs is
UAC GCC UCU
The amino acids carried by these tRNAS would be
Met Ala Ser
This image from ATDBio Ltd., Transcription Translation and Replication
Building a RC car: Elective
In this elective our students will build a remote control car from a lego-like construction set, addressing the learning standards listed below.
Goals: Fun, and developing fine motor skills; Reading and precisely following. step-by-step instructions. Discerning exact sequence of cause-and-effect for simple machines.
Here one of our students is engaged in the build.
Learning Standards
Massachusetts Science and Technology/Engineering Curriculum Framework
Using simple machines in engineering
HS-ETS4-5(MA). Explain how a machine converts energy, through mechanical means, to do work. Collect and analyze data to determine the efficiency of simple and complex machines.
7.MS-ETS3-4(MA). Show how the components of a structural system work together to serve a structural function. Provide examples of physical structures and relate their design to their intended use.
Appendix VIII Value of Crosscutting Concepts and Nature of Science in Curricula
Cause and Effect: Mechanism and Explanation. Events have causes, sometimes simple, sometimes multifaceted. A major activity of science and engineering is investigating and explaining causal relationships and the mechanisms by which they are mediated. Such mechanisms can then be tested across given contexts and used to predict and explain events in new contexts or design solutions.
College Board Standards for College Success: Science
Standard PS.1 Interactions, Forces and Motion
Changes in the natural and designed world are caused by interactions. Interactions of an object with other objects can be described by forces that can cause a change in motion of one or both interacting objects. Students understand that the term “interaction” is used to describe causality in science: Two objects interact when they act on or influence each other to cause some effect.
Massachusetts Digital Literacy and Computer Science (DLCS) Curriculum Framework
6-8.CS.a.4 Identify and describe the use of sensors, actuators, and control systems in an embodied system (e.g., a robot, an e-textile, installation art, smart room).
Autism Shares Brain Signature with Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder
What is autism? Autism is a complex developmental condition that involves persistent challenges in social interaction, speech and nonverbal communication, and restricted/repetitive behaviors.
The effects of ASD and the severity of symptoms are different in each person.
What causes autism? Read Causes of autism
Autism Shares Brain Signature with Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder
By Nicholette Zeliadt, Spectrum, Scientific American, February 8, 2018
Gene expression patterns in the brains of people with autism are similar to those of people who have schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, according to a large study of postmortem brain tissue.
All three conditions show an activation of genes in star-shaped brain cells called astrocytes, and suppression of genes that function at synapses, the junctions between neurons. The autism brains also show a unique increase in the expression of genes specific to immune cells called microglia.
“This study demonstrates for the first time that [gene expression] can be used to robustly define cross-disorder phenotypes that are shared and distinct,” says lead investigator Daniel Geschwind, professor of neurology, psychiatry and human genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles. “And these phenotypes are related to the molecular and cellular pathways that likely have gone awry.”
People who have one of these conditions may have features in common, such as language problems, irritability and aggression. They also share certain genetic variants that raise the risk of the conditions.
The new work shows that the overlap among risk variants is related to the commonality in their gene expression patterns. This hints that the variants raise risk in part by turning on or off certain sets of genes in the brain.
“We’re seeing all these studies coming out finding links between genetic variants and psychiatric [conditions], but how do we go from genetic risk to mechanisms?” says Emma Meaburn, senior lecturer of psychological sciences at Birkbeck University of London, who was not involved in the study. “This paper begins to fill that gap.”
Networks of genes derived from certain ‘modules’ (neuron, top right, and astrocyte, bottom left) are altered in autism, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
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Autism may share inherited variants with other psychiatric conditions
By Nicholetter Zeliadt, Spectrum News, 1/13/2020
Some of the inherited variants implicated in autism also increase the odds of other conditions, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), according to a new study1.
The results come from an international effort called the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium, which involves more than 800 scientists. “These disorders, which we think of as very clinically different, might be related at the level of their genetic basis,” says lead investigator Jordan Smoller, associate chief for research in psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
Smoller and his colleagues analyzed data from 727,126 people, about one-third of whom have one or more of eight psychiatric conditions. The team focused on so-called common variants — single-letter changes to DNA that appear in 1 percent or more of the population.
The team linked 146 variants to least one condition, and most of them to multiple conditions. Variants in the latter group tend to affect genes that are highly expressed throughout life, starting during the second trimester of fetal development, and may be key to brain development.
“More and more, the picture that’s emerging is that there are multiple [variants] associated with, let’s say, a psychiatric vulnerability that is not specific to one disorder,” says Tinca Polderman, assistant professor of complex trait genetics at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands, who was not involved in the work. “Whether it develops into autism or [something else] may have to do with other factors.”
Reference – Genomic Relationships, Novel Loci, and Pleiotropic Mechanisms across Eight Psychiatric Disorders, There are 606 authors, collectively referred to as the Cross-Disorder Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. Cell. 2019 Dec 12; 179(7):1469-1482.e11. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2019.11.020.
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The Same Genes May Underlie Different Psychiatric Disorders:
A distinct set of genes may underlie several psychiatric conditions.
By Mark Fischetti, Scientific American, July 1, 2018
People who have autism, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder may have different challenges, but the ailments might arise from a common set of genes.
Researchers compared genetic analyses of 700 human brains from deceased individuals who had one of those three disorders, major depression or alcoholism (columns) with brains of individuals who had none of the conditions. They examined 13 groups of genes thought to function together (rows).
The scientists found that five groups had a pattern of overactivity or underactivity across at least three of the five conditions (blue and gray panels). Bipolar disorder, for example, was more similar to schizophrenia than to major depression even though clinicians may link bipolar disorder and depression, based on their symptoms.
These insights could possibly reveal new treatments, says neurogeneticist Daniel Geschwind of the University of California, Los Angeles, one of the investigators. He adds that one path to that result, which has not yet been tested, could be to “put the different groups of genes in lab dishes and see which drugs reverse any overexpression or underexpression of the genes.”
Graphic by Martin Krzywinski; Source: “Shared Molecular Neuropathology across Major Psychiatric Disorders Parallels Polygenic Overlap,” by Michael J. Gandal et al., in Science. Vol. 359; February 9, 2018
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Networks of genes altered in autism brains, study says
Virginia Hughes, 5/25/2011, Spectrum News
Networks of genes altered in autism brains, study says
Autism is known for its diversity in symptoms and in the genes that might cause it. “[But] there is a remarkable consistency in the molecular changes that are occurring in the brain,” notes lead investigator Daniel Geschwind, distinguished professor of neurology, psychiatry and human genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles.
The study turned up several unexpected findings. For example, the frontal lobe and temporal lobe in healthy controls show significant differences in gene expression, reflecting their distinct cell types and functions. But in the autism brains, “those differences are essentially wiped out,” Geschwind says. Many of these genes are first turned on during embryonic development, he says, suggesting that the abnormal trajectory of autism brains begins early.
“This has never been reported before — it’s definitely an original contribution and an advance,” notes John Allman, professor of neurobiology at the California Institute of Technology, who was not involved in the study.
Lichens and mosses
What are lichens and mosses? Many people speak about them together, as if they are related. But this turns out not to be correct – they are entirely different forms of life.
I. Lichen
A colony of two organisms living together as a single unit.
One is a fungus, and the other is something that performs photosynthesis
Either green algae or a photosynthetic bacterium, cyanobacteria.
from Miller and Levine Biology, Chap 21, MaCaw
Two organisms living together in a close relationship is called symbiosis.
How do these two different species help each other?
The green algae or cyanobacteria carry out photosynthesis. This provides the fungus with food.
The fungus provides the green algae or cyanobacteria with water and minerals.
The fungal hyphae protect the delicate green cells from bright sunlight.
Lichens can grow in places where few other organisms can survive.
Even on rocks in desert and on mountaintops.
Lichens are often the first organisms to enter barren environments. They gradually break down the rocks on which they grow. In this way lichens help in the early stages of soil formation.
Lichens are very sensitive to air pollution. They are among the first organisms affected when air quality gets worse
Some colonies of lichens have existed for 9,000 years.
II. Moss
A very simple type of plant.
This image by Bob Blaylock, Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0
Image: A patch of moss showing both gametophytes (the low, leaf-like forms) and sporophytes (the tall, stalk-like forms)
Mosses are small flowerless plants.
They form dense green clumps or mats, often in damp or shady locations.
The individual plants are usually composed of simple leaves that are generally only one cell thick.
These are attached to a stem that may be branched or unbranched and has only a limited role in conducting water and nutrients.
Role of mosses in the ecosystem
Mosses are extremely important for ecological succession.
They stabilize the soil surface, reducing erosion, reducing evaporation of water, making more available for succeeding plants.
Mosses are not an important source of food for vertebrate herbivores.
Peat mosses are the dominant plants of extensive northern wetland areas, and are largely responsible for the development of bogs.
Most species of mosses are not of any direct economic importance, and none are a food source for humans.
Peat mosses are economically the most important mosses. Peat mosses are an important source of fuel in some countries. Peat is abundant in northern regions and represents a vast reservoir of potential energy. In northern Europe, peat has historically been dried, and in some cases compressed into briquettes for use in fireplaces and stoves. In Ireland, peat is still extensively used for cooking.
In recent years, mosses have become important in monitoring the health of ecosystems, especially in relation to atmospheric contamination. Because bryophytes lack roots, many of their nutritional requirements are met by nutrients deposited from the atmosphere. Thus, they are sensitive indicators of atmospheric pollutants. Changes in the distributions of mosses (and lichens) are therefore an early-warning signal of serious effects of atmospheric pollution.
How Do Airplanes Fly?
How do airplanes fly? And for that matter, how do sharks swim through water? Both are massive objects with interesting shapes moving through a fluid (both air and water are fluids.)
After all this time you’d think that we know all the details of how an airplane flies. There must be some specific and agreed-upon explanation. Air hits a plane, air and plane then follow laws of physics, and voilà, the plane flies, right?
Although flight indeed is in accord with the laws of physics, the specific ideas about how this happens are incomplete and controversial.
What’s the controversy about? What new ideas are being proposed?
Bernoulli theorem idea
(Here the class will look into the general idea.)
image from http://www.thaitechnics.com
This explanation is from the Scientific American article.
Newton’s laws of motion
(Here the class will look into the general idea.)
This explanation is from the Scientific American article.
New Theories of lift
These ideas are also from the Scientific American article.
How do fish fly through water?
Just as aerodynamics explains how airplanes generate lift and fly through the air. hydrodynamics explains how fish generate lift and fly through water.
And yes, fish do fly through water. If they stop moving, then they literally fall down to the bottom of the ocean.
We all know how interesting hammerhead sharks are. Why do their heads have this peculiar shape?
Part of it has to do with the fact that their head is a giant electromagnetic sensor; it can detect the EM fields of nearby prey. But evolution optimizes body design in more than one way. Sharks need to do more than sense prey, they need to move efficiently.
This recent paper, A hydrodynamics assessment of the hammerhead shark cephalofoil, shows that the shape of their head may increase maneuverability as well as produce dynamic lift similar to a cambered airplane wing.
See Gaylord, M.K., Blades, E.L. & Parsons, G.R. A hydrodynamics assessment of the hammerhead shark cephalofoil. Scientific Reports 10, 14495 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-71472-2
Also see : Pioneers of flight, How do airplanes fly?, the graveyard spiral, and breaking the sound barrier – Flight
References
No One Can Explain Why Planes Stay in the Air: Do recent explanations solve the mysteries of aerodynamic lift? By Ed Regis
Scientific American, February 2020, Volume 322, Issue 2
Aerodynamic Lift, Part 1: The Science, Doug McLean, The Physics Teacher Vol. 56, issue 8, 516 (2018)
https://doi.org/10.1119/1.5064558
Aerodynamic Lift, Part 2: A Comprehensive Physical Explanation, Doug McLean, The Physics Teacher Vol. 56, 521 (2018)
https://doi.org/10.1119/1.5064559
Understanding Aerodynamics: Arguing from the Real Physics, Doug McLean. Wiley, 2012
You Will Never Understand Lift. Peter Garrison, Flying; June 4, 2012.
Flight Vehicle Aerodynamics. Mark Drela, MIT Press, 2014.
#Flight #aerodynamics #Bernoulli #Lift
Learning Standards
2016 Massachusetts Science and Technology/Engineering Curriculum Framework
HS-PS2-1. Analyze data to support the claim that Newton’s second law of motion is a mathematical model describing change in motion (the acceleration) of objects when acted on by a net force.
A FRAMEWORK FOR K-12 SCIENCE EDUCATION: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas
PS2.A: FORCES AND MOTION
How can one predict an object’s continued motion, changes in motion, or stability?
Interactions of an object with another object can be explained and predicted using the concept of forces, which can cause a change in motion of one or both of the interacting objects… At the macroscale, the motion of an object subject to forces is governed by Newton’s second law of motion… An understanding of the forces between objects is important for describing how their motions change, as well as for predicting stability or instability in systems at any scale.
NGSS
2016 High School Technology/Engineering
HS-ETS1-2. Break a complex real-world problem into smaller, more manageable problems that each can be solved using scientific and engineering principles.
HS-ETS1-4. Use a computer simulation to model the impact of a proposed solution to a complex real-world problem that has numerous criteria and constraints on the interactions within and between systems relevant to the problem.
College Board Standards for College Success: Science
PS-PE.1.2.2 Analyze force diagrams to determine if they accurately represent different real-world situations.
PS-PE.1.2.4 Given real-world situations involving contact, gravitational, magnetic or electric charge forces and an identified object of interest:
PS-PE.1.2.4a Identify the objects involved in the interaction, and identify the pattern of motion (no motion, moving with a constant speed, speeding up, slowing down or changing [reversing] direction of motion) for each object.
PS-PE.1.2.4b Make a claim about the types of interactions involved in the various situations. Justification is based on the defining characteristics of each type of interaction.PS-PE.1.2.4c Represent the forces acting on the object of interest by drawing a force diagram.
PS-PE.1.2.4d Explain the observed motion of the object. Justification is based on the forces acting on the object.
.
How much area would renewable energy require?
Many people believe that we must use either fossil fuels or nuclear power for energy production, because renewable energy (solar, wind) takes up far too much land area.
For instance, consider Ivanpah’s Land Footprint: World’s Largest Thermal Project Requires 92 Times the Acreage of Babcock & Wilcox “Twin Pack”, by Ben Heard, 3/13/2014, The BreakThrough
The author points out that the land footprint of a solar power plant is 92 times larger than the land footprint of a small nuclear reactor. He thus concludes that we need nuclear fission power, not solar.
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PWR_nuclear_power_plant_diagram.svg
Although I certainly agree that there are safe ways to generate power from nuclear fusion, the case against solar and wind power is overstated and doesn’t hold up to close analysis.
It turns out that the power needs of the entire United States could be filled by renewable energy that uses less than 1% of land area in the nation.
Further, that land could even be dual-purpose.
There are many places where people grow crops under and between solar panels or wind turbines.
GIF created by Ssgxnh for Wikimedia. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAWT_and_VAWTs_in_operation_medium.gif
Prof. Katharine Hayhoe writes
People worry about how much land we’d need to supply the US with clean energy.
Well, @elonmusk and I have independently calculated it and we both come up with something roughly comparable to the area we currently use for maple syrup or golf.
A square about 100 to 120 miles per side.
As a 🇨🇦 {Canadian} let me hasten to clarify that I’m not advocating for removing maple syrup production but rather for co-production of energy on land that is also used for farming or pollinator ecosystems 😁
For example, @FreshEnergy runs this amazing clearinghouse, The Center for Pollinators in Energy
This graphic is from Here’s How America Uses Its Land,
By Dave Merrill and Lauren Leatherby, Bloomberg, 7/31/2018
“Land use classifications are based on data published in 2017 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service in a report called the Major Uses of Land in the United States (MLU). Data from the report provide total land-use acreage estimates for each state across six broad categories. Those totals are displayed per 250,000 acres.”
Ramez Naam has a similar analysis, How Much Land Would it Take to Power the US via Solar?
Guest writer Ben Heard [see above] complains that solar’s land footprint (specifically at the Ivanpah plant) is 92 times that of a small modular nuclear reactor…
What Heard’s Breakthrough Institute article doesn’t tell you is how tiny that land footprint, in the grand scheme of things, actually is.
Do the math on the numbers he presents:
1087 Gwh / yr, or 0.31 Gwh / acre / year.
Gigawatt hours, abbreviated as GWh, is a unit of energy
It = one billion (1 000 000 000) watt hours = one million kilowatt hours
At that output, to meet the US electricity demand of 3.7 million Gwh per year, you’d need about 48,000 square kilometers of solar sites. (That’s total area, not just area of panels.)
That may sound like a stunningly large area, and in some sense, it is. But it’s less than half the size of the Mojave desert.
And more importantly, the continental United States has a land area of 7.6 million square kilometers.
So to meet US electrical demand … would require just 0.6 percent of the land area of the continental US.
Asked about this on Twitter, Heard replied that larger size nevertheless is a disadvantage. It threatens ecosystems and endangered species, for instance.
And this is a legitimate point, in some specific areas. (Though certainly far less so than coal and natural gas.)
But, for context, agriculture uses roughly 30% of all land in the United States, or 50 times as much land as would be needed to meet US electricity needs via solar.
Iridescence and thin film interference
Iridescence is a spectacular optical trick – it is the creation of color without pigment!
Consider surfaces that gradually change color as the angle changes. Soap bubbles, feathers, butterfly wings, some seashells, and certain minerals. Let’s dig in to what causes this phenomenon.
The word iridescence comes from Iris (Ἶρις) the Greek goddess of the rainbow.
There are three ways to get color
Additive color – mixing together light of two or more different colors. Red, green, and blue are the additive primary colors normally used in additive color systems such as smartphones, TVs, projectors and computer displays.
Subtractive color – uses dyes, inks, or pigments to absorb some wavelengths of light and not others. The color that we see comes from the wavelengths of light that are not absorbed by these chemicals.
But iridescence is nature’s special, third way of producing color. In this method, color is created by wave interference with tiny physical structures on the scale of the color’s wavelength.
Iridescence in animals
Iridescence: a functional perspective
Iridescence in minerals
Bismuth is a great example of thin-film interference.
The colors come from a thin film of bismuth(III) oxide that forms on the surface if the crystals are formed in air.
Chemistry.stackexchange What causes the iridescent colour in bismuth?
The physics of thin film interference
Thin-film interference is a natural phenomenon.
In it, light waves reflected by the upper and lower boundaries of a thin film interfere with one another. The result either enhances or reduces the reflected light.
When the thickness of the film is an odd multiple of one quarter-wavelength of the light on it, the reflected waves from both surfaces interfere to cancel each other.
Since the wave cannot be reflected, it is completely transmitted instead.
When the thickness is a multiple of a half-wavelength of the light, the two reflected waves reinforce each other, thus increasing the reflection and reducing the transmission.
Thus when white light, which consists of a range of wavelengths, is incident on the film, certain wavelengths (colors) are intensified while others are attenuated.
Thin-film interference explains the multiple colors seen in light reflected from soap bubbles and oil films on water.
It is also the mechanism behind the action of antireflection coatings used on glasses and camera lenses.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin-film_interference
http://physics.highpoint.edu/~jregester/potl/Waves/InterferenceColors/interfcolors.html
Videos for thin film interference
Apps
Molecular Expressions Interference Phenomena in Soap Bubbles
https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/interference/soapbubbles/
Optical Interference – Java Tutorial
https://www.olympus-lifescience.com/en/microscope-resource/primer/java/interference/
Molecular Expressions – Interference Between Parallel Light Waves
https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/interference/waveinteractions2/index.html
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