Remembering 9/11

Although most of us remember 9/11 through media coverage, a vast amount of victims and heroes now remain permanently scarred from witnessing the tragedy first-hand. Many are still physically suffering from their exposure to a mix of fibers, metals, concrete, noxious chemicals and gases. Yet many others are suffering mentally from their experiences on that day and the days following.

“Officially, as many as 10,000 firefighters, police officers and civilians who were at the disaster site here have been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Other figures suggest more than 60,000 of the 409,000 who were at Ground Zero have shown elements of PTSD.”

In the past 10 years, there has been more research and attention given to the very real PTSD and the stigma of mental illness and seeking treatment has also diminished somewhat.

So today, many of us are not only remembering where we were or what we were doing on that day, but those that perished, lost their lives trying to save lives and those still affected.

For more on PTSD, visit this past post: http://www.mentalhealthblog.com/2008/09/ptsd-victims-of-911.html

Our faded memories of 9-11

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Infants Trained to Concentrate May Have Improved Abilities

New research suggests that infants can be trained to improve their concentration skills much earlier than once thought, which, unlike adults, can lead to improvements on unrelated tasks. Such abilities could lead to greater academic success, especially for those infants that may not be expected to thrive.

"Research suggests that differences in attentional control abilities emerge early in development and that children with better attentional control subsequently learn better in academic settings," said Sam Wass of the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development at Birkbeck, University of London.

In other words, infants that can more readily concentrate on a specific object while ignoring other distractions are better equipped to learn. To test this theory, researchers observed 42 eleven-month-old infants on 5 occasions over 15 days. The cognitive abilities of each child were tested at the beginning and end of the 15 day period. Half of the babies watched TV, while the other half explored images on a computer screen. The latter half were tested to see how long they could watch a butterfly that flew only as long as they kept their eyes on it, meanwhile other distracting elements appeared on the screen.

Results showed that, “trained infants rapidly improved their ability to focus their attention for longer periods and to shift their attention from one point to another. They also showed improvements in their ability to spot patterns and small but significant changes in their spontaneous looking behavior while playing with toys”.

Consequently, the ability to stay focused on a task or to quickly shift attention can facilitate learning and social interactions, which can significantly impact abilities later in life.

Although the plasticity of the infant brain might allow training to occur at an earlier age, it remains a mystery whether infants might lose their novel skills just as quickly as they were learned.

Infants Trained to Concentrate Show Added Benefits

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