Category Archives: Internet
Why brain training is (probably) pernicious hogwash
The only treadmill your brain should be on is a hedonic one.
So-called brain-training tools seem to have exploded in the last few years; one estimate puts it at a $6 billion market by 2020. It’s clearly become a major industry, but what’s less clear is exactly what it does, and if it even works. The typical procedure seems to be to engage in short games, puzzles and working-memory-type tasks, and these are supposed to produce long term changes in attention, engagement and general fluid intelligence.
Whether this is actually true or not is a matter of some debate. I’m not a specialist in this area, but the received wisdom appears to be that training on specific tasks does improve performance – on those tasks. There seems to be little generalisation to other tasks, and even less to domain-general abilities like executive processing, or working memory. A high-profile study by Adrian Owen and colleagues (2010) reported exactly that – benefits in the tasks themselves, but little (if any) general benefits. A previous study from PNAS in 2008 does seem to contradict this, and reports an increase in fluid intelligence as a result of working-memory training – not only that, but they claim a dose-dependent effect, that is, more training = more increase in intelligence. The gains in that study were relatively small, and it should be also noted that the control group also apparently increased their intelligence somewhat over the same period as the experimental group – curious. There are lots of other studies around, but many have issues; small samples, poorly-controlled etc. etc.
So, the jury’s still very much out (though personally, I’m on the side of the skeptics on the issue). This hasn’t stopped a bewildering array of businesses starting up, making all kinds of wild claims, and playing on the fears of educators and parents that perhaps if they don’t provide these kinds of programs, their kids will be slipping behind the rest. All these companies have glossy, highly-polished, ethnically-balanced websites with testimonials, and lots of links to science-y looking videos that present their program as the only scientifically-proven method of increasing your child’s intelligence. A brief browse through some of these companies websites reveals that they range from the absurd (QDreams! Success at the speed of thought!) to the very, very slick indeed (e.g. Lumosity). Other examples are Cogmed (seems to be backed by Pearson publishers and, to its credit, links to a list of semi-relevant research papers), and the very simplistic PowerBrain Education - which seems to involve getting kids to do some odd-looking arm-shaking exercises. There’s literally hundreds of these companies. Some of them even seem to cater to businesses who want their employees to do these ‘exercises’.
LearningRX definitely falls into the slick category. According to this New York Times article it has 83 physical store-front franchises across the USA, where people can come to pay $80-90 an hour for one-on-one training, and they market this to parents as an alternative to traditional tutoring. A quick glance at their Scientific Advisory Board is pretty revealing – I count only one (clinical) psychologist, and a grab-bag of other professionals – mostly teachers (qualified to Masters level) with an optometrist, a chemical engineer and an audiologist. Not a single neuroscientist, and only a few qualified at doctorate level.
I’m not trying to be unnecessarily snobby about their qualifications here, I’m suggesting that the claims they make for their brain-training programs (literally: it will change your child’s life) are big ones, and we might expect that the people who developed it might be qualified in some area of brain-science. If it really, clearly worked, then of course it wouldn’t matter exactly who developed it, and what their qualifications were, but there’s definitely reasonable doubt (if not outright disbelief) over its effectiveness.
And this is the important point. People are spending money on this - big money. Whether that’s a hard-pressed family struggling to find an extra $90 a week for their kid to have a session at one of LearningRX’s centres, or an education board deciding to institute one of these programs in its schools. Education budgets are tight enough, but these kinds of programs are being heavily invested in, and I can see why – they promise to make kids smarter, better-behaved, more attentive, and all you have to do is sit them in front of a special computer game for an hour a week. That must seem like a pretty attractive proposition for teachers. Unfortunately, if they really don’t work, then that money could be better spent on books, or musical instruments, or something else which might genuinely enrich the kids’ lives.
There’s a long and venerable history of unscrupulous people making money from pseudo-neuroscience – back in the 19th Century phrenology was described as “The science of picking someone’s pocket, through their skull.” I’d like to believe that some of these companies have a solid product that actually made a difference, but they all seem to have the whiff of snake-oil about them. For now I’m very much of the opinion that you’d probably be better off learning the piano, or Japanese, or even playing the latest Call of Duty. If you were really ambitious you could even try and get your kid to (Heaven forfend!) read the odd book now and again.
TTFN.
**Update 07/02/13**
I put that last sentence that mentions Call of Duty in there as a bit of flippancy, but I’ve since been informed (by Micah Allen on Twitter) of some evidence that playing action video games can indeed improve some cognitive processes such as the accuracy of visuo-spatial attention and reaction times. These results mostly originate from a single lab and so are in need of replication, but still – interesting. (I still reckon you’re probably better off with a good book though.)
Links page update
Just posted a fairly major update to my links page, including new sections on Neuropsychological/Cognitive testing, Neuromarketing/research businesses, and Academic conferences and organisations, plus lots of other links added to the existing sections, and occasional sprinkles of extra-bonus-added sarcasm throughout. Yay! Have fun people.
Website of the week: Cogsci.nl. OpenSesame, illusions, online experiments, and more.
A quick post to point you towards a great website with a lot of really cool content (if you’re into that kind of thing, which if you’re reading this blog, then I assume you probably are… anyway, I digress; I apologise, it was my lab’s Christmas party last night and I’m in a somewhat rambling mood. Anyway, back to the point).
So, the website is called cogsci.nl, and is run by a post-doc at the University of Aix-Marseille called Sebastiaan Mathôt. It’s notable in that it’s the homepage of OpenSesame - a very nice-looking, Python-based graphical experiment builder that I’ve mentioned before on these very pages. There’s a lot of other cool stuff on the site though, including more software (featuring a really cool online tool for instantly creating Gabor patch stimuli), a list of links to stimulus sets, and a selection of really-cool optical illusions. Really worth spending 20 minutes of your time poking around a little and seeing what’s there.
I’ll leave you with a video of Sebastiaan demonstrating an experimental program, written in his OpenSesame system, running on a Google Nexus 7 Tablet (using Ubuntu linux as an OS). The future! It’s here!
Why every student needs a Google account
This post might seem a trifle umm… politically insensitive after recent revelations in the UK about exactly how much corporation tax Google pays (answer – basically none), but I’ve been planning it for a while, and unlike Starbucks (which should be boycotted at all costs, because their coffee sucks) Google is a little harder to avoid, and actually provides a whole slew of incredibly worthwhile, and mostly free, services. One of the first things you should do when you start an undergraduate course at a college/university is sign up for a Google account. Here’s why:
1. Gmail
You’ve probably already got an email address, but if you’re not using Gmail then you need to switch. The interface is brilliantly usable and customisable, and you get a massive 10Gb of storage for all your mail – more than you’ll likely ever need. The most important benefit though, is Gmail’s ability to pull all your current and future email accounts together in one place. Gmail can be set up as a POP3 client (here’s how) meaning it can pull email in from several different accounts and present it all in one inbox. You’ve probably got an account already, you’ll definitely get an account on your university’s servers, and when you leave and either go on to postgraduate study (maybe at a different university) or get a job, you’ll almost certainly get given yet another account. Gmail can centralize everything, and mean that you only have to check one inbox for all your accounts. You can even configure it so that it sends mail through, say, your university account by default, so people you contact see your ‘official’ email address. I’ve currently got five email accounts configured to read through Gmail, and I honestly couldn’t manage without it. Additionally, if you start using Gmail from day one, all your contacts and mail are saved in your Gmail account, and won’t be lost when you complete your course and your university account inevitably gets cancelled/deleted. Another benefit of Gmail is its ease of use with various smartphone platforms. Android (obviously) and iOS devices are designed to sync up with Google accounts pretty much seamlessly.
So, set up a Gmail account, and assume it’ll be your email address for life. Be sensible. Don’t choose a username like sexyluvkitten69@gmail.com, or gangzta4life@gmail.com – choose something you’ll be happy to put on a CV when you leave college, i.e. something that pretty much consists of your name.
2. GDrive/Docs
In one sense, Google Drive is a simple online storage locker for any kinds of files you like, a bit like Dropbox, or any of the other similar services which have proliferated recently. You get 5Gb of free space, and it’s easy to set up file sharing for specific other users, or to make your files available for download to anyone you send a link to. In another sense, it’s a full-featured web-based alternative to Microsoft Office, with the ability to create/edit documents, spreadsheets or presentations online, collaborate on them simultaneously with other users, and download them in a variety of the usual formats. Use it for just backing important things up, or use the full ‘Docs’ features – it’s up to you.
One other incredibly powerful feature of Google docs are the forms tools. These can be used to create online forms – the best way I currently know of to create online questionnaires for research purposes. The data from the questionnaires all gets dumped into a google docs spreadsheet for easy analysis too – very cool. This page has some good tips.
3. Google Scholar
Google Scholar is pretty much my first port-of-call for literature searches these days, and is often the best way of looking up papers quickly and easily. Yes, for in-depth research on a particular topic then you still need to look at more specialised databases, but as a first-pass tool, it’s fantastic. You can use it without being logged in with a Google account, but if you’re a researcher, you can get a Google Scholar profile page – like this: Isaac Newton’s Google Scholar profile page (only an h-index of 33 Isaac? Better get your thumb out of your arse for the REF old boy). This is the best way to keep track of your publications and some simple citation metrics.
4. Google Calendar
Yes, you need to start using a calendar. Google calendar can pull together several calendars together into one, sync seamlessly with your ‘phone, and send you alerts and emails to make sure you never miss a tutorial or lecture again. Or at least, you never miss one because you just forgot about it.
5. Blogger
Blogger is owned by Google, so if you want to start a blog (and it’s something you should definitely think about), all you need to do is go to blogger and hit a few buttons – simples. That’s the easy bit – then you actually have to write something of course…
6. Google Sites
Probably the easiest way to create free websites – as for Blogger above, you can literally create a site with a few clicks. Lots of good free templates that you can use and customise.
7. Google+
Yes, I know you use Facebook, but Google+ is the future. Maybe. The video hangouts are cool, anyway.
8. Other things
Use your Google account to post videos to YouTube, save maps/locations/addresses in Google Maps, find like-minded weirdos who are into the same things as you on Google Groups, read RSS feeds using Google Reader, and oooh… lots of other things.
Honestly, the feature of Gmail should be inducement enough for everyone to sign up for a Google account, the rest is just a bonus. Get to it people – it’s never too late to switch.
TTFN.
***UPDATE***
Following a couple of comments (below, and on Twitter) I feel it necessary to qualify somewhat my effusive recommendation of Google. Use of Google services inevitably involves surrendering personal information and other data to Google, which is a large corporation, and despite these services being free at the point of use, it should always be remembered that the business of corporations is to deliver profits. Locking oneself into a corporate system should be considered carefully, no matter how ‘convenient’ it might be. This article from Gizmodo is worth a read, as is this blog post from a former Google employee.
New ‘Links’ page
Just a quick notification to say that I’ve just put up a ‘Links’ page, accessible from the top-level menu on this site, or by clicking here. There’s a couple of hundred categorised and (more or less) colour-coded links there, all more-or-less relevant to psychology and/or computing. Hope it’s useful to someone, because it took me bloody ages… ;o)
More to come on the links page as I find more stuff/get around to it.
TTFN.
Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my application. Prepare to die.
With thanks to Nick Davis. I wonder if he codes better with his right or left hand?
A review of social science research using Facebook
A quick-ish post just to point you towards a fascinating review published last month in Perspectives in Psychological Science: Wilson, Gosling and Graham (2012) A review of Facebook research in the social sciences. These authors review a set of 412 (!) studies that have been published, all since Facebook was launched in 2004. One of the striking figures in their review is this one, which highlights both the meteoric increase in Facebook users (currently over 800 million) and the parallel growth in research papers which have used Facebook as a means to gather data:
Figure 1 from Wilson, Gosling and Graham (2012). People like using Facebook, and researchers apparently *really* like people who like using Facebook.
The 412 research reports were divided into five broad-ish categories, in terms of their aims:
1. Who is using Facebook?
2. Why do people use Facebook?
3. How are people presenting themselves on Facebook?
4. How is Facebook affecting relationships among groups and individuals?
5. Why are people disclosing information on Facebook despite potential risks?
The authors suggest that, as well as just being a descriptive characterisation of the literature, these five central questions might serve as a common framework for future research in other online social networks, especially research which seeks to compare patterns of usage across two or more networks. Seems reasonable.
Also of interest (to me, anyway) is Appendix B which details the major data collection methods used by the studies, and also discusses some ethical considerations. It notes that some researchers have built custom applications for Facebook in order to collect data, but that these applications are not always successful in attracting a large user-base, i.e. some ‘go viral’ and some do not. This seems like an opportunity to do some interesting ‘meta’-research; a study of which research-driven applications are successful, and which aren’t!
Online social networks are an important part of many people’s social lives nowadays, and it seems unlikely that their influence has even come close to peaking yet; we can only expect that take-up and usage of these social tools will carry on increasing (and perhaps even accelerating) for some time. It’s good to see that social scientists have embraced these new ways that we all interact and are making serious efforts to describe and evaluate them.
TTFN.
Video analysis software – Tracker
I just came across a gosh-darn drop-dead cool (and free!) piece of software that I just had to write a quick post on. It’s called Tracker, it’s cross-platform, open-source and freely available here.
In a nutshell, it’s designed for analysis of videos, and can do various things, like track the motion of an object across frames (yielding position, velocity and acceleration data) and generate dynamic RGB colour profiles. Very cool. As an example of the kinds of things it can do, see this post on Wired.com where a physicist uses it to analyse the speed of blaster bolts in Star Wars: Episode IV. Super-geeky I know, but I love it.
An example of some motion analyses conducted using Tracker
Whenever I see a piece of software like this I immediately think about what I could use it for in psychology/neuroscience. In this case, I immediately thought about using it for kinematic analysis – that is, tracking the position/velocity/acceleration of the hand as it performed movements or manipulates objects. Another great application would be for analysis of movie stimuli for use in fMRI experiments. Complex and dynamic movies could be analysed in terms of the movement (or colour) stimuli they contain and measures produced which represent movement across time. Sub-sampled versions of these measures could then be entered into a fMRI-GLM analysis as parametric regressors to examine how the visual cortex responds; with careful selection of stimuli, this could be quite a neat and interesting experiment.
Not sure I’ll ever actually need to use it in my own experiments, but it looks like a really neat piece of software which could be a good solution for somebody with a relevant problem.
TTFN.
Digital audio and video basics – two excellent videos
Feb 26
Posted by Matt Wall
I’ve just come across two outstanding tutorial videos over on xiph.org - an open-source organisation dedicated to developing multimedia protocols and tools. So, the first one covers the fundamental principles of digital sampling for audio and video, and discusses sampling rates, bit depth and lots of other fun stuff – if you’ve ever wondered what a 16-bit, 128kbps mp3 is, this is for you.
The second one focusses on audio and gets on to some more advanced topics, about how audio behaves in the real world.
They’re both fairly long (30 mins and 23 mins respectively) but well worth watching. If you’re just getting started with digital audio and/or video editing and production, these could be really useful.
TTFN.
Posted in Commentary, Experimental techniques, Internet, Software
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Tags: a/v, audio, digital audio, digital video, how-to, tutorial, tutorial video, video, xiph.org, youtube