<p>Multitasking can make you feel better<br /> <br />Media multitasking- like reading a book while watching TV - may hurt your performance, but it will make you feel good, a new study has suggested. <br /><br />The findings provide clues as to why multitasking is so popular, even though many studies show it is not productive.<br /><br />Researchers had college students record all of their media use and other activities for 28 days, including why they used various media sources and what they got out of it. <br />The findings showed that multitasking often gave the students an emotional boost, even when it hurt their cognitive functions, such as studying.<br /><br /> “There’s this myth among some people that multitasking makes them more productive,” said Zheng Wang, lead author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University. <br /><br />“But they seem to be misperceiving the positive feelings they get from multitasking. They are not being more productive - they just feel more emotionally satisfied from their work,” Wang stated.<br /><br /> One of the key findings of the study is that multitasking didn’t do a very good job of satisfying their cognitive, needs which actually motivate the multitasking in the first place, Wang said.<br /><br /> That’s probably because their other media use distracted them from the job of studying. However, the students reported that the multitasking was very good at meeting their emotional needs (fun/entertainment/relaxing) - interestingly, a need they weren’t even seeking to fulfill. <br /><br />In addition, the results showed that habits played an important role in the use of media multitasking. <br /><br />“Our findings showed that habitual needs increase media multitasking and are also gratified from multitasking,” she said.<br /><br /> This suggests that people get used to multitasking, which makes them more likely to continue. <br /><br />Brain stimulation technology eases chronic migraine pain</p>.<p><br /> A team of researchers have come out with a brain stimulation technology, which they claim could prevent migraine attacks from occurring. Their technique, using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), applies a mild electrical current to the brain from electrodes attached to the scalp.<br /><br /> “We developed this technology and methodology in order to get the currents deep into the brain,” said Dr. Marom Bikson, associate professor of biomedical engineering in CCNY’s Grove School of Engineering. Professor Bikson and his colleagues, including Dr. Alexandre DaSilva at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry and Dr. Felipe Fregni at Harvard Medical School, found that the technology seems to reverse ingrained changes in the brain caused by chronic migraine, such as greater sensitivity to headache triggers. <br /><br />Repeated sessions reduced the duration of attacks and decreased the pain intensity of migraines that did occur on average about 37 percent. The improvements accumulated over four weeks of treatment and they persisted.<br /><br />In pilot studies, the effects lasted for months. The only side effect subjects reported was a mild tingling sensation during treatment. <br /><br />Remarkable outburst from old black hole captured<br /><br />Astronomers have observed an extraordinary outburst produced by a black hole in a nearby galaxy, which offers direct evidence for a population of old, volatile stellar black holes. <br /><br />The discovery, made using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, provides new insight into the nature of a mysterious class of black holes that can produce as much energy in X-rays as a million suns radiate at all wavelengths. <br /><br />Researchers used Chandra to discover a new ultraluminous X-ray source, or ULX. These objects give off more X-rays than most binary systems, in which a companion star orbits the remains of a collapsed star. These collapsed stars form either a dense core called a neutron star or a black hole. The extra X-ray emission suggests ULXs contain black holes that might be much more massive than the ones found elsewhere in our galaxy. <br /><br />The companion stars to ULXs, when identified, are usually young, massive stars, implying their black holes are also young. The latest research, however, provides direct evidence that ULXs can contain much older black holes and some sources may have been misidentified as young ones. <br /><br />The intriguing new ULX is located in M83, a spiral galaxy about 15 million light years from Earth, discovered in 2010 with Chandra. <br /> <br />Sleeping more than 8 hours a night may help you stay slim<br /><br />Adding a few hours sleep to your night may prevent you from gaining weight. A new study has found that sleeping more than nine hours a night appears to suppress genetic factors that lead to weight gain. In contrast, getting too little sleep seems to have the opposite effect. <br /><br />Previous research has shown an association between poor sleep and obesity, but the new findings reveal a complex interaction between sleep and genetic factors linked to body weight. <br /><br />Scientists made the discovery after studying 1088 pairs of identical and non-identical twins. Twin studies help researchers unravel genetic and environmental influences. Only identical twins share the same genes, and are therefore subject to the same genetic effects, so differences between them are likely to be due to environmental factors. The study found heritability of body mass index (BMI) - a measurement relating weight and height - was twice as high for short than for long sleepers. <br /><br />For twins sleeping less than seven hours a night, genetic factors accounted for 70 per cent of differences in BMI. In twins averaging more than nine hours’ sleep, only 32 per cent of weight variations could be attributed to genes. <br /><br />‘‘The results suggest that shorter sleep provides a more permissive environment for the expression of obesity related genes,” WAtoday reported.</p>
<p>Multitasking can make you feel better<br /> <br />Media multitasking- like reading a book while watching TV - may hurt your performance, but it will make you feel good, a new study has suggested. <br /><br />The findings provide clues as to why multitasking is so popular, even though many studies show it is not productive.<br /><br />Researchers had college students record all of their media use and other activities for 28 days, including why they used various media sources and what they got out of it. <br />The findings showed that multitasking often gave the students an emotional boost, even when it hurt their cognitive functions, such as studying.<br /><br /> “There’s this myth among some people that multitasking makes them more productive,” said Zheng Wang, lead author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University. <br /><br />“But they seem to be misperceiving the positive feelings they get from multitasking. They are not being more productive - they just feel more emotionally satisfied from their work,” Wang stated.<br /><br /> One of the key findings of the study is that multitasking didn’t do a very good job of satisfying their cognitive, needs which actually motivate the multitasking in the first place, Wang said.<br /><br /> That’s probably because their other media use distracted them from the job of studying. However, the students reported that the multitasking was very good at meeting their emotional needs (fun/entertainment/relaxing) - interestingly, a need they weren’t even seeking to fulfill. <br /><br />In addition, the results showed that habits played an important role in the use of media multitasking. <br /><br />“Our findings showed that habitual needs increase media multitasking and are also gratified from multitasking,” she said.<br /><br /> This suggests that people get used to multitasking, which makes them more likely to continue. <br /><br />Brain stimulation technology eases chronic migraine pain</p>.<p><br /> A team of researchers have come out with a brain stimulation technology, which they claim could prevent migraine attacks from occurring. Their technique, using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), applies a mild electrical current to the brain from electrodes attached to the scalp.<br /><br /> “We developed this technology and methodology in order to get the currents deep into the brain,” said Dr. Marom Bikson, associate professor of biomedical engineering in CCNY’s Grove School of Engineering. Professor Bikson and his colleagues, including Dr. Alexandre DaSilva at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry and Dr. Felipe Fregni at Harvard Medical School, found that the technology seems to reverse ingrained changes in the brain caused by chronic migraine, such as greater sensitivity to headache triggers. <br /><br />Repeated sessions reduced the duration of attacks and decreased the pain intensity of migraines that did occur on average about 37 percent. The improvements accumulated over four weeks of treatment and they persisted.<br /><br />In pilot studies, the effects lasted for months. The only side effect subjects reported was a mild tingling sensation during treatment. <br /><br />Remarkable outburst from old black hole captured<br /><br />Astronomers have observed an extraordinary outburst produced by a black hole in a nearby galaxy, which offers direct evidence for a population of old, volatile stellar black holes. <br /><br />The discovery, made using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, provides new insight into the nature of a mysterious class of black holes that can produce as much energy in X-rays as a million suns radiate at all wavelengths. <br /><br />Researchers used Chandra to discover a new ultraluminous X-ray source, or ULX. These objects give off more X-rays than most binary systems, in which a companion star orbits the remains of a collapsed star. These collapsed stars form either a dense core called a neutron star or a black hole. The extra X-ray emission suggests ULXs contain black holes that might be much more massive than the ones found elsewhere in our galaxy. <br /><br />The companion stars to ULXs, when identified, are usually young, massive stars, implying their black holes are also young. The latest research, however, provides direct evidence that ULXs can contain much older black holes and some sources may have been misidentified as young ones. <br /><br />The intriguing new ULX is located in M83, a spiral galaxy about 15 million light years from Earth, discovered in 2010 with Chandra. <br /> <br />Sleeping more than 8 hours a night may help you stay slim<br /><br />Adding a few hours sleep to your night may prevent you from gaining weight. A new study has found that sleeping more than nine hours a night appears to suppress genetic factors that lead to weight gain. In contrast, getting too little sleep seems to have the opposite effect. <br /><br />Previous research has shown an association between poor sleep and obesity, but the new findings reveal a complex interaction between sleep and genetic factors linked to body weight. <br /><br />Scientists made the discovery after studying 1088 pairs of identical and non-identical twins. Twin studies help researchers unravel genetic and environmental influences. Only identical twins share the same genes, and are therefore subject to the same genetic effects, so differences between them are likely to be due to environmental factors. The study found heritability of body mass index (BMI) - a measurement relating weight and height - was twice as high for short than for long sleepers. <br /><br />For twins sleeping less than seven hours a night, genetic factors accounted for 70 per cent of differences in BMI. In twins averaging more than nine hours’ sleep, only 32 per cent of weight variations could be attributed to genes. <br /><br />‘‘The results suggest that shorter sleep provides a more permissive environment for the expression of obesity related genes,” WAtoday reported.</p>
