All posts tagged: Focusing

Focusing on yourself is a trap

Focusing on yourself is a trap

Published by Daniella Wilson

Add Comic Relief: Funny For Money to your watchlist I get an insight into people’s lives hosting Radio 1’s breakfast show. In a dangerous, divided and digital world, many listeners can feel isolated. For some, the solitary life enforced during the pandemic became a habit. What’s more, you can easily live on your phone – you can stay home, order every meal online and get nearly every-thing done without physically talking to anyone. We need connections. This isn’t necessarily romantic relationships; it’s neighbours, local shopkeepers, colleagues and friends. So I try to create shared moments on my show, a feeling of togetherness and community – everyone mucking in to make something fun and joyful. My Comic Relief challenge – a 1,000km cycle ride across the UK on a tandem – feels like an extension of this endeavour. Listeners, locals, famous faces and people whose lives have been supported by Comic Relief-funded projects will, at various points, join me on my gruelling eight-day journey through cities, towns and villages. I’m the daft ringleader, conducting the circus …

Do you like cat photos? Are you constantly distracted? You’re probably actually quite good at focusing: 10 myths about attention | Life and style

Do you like cat photos? Are you constantly distracted? You’re probably actually quite good at focusing: 10 myths about attention | Life and style

Published by Sam Flores

It’s believed that we have about 50,000 thoughts a day: big, small, urgent, banal – “Did I leave the oven on?”. And those are just the ones that register. Subconsciously, we’re constantly sifting through a barrage of stimuli: background noise, clutter on our desks, the mere presence of our phones. Every second, 11m bits of information enter our brains. Just 0.0004% is perceived by our conscious minds, showing just how hard our brains are working to parse what’s sufficiently relevant to bring to our attention. It’s no wonder you feel distracted. Formidable though they may be, our brains’ processing powers are a poor match for the fast-paced modern world, the constant pings of our devices and sources of distraction. Many of us routinely feel overwhelmed, and struggle to focus on what we need to get done. But a new book suggests doing so may be easier than we think. In Focus On-Off, Dutch experts Mark Tigchelaar and Oscar de Bos argue that we can better harness our attention by better understanding our brains, and learning …

Federal investigation focusing on Becca Good

Federal investigation focusing on Becca Good

Published by Sam Flores

IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Drone video shows 100-vehicle pileup in Michigan 00:22 Fashion icon Valentino will lie in state in Rome 00:55 1982: Valentino on his fashion hallmark and high prices 00:28 Fashion designer Valentino Garavani has died at 93 00:14 Tensions rise over Trump’s efforts to acquire Greenland 01:01 Severe winter weather pounds parts of the country 00:52 Dozens dead after train derailment in southern Spain 00:48 Israeli settlers set fire to houses in the West Bank 00:29 Protests erupt over pastor’s alleged links to ICE 00:36 At least 10 killed in Pakistan shopping mall fire 00:30 Drone video shows aftermath of deadly Chile wildfires 00:26 Video captures Florida snow during rare Southern storm 00:16 Train collision in Spain leaves at least 20 dead 00:21 Bruce Springsteen calls out ICE during concert in N.J. 00:47 Now Playing Sources: Federal investigation focusing on Becca Good 00:19 UP NEXT ‘Deeply concerning’: Minnesota mayor reacts to DOJ investigation 01:09 Bessent: European leaders will “come around” on …

ADHD news: Researchers discover a gene that shapes how well the brain filters noise

ADHD news: Researchers discover a gene that shapes how well the brain filters noise

Published by Jenni Sidey

Attention can feel like a fragile thing, especially when your brain struggles to sort signal from noise. Every second, your senses flood you with information. Focus depends on the brain’s ability to quiet the distractions and highlight what matters. Stimulant drugs for ADHD try to help by turning activity up in attention circuits such as the prefrontal cortex. A new study points to a different strategy: make the background quieter instead. Researchers have identified a gene, called Homer1, that shapes how well the brain filters noise. When levels of specific forms of this gene drop during development, mice show calmer baseline activity in the prefrontal cortex and much better focus. “The gene we found has a striking effect on attention and is relevant to humans,” says Priya Rajasethupathy, who leads the Skoler Horbach Family Laboratory of Neural Dynamics and Cognition at Rockefeller University. Identification of a QTL associated with pre-attentive processing. (CREDIT: Nature Neuroscience) Hunting For an Attention Gene The team did not expect Homer1 to be at the center of attention. Scientists already knew …

Conan O’Brien Calls Out Anti-Trump Comedians for Focusing on Anger

Conan O’Brien Calls Out Anti-Trump Comedians for Focusing on Anger

Published by Daniella Wilson

Conan O’Brien is calling out comedians who have centered their jokes on being anti-Donald Trump and focus too much on anger rather than comedy. The late night veteran spoke at a recent Oxford Union event, where he said comedians “always need to be funny,” as that’s their job and should be their first instinct. “I think some comics go the route of, ‘I’m going to just say, “F Trump” all the time,’ or that’s their comedy,” O’Brien explained. “Well, now a little bit you’re being co-opted because you’re so angry. You’ve been lulled into just saying ‘F Trump. F Trump. F Trump. Screw this guy.’ And I think you’ve now put down your best weapon, which is being funny, and you’ve exchanged it for anger.” The Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast host suggested that comedians need to find a funny way to channel their anger, especially when it comes to topics surrounding serious life events and politics. “Any person like that would say, ‘Well, things are too serious now. I don’t need to be …

Focusing on surface-level diversity is stopping Britain from becoming truly multicultural

Focusing on surface-level diversity is stopping Britain from becoming truly multicultural

Published by Sam Flores

Arguments about diversity in Britain often get stuck on the surface. Instead of talking about who holds power or how resources are distributed, many politicians and culture warriors obsess over the colour of faces in adverts, media and public spaces. Reform UK MP Sarah Pochin claimed that adverts “full of black people, full of Asian people” drove her “mad”, before apologising for the wording. Conservative MP Robert Jenrick depicted Handsworth in Birmingham as a slum where he “didn’t see another white face”. One reading of this comment is that it implies that the absence of white people signals disorder or decline. In 2020, a Sainsbury’s Christmas advert featuring a black family sparked outrage online. Critics on social media declared that the country they recognised had vanished, that “too many” adverts now featured people who didn’t look like them. Such controversies point to the heart of a dilemma currently facing Britain: a society wrestling with deep inequalities keeps picking fights about surface-level diversity. A central problem is that multiculturalism is often confused with what might be …