Chapter 2 - Why Trying Too Hard Can Be A Part Of The Problem Flashcards
Should you read a chapter from beginning to end or skim it before reading?
Skimming and glancing through a chapter beforehand can help prime your mental pump, and allow your brain time to create ‘pegs’ to hang mental concepts off.
What is focused mode thinking?
Highly attentive, sequential, logical mode used a lot in solving maths, science. It’s focused, analytical, requires a lot on concentration. Associated with pre-frontal cortex.
What is diffuse mode thinking?
Big picture thinking. Hooks up different concepts and connects things together. Happens while your mind is wandering. Not associated with one area of the brain.
Do you stay in one mode of thinking (focused or diffuse) only and switch consciously?
You switch between these states constantly and sub-conciously.
Use metaphor to describe the focused mode of thinking.
Focused mode is like a tight pinball machine. Groups of neurons in close proximity fire together to zero in on a concept you know. Multiplication, verb conjugation etc.
Use a metaphor to describe diffuse mode of thinking.
Like a spread out pinball machine. Ideas spread out around the brain and groups of neurons in different regions fire together.
Why are maths and science more difficult to learn than other subjects?
They are abstract in nature. With a cow, you can actually point to an animal in a field, but with a mathematical symbol such as + or x you cannot point to a concrete example of it.
What is the Einstellung effect?
It’s the phenomenon of an initial thought or leap to solving a problem getting in the way of other, potentially better solutions to solving something. Your focused mode brain leaps to a conclusion before your diffuse mode starts connecting dots.
Switching modes can help you avoid this effect.
Is the best way to succeed in learning Mathematical and Scientific concepts just to leap in?
No. Often people leap in to doing before they’ve read through the textbook and learning material thoroughly, and haven’t put the concepts together. This is like jumping into the water before you have learned to swim.
Is the diffuse mode better for helping you deal with concepts you already know about, or new concepts?
It’s better for dealing with new concepts. When encountering new situations, it helps you to pull together other concepts you are already aware of and build up a larger picture of the thing that you are encountering. The problem is that our brain immediately jumps into focus mode when encountering new things.
Does pushing your brain harder help you solve problems?
Counterintuitively, often when we push our brains harder to solve a problem, the less often a solution will appear for us. This is because we’re accessing the focused, rather than the diffuse mode of thinking
Why do we have the focused and diffuse ways of thinking about things from an evolutionary perspective?
The one is suited to performing a specific task at hand while the other is better at scanning the environment as a whole, putting things together and identifying threats. At least, this is the best information that we have.
What does the evidence suggest we need to do to solve problems effectively? All focus, all play, a mix of both? Eating ice-cream?
First, grapple with a problem and engage the focused mode. However, after that it’s important to allow our diffuse mode to engage and work in the background, piecing things together and coming up with solutions that we would not have previously considered.
Is confusion a bad or a good thing? Why would it ever be a good thing?
It’s a good thing. Knowing how to express the questions we are trying to answer clearly is 80% of the battle to truly understanding something. Grappling with a problem doesn’t mean we’re not good at a subject, it just means we’re on the path to really understanding the concept.
Is cramming the most effective way to learn a new concept?
No. Our brain needs time to absorb new concepts, turn things around in our mind, piece things together in a big picture kind of way, and lots of spaced repetition before we truly know something.
Short, regular learning is much more effective as a method as opposed to last minute cramming.
