“Be yourself, be wise, be happy
How to live a better life is ultimately in the brain.”
It will be a clear guide to a complicated life.
Smart and interesting brain science stories

We fight with ourselves several times a day against our own will.
We put off things until the last minute even though we know we'll regret it, buy lottery tickets even though we know it's a loss, and react emotionally to trivial things only to regret it later.
We impulsively buy things we don't need, repeat the same mistakes, and delude ourselves into thinking, "This time will be different."
In this way, we make wrong choices without even knowing it, even though we know we will regret it.
Why is that? Because there's a separate entity that controls our thoughts, emotions, and actions.


Yuji Ikegaya, one of Asia's most notable young neuroscientists, says that the brain is the basis of human repetitive thoughts, emotions, and actions.
Moreover, because the brain is designed to operate in an instinctive and emotional way rather than rationally, it often interferes with our daily lives.
So if we want to better control our behavior, we must start by understanding our brain's instincts and limitations.
We are not simply beings who are dragged along by the workings of the brain.
If you learn how to properly understand your brain and make it work for you, you can stop resenting the 'me' that doesn't suit you and get closer to the 'me' you want.
This book, "I Read Brain Science to Live My Life," teaches us how to use brain science not just as knowledge but as a tool to lead our lives in a better direction. Its value was recognized immediately after its publication, when it became a bestseller on Amazon Japan's brain science section.

Even if you're seriously contemplating something right now, thinking, "I already made the decision unconsciously anyway," will put your mind at ease.
Because we don't have any freedom in the first place.
How convenient would it be to leave it up to the brain, the automatic judgment device? Of course, whether the automatic judgment device responds correctly depends on how many positive experiences you've had in the past.
So I think that 'living well' means 'having good experiences.'
That way, you will develop ‘good habits’.

--- From "Our minds and actions are being controlled"

The human brain has a strange phenomenon called the endowment effect.
In short, it refers to 'the psychological tendency for the subjective value felt about something to increase when one owns it.'
In other words, it is a mentality that when someone else has it, you are not very interested, but when you actually have it, it ‘looks much better than its actual value.’
This psychological tendency manifests itself not only in antiques but also in everyday possessions, including land, buildings, stocks, and even the value of lovers.
For example, it is common for investors to fail because they become obsessed with a stock they have traded repeatedly, or because they are optimistic and think, "This must be the bottom, it won't go any lower," even when a long-held stock declines.

--- From "I knew it would be like this? The reason for training with a back drum"

We compared children's liking for toys when their mothers strictly forbade them by saying, "Never play with this toy!" and when they gently discouraged them by saying, "You shouldn't play with this toy."
Then, we found that even though it was the same toy, the one that was gently touched showed less favorability.
In the case of gentle teasing, there is still an element of free will in that the child stops playing of his own free will even though he has been instructed to do so by others.
In other words, the conclusion is, 'This toy wasn't very fun because I decided to stop playing with it.'
On the other hand, in cases where there is a strong prohibition, the reason for stopping the playing behavior is clear.
It was fun, but I had to stop.
There is no ambiguity in the actions he takes.

--- From "If you can't change your behavior, at least change your feelings"

Have you ever heard of the word "Schadenfreude"? Schadenfreude is the feeling of delight at the misfortune of others.
When you are openly happy about someone else's failure, people usually point fingers at you and say that you are a bad symbol.
But Dr. Takahashi's research results clearly show that schadenfreude is an emotion that exists in our brain circuits.
No matter how much we pretend to sympathize, the feeling of being happy when we see the misfortune of others is a fundamental emotion that is already imprinted in our brains.

--- From "Why We Feel Anxious When We See Other People's Lives"

If we think about it objectively, our moral values ​​may be irrational and illogical, but it is clear that this very illogical intuition gives rise to what we call "humanity," and when combined with the spirit of self-sacrifice, a peaceful society is formed.
--- From "Why Don't We Steal Other People's Stuff?"

Michael A. Keasley of the University of Colorado
Dr. Kisley's team studied this phenomenon in detail over an 80-year lifespan and found that negativity bias gradually decreases with age.
And “it can be said that the senior generation is more emotionally healthy.
“People who had experienced the loss of a partner or a serious illness showed less negativity bias,” he said.
Dr. Mara Mather's team at Stanford University focused on a place called the 'amygdala.'
The amygdala is the area that controls emotions, and is generally known to be more involved in negative emotions such as fear and anxiety.
However, it is said that the amygdala of the senior group was more strongly activated when they saw positive pictures.
That is, in the case of the senior generation, the amygdala is producing positive emotions.

--- From "The Scientific Reasons Why You Get Happier as You Age"

According to Dr. Donna Rose Addis' team at Harvard University, the hippocampus in the right hemisphere of the brain becomes active when imagining a vibrant future.
Eleanor A. Maguire of University College London
According to Dr. Maguire's team, patients with hippocampal damage cannot imagine the future clearly.
Since it has to do with the hippocampus, the thing that is of concern is aging.
When dementia occurs, the area that is particularly severely damaged is the hippocampus.
When the hippocampus is weakened, it becomes difficult to visualize the future clearly.
Perhaps saying that the brain 'grows old' is similar to saying that it can no longer dream.
Don't people with sparkling eyes and dreams certainly look younger? The latest brain research reveals anew how important it is to have dreams.

--- From "How to Regain Stolen Concentration"

The information that is stored in the brain is selected not based on how often the information enters the brain, but on how much the information is needed in the situation, that is, how much the information is used.

The same goes for ‘motivation’.
There are more cases where motivation arises once you start rather than when you do something because you are motivated.
A good example is something like year-end cleaning.
We've all probably had the experience of really hating to clean, but once we started, we gradually became more motivated and cleaned the room until there wasn't a single speck of dust left.
There is a saying, “Well begun is half done.”
Since our brains are designed to prioritize output, I believe we should always live with an eye on output.
That's the natural way to work with a brain based on co-optation.

--- From "Once the body moves, the mind follows"