TERRE HAUTE — It is possible to buy products that are supposed to improve one’s mind? Last month’s column discussed products that aim at improving a person’s memory. As promised, this month’s column reviews products (such as courses, books, tapes, CDs, and CD ROMS) that are aimed at improving a person’s ability to think.
There are two kinds of thinking training that may be considered: critical thinking and creative thinking. We have examined these different kinds of thinking in the past but not while considering different methods of training. However, before we do so, we will reconsider the likelihood of achieving a change in thinking from the different instructional methods that were reviewed in last month’s column on memory improvement.
Instructional Methods: Improving thinking skills is more difficult to achieve than improving memory skills.
Memory improvement is achieved by learning ways to do certain memory tasks. For example, people can learn someone’s name more easily if they repeat the name several times in an introduction. However, improvement in thinking rests on acquiring considerable knowledge about a specific kind of problem as well as acquiring ways to think about the knowledge. What improves thinking for one kind of problem may not work for another kind of problem. For example, the knowledge necessary to lose weight has nothing to do with the knowledge necessary to win at poker.
The greatest amount of improvement in thinking comes from attending a course, that’s on critical thinking or creative thinking, and then from studying what was taught in the course. You can find advertisements for these courses in the backs of respectable magazines (and magazines you should not be opening). These courses are offered in colleges, in management training, and in adult education programs. The best improvement in thinking occurs in courses that teach people how to think about the problems encountered in a certain topic, such as courses that teach somebody how to cook, invest in stocks or how to tune up a car.
If a person does not want to take a course in thinking, improvement in thinking is most likely to occur from reading books on this topic. As you know, just owning a book on improving thinking will not lead to such improvement. Nevertheless, ownership of a book on improving thinking may still help how others regard your ability to think.
If you buy a lot of books on thinking and display them conspicuously on your desk or in a prominent bookcase, others may conclude that you are an expert at thinking. (However, I confess doing so has not seemed to help me much with my significant other, my children, and other members of my family.) None of the other instructional methods (listening to audio tapes, or seeing instruction on a videotape, a CD or DVD) work well because the owners of these products do not attempt to use the thinking techniques enough or even at all.
Critical thinking: Critical thinking courses have become very popular on college campuses in the past two decades. These courses are usually taught in the philosophy departments, but they may also be taught in psychology departments, and really in almost any other department. These courses are often taught in continuing educational courses and they are presented in professional settings, such as in management training. Critical thinking courses emphasize three kinds of techniques.
First, they stress that people should make sure they understand the problems they have to think about. A good understanding of how to solve problems requires us to recognize that some problems do not have a logical solution. Some problems are easier to answer or solve than others because the answers are more predictable.
Second, those taking these courses are taught to check whether they have the knowledge and fundamental assumptions necessary to think about a problem. This foundation will include our own particular view of the world, of what is right and what is wrong, and our orientation to particular problems. If we understand what will qualify as an adequate solution to a problem, we also need to recognize the assumptions that underlie our thinking.
Third, these courses teach logical rules that ensure a person will properly draw the conclusions appropriate to their understanding and knowledge of a problem. Proper reasoning is necessary to put all the pieces of a problem together and to determine the best solution. When problems are clearly stated, the critical thinker will draw conclusions consistent with the statement and the foundation of knowledge that he or she brings to a problem.
Creativity Training. Many people agree that much success in this world comes from creativity. Creative thinking produces solutions to problems that are unique and compelling. A popular way to express the need for creativity is to call it “thinking outside of the box.” Unfortunately, no one tells us where are the sides, bottom, and top of the box, so it is hard to know whether we are still in, or outside of, the box. A lot of creativity courses can be called “b.s.” (where b stands for bull and s stands for stuff).
Some creativity training emphasizes mental exercise. These courses sometimes assume that the mind is like a muscle and that exercising the mind will get it in shape. Research indicates that exercise works best if it is with a specific topic. For example, doctors develop clinical judgment as a result of solving the same kinds of problems over and over. Unfortunately, clinical judgment is useful for medical problems and not for other kinds of problems. So if you want to acquire creative thinking ability, learn as much as possible about the topic at which you want to be a good thinker.
A Sharper Mind
July 9, 2008
Consider thinking training
- A Sharper Mind
-
- A Shaper Mind: A review of Sharper Mind columns Don’t worry. Just because I am providing a review in this column, it doesn’t mean I am going to give an exam afterward. I just want to go over some of the most important ideas discussed in this column previously. The reason that I am doing this is because this is my last column. I admit that I just could not remember any topic that had not been examined here.
- Holiday gift giving for the sharper mind This year, more than most years, gift giving during the holidays is going to be especially challenging. Gift-giving this year will require more accurate remembering and more problems solving than in previous years.
- The pros and cons of cell phones This column will, first, review why cell phones have a positive effect on our mind. Subsequently, we will consider the dangerous consequences of talking on a cell phone while driving and then the very dangerous consequences of text-messaging on a cell phone while driving,
- Activities of daily living that depend on memory Everyone forgets something that they are supposed to do in everyday life. They may have known what they should do for a long time or for after a minute or so. This column examines the role of memory in some common activities in one’s day.
- Why names and appointments are difficult to remember Everyone has weaknesses. Mine is popcorn and more popcorn. We also have weaknesses when it comes to memory. I don’t know your memory weaknesses and I don’t care to share mine. But I can tell you the memory weaknesses that most of us say we have.
- Consider thinking training It is possible to buy products that are supposed to improve one’s mind? Last month’s column discussed products that aim at improving a person’s memory. As promised, this month’s column reviews products (such as courses, books, tapes, CDs, and CD ROMS) that are aimed at improving a person’s ability to think.
- A Sharper Mind: The science behind commercial methods of mind improvement It is possible to buy products that are supposed to improve one’s mind. Most of these products aim at improving a person’s memory but many products aim at improving a person’s ability to think. This month’s column reviews products that are supposed to improve a person’s memory. Next month’s column will review products intended to improve a person’s thinking ability.
- Candidates, superdelegates not lying, just forgetful Recently, some presidential candidates have apparently forgotten something that others expected them to remember. Also some superdelegates have switched allegiance from one candidate to the other, revealing that they forgot the candidate they originally favored.
- The advantages and disadvantages of memorists Every family has one. Every group of friends has one, too: a person who tends to remember almost everything that is going on. This person knows all about upcoming events (concerts, lectures), what is at the movies, and what’s on TV. Sometimes, this person even knows what is going on among family members, friends and acquaintances. Accurate gossip is a valuable commodity.
- Drake sweeps ISU softball Friday, but Saturday's game called off Indiana State’s softball team played 19 games before ever stepping foot on the Price Field diamond Friday for a doubleheader against Drake. The homecoming wasn’t a happy one — Drake swept ISU with 5-1 and 6-2 victories — but the long-term concern is on the mound, where star pitcher Darcy Wood is battling a shoulder injury.
- Completing a medical history form at a doctor’s office These days, when you visit a doctor’s office for the first time, you are given a form on which you are supposed to record important facts about your medical history. Unfortunately, these forms ask for considerable information, much of which few human beings can recall. More unfortunate yet is that different doctors use different forms. Consequently, we are required to fill out medical history forms calling for essentially the same information all over again for each new doctor.
- Owls may get the credit for being wise, but you should want an elephant’s mind Just to be clear at the outset, this column does not endorse or reject the symbol of a political party. Also, the column has nothing to do with a rock group called Elephant Memory that Yoko Ono and John Lennon promoted in the early 1970s. Instead, the topic of this column is the memory of real live elephants.
- Sometimes we fail to remember something and feel guilty Some people regard memory as an open or shut case. We either remember or don’t remember.
- A Sharper Mind: Benefiting from each others memory failures We all are forgetful occasionally and leave something of ours behind in public places such as stores, shopping centers, and at the homes of family, friends and acquaintances. For example, we may forget to take with us things like a pair of gloves, an umbrella, a scarf or a jacket. Because we are all in this world together, we should forgive each other's memory failures.
- Don’t let others profit from your memory failures We all are forgetful on occasion. Some of us are more forgetful than others. If our forgetting inconveniences someone else, we hope that they will not be angry and will forgive our lapse. However, in addition to the possible anger or forgiving, there is another way someone might respond to our memory failure.
- A Sharper Mind: Learning how to get a bright idea In the past, this column has discussed the factors that facilitate problem solving and critical thinking. For example, such factors include understanding a problem in the first place, ignoring solutions tried previously, avoiding being fixated on a solution to a similar problem and by overloading one’s brain.
- A Sharper Mind: Reminiscences of meals past Much of our lives are spent eating. As a result, we have many memories of breakfast, lunch or dinner, as well as for in between snacks. Sometimes we may want to remember what we ate on a certain occasion. This column considers what is the best way to recover the memory of what was eaten.
- A Sharper Mind: Some amount of forgetting is normal, but just how much? We often hear that it is important to be normal. Certainly we prefer to have a normal body temperature, heart rate and blood pressure. However, we probably prefer not to be normal on some occasions. I am not saying we should prefer to be abnormal, but we want to be distinguished for something, to know something or do something better than others.
- A Sharper Mind: How to not look stupid (at least some of the time) I do not mean to suggest that you or I look stupid a lot of the time.
- A Sharper Mind: Politics of remembering and the intelligencia of Indiana Part of this column will be devoted to an announcement. Another part will be devoted to my claim that Hautians are among the brightest people on the planet. Finally I will discuss a public demonstration of how important remembering can be in everyday life.
- A Sharper Mind: Forgetting names is most annoying but we aren’t raised to remember Here is a topic that we haven’t covered for quite a while. It hasn’t been covered because there were so many other things to discuss. Nevertheless, it probably will be beneficial for most of us to review the key ideas about how to learn names.
- A Sharper Mind: Finally enough failures for Forgetting Hall of Fame III A few months back, this column honored noteworthy memory failures in the Forgetting Halls of Fame I and II. It looks like these Halls of Fame have been very helpful to readers because very few failures have been happening to the people around me.
- A Sharper Mind: Is it nature or nurture? Why memory differs for men, women Here is a topic that most people find interesting: the memory performance of men and women. I will review the results of a great deal of research about gender differences in memory in this column. The research indicates that women are superior at some memory tasks and men are superior at other memory tasks. Some of the results are not surprising; some are surprising. Regardless of how the results come out, there is one overriding question. Do men and women differ in memory performance because of differences in genetic ability or because of differences in how males and females are raised and treated as adults in our culture?
- A Sharper Mind: Changing of seasons makes for forgetful time of year Ah yes, spring is upon us. This is the time that our thoughts stray to — whatever. As wonderful as spring may be, we actually are especially vulnerable to forgetting when this season arrives. Each season we become accustomed to the season’s typical temperature and season’s typical appearance of the sky. When the environment changes unexpectedly, we lose environmental cues that remind us of things to do.
- A Sharper Mind: Consider the effort we give to thinking about our problems There is a famous statue of a nude person sitting with his head looking down, with his jaw resting on the fist of the right forearm, which rests on the person’s right knee. The sculptor, a Frenchman named Auguste Rodin, called this sculpture “the thinker.”
- A Sharper Mind: Memory performs up to cultural expectations People in different cultures vary in what memory tasks they are good at. A culture refers to a group of people who share beliefs and habits of communication. The workplace is made up of different cultures, management, skilled workers and unskilled workers. Each family has its own culture. Everyone belongs to one or more cultures.
- A Sharper Mind: Brilliant ideas more elusive, likely to be forgotten Some of our thoughts elude us because they pass through our mind so quickly that we cannot remember them later. For this article, we are concerned with just important elusive thoughts. These are thoughts about brilliant ideas we may want to act on or about ideas that are practically useful, such as for something we need to do.
- A Sharper Mind: Mental dictionary, spell check provide sharp language tools This column considers how sharp we are when it comes to language.
- Herrmann: Creativity: Something for all, no matter what you think Creativity is admired whenever it is noticed. We may recognize a new invention as creative.
- A Sharper Mind: As matter of courtesy, don’t be caught faking memory Courtesy is more than knowing what fork to use and when.
- More A Sharper Mind Headlines
Raw Video: NATO Protesters Face-off With Police
Mary Kennedy Mourned at Private Funeral in NY
Raw Video: Demonstrations Ahead of NATO Summit
Obama Pushes for Post-2014 Vision for Afghanista
Prosecutors: Trio Planned to Attack Obama's HQ
G-8 Seeks Unity on Euro-debt Crisis, Iran
NATO Chief: 'No Rush for Exits' in Afghanistan.
Libyan Convicted in Lockerbie Bombing Is Dead
Video Surfaces of Alleged Abuse at Kansas School
Blind Chinese Activist Arrives in NY
Raw Video: Powerful Quake in Northern Italy
G-8 Leaders Hope Greece Remains in Eurozone
Violence in Aleppo, Rastan Amid Observer Warning
Raw Video: Will Smith Slaps Kissing Reporter
Raw Video: Demonstrators Protest NATO
Police: 3 Face Terror Charges Ahead of NATO
Raw Video: G8 Leaders Gather for Class Photo
Raw Video: Obama Greets Leaders at Camp David
Coffee May Be Key to Living Longer
Big Job: G-8 Tackles Euro Crisis
'Ring of Fire' solar eclipse as seen from Japan
ET's Last Interview with Robin Gibb
Magnitude 6.0 Earthquake Slams Italy
Wiig's Emotional SNL Sendoff
Bloodied anti-NATO protester
Bee Gees Singer Robin Gibb Dies
Facebook Founder Ties the Knot
Heat even up series with Pacers
The Dictator Overthrows Elisabetta
Anarchists Arrested at NATO Summit in Chicago
Transgender Beauty Rocks Bikini
Raw Video: Will Smith Slaps Journalist
Spurs rally, take 3-0 lead
Protesters in front of Emanuel's house
John Edwards trial: Main points jurors may be mulling
Facebook IPO underwhelms
Kate Middleton's Two Thousand Dollar Dress
Man Who Fathered 30 Kids Asks Judge for Child Support Break
Sebelius Heckled During Georgetown Speech
