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Spending too much time in dimly lit rooms and offices may actually change the brain's structure and hurt one's ability to remember and learn, indicates groundbreaking research by Michigan State University neuroscientists.
A new study reveals exposure to dim light might impact memory and learning. Researchers report rodents exposed to dim lighting lost 30 percent of hippocampal capacity and performed poorly on spatial tasks they had previously experienced.
The researchers studied the brains of Nile grass rats (which, like humans, are diurnal and sleep at night) after exposing them to dim and bright light for four weeks. The rodents exposed to dim light lost about 30 percent of capacity in the hippocampus, a critical brain region for learning and memory, and performed poorly on a spatial task they had trained on previously.
The rats exposed to bright light, on the other hand, showed significant improvement on the spatial task. Further, when the rodents that had been exposed to dim light were then exposed to bright light for four weeks (after a month-long break), their brain capacity – and performance on the task – recovered fully.
The study, funded by the National Institutes of Health, is the first to show that changes in environmental light, in a range normally experienced by humans, leads to structural changes in the brain. Americans, on average, spend about 90 percent of their time indoors, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Source: http://neurosciencenews.com/dim-light-dumber-8433/
(Score: 5, Interesting) by requerdanos on Wednesday February 07 2018, @05:01PM (6 children)
Sadly, this leads actual clients to say things like "When you enlarge it just clarify it like they do on CSI." and "I'd like you to flip the picture around so we see their faces instead of their backs." And "Can you photoshop away his sweatshirt? I want to see if he has that tattoo on his arm underneath."
Presumably, a large percentage of these people simply die because they forget to breathe (go Darwin), but the portion of them that continue to live apparently do live in darkness, watch CSI, and believe that it is a documentary.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by rts008 on Wednesday February 07 2018, @05:24PM
Your comment is a shining example of why a '+1 sad, but true' mod would be useful.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 07 2018, @05:30PM
I forgot to breathe the once. It wasn't so bad. When I woke up I found myself as a rat in a bright maze.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 07 2018, @05:31PM (3 children)
Mocking the technically illiterate is always good for a laugh, but really how can we expect people with zero tech experience to sift through what is real and what's not when they see it in TV? Computers do a lot of things people regard as near magic, so with that level of expectation I'm not surprised. Now *enhance*.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Wednesday February 07 2018, @05:55PM (1 child)
Can lack of tech experience really account for what was being described though? It seems to me it's more intellectual laziness. A refusal to think critically and pause to analyze a concept.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Wednesday February 07 2018, @06:23PM
With things like X-Ray, Infrared, and Lasers, I'm not so sure that we can just expect someone to "get it". For all they know the new security cameras are just better than the old ones. So, you can zoom in and extrapolate things. https://www.xkcd.com/605/ [xkcd.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Funny) by requerdanos on Wednesday February 07 2018, @07:54PM
The line is fuzzy, but there's a line. Joining the things I mentioned over on the "dumb" side of that line are also gems such as the following.
"Demolition crew? Labor cost?? That was stupid! Why didn't you just make it disappear like David Copperfield did on TV?"
"Food costs? Ridiculous! Why don't the restaurants just use something like a replicator? I'm not paying."
"What do you mean you can't do it? You're the expert! Besides, I saw them do it on TV" --Worst one. Because I am the expert, *I* tell *you* whether something is possible on your budget or in your universe.