8 ms·

My open source brain data

55 points by mattangriffel 12y ago

mrfusion 12y ago
I'd suggest to record all of the foods you eat each day. Just a quick list. Also total calories would be interesting, and exercise. I tracked diet, and my estimates of mental functions for a while and surprisingly found that strawberries increased my mood considerably. Of course I could just be bad at statistics :-(
- epaladin 12y ago
  Did you harbor affection for strawberries beforehand?
  - mrfusion 12y ago
    I guess I've always liked them. Do you think that would make a difference? I noticed they're high in vitamin C so I was thinking maybe it was related to that.
    - epaladin 12y ago
      Vitamin C is in so many things now that it seems unlikely that the additional vitamin c in strawberries would have much of an effect. There's a lot of positive benefit of long-term consistent consumption of various fruits (such as the study that showed an association between blueberries and brain health) but for such an effect on mood in the short term it could be that you just like them :). But hey, if it works, it works!
      - mrfusion 12y ago
        Well at the time I was dieting pretty hard, so it might be possible to have had a short term deficiency of vitamin C. But good. If I recall I did a correlation analysis, between foods and mood and strawberries related jumped out strongly.
        derefr 12y ago
        Strawberries contain serotonin! This is pretty well-studied; it's hypothesized they do it because serotonin in the gut acts as a laxative, causing you to expel the strawberry seeds without digesting them. If the serotonin manages to make it into your bloodstream (e.g. if your gut bacteria don't want it, and your stomach pH isn't low enough to destroy it, and your gut permeability is high) then you'll certainly get a mood boost.
smanuel 12y ago
Cool project. I think it would be really cool if you try to interpolate some EEG data (collected through MyndPlay, Emotiv or sth else).
- ehurrell 12y ago
  This would definitely elevate this project to something really noteworthy, I've a friend who works with EEG data who would absolutely love this. Chances are the data would be too noisy to be useful (from experience this is one of the biggest problems with collecting data from the human brain, there's a lot going on) but you never know til you experiment.
butler14 12y ago
It's an interesting test for sure. I do similar with brain training on the 3DS, and though I've always been mindful of the various factors affecting my performance, I've never gone the effort of mapping them vs. my results. As noted, as long as you don't start drawing any conclusions before you've played consistently to eliminate practice effects (getting better at the games) as best you can, it's fairly interesting and valuable stuff.
mattangriffel 12y ago
Hey all, author here. What I'd really like is feedback from statisticians / cognitive scientists about better / less biased ways to perform these tests and the analysis.

55 points by mattangriffel 12y ago

I'd suggest to record all of the foods you eat each day. Just a quick list. Also total calories would be interesting, and exercise. I tracked diet, and my estimates of mental functions for a while and surprisingly found that strawberries increased my mood considerably. Of course I could just be bad at statistics :-(

epaladin 12y ago
Did you harbor affection for strawberries beforehand?
- mrfusion 12y ago
  I guess I've always liked them. Do you think that would make a difference? I noticed they're high in vitamin C so I was thinking maybe it was related to that.
  - epaladin 12y ago
    Vitamin C is in so many things now that it seems unlikely that the additional vitamin c in strawberries would have much of an effect. There's a lot of positive benefit of long-term consistent consumption of various fruits (such as the study that showed an association between blueberries and brain health) but for such an effect on mood in the short term it could be that you just like them :). But hey, if it works, it works!
    - mrfusion 12y ago
      Well at the time I was dieting pretty hard, so it might be possible to have had a short term deficiency of vitamin C. But good. If I recall I did a correlation analysis, between foods and mood and strawberries related jumped out strongly.
      - derefr 12y ago
        Strawberries contain serotonin! This is pretty well-studied; it's hypothesized they do it because serotonin in the gut acts as a laxative, causing you to expel the strawberry seeds without digesting them. If the serotonin manages to make it into your bloodstream (e.g. if your gut bacteria don't want it, and your stomach pH isn't low enough to destroy it, and your gut permeability is high) then you'll certainly get a mood boost.

smanuel 12y ago

Cool project. I think it would be really cool if you try to interpolate some EEG data (collected through MyndPlay, Emotiv or sth else).

ehurrell 12y ago
This would definitely elevate this project to something really noteworthy, I've a friend who works with EEG data who would absolutely love this. Chances are the data would be too noisy to be useful (from experience this is one of the biggest problems with collecting data from the human brain, there's a lot going on) but you never know til you experiment.

butler14 12y ago

It's an interesting test for sure. I do similar with brain training on the 3DS, and though I've always been mindful of the various factors affecting my performance, I've never gone the effort of mapping them vs. my results. As noted, as long as you don't start drawing any conclusions before you've played consistently to eliminate practice effects (getting better at the games) as best you can, it's fairly interesting and valuable stuff.

mattangriffel 12y ago

Hey all, author here. What I'd really like is feedback from statisticians / cognitive scientists about better / less biased ways to perform these tests and the analysis.