lornamatic

Highly anxious rats were found to have low levels of a brain chemical that increases with exposure to challenges and mental stimulation. It also seems to play a factor in whether or not new neural cell growth is successful.

Here’s the Reuters story. Exposure to new things increased the amount of the beneficial chemical, which reduced anxiety. And we all know reducing anxiety is a good thing to do.

A potential example of people being drawn to creative fields as survival technique?

There’s a much longer thing waiting to be written on this, just not tonight.

Exhibit A
Most popular lyrics in Great Britain in 2008

Exhibit B
An oldie but goodie, psych paper from Austin:
(full .pdf, launches Acrobat)

“… depressed participants…. used the word, “I” more than did never-depressed participants…”