{"id":405,"date":"2020-11-23T16:03:16","date_gmt":"2020-11-23T21:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/ravenmag\/?post_type=cu-stories&p=405"},"modified":"2020-11-23T16:18:29","modified_gmt":"2020-11-23T21:18:29","slug":"hellemans-davies-covid-brain","status":"publish","type":"cu-stories","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/ravenmag\/story\/hellemans-davies-covid-brain\/","title":{"rendered":"This Is Your Brain On COVID"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kim Hellemans<\/a> is a neuroscience<\/a> professor at Carleton, chair of the department and the winner of multiple awards for teaching and student support. Her research focuses on mental health, stress and addiction.<\/em><\/p>\n

Jim Davies<\/a> is a cognitive science<\/a> professor, director of the university\u2019s Science of Imagination Laboratory<\/a> and the author of two books, most recently<\/em> Imagination: The Science of Your Mind\u2019s Greatest Power<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Together, Hellemans and Davies host an award-winning podcast, \u201c<\/em>Minding the Brain<\/em><\/a>,\u201d which explores cognitive and brain science, covering subjects such as sleep, climate change psychology and emotional expression. They\u2019ve been recording it from separate locations for a few months, so we interviewed them individually and stitched together their conversation<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Prof.

Prof. Kim Hellemans<\/p><\/div>\n

Jim:<\/strong> I first heard about COVID-19 in late 2019 and figured it was nothing. That was fairly rational at the time. Different diseases pop up now and again and they\u2019re usually nothing to worry about. I started thinking it was a real problem in early 2020 when it was spreading around the world and was particularly virulent and people were dying.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> I follow a lot of medical and science people on Twitter and started seeing a lot coming out of China in January. It was inevitable that information would trickle out. Right before Reading Week in February, I remember telling a student, \u201cWe\u2019ll see how long we\u2019re going to be back for after the break.\u201d It happened so quickly. We went from \u201cIt\u2019s far away in China\u201d to \u201cLook at what\u2019s happening in Italy\u201d to the first cases in the U.S. There\u2019s no way it could be in the U.S. and not in Canada.<\/p>\n

Jim: <\/strong>I was in Toronto just as everything was shutting down. Hour by hour things were changing. The streets were emptying and we were figuring out how to react. My wife and I were going to see the musical Come From Away and it was cancelled two hours beforehand. Then I was on TVO\u2019s \u201cThe Agenda with Steve Paikin,\u201d the last studio interview they filmed<\/a>. We flew back to Ottawa on a nearly empty plane and shut ourselves in.<\/p>\n

\"Prof.

Prof. Jim Davies<\/p><\/div>\n

Kim:<\/strong> Two or three days before the university shut down I was in a departmental chairs and directors meeting devoted to COVID-19. There was a big event coming up on campus and we weren\u2019t sure if it was going to go ahead. My heart was pounding. I was flooded with adrenaline and I was scared. \u201cAll I want to do is go home,\u201d I was thinking. \u201cI want to pack up my stuff, get my kids from school and go home.\u201d There was so much we still didn\u2019t know. It felt like the virus was everywhere and nowhere at the same time, so that was my emotional fear-driven response.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> I have an intellectual interest in many facets of our world, and I think about things scientifically to try to understand them. That informs the practical decisions I make with respect to, you know, how much I stay in the house or how often I shop. Science informs my opinions and behaviours, and I try to keep my selfish urges at bay and have everything be determined by my moral compass.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> Seven years ago, when I was pregnant with my second child, my husband and I made the mistake of watching the movie Contagion<\/em>. Since then I have had an acute fear of pandemics. I\u2019m very conscious of illness and am anxious when my kids get sick. As Carleton shut down, I was combing mainstream media and social media for any information related to COVID-19. I was looking at the preprints of journal articles coming out of China, trying to learn as much as I could. That soothed me. When I\u2019m panicking and fearful, I always turn to science. It\u2019s a powerful coping mechanism. I turn to rational information to try to understand what I can control. I can\u2019t control the spread of this virus. I can\u2019t control other people\u2019s behaviour. But I can try to control mine.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> I\u2019m immunocompromised, so I wash my hands a lot and try to wear a mask any time I go outside. I believe in modelling good behaviour. The more people wear masks outside, the more social proof it establishes and encourages \u2014 the same way that fashion works. I also don\u2019t want to have to think about it. I know how habit works. When something becomes a habit, it becomes the default position. You just do it. Like having a cup of coffee in the morning. It\u2019s not like people decide to have coffee every morning. Even if they\u2019re thinking about something else, the coffee will get made and consumed.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> The neural basis of routine is deep-brain basal ganglia. If something is compelling enough to override your routine, it\u2019s going to signal to your prefrontal cortex, which is then going to signal down to your basal ganglia to put a stop to that routine and correct course. Let\u2019s say you\u2019re driving along a highway that you\u2019re on regularly and you kind of tune out. But all of sudden you see ambulance lights in the distance. You\u2019ll put your foot on the brakes. That\u2019s kind of what happens on a daily basis. Routines and habits are good and they\u2019re soothing. I have an exercise routine, a work routine, a home routine. But you need to have the flexibility to get out of those and adapt to the current scenario.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> The function of habit in the brain is to make space for your conscious thought, your cognitive processing, your goal-directed behaviour. You can really only think about one thing at a time. But because you need to do more than one thing at a time \u2014 like walk and breathe and talk \u2014 there\u2019s this habit system that runs those processes and controls your body when your cognitive system is occupied with other things. The problem is if you\u2019ve got a bad habit, you can\u2019t rely on your cognitive system to always prevent you from engaging in it, because at some point you\u2019re going to be distracted and the habits will take over. So curating your habits and trying to replace the bad ones and encourage the good ones is necessary for good behaviour. Even without the pandemic, our lives are constantly changing and you have to end old habits. Your body tries to respond to the environment the best way it can. The reason we develop bad habits is because we have some natural instincts that aren\u2019t great in our modern-day environment. That\u2019s why eating M&Ms every day is an easy habit to have because sugar has been, for the vast majority of human existence, extremely rare. Developing a habit of eating sugar if you could was a great idea. Modern Canada is not suffering from caloric restriction, yet we\u2019re still energy saving creatures.<\/p>\n

Kim: <\/strong>The society we live in today is very different from what it was in 1920 and 1820. It\u2019s often massive events \u2014 industrialization, World War I, World War II, economic collapses \u2014 that shake us up. Society is being disrupted now on a massive scale and we\u2019re altering our behaviours. I\u2019m fascinated by the sociology of it. What are we changing that is never going to go back? Also, what is going to be disrupted for the better? When we think about teaching going online, for example, we\u2019re also thinking about equity and how to support students from marginalized communities and students who struggle with certain modalities of learning. What we\u2019re doing could actually benefit certain populations if we keep them front and centre. That might sound a little Pollyanna, but if we don\u2019t consider positive outcomes we run the risk of becoming incredible cynics and succumbing to despair.<\/p>\n

\"Prof.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> When you\u2019re dealing with bad uncertainty \u2014 when you don\u2019t know how bad something is going to be \u2014 that can cause anxiety. Sometimes, in psychology experiments, people prefer to get a more intense electric shock then an unknown amount of electric shock, even if the intensity would likely be lower. That indicates there\u2019s a value to certainty. Also, uncertainty keeps our minds thinking about things and increases our emotional response. In artistic works and in religion, where there are mysterious things that are hard to understand, your mind tends to obsess over them, in either a good or a bad way. An ambiguous ending can be a beautiful thing and your mind won\u2019t let it go. If the ending is a little too wrapped up, it\u2019s satisfying in the moment but your mind tends to forget it because there\u2019s nothing really there to figure out. So uncertainty generally causes your cognitive system to think about things over and over again. If it\u2019s a fearful uncertainty, you\u2019re going to be re-experiencing negative emotions, because your mind is constantly returning to those ideas, and that can border depression.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> One of the best mechanisms to stave off fear and anxious worry is to focus on today, on what\u2019s happening today. We have this wonderful prefrontal cortex that allows us to time travel: it allows us to think about the past in order to plan for the future. Some say this is the root of our intelligence because our cognitive capabilities of planning for the future ensures our survival. But it may also be what is at the seat of a lot of mental health disorders, because when you think about rumination and worrying, it\u2019s about lamenting the past and worrying about the future. So the best way to keep the prefrontal cortex in check is mindfulness \u2014 focusing on the present day, the real, the here and now. There\u2019s also the concept of \u201cgrounding,\u201d of thinking about what you can control. You can control how often you wash your hands and you can try to maintain physical distance. Your reaction to things that you hear about? You can\u2019t control that. Another tip I\u2019ve heard from psychologist friends is that if you\u2019re susceptible to worry and rumination on the uncertainty of tomorrow, then spend 15 minutes every day thinking about or writing down all your fears and concerns. Then that\u2019s it: 15 minutes and you\u2019re done. You\u2019re kind of relieved of your worries.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> There\u2019s a belief out there that in hard times people get really selfish and start turning on each other. But under conditions where people feel that we\u2019re all in this together, the opposite happens. You get a remarkable kind of community building. Sometimes people look back at a food shortage or a power outage or a natural disaster, such as a flood, and see that they were hard times but they also reminisce fondly about the incredible feeling of mutual brotherhood that arose. This pandemic has inspired that. You see people getting to know their neighbours a little bit more and helping each other.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> We\u2019re seeing the uptick in cases of COVID-19 because I think people are getting physical-distancing fatigue. As a species, we are social. Obviously, this exists on a continuum, but most people need some socializing. Are Zoom and other digital proxies enough to keep us going? I don\u2019t think so. We need human interactions and we\u2019re fighting against that inherent drive. I\u2019ve got two lovely kids, an amazing husband, and my parents and my sister and her family are also in my bubble. I have a very busy work life. All of this can maintain me, to a certain extent, whereas 20-year-olds who are unpartnered, who may be out of a job, who are not currently in school, they\u2019re driven to hang out and be social. They\u2019re going to bars. If I were 20 that\u2019s where I would want to be too. I think we need to recognize that there is an inherent human desire to be social. This is the challenge. It\u2019s not my problem to solve, and holy crap am I glad it\u2019s not. But we need to figure out a way to live with this virus in the next few months, maybe years, that allows us to be in social environments.<\/p>\n

Jim: <\/strong>It\u2019s comforting to know that when things go bad, it\u2019s not just every man for himself, but a lot of the changes we make as a species are situational. People want to get back to normal and will start giving one another the finger on the road again. I don\u2019t think the feeling of community that\u2019s engendered by this pandemic will last. The bubonic plague had enormous repercussions far beyond what we\u2019re talking about now. It ended serfdom because so many people died and there weren\u2019t enough serfs around and suddenly everyone\u2019s work was valuable and everyone started getting paid. But that has nothing to do with the building of community. Disasters of the past changed society in a zillion ways, but their contribution to progress is very complex. This pandemic is bad, but it could be way worse. There\u2019s an argument to be made that we would never have prepared for the one that\u2019s going to be way worse if we hadn\u2019t had one that was just a little bit scary first. Maybe we\u2019re actually inoculating our psyches and our research priorities. We might actually start preparing for it.<\/p>\n

Kim:<\/strong> We need to gather information. This is what me and my colleagues are doing. I do research on university populations and their mental health. We need to find out how they\u2019re doing. Right now, we\u2019re seeing if people who had pre-existing conditions are suffering the most, or is it everybody? We\u2019re tracking them through time. We\u2019re looking into whether we\u2019re seeing increased rates of problematic substance use and, if so, how can we respond? How can we best provide that circle of care? If it\u2019s virtual, what are the best virtual means to support students and people in general? We need to listen and put money towards this. Because mental health has not, historically, been a space that has been sufficiently funded. But maybe we\u2019re going to hit a crisis point. And people like me need to keep advocating for mental health awareness and keep ensuring that the voices of people with lived experience are heard.<\/p>\n

Jim: <\/strong>At a government level, this is a good time to push through legislation to increase support for mental health. My American friends are shocked because they think that Canadian medicine is socialized, but it doesn\u2019t cover therapy or drugs. The two things that help with mental health are therapy and drugs. So, basically mental health is not covered by our so-called socialized medicine. I think that\u2019s a real oversight.<\/p>\n

\"Prof.<\/p>\n

Kim: <\/strong>The cure cannot be worse than the disease. The factors that are contributing to ill mental health right now are social distancing and the fears and concerns of people without jobs, without support, without access to services. We know when your mental health is suffering, you\u2019re getting lots of proinflammatory factors coursing through your body, which makes you more susceptible to disease. There\u2019s a reason why mental health and physical health are so interrelated. When somebody is not doing well mentally, they\u2019re more at risk. We\u2019re already recognizing that COVID-19 is disproportionately affecting people from marginalized populations. Mental health is a big piece of that. I feel the burden of responsibility for advocating for mental health among students, and also the burden of continuing to provide excellent educational opportunities for my students and buoying their journey, because they are more vulnerable and at-risk and they\u2019re facing the worst economic prospects in generations. I also feel a certain amount of responsibility to be an advocate for science, period. There\u2019s a vast amount of misinformation and politicized information out there, and I need to chime into the conversation about what\u2019s fact and what\u2019s evidence and what\u2019s not.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> During the pandemic people might be paying maybe more attention to science than they normally would, but I\u2019m not convinced that faith in science has been declining. I haven\u2019t seen good evidence for that. In Steven Pinker\u2019s book Enlightenment Now<\/em> he makes the case that in every single way that you can think of the world is getting better and has been over the last hundred years. Even fake news. People forget that fake news was way more rampant than it is now. The very fact that people even know what fact checking is, the fact that we even have the reflection to be able to even have a concept of fake news, suggests that society is smarter than it used to be. The only things that seem to be getting worse are social capital in the industrialized world and environmental destruction.<\/p>\n

Kim: <\/strong>I had a moment in the summer when I realized that I probably wasn\u2019t going to be on campus for a while. It made me sad. I value being around students and my colleagues and have grown to appreciate them more. I\u2019m sure there are some people who are out living their best lives and couldn\u2019t be happier to be away from others, but I am genuinely sad. Because of my role at Carleton and who I am, I\u2019m usually all over campus, meeting with lots of different people, creating deep friendships and strong collegial relationships that I just can\u2019t replace. Video calls are no substitute for coffee chats and bumping into one another in the tunnels. I\u2019m hopeful, though. I know my emotions are going to be waxing and waning. The way I cope with that is I acknowledge it, I label it \u2014 here\u2019s what I\u2019m feeling \u2014 and I move through it.<\/p>\n

Jim:<\/strong> The summer for me was not that much different because I usually just sit at home working all summer anyway. I wrote a book, my third, which is coming out in early 2021 and is going to be called Being the Person Your Dog Thinks You Are<\/em>. It\u2019s about the science of productivity, happiness and morality. If you want to be the best person you can be, how do you be maximally productive, maximally happy and a maximally good person? I didn\u2019t change the book much after the pandemic started. In the part about productivity, I talk about research into differences between working at home and in an office. Studies show that at the office you\u2019re more creative and at home you\u2019re more productive. Being with people and having casual encounters helps you hash out ideas. But if what you\u2019re doing is relatively cut and dried, then working from home is better. You know what you need to do and just need to do it.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>

\"Microphone\"<\/div>
\n

—
\nRaven Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kim Hellemans is a neuroscience professor at Carleton, chair of the department and the winner of multiple awards for teaching and student support. Her research focuses on mental health, stress and addiction. Jim Davies is a cognitive science professor, director of the university\u2019s Science of Imagination Laboratory and the author of two books, most recently […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"story-topics":[16],"yoast_head":"\nCOVID: What Happens Inside Our Heads During Troubling Times<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I first heard about COVID-19 in late 2019 and figured it was nothing. That was fairly rational at the time. Different diseases pop up now and again\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/ravenmag\/story\/hellemans-davies-covid-brain\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"COVID: What Happens Inside Our Heads During Troubling Times\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I first heard about COVID-19 in late 2019 and figured it was nothing. That was fairly rational at the time. 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