Stoned Ape Theory and Negativity Bias
Stoned Ape Theory and Negativity Bias
How did our brains come to be? How can we make them better?
Hey Brainiacs,
Welcome to this week’s newsletter! Let’s explore how the brain came to be, why we function like we do, and how we can make it all a little better.
Are We All Just Stoned Apes?
To start us off on our brain health journey, we’re going to talk about how our brains came to be. Humans evolved from apes that lived tens of millions of years ago. But how is it that humans have created the internet, developed modern medicine, and landed on the moon when most other animals can barely use tools? The answer lies within an area of the brain known as the frontal lobe1,2. For ease, I’ll refer to this area as our ‘personality center’.
Humans have the largest personality center of all mammals, but this is actually a recent development. Mammals had very small personality centers until 800,000 years ago when they started rapidly expanding3. But how, I hear you ask? Well, this is where we all just turn into stoned apes. A 20th-century ethnobotanist named Terence McKenna proposed that the consumption of psychedelic fungi (psilocybin) played a critical role in the development of the human mind in his book “Food of the Gods”. He argues that our personality centers started expanding at a time when climate change put our ancestors, cattle, and mushrooms into co-existence. The cattle fertilized the ground for mushrooms to grow, and our ancestors ate them! This also correlates nicely to when homo sapiens had their ‘creative explosion’ - creating art and inventing new tools unlike any time before.
Although we now know that psilocybin can mediate the formation of new brain pathways and treat forms of depression through its action on serotonin receptors4, it is still debated if it is the cause for our expanded personality center. Much of the scientific community dismisses the theory because it is overly speculative and resides solely on misused evidence from one researcher, Roland L. Fischer. Plus, you cannot inherit someone’s dietary history, so how this newfound consciousness would be passed onto children is unknown. But, it is definitely a theory that gets you thinking, and with more evidence, who knows what might be true…
What is definitely true is the impressive power that resides within your brain’s truly wonderful personality centers! These centers are responsible for focusing our attention, predicting the consequences of actions, controlling our impulses, and planning the future5. This area doesn’t fully develop until our mid-20s, which means you now have an excuse for every stupid thing you did as a teenager! But, that also means the area is extremely plastic, so with consistency and repetition, you can form new habits and new ways of thinking6. And things like moving your body, volunteering, and sleeping well encourage brain health. So, if you’re debating picking up that new hobby or sport, here’s your sign to do it!
Negative Nellies
Since on the topic of evolution, and specifically the personality center, let’s talk about a process that seems unhelpful now but enabled us to survive for millions of years. It’s called negativity bias. Negativity bias means that we register negative stimuli more readily than positive stimuli and dwell on negative events more than positive events7. Studies have shown that brain activity increases more when shown negative stimuli than when shown positive stimuli8. Importantly, negativity bias also impacts our decision-making and our motivation.
Let’s take a few examples:
You get into a fight with a partner, and after the fight, you ruminate on all the bad things about your partner. You forget all the good things about them.
You did something embarrassing in front of your friends years ago, but you still cringe when you think about it, even though they’ve all forgotten it.
You have an annual review at work, and despite most comments being positive, you can only think about the negative one. The rest of the day you think about that one negative comment.
From an evolutionary perspective, negative events were usually a matter of life and death, so it makes sense that it was important to focus on them. But in modern times, most negative events are not life and death, and giving so much focus to them can be harmful to our mental health and our relationships. The good news is that knowing about your negativity bias can help you make better judgments about negative events and negative information. In fact, now that you know about negativity bias, you can rewire your inner self-talk and establish new thinking patterns. You can work on framing things in a more positive light, which can be done thanks to the plasticity of your personality center!
But if you need a quick way of distracting your brain at this exact moment, I’ve got you:
Go for a walk
Listen to music
Read a book
Life Updates
Hopefully, you’ve made it this far through the newsletter! Your reward is to hear more about me.
I am currently missing my dog Kobe (if you don’t know Kobe, you’re missing out) who is currently staying at my sisters' whilst Max (my other dog, also missing out if you don’t know her) is in season.
On a more positive note (changing that pattern of thinking!), I will be flying to London to record my audiobook over the next few months!
Oh and stay tuned for next week’s newsletter, I made you beautiful babes a mixtape. Yes, you read that right.
Other than that, I’m just keeping things all around badass.
Until next week,
Nicole x
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