football – BioQuakes

A Historiography Cognitive Dissonance

On November 18, 2014

In his theory of Cognitive Dissonance, American psychologist Leon Festinger, hypothesizes that humans “cognize and interpret information to fit what they already believe.” In a recent article from nautil.us, Tom Vanderbilt provides the reader with a brief summary and historiography of the various studies related to Festinger’s theory and the idea that “we see what we want to see.”

Since both of my parents are psychologists I figured, “this article should be right in my wheelhouse, right?.” I found the article interesting primarily because Vanderbilt’s collection of studies serve to confirm that our brains have a “mind of their own,” and that it is essentially impossible to observe something truly objectively. One study involving the above ambiguous image of a sort of duck/rabbit hybrid, revealed that children were more likely to see the rabbit on easter sunday, “where on other sundays they were more likely to see the duck.” A similar study, conducted by psychologists Albert Hastorf and Hadley Cantril, was based off of the footage from a highly contentious football game. The game was Princeton v. Dartmouth 1951, and after asking students from the respective universities questions such as “Which team do you feel started the rough play,” Hastorf and Cantril, concluded that since the “responses were so biased… the data [indicates] that there is no such thing as a game existing out there in its own right which people merely observe.” The general consensus of the various, interconnected studies that Vanderbilt cites is that “in a world of ambiguity, we see what we want to see:” our environment presents us with an influx of information (too much information for us to process) so the brain simply chooses which bits of information to deal with. In order to efficiently process all the information from our environment, the brain “fill[s] in the details, making sense out of ambiguous sensory input.” So, the research warns us to take what we see with a grain of salt: because our biases alter even our physical, sensory perception of the world.

Football may become safer with the use of magnets in helmets

By mjb96

On November 17, 2014

In Student Post

New research is being conducted which shows that magnets might make football safer. The purpose of the magnets would be to repel each other when players heads are colliding with one another, which in turn would lessen the force of the hit. Although it has not been tested yet, any idea that could be used to protect athletes in crucial. As time goes on the football helmet continues to change as new safety precautions are created. Profesional football players are known to travel at speeds of almost 20 miles per hour, coupled with the fact that they generally weight upwards of 200 lbs causing nearly 150 g’s of force when players collide. Many helmet to helmet collisions lead to concussions, which could lead to very severe health problems. It is necessary for us to become aware of these dangers, and take appropriate action to lessen player injuries.

Magnetizing the Game of Football

By gergory

On November 17, 2014

In Student Post

As more and more concussions have plagued Football, from the high-school level to that of the NFL, it is known that change must occur, and fast. Along with creating temporary memory loss, concussions have created long-term health problems for football players that hurt them for the rest of their lives. This article highlights the innovative invention of magnetized football helmets that repel each other to decrease the impact into the helmet.

Up until now, the only real idea with respect to reducing the amount of concussions has been to “disperse the impact energy after the impact’s already occurred.” Neuroscientist Raymond Colello believes that magnets would lower the impact before the collisions occur, thus reducing the amount of concussions in football.

Although the magnets haven’t been tested in football helmets yet, there have been several experiments verifying the magnets’ effectiveness. The article talks about how, with players running up to 20 mph on the field, players can receive impact forces of up to 150 g’s; this is terrifying because concussions occur at an impact of 100 g’s. Colello argues that the only way to lower the 100,000 people who receive concussions playing football every year is to put magnets in their helmets.

Using very powerful magnets made in China that weigh about .3 lbs, Colello measured that two magnets beside each other repel each other with about 100 pounds of force. After testing the magnets by attaching them to weights and dropping them from 48 inches, he recored that dropping a helmet and it hitting a stationary object would create 120 g’s of force. With these magnets in the helmets, the impact force would be under 100 g’s, which is enough of a difference to stop a concussion from occurring.

Of course Colello recognizes that there are different levels of football with different amounts of contact. The powerful magnets cost about $50 to $100, but for younger players, Colello recommends less powerful, cheaper magnets that will still help in preventing concussions. He is anxiously awaiting customized magnets that will fit into helmets and allow him to begin testing the magnets with dummy’s, and then eventually real people!

I am completely in support of changes in the technology of football helmets! Concussions have become more and more common as football players have become stronger, and concussions have also proven to be detrimental to the health of many athletes. Articles such as these are very exciting, and I expect big improvements in preventing concussions in years to come. What is your take on putting magnets in football helmets?

Major Article Used: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/magnets-helmets-might-make-football-safer?tgt=nr

BioQuakes

AP Biology class blog for discussing current research in Biology

Tag: football

A Historiography Cognitive Dissonance

Football may become safer with the use of magnets in helmets

Magnetizing the Game of Football

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