Abstract

When we're faced with decisions about anything - including how to respond to a health-related threat like a pandemic - knowing how our brains work can make us better decision-makers. Dr. Lubischer shares what your brain can learn without your approval, and how you can use this knowledge to become a better critical thinker and to take more control over your own decisions (what to do, what to believe, how to think critically). 

Jane Lubischer, Ph.D., is passionate about using the science of learning as a framework for better learning, better teaching and better design of courses and curricula. She grew up in California and earned degrees from Stanford University and UCLA before eventually joining the faculty at NC State over 20 years ago. Dr. Lubischer serves as associate department head of the Department of Biological Sciences, as program director for the Inclusive Excellence at NC State Initiative, and she helped create the Life Sciences First Year Program, the interdisciplinary B.A. in Biology and Wicked Problems, Wolfpack Solutions.

TRANSCRIPT

WANT TO LEARN MORE?

1. Watch “The danger of a single story” to hear powerful examples of implicit biases and assumptions from a storyteller’s perspective in this TED talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

2. Read more about Dr. Brenda Milner.

3. Read Dr. Milner's paper: Milner, B. (2005). The Media Temporal-Lobe Amnesic Syndrome.  The Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 28(3), 599-611.

4. Read the New York Times remembrance of H.M.: H.M., an unforgettable amnesiac, dies at 82.