Optimal Decision-Making Skills

The Latest Brain Research & Our Ability to Choose Effectively & Efficiently

Katherine Kerber 4-9-2010

How can recent brain research help you become a better Hanna Somatic Educator? Learn how your brain makes decisions and when to trust and/or question them. The material in this workshop is based on findings from How We Decide, Jonah Lehrer, a science writer and former “lab worker” under Nobel Prize winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel.

Lehrer currently edits the Mind Matters blog for Scientifific American and writes his own blog, The Frontal Cortex.

Workshop Highlights:

• Does Your Mind Make Decisions “Without You”?: Quarterbacks “in the pocket” don’t have time to think, they have to choose a target before understanding why.

• Dopamine – Prediction Neurons, How to Maximize Them: Dopamine neurons must be continually trained and retrained or their predictive accuracy declines. Intelligent intuition is the result of deliberate practice.

• Choking on Thought: Too much thinking can cause the brain to second-guess skills that have been honed through years of practice. When the rational brain takes over, we ignore the wisdom of our feelings, and decision-making mistakes occur.

• How to Survive a Crisis When Seconds Count: Tap into amazing problem-solving abilities, but fi rst you must beat back panic which narrows thinking.

• Self-delusion Feels Really Good: Research done during the run-up to the 2004 election showed that voters used reason to reinforce their already partisan beliefs rather than using it to analyze the facts.

Katherine Kerber is founder of San Jose-based Persensa. She is a full-time, Certififi ed Hanna Somatic Educator, (Wave 9, Novato Institute). Prior to this, she trained her dopamine neurons for over twenty years to make better marketing decisions for technology companies.