research

October 16 is World Spine Day, which makes this the perfect time to share with you a fascinating piece of recent research about the human spine.  In April I was contacted by Scott Williams PhD, Associate Professor at the Center for the study of Human Origins, Department of Anthropology, New York University. He and his team of anthropologists had recently published a scientific paper that concluded that understanding the spines of Neanderthals, a human ancestor, may explain the back pain experienced by humans today. Who were the Neanderthals? The Neanderthals populated Europe and Asia between about 400,00 and 40,000 years ago. Neanderthals became extinct, but are considered one of our most recent evolutionary ancestors. Research shows there is DNA evidence that they interbred with early human populations.

Many back pain interventions could be described as having a single, dominant approach: cortisone injections into inflamed tissue, insertion of acupuncture needles to open flow in meridians, “adjustments,” medications for reducing pain, etc. Of course, each of these interventions has complexity and nuance in theory and practice, but the vast majority of existing interventions have a single focus. To put it somewhat crassly, they could be described as one-trick ponies. And I’ve wondered if this is perhaps related to why most approaches to back pain are so ineffectual. What sets the Gokhale Method apart?

Stanford now lists the Gokhale Method Foundations course as an option for which Stanford staff can use their STAP (Staff Training Assistance Program) funds. I am thrilled that the educational institution closest to home (I live on campus) is the first to make my offering more available to their staff.

My avenues for bringing posture into Stanford are manifold, both through my family members and through hundreds of students and staff who have taken my courses. Healthy posture has been demonstrated to have a positive impact on those in close proximity, and I'm hopeful this effect will permeate the community over the years.  

My husband is a professor in the Math Department and is beaming out

When we first learn new information, we create shallow neural pathways in our brain that can quickly disappear. To retain information for the long-term requires reuse. Beyond the learning techniques referred to in Don’t Forget The Forgetting Curve (Part 1) (mnemonic devices, association, and multi-channel learning), re-engagement with the material is crucial in deepening the related neural pathways. Some aspects of re-engagement that play a big role in mitigating the effects of the forgetting curve are:

Repetition
Recall
The Halo Effect

Repetition is one form of engagement that is built into the Gokhale Method Foundations Course. Each technique is taught repeatedly in the course, and in multiple

As a posture teacher, I am very aware of my students’ tendencies to forget the finer points of the Gokhale Method. The longer students wait between classes or refreshers, the more they’ve forgotten. Although there’s always room to improve our teaching methods, forgetting is and will always be a natural phenomenon that accompanies any kind of memory acquisition.

 

According to nineteenth century psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus and his theory of the Forgetting Curve, people have a steady rate at which they forget material over time. After learning new material, we forget the majority of what we have learned within 24 hours; we forget even more in the following days.

The Forgetting Curve shows