2019年2月15日星期五
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antarvasna - ASMR and Why People Love to Hear Strangers Whispering on Internet
ASMR and Why People Love to Hear Strangers Whispering on Internet
Specific kinds of sounds soothe us, that is no big secret. Think running water, sea breeze, waves so on and so forth. But how about the sound of munching potato chips, someone eating ice, slicing sand?
Does this video calm you?
If this or any of the sounds mentioned above send tingles down your spine, you’re not alone. The massive ASMR community backs you on it.
ASMR or Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response refers to the reaction invoked in your body by specific kinds of sounds.Dr Sameer Malhotra, Director-Department of Mental Health and Behavioural Sciences, Max Super Speciality Hospital, Saket, New Delhi, describes it as tingling sensation experienced by people in response to an auditory stimulus.
Sand, Slime and Role Playing
There are close to 15 million ASMR videos on YouTube.
There are close to 15 million ASMR videos on YouTube.A simple search leaves you with titles, bizarre at first glance, but welcoming and calming once you familiarise with the world of ASMR. Cases in point include:
i) Best Friend Does Your Nails
ii) even a Harry Potter themed roleplay!
iii) Someone eating a baby mermaid (also one of the most watched ASMR videos)
iv) Doing Your Makeup
Of course there is a sexual subtext here - I mean if we’re talking about role-playing producing physical sensations, where else could we be headed? So much so, China banned ASMR from its platforms in June 2018 because of its sexual nature.
According to this report, the ruling came via China’s anti-pornography office. The statement that was issued explained that “porn was being released under the guise of ASMR, emphasising that this could be a threat to minors, who apparently make up a large part of ASMR’s viewership.”
The report further added that according to a 2015 study at Swansea University in the UK, only 5 percent of total ASMR users experienced sexual arousal.
So, what is ASMR primarily being used for?
ASMR and Mental Health
According to a study by the University of Sheffield in the UK, ASMR can have the same effects as a mindfulness or meditation exercise. The study went ahead to conclude that ASMR has both mental and physical health benefits in the form of lowered heart rates and reduced levels of anxiety. Additionally, ASMR is also known to have helped pregnant women relax, and fight insomnia.
ASMR is also known to have helped pregnant women relax, and fight insomnia.Dr Malhotra explains it by saying that the possible mechanisms through which it operates include distraction from worrying thoughts by using sensory inputs in the form of comforting or relaxing sounds. These sounds positively affect the neurochemicals in the nervous system.
However, doctors and mental health experts advise that while ASMR might calm anxiety, it really is no lasting treatment for anxiety or depression. He explains that when we engage the brain in a task-oriented activity, the ‘day-dreaming’ parts of the brain, medial prefrontal cortex and the posterior cingulate gyrus are most active.
Dr Sameer MalhotraThe reduced connectivity may be associated with decreased attentional control and ASMR may involve a reduced inhibition of sensory-emotional experiences that would be suppressed in most individuals.In simpler terms, the ASMR sound is calming your other senses and helping you lull off to sleep or ease your anxiety.
Who Does ASMR Work On?
Now, if you are shaking your head at all of this in disagreement, you are perhaps not the only one. While lack of conclusive data keeps any definite deductions evasive, Dr Malhotra does add that ASMR will work only on people who are suggestible and open to experience.
According to this report, Craig Richard, a professor at the Shenandoah University School of Pharmacy in Winchester, Virginia, explains how specific people are more susceptible to it, in the following manner:
Craig RichardIncreasing levels of oxytocin happens naturally during pregnancy, and oxytocin is the brain chemical most associated with the triggers and stimuli of ASMR. When I’m asked why I think some people experience ASMR and some don’t, my best guess is that I think the people who experience it are producing increased amounts of oxytocin.It is a surreal internet trend, with people doing some very unusual things for hours. Maybe it works for you, maybe it doesn’t, but either way here’s a person eating ice for you online. Enjoy!
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tamilrockers - Australia approves new drug to fight obesity
Australia approves new drug to fight obesity
Melbourne, Feb 15 (PTI) Australian health authorities have approved a new weight loss drug to help fight obesity. The weight loss drug Contrave has been listed on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods and is intended to be used with a diet control and increased exercise, according to a media report.
Australian Researcher Michael Cowley, Head of the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute's Department of Physiology, developed the medication while working overseas after mapping key areas of the brain involved in the regulation of food intake.
Cowley said he hopes the extra medication on the market, which has been approved for use in the US since 2014, will help people realise there are effective medical treatments available.
That will also help break down inappropriate social stigma, he said.
"There is a sector of the medical community and a sector of the Australian political community who regard obesity as a moral failing," he was quoted by AAP news agency.
"Most of the rest of the world has acknowledged it as a disease and applies normally clinical judgement to treating diseases. The pill affects the central nervous system, by both suppressing appetite and reducing food cravings and in clinical trials it has shown to help people lose on average five per cent of their body weight.
Cowley said while this may not sound like a lot, but it was enough to improve people's metabolic health and reduce rates of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and lipid disorders.
Contrave is not listed on Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme - meaning the federal government is not subsidising it - and will cost those who use it about 230 dollars to 250 dollars per month.
The drug's side effects - established in clinical trials - include headache, constipation, dizziness, vomiting and dry mouth.
.This is published unedited from the PTI feed..
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live cricket score - High blood pressure: Drinking this green juice could help lower your hypertension reading
High blood pressure: Drinking this green juice could help lower your hypertension reading
High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, can be caused by a number of factors such as a lack of exercise and being overweight or obese. Left untreated it can lead to serious and life-threatening health problems such as stroke and heart attack. The best way to find out if you have a high reading is to have your blood pressure regularly checked by your GP. To prevent and control high blood pressure it’s important to watch what you eat and follow a healthy, balanced diet.
Another risk factor of developing high blood pressure is eating a high amount of salt in your food.
Eating too much salt is the biggest cause of high blood pressure - the more salt you eat, the higher your blood pressure will be, according to Blood Pressure UK.
It explains: “Salt makes your body retain water. If you eat too much, the extra water stored in your body raises your blood pressure. This can be a particular problem if you have high blood pressure.”
To counteract the negative effects of salt on blood pressure, it’s important to eat potassium.
The high blood pressure charity continues: “Potassium is a key mineral that the body relies on heavily to function properly. It helps to lower blood pressure by balancing out the negative effects of salt.
“Your kidneys help to control your blood pressure by controlling the amount of fluid stored in your body. The more fluid, the higher your blood pressure.
“Your kidneys do this by filtering your blood and sucking out any extra fluid, which it then stores in your bladder as urine.
“This process uses a delicate balance of sodium and potassium to pull the water across a wall of cells from the bloodstream into a collecting channel that leads to the bladder.”
One vegetable high in potassium is spinach. Just one cup (156g) of frozen spinach contains 540mg of potassium, say experts - more potassium than a banana.
Spinach can be enjoyed raw in a salad or steamed as a side during the dinner.
But a popular way to consume the leafy vegetable these days is whizzed up in a blender and in juice form.
As well as potassium, spinach contains vitamin A, vitamin K, folate and magnesium, which are all essential vitamins and minerals for the body/
It also contains high amounts of nitrates, which have been shown to help moderate blood pressure levels and decrease the risk of heart disease (‘Inorganic nitrite and nitrate: evidence to support consideration as dietary nutrients’).
One randomised, controlled crossover trial of 27 people found eating spinach effectively lowered blood pressure levels.
But spinach juice isn’t the only vegetable juice proven to help lower your reading.
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tamilrockers - Prickly pears: 'humble' cactus brings hope to Algeria
Prickly pears: 'humble' cactus brings hope to Algeria
For generations Algerians like the Gueldasmi family have barely eked out a living growing prickly pear fruits, but thanks to the cactus’s new found virtues their lives are steadily improving.
“Now, my future is here. There is no need to go abroad” to find work, said Fethi Gueldasmi, 40, whose family’s revenues have been growing thanks to what agronomists and biologists now call the “green gold”.
Scientific reports indicate that the Opuntia species of prickly pears which thrives in arid regions like Algeria’s northern Sidi Fredj contains a plethora of virtues.
Everything from the cactus -- once considered sacred by the ancient Aztecs -- can be transformed to yield nutritional and medical benefits except for its prickly spines.
The green spiny discs known as cladodes are used for fodder while their tender inner flesh is a star of the cuisine of Mexico, where the cactus originated and figures on its national flag.
Oil extracted from the seeds of fruit has antioxidant benefits and is used in cosmetics for its anti-ageing properties, besides being rich in vitamin C, calcium and magnesium.
The flowers of the cactus go into making herbal tea while the pulp of the red fruit is turned into juice, vinegar, jams and even sorbets.
A 2017 study by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) concluded prickly pears could be the answer to much of the world’s food security woes and prevent soil erosion.
Green gold
In Sidi Fredj, once an impoverished town in the Souk Haras province bordering Tunisia, Gueldsami, like his father and grandfather before him, farms prickly pears.
The fruit must be handled carefully to avoid being pricked by the sharp spines. And until recently it was harvested for its tasty, sweet flesh, which only fetched a pittance of 10 dinars (US 0.08 cents, 0.07 euro cents) a piece at the local market.
Since 2013 however all that has changed with the creation of a cooperative of farmers, scientists and traders in Souk Haras, with help from Mexico, to exploit and market prickly pear by-products.
A small factory was built in 2015 and oil was produced in small quantities before reaching 300 litres in 2017 and 1,000 litres in 2018.
The cooperative is hoping to increase the output seven-fold by the end of this year thanks to a new and bigger factory which opened at the end of last year.
One tonne of grains is needed to produce one litre of oil, which can fetch more than 2,000 euros (dollars) in Europe.
Algeria’s “green gold” is exported to France, Germany and Qatar and plans are being made to sell it in the United States as well, according to farmer Djamal Chaib.
Although Algeria -- where most of the fertile land is free of pesticides -- has no organic certification body, oil from Sidi Fredj obtained an “organic” label from European agencies and is sold as such abroad.
Crucial food supply
“While most cacti are inedible, the Opuntia species has much to offer, especially if treated like a crop rather than a weed run wild,” the FAO said in its 2017 report.
It highlighted the 2015 Madagascar drought in which the “cactus proved a crucial supply of food, forage and water for local people and their animals”.
Around 80 percent of Algeria, Africa’s largest country, is arid or semi-arid, providing an ideal terrain for farming prickly pears.
In Sidi Fredj, the Gueldsami family and others have seen their revenues increase thanks to farming and selling prickly pears.
Fathi said his family is now able to make home improvements and pay in cash for their groceries instead of signing IOUs.
His mother has also been saving money to carry out the hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. It is one of the five pillars of Islam and Muslims must undertake the hajj at least once in their lifetime.
“Now, my future and that of my (10-year-old) daughter is here. There is no need to travel abroad,” he said.
Algeria is a country of 40 million where half the population is under 30, with one in three young people unemployed. Many dream of travelling to Europe to find a job and improve their standard of living.
Now “hundreds of families are making a living” from prickly pears, said Mohamed Mohamedi, who heads a farmer’s cooperative in the region.
This includes women who take part in the harvest of prickly pears and young people.
No ‘humble’ cactus
The FAO said in its report that beyond its immense benefits, the “humble cactus” can help fight food insecurity, improve soil quality, promote barley plantations and may even help limit emissions of greenhouse gases.
A “cactus stores water in its pads, thus providing a botanical well that can provide up to 180 tonnes of water per hectare -- enough to sustain five adult cows, a substantial increase over typical rangeland productivity,” FAO said.
“Climate change and the increasing risks of droughts are strong reasons to upgrade the humble cactus to the status of an essential crop in many areas,” said Hans Dreyer, director of FAO’s Plant Production and Protection Division, in the 2017 report.
In Algeria, the farming of prickly pears has helped crop diversification as well, according to Khodir Madani, head of a university research laboratory, with farmers growing cereals and other crops among them.
Fethi’s father, Youcef Gueldsami, agreed pointing to a few pistachio trees he planted alongside the cactus.
First Published: Feb 15, 2019 13:33 IST
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