Can technology handle deep emotional learning challenges? I think so...
Monday, March 29, 2010 at 05:38PM I know he wasn't aware of it, but I've had Donald Clark on my shoulder all weekend. Last week I read his wonderful posting about good (not good) old-fashioned training sessions, Fox's Glacier Mints and all. Then over this weekend, I voluntarily subjected myself to a training experience which, although I think I've benefitted somewhat, had many of the characteristics of traditional training that would have had Donald alternately fuming and guffawing (and had me occasionally cringing). I'm not going to say what the course was, but it's fair to say that there were more than a few moments when I felt Donald was there on my shoulder wearing an expression I'd rather not describe.
What I was going to do in this posting was defend the course. I was going to say that there will always be some learning challenges that can still only be handled when you share real space with real people, experience the quality of eye contact, engage your emotions deeply, when quite literally you get touchy and feely.
But I've just been to a session at the Learning Games Conference that's made me think that I might be wrong, at least in the medium term. At the session, Ian Glasscock, from Games for Life, donned an adapted cycling helmet and mentally controlled a simple game-like interface on the screen. Using only his level of mental focus, he made a fish (or was it a dolphin?) descend through a simulated sea and pick up a coin. In responding to my questions Ian said that this technology could be used to train our brains to control, for example, our emotional responses to social situations, phobias and a host of other challenges that are typically dealt with in the kind of workshop I just worked through over the weekend. It felt like pure science fiction (but so did watching live football on my iphone a few months ago and now I'd be outraged if I couldn't do it).
An underlying principle of the kind of course I attended over the weekend is that by using a range of metaphors and "mental tools" we can shift our personal state and our emotional responses to situations and consequently improve our lives. This kind of learning has to use metaphors because it can't look inside the brain. It can only provide rehearsal opportunities using these metaphors. And that's fine, and I reckon that at least some of the time, they work.
But Ian's technology can look inside the brain. And it can provide genuine - not metaphorical - rehearsal to help us change the way we think. You want to be more confident at parties? OK, simulate a party - using full 3D - and learn to manage your emotional state. Build up the complexity and challenge of the party scenario, starting with a fairly safe little gathering at home, ending with hosting a glamorous party in Hollywood. Why not? How about anger management? Forget about sharing into a microphone in front of a bunch of strangers or beating the hell out of a cushion with a club (these things happen at anger management courses; believe me...I know). Instead, put yourself in a range of situations that progressively anger you, and see how you get on. Practise controlling whatever the mental state is that will ensure success. Do it at home, in bed, on the tube, while waiting for a plane. Do it when you get to the airport and find your flight has been delayed for ten hours and all the food shops are shut. Ah - no, that last one is real life; that's when you need to apply what you've learned.
Is there any learning challenge that technology is unable to help us with? I'm starting to doubt it.
Reader Comments (2)
FMRI machine today provide less resolution in your emotions then microphones have been giving your voice for 100 years. How many performers value computer feedback over a live audience.