Literature ReviewLinda Maree 170074 (230)Isa Carstens30 August 2018rightcenterHolistic Approach to Improve Concentration DurationResearch Principle and Academic Writing TABLE OF CONTENTCHAPTER 1*Introduction: The researcher has a holistic approach to improve attention span by using essential oils in Aromatherapy.Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder known as ADHD is a common childhood psychiatric disorder which affects up to 3-8% of school-aged children, with 65% of cases persisting into adulthood. Symptoms characterised with ADHD are age-inappropriate inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity. ( Katya Rubia, Analucía A. Alegría, Helen Brinson)There will be 3 clients which will each undergo 4 treatments of Aromatherapy, each client with a different oil (lavender, jasmine, peppermint) with the expected outcome to improve the attention span.Aromatherapy is an alternative form of medicine that uses essential oils and other aromatic compounds with the intention of altering a person’s mind, mood, cognitive function or health.
Shah, Y.R., et.
all. The aroma of the natural essential oil stimulates the brain to sets off a reaction and the natural constituents can supply a therapeutic benefit. Olfactory stimuli are used in aromatherapy to enhance mood, well-being and work efficiency (Eva Heubergera,* and Josef Ilmbergerb), the aroma moves across the olfactory nerves and up into the Limbic system in our brain which controls our moods, our memories and our ability to learn.Shah, Y.R., et. all. *Basic Terms and Definitions:ADHD – Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder Alertness: Fully aware and attentive Aroma: Sweet smell.
Aromatherapy: Total treatment of the face and the body with essential oils via the skin in a therapeutic manner.Attention: Act of applying one’s mind.Cognitive: Concerned with the act or process of knowing, perceiving, etc.Essential Oils: Volatile oil with characteristic odour.
Hormones: Substance internally secreted to stimulate organs, growth, etc.Limbic System: Set of brain structures that support a variety of functions including emotions, behaviour, motivation, long-term memory and olfaction.Olfactory: Relating to sense of smell.
Sedative: Substance that tends to calm or sooth.Stimulant: Substance that increases bodily or mental activity.Synergy: The cooperation of two or more substances to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.
Vigilance: State or quality of being ever awake and alert.*Research problem:The researcher wants to increase the attention span of subjects (male/female) between the ages of 19-29 with essential oils (lavender, peppermint, jasmine).Attention is a complex cognitive process of choosing important content and ignoring the less important. For the physiological and behavioural responses both attention and concentration are equally important. An individual possesses active (voluntary process and increases alertness, concentration, a person’s interest and needs) and passive (involuntary cognitive process and gets easily distracted by external stimuli’s) attention when conscious. Attention span is the total amount of time given to concentrate on an activity and not get distracted, by an individual. According to Hartley and Davis the attention span is 10-20 minutes at a time of an average adult on a specific topic is for. For individual to regain attention for a few more minutes, mild changes in the mental focus will help.
Factors which can reduce the attention span of a person are fatigue, hunger, noise, external stimuli, state of the mind and emotion, (Lamba, S., Rawat) Silence helps individuals to pay full attention to a topic. It is important to pay attention and concentrate due to it enhances individuals’ ability and skill to memorize the content for a longer period. Lamba, S.
, Rawat)Stimulant medication (e.g. methylphenidate or dexamphetamine) are first line treatment for ADHD as they reduce the severity of ADHD core symptoms in up to 70% of patients 61. Several fMRI studies have sought to further our understanding on the acute and chronic effects of stimulant medications on the function of the ADHD brain.
Several well-designed (e.g. randomised placebo controlled, case-control crossover) whole-brain and ROI fMRI studies have examined the acute effects of Methylphenidate on brain function during a series of cognitive tasks in medication-naïve ADHD patients. An acute dose of methylphenidate in medication-naïve or in chronically medicated ADHD youth has been shown to increase and normalise the under activation in right and/or left IFC as well as ACC during motor and interference inhibition 62-66, timing 6,65,67, error processing 64 and sustained attention 51, but had no effect during working memory 68,69. Effects were also observed in the cerebellum during time discrimination 6, interference and motor inhibition 6466 and attention tasks 51; and in the striatum during reward 51 and response inhibition tasks 64-66,70. .( Katya Rubia, Analucía A. Alegría, Helen Brinson)Purpose of the study: The purpose of the study is to evaluate the effectiveness of essential oils (Lavender, Peppermint, and Jasmine) on the attention span of subjects (male and female) between the ages of 19-29 who has a short attention span.
Objectives: In this study it will be aimed to:Evaluate the effectiveness of the lavender, jasmine and peppermint essential oils increasing the attention span of the objectives.Establish if the oils do increase the attention span duration and how many treatments are required to have a result.Determine if there is an increase/decrease or no change of the attention span of the subjects.*Research questions / hypothesis:Research Question: Does lavender oil have an increasing effect on the attention span of subjects?Research Question: Does peppermint oil have an increasing effect on the attention span of subjects?Research Question: Does jasmine oil have an increasing effect on the attention span of the subjects?Research Question: Does aromatherapy have an increasing effect on the attention span of the subjects?Research Question: Does gender affect the outcome of the treatment?Research Question: Does the amount of sleep subjects get in affect the outcome of the treatment?Research Question: Does inhalation of the oils during the treatments improve have an effect on the outcome?Which oil has the little or no effect on increasing the attention span of the subjects?CHAPTER 2Attention refers to tThe ability to selectively process information at the expense of other information Pashler, 1998) (attention) and working memory refers the ability to retain task-relevant information in an accessible state over timteo retain information in an accessible state, for our cognitive capacities both are a (working memory) are critical aspects of our cognitive capacities.
The capacity to perform some complex tasks depends critically on the ability to retain task-relevant information in an accessible state over time (working memory) and to selectively process information in the environment (attention). Attention refers to the processing or selection of some information at the expense of other information (Pashler, 1998). It has been debated at which processing stage attentional selection occurs. There is Eevidence has been collected that attention can affect early perceptual processing (Cherry, 1953; Mangun and Hillyard, 1991) as well as evidence that attention affects only later processing stages (Osman and Moore, 1993). Due to theThe strong support for both early and late selection it has led to the proposalsuggestion that attentional selection (Allport, 1993; Lavie, Hirst, de Fockert, and Viding, 2004, Luck and Vecera, 2002; Posner and Peterson, 1990) there might ay be done in more than one form of attentional selection (Allport, 1993; Lavie, Hirst, de Fockert, and Viding, 2004, Luck and Vecera, 2002; Posner and Peterson, 1990).
Posner and colleagues (Fan, McCandliss, Sommer, Raz, and Posner, 2002; Fan, McCandliss, Fossella, Flombaum, and Posner, 2005; Posner and Boies, 1971; Posner and Peterson, 1990) developed aOne detailed and influential taxonomyclassification of attention has been developed by Posner and colleagues (Fan, McCandliss, Sommer, Raz, and Posner, 2002; Fan, McCandliss, Fossella, Flombaum, and Posner, 2005; Posner and Boies, 1971; Posner and Peterson, 1990). There are three attention networks: alerting, orienting, and executive attention, that perform distinct roles aAccording to recent conceptions of this taxonomy, there are three attention networks that perform distinct roles: alerting, orienting, and executive attention.classification. The general state of responsiveness to sensory stimulations controlled by theThe alerting network controls the general state of responsiveness to sensory stimulation. The orienting network selects a subset of sensory information is selected by the orienting network for privileged perceptual processing.
Several mechanisms have been proposed to account for the beneficial effects of attentional orienting including Nneural boosting (Luck, Hillyard, Mouloua, and Hawkins, 1996; Mangun and Hillyard, 1991), distractor suppression (Reynolds, Pasternak, and Desimone, 2000; Slotnick, Schwarzbach, and Yantis, 2003), and noise reduction (Dosher and Lu, 2000) have been proposed to account for the beneficial effects of attentional orienting. The executive attention network is needed for the central, limited-capacity system when there is competition for access to it and acts on post-sensory representations,and is needed when there is competition for access to a central, limited-capacity system. Paradigms that reveal the role of central attention include flanker tasks (Eriksen and Eriksen, 1974) and stroop tasks (Macleod, 1991; Stroop, 1935), and speeded dual-task performance.Claims of a non-unitary attention system has been made by making distinguishes between perceptual and central attention by sSeveral theorists have made claims of a non-unitary attention system by distinguishing between perceptual and central attention (Johnston, McCann, Remington, 1995; Luck and Vecera, 2002; Pashler 1989, 1991, 1993; Vogel, Woodman, and Luck, 2005). Perceptual attention or orienting refers to the selection of a subset of sensory information. Central or executive attention share in depicting a central, amodal processing capacity shared broadly in postperceptual cognition. Working memoryM is often defined as the mental workspace where important information is kept in a highly active state, available for a variety of other cognitive processes (Baddeley and Hitch, 1974),.
iIt includes the processes that encodes, manipulatesstore, and stores manipulate this information. ItWM is distinguishable identifiable from two other forms of iconic memorymemory storage, memory storage iconic memory and long-term memory (LTM). Iconic memory is a short-lived sensory trace of unlimitedlimitless capacity which lastsing around 300ms (Averbach and Coriell, 1961; Sperling, 1960). TheIn contrastdifference of ,working memory WM is that it is a capacity limited store that is less transientmomentary and longer lastingmore durable than iconic memory (Phillips, 1974). Information may last a lifetime that is stored in long term memory, whereasWhile working memory WM is a temporary store lasting only on the order of seconds, information that is stored in LTM may last a lifetime. Many theorists view WM as the subset of knowledge in LTM that is currently activated (Cowan, 1995; Oberauer, 2002; but see Baddeley and Logie, 1999). Working memory, like attention, is a complex and multifacetedcomplicated construct.
It is has been suggested that there are independent stores for spatial, verbal, spatial, and visual information (Baddeley and Logie, 1999). There is sStrong evidence that the processes in working memory has also accrued that the processeswhich is involved in the storage of items in WM are separabledistinguishable from the processes that manipulate or update the contents of WM working memory (Cornoldi, Rigoni, Venneri, and Vecchi, 2000; D’Esposito, Postle, Ballard, and Lease, 1999; D’Esposito, Postle, and Rypma, 2000; Kane and Engle, 2002; Postle, Berger, and D’Esposito, 1999; Postle, et al., 2006; Smith and Jonides, 1999).
In addition, It seems to be that eencoding and storage processes in WM working memory are seem to be distinct (Marois, Todd, and Chun, in preparation; Woodman and Vogel, 2005). The above mentioned definitions explicitly acknowledge the non-unitary nature of WM and attention. The relationship between attention and working memoryWM may depend on the type of attention and working memory WM processes (fOUGNIE)Attention is a complex cognitive process of choosing important content and ignoring the less important. For the physiological and behavioural responses both attention and concentration are equally important. An individual possesses active (voluntary process and increases alertness, concentration, a person’s interest and needs) and passive (involuntary cognitive process and gets easily distracted by external stimuli’s) attention when conscious. Attention span is the total amount of time given to concentrate on a particular activity and not get distracted, by an individual. According to Hartley and Davis the attention span is 10-20 minutes at a time of an average adult on a specific topic is for.
For individual to regain attention for a few more minutes, mild changes in the mental focus will help. Factors which can reduce the attention span of a person are fatigue, hunger, noise, external stimuli, state of the mind and emotion, (Lamba, S., Rawat)Silence helps individuals to pay full attention to a topic. It is important to pay attention and concentrate due to it enhances individuals’ ability and skill to memorize the content for a longer period of timeperiod. Lamba, S., Rawat)Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder known as ADHD is a common childhood psychiatric disorder which affects up to 3-8% of school-aged children, with 65% of cases persisting into adulthood. Symptoms characterised with ADHD are age-inappropriate inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivityAttention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is characterised by symptoms of age-inappropriate inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity 1.
ADHD is one of the most common childhood psychiatric disorders, affecting 3-8% of school-aged children, with 65% of cases persisting into adulthood 2. ADHD patients have deficitsshortages in higher-level cognitive functions necessaryessential for goal-directed behaviorsbehaviours, so-called ‘executive functions’ (EF), that are known to act as an intermediary be mediated by later development of theing fronto-striato-parietal and fronto-cerebellar networks 3. Sustained attention, The most consistent deficits are in motor response inhibition, sustained attention, and working memory 4,5 as well as timing processing are t, he most consistent deficits and in in particular time estimation 6,7 and temporal foresight.
,( as measured in temporal discounting and gambling tasks 7.( Katya Rubia, Analucía A. Alegría, Helen Brinson)In this study the researcher has a holistic approach to improve attention span by using essential oils in Aromatherapy.Aromatherapy is an alternative form of medicine that uses essential oils and other aromatic compounds with the intention of altering a person’s mind, mood, cognitive function or health.health. Shah, Y.R.
, et. all.Essential oils are aromatic and unstable compounds found only in 10% of the plant kingdom and are stored in its special delicate secretary structures.(structures. ( Djilani, A.
and Dicko). Essential oils can be mixed together to produce pleasing and complex aromas but also for a particular therapeutictherapeutic purpose in mind referred to as an essential oil synergy. A synergistic essential oil mixture is considered to beis better in total action than each one working separately.
Shah, Y.R., et. all)Inhaling essential oils into the lungs offer both psychological and physical benefits. The aroma of the natural essential oil stimulates the brain to sets off a reaction and the natural constituents can supply a therapeutic benefit. When inhaling scents, the aroma moves across the olfactory nerves which are located inside the nose and then up into the Limbic system in our brain which controls our moods, our memories and our ability to learn.
When the Limbic system is stimulated it releases endorphins, neurotransmitters and other ‘feel-good’ chemicals. Shah, Y.R., et. all.The benefit of essential oils that are applied directly onto the skin is that it’s absorbed into the bloodstream. The constituents of essential oils can assist in health, beauty and hygiene conditions.
Essential oils should be applied to the skin in their diluted form due to it being so powerful and concentrate. Essential oils are normally diluted into a carrier oil, such as a cold pressed vegetable oil. Common carrier oils include sweet almond oil, apricot kernel oil and grapeseed oil Shah, Y.R., et. all.Essential oils are also absorbed into the skin and blood stream through aromatherapy. Aromatherapy massages reaps the benefits of topical application which is that the essential oils can go directly to the spot where you need them the most, along with the soothing therapeutic benefits of massage.
Shah, Y.R., et. all. Olfactory stimuli are used in aromatherapy to enhance mood, well-being and work efficiency.(efficiency. (Heuberger E.
)The theory of aromatherapy is that it’s a treatment or avoidance of diseases by use of essential oils. Other known uses include reduction of pain and nervousness, improvement of energy and short-term memory and relaxation. Two basic mechanisms are presented to explain the supposed effects. First is the influence of aroma on the brain, particularly the limbic system through the olfactory system. Secondly are the direct pharmacological effects of the essential oils. The effectiveness of aromatherapy remains unproven, while exact knowledge of the synergy between the body and aromatic oils is regularly claimed by Aromatherapists.
However, certain initial clinical studies of aromatherapy combined with other techniques presents positive effects. Aromatherapy does not heal conditions, but aids to help the body find aan innate way to heal itself and improve the immune response. Shah, Y.
R., et. all.The Benefits of Aromatherapy are listed below: It reduces muscular aches and pains.
Relaxation and stress relief Mood enhancement, balance and well being Relief of minor discomforts Boosting the immune, respiratory and circulatory systems For women’s problems like PMS or menopausal distress it is particularly helpful. Stress level or Blood pressure can be reduced.Tension headaches can be relieved. Aromas can be used to facilitate communication, decrease difficult and self-stimulating behaviour and provide very meaningful communication.
Shah, Y.R., et. all.Contra-indications to aromatherapy:First trimester of pregnant women. All essential oils should be avoided for anyone with severe asthma or a history of allergies. Hyssop oil should be avoided by people with a history of seizures. Stimulating essential oils should be avoided by people with high blood pressure.
Oils with estrogenoestrogen-like compounds such as fennel, aniseed, sage, and clary-sage should not be used by people with estrogenoestrogen-dependent tumorstumours (breast – or ovarian cancer) Caution should be taken when considering aromatherapy for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy. Shah, Y.R., et.
all.According to Sayowan W. Jasmine oil revitalizes and restores energy and improves memory. The information regarding the effects of jasmine odour on research participants is a stimulation of human attention. (Sayowan W.) The effect of jasmine oil by massage may be characterised by having a stimulating effect.
There was also a significant increase in the beta brain wave in the presence of jasmine aroma. (jasmine npc). Beta activity increase is closely linked to motor behaviour and is generally attenuated during active movements.
Low amplitude beta with multiple and varying frequencies is often associated with active, busy or anxious thinking and active concentration 21. Our result areis similar to Nakagawa, et al 24 found methyl jasmonate and cineole, a major component of jasmine oil, increased beta wave and inhibited alpha and theta waves with aan enhancement that corresponded with the stimulating effect on the brain function. (Sayowan W)To get the full attention and concentration, we need to know various contributing factors which distract students someone to learn effectively.(effectively. Lamba(Lamba, S., Rawat) Aroma has both a direct and indirect psychological effect and memory is stimulated by the sense of smell. Peppermint helps to increase the attention spanspan, but memory was not extensively affected. Lavender decreased the working memory and ability to concentrate.
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