Happy Brain Project by Cole Feeney

Frontal Lobe

8023678 — 2024-04-05 12:32:33 UTC

Perhaps the most important and impactful part of the brain. Responsible for voluntary movements, expressing language, and your capacity to plan and make decisions, and generally how you think!

How it affects my happiness:

Because the frontal lobe is much of what makes you, well, you, it essentially determines your grasp on your personality and how you feel. I like to think that my personality is energetic and friendly, and when I am spending time with my friends and family I seek to make everyone comfortable and entertained, and this brings me a lot of joy! So by making my personality this way, the Frontal Lobe has contributed to not just my own happiness when I bring light into other's lives, I like to think it contributes to other's happiness too.

Occipital Lobe

8023678 — 2024-04-05 12:53:53 UTC

The occipital lobe is vital for processing visual information, helping you recognize what it is you're seeing. It works in conjunction with several other parts of the brain to spatially map and create visual memories.

How it affects my happiness:

A lot of the things that make me happy are visual! For example, I've always loved playing video games with my friends at home, and being able to quickly process what's happening and make split-second decisions is a big component of what makes it enjoyable for me.

Parietal Lobe

8023678 — 2024-04-11 12:29:52 UTC

The parietal lobe is super important for its responsibility regarding spatial awareness. It helps you understand and process where you are in relation to the world around you, and also processes things like touch, hot & cold, and smell.

How it affects my happiness:

I love cooking, I always have, and a big component of home-cooked meals to me at least are the smells! Coming home to my mom cooking something that doesn't just taste delicious, but smells just as good to is a pretty amazing feeling!

Medulla Oblongata

8023678 — 2024-04-11 12:39:26 UTC

The medulla oblongata is another super impactful component of the brain, and it's responsible for managing vital processes like breathing and heartbeat. You couldn't live without it!

How it affects my happiness:

Since COVID-19, I've gotten much more involved with exercise and working out, and by far the important part of the brain for ensuring you are able to safely exercise your body is the medulla. By helping regulate things like heartrate and breathing, I am able to exercise safely and know when I am pushing myself to my limits.

Hippocampus

8023678 — 2024-04-11 12:46:28 UTC

The hippocampus (what a crazy word..) is a part of the brain's limbic system, and is important for it's role in regulating memories, how we learn, and emotions. Does a lot more than people give it credit for each day!

How it affects my happiness:

Knowing that each day I am able to make new incredible memories with people I love like my friends and family definitely brings me happiness, personally. The hippocampus ensures that anytime I'm doing something that is worth remembering, I have the ability to treasure that moment forever!

Reticular Formation

8023678 — 2024-04-12 12:27:48 UTC

Part of the brain stem, the reticular formation plays an important role in our body. From motor control, mood, cognition and behavior, the reticular formation does a lot of "background" work for our body.

How it affects my happiness:

Considering how the reticular formation plays a role in regulating my mood, it's a pretty safe bet that whenever I am happy for any reason, my mood improves! Doesn't matter who you're with, what you're doing, or where you are, if you're happy, then that's a result of your reticular formation.

Cerebellum

8023678 — 2024-04-12 12:33:22 UTC

The cerebellum, one of the biggest components of the brain, plays a key role in coordinating balance and movement to ensure we are able to stay upright and coordinated!

How it affects my happiness:

This is a bit of a silly example, but a long time ago in elementary school, maybe 2nd or 3rd grade, I remember I always had trouble doing the monkey bars during recess. It felt like all the other kids could do it with no real problem, but I was just too nervous and unsure of my own balance to get across. But someday, while in a park with my mom on a weekend, when she was around I felt like I had the confidence to try and impress her and I was able to fully cross the monkey bars! I was so excited and proud of myself, and looking back I like to believe that my cerebellum had something to do with it, keeping me coordinated enough to get across.

Amygdala

8023678 — 2024-04-14 18:39:39 UTC

The amygdala is such a small part of the brain, yet it plays such an integral role! It's essentially a processing center for emotions, especially fear and signaling potential danger.

How it affects my happiness:

I LOVE horror movies, and have seen hundreds by this point. Me and my mom and my friends can just tear through these movies, and they are always a blast, even if they can be pretty cheesy. But my favorite parts of those movies is the suspense they can induce on me while watching. It can be such a thrill to indulge in your basic survival instincts when watching a scary or suspenseful movie, and my amygdala is definitely a component of the fear and enjoyment I get from watching the movies!

Dopamine

8023678 — 2024-04-14 18:44:39 UTC

Dopamine is essentially happiness if it was an actual physical substance. It's a neurotransmitter responsible for your own motivation and pleasure, it's often referred to as the activator of the "reward pathway" of the brain.

How it affects my happiness:

It's pretty easy to explain how dopamine affects my own happiness; it's literally what happiness, or at least the feeling of happiness, is! Whenever I am doing something I like to do, or is pleasurable, I am having dopamine released into my brain. I could be cooking, driving, playing video games, or even beyond, and dopamine could be being released

Acetylcholine

8023678 — 2024-04-14 18:50:03 UTC

Acetylcholine is a neurotransmitter which plays a role with involuntary movements, learning, attention, and memory.

How it affects my happiness:

I won't act like I'm some big try hard in school or anything, but I like to think that I'm capable of making some pretty significant efforts when I am properly motivated. And there's no better feeling that studying for a test on a subject you're a little iffy on, putting the work in, then finally seeing your work pay off during the test as acetylcholine kicks in and you tap into your memory banks of the studied material. Doing good on a test would make anybody happy, and it