Dr. Joe Whittington, 47, was an emergency room doctor for two decades, but he still manages to find it difficult to calm his mind after leaving the hospital.
While trying to do it by naping after a particularly chaotic turn, he continued to think of a victim of a motorcycle accident whose vital signs had returned, a patient who developed sepsis and another whose heart had suddenly stopped beating.
His tendency to reproduce the events of the night – and his irregular working hours – often made him difficult to fall asleep. Over the years, he has tried to breathe deep, meditation and melatonin, before finally stumbled on a technique called cognitive mixing.
The sleep strategy helps “force my mind to get out of that cycle and in a state in which I can finally rest,” said dr. Whittington, who shared him on his Instagram account, which has more than 750,000 followers.
“Cognitive Shuffling” has been advertised on social media for years, but does it really work? We talked to sleep experts and the scientist who created the technique to find out more.
What is cognitive mixing?
Cognitive mixing is a mental exercise that provides to focus your mind on the words that have no mutual association, as a way of reporting to your brain which is time to fall asleep. The task is designed to be quite engaging to be distracted by the thoughts that could prevent you from falling asleep, but not so interesting that your brain rejoices.
You start taking a random word – “Pluto”, for example. So think of how many more words you can start with the same first letter, such as: “plane, poodle, game, peaches”. When you finish the words “P”, you can move on to the next letter of your original word, which is “l”, and do the same thing: “Love, light, lemur, undeclared”. Take a second to view each word.
Research suggests that when people naturally move away, their minds are often full of vivid images or distant thoughts, said Luc P. Beaudain, a cognitive scientist in Canada that has developed the cognitive mix technique. The goal is to help your mind imitate that process, he added.
“These images do not create a clear plot and can help your brain disengage from the resolution of problems or in the workers’ loops,” said dr. Beaudain, which markets a technique -based app.
How did the idea come about?
Dr. Beaudain created cognitive by mixing more than 15 years ago in part because he suffered from insomnia and wanted to find a solution.
In 2016, he and his colleagues decided to study him. They recruited about 150 students and assigned a group to make cognitive mixing. A second group was asked to spend 15 minutes in prime time to write down their concerns and any potential solutions, a method that psychologists call constructive concern. A third group was said to do both.
After about a month, the researchers discovered that each of the methods was equally effective. But the participants who had tried both were more likely to evaluate the cognitive method of mixing as more useful and easier to use.
The study of Dr. Beaudain, who was presented in 2016 at the conference associated with professional sleep societies in Denver, attracted the attention of a Forbes journalist who then wrote about it. The concept was soon circulating widely online.
Should you try it?
Perhaps.
There is no enough evidence to support the use of cognitive mixing as a primary treatment for insomnia, said dr. Jorge I. Mora, associate head of clinical affairs in the division of sleep medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
“We have to study it more to be able to fully say, yes, this should be a coherent tool, like the CBT-I. It is,” said Dr. Mora, referring to cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, a treatment that has shown to help people who often fight to fall or remain asleep.
But there is no damage in trying a cognitive mixing, provided that it is used as a complement to evidence -based methods, the experts said.
“When it works, Wow can really help some people,” said Shelby Harris, a clinical psychologist in the New York City area specialized in sleep behavioral medicine.
Since the technique has grown in popularity, people created their unique variants. Dr. Harris sometimes suggests that his patients try to find random combinations for cupcakes, such as red velvet with vanilla glaze or chocolate with cream cheese glaze, until they move away.
But if you try to mix cognitive and known that it does not work and you are frustrating – or if you are no longer sleep after 20 minutes – Dr. Harris advised you to get up and find something else to calm your mind.
He suggested doing a quiet activity with a dim light – such as lengthening, coloring or working on a puzzle puzzle – and then go back to bed when you feel sleepy.
“I even read old cookbooks – I collect them – and I establish things I want to do in the end,” said dr. Harris. “It helps to spend time and acts as a holder of the busy brain.”