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This is the result I got from The Brain Test (12/29/06) on Tickle. This is the full version of the result. And as usual this taken from the PHD-Certified category.

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Ryman, you are Balanced-brained, which means that you rely equally on both the left and right hemispheres of your brain.

You have a balanced brain — able to draw on the strengths of both the right and left hemispheres depending on context. Typically, people with balanced right and left hemispheres are very comfortable with switching between local and global perspectives — that is, paying attention to both small details and larger issues when the circumstance indicates. That means they can identify elements that make up an image or situation and also attend to the larger, more holistic pattern or unified whole that those details comprise.

You are able to capitalize on the left hemisphere’s skills in verbal communication as well on the right hemisphere’s focus on patterns and association making. This rare combination makes you a very creative and flexible thinker.

Depending on the situation, you may rely on one hemisphere or the other. Some situations may lend themselves to using your right brain’s creativity and flexibility while other situations may call for a more structured approach as dictated by your left brain.

That’s how your brain processes information. And while your dominant brain hemisphere certainly contributes to the way you process information, there is also a style of learning, unrelated to your dominant hemisphere, that determines the ways in which you are best able to pick up information. When you’re learning something new, your dominant brain hemisphere will want to take over. But there are times when the information being presented is not well suited to your dominant hemisphere’s abilities.

That’s why, in addition to your hemispheric dominance, you also have a style of learning that is dominant for you. Whether you know it or not, you are naturally predisposed to learning things visually, aurally, or through a combination of the two.

Your test results show that you are an auditory learner.

Other balanced-brained people who are auditory learners are pop singer Madonna, classical composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and comedian and actor Robin Williams. But before delving deeper into how you learn, you should get the basics of your brain’s physiology.

The physiology of your brain

Your brain is made up of many different parts and is responsible for many different functions of your body. Because of this, it has adapted to be a very specialized organ. There are parts that control what you taste, what you feel, how you learn, how you think, and how you reason. All of this is so no one part gets overtaxed or worn out, and also so you can perform more than one task at a time.

Your brain stem controls your reflexes and involuntary functions such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, and digestion. Your cerebellum helps coordinate movement. Your hypothalamus controls body temperature and feeds behaviors like eating, drinking, aggression, and physical pleasure. Your cerebrum, or cerebral cortex, translates information transmitted from all of your sensing organs. It helps start motor functions, it controls emotions, and it is the center for all thinking, reasoning, learning, and memory. In short, it analyzes all information you feed to it.

The cerebral cortex is divided into two hemispheres. The left hemisphere is responsible for speech, controls the right side of your body, and serves as your logic and reasoning center. The right hemisphere governs your creativity and your athleticism among other things. In the past, people oversimplified this relationship.

People used to say if you were logical, you were definitely left-brained, and if you were creative, you were definitely right-brained. This is no longer the case. New research indicates that there’s more flexibility when it comes to our gray matter. And if you know where your strengths and weaknesses lie, you can train your brain to become more organized, creative, or better able to process all sorts of information. Here’s some general information on the differences between the left and right hemispheres.

Left hemisphere
There’s more to your left hemisphere than analytical strength. Your left hemisphere is involved in linear analytical processes, including processing word meanings and symbols, interpreting facts, and much of your language production and reception.

When you look at a photograph or a painting, your left hemisphere is the one that orients on the logical, linear, and literal action in the picture, such as the storyline or the characters in the picture, as opposed to the more abstract or conceptual elements. Furthermore, when you hear a word, it is the left side that decodes that word’s meaning, as opposed to something that word might remind you of. Overall, the left hemisphere is heavily involved in more reductionistic processes, such as breaking a picture into its constituent parts, as opposed to seeing it as a single and unified whole.

Right hemisphere
Similarly, the right hemisphere is not just the seat of intuition. Perhaps it is more intuitively oriented than the left, but in most cases it also identifies patterns and performs spatial analysis. This hemisphere tends to process information in non-linear ways, looking at the whole instead of all the parts that make it up.

When you look at a photograph or painting and notice the overall pattern or abstract contour of the image, it is your right hemisphere that is being activated. As another example, the right side looks at a spiral and sees a unified spiral pattern. Whereas the left side of your brain would see the series of lines making up the spiral and would interpret it in a holistic manner.

Learning styles
We are all different, and that applies to how we learn information, as well. Research has found that the two major categories of learners, are those who learn best in visual ways and those who work better in auditory ways. Your learning style is determined primarily by your brain — whether it relies more on your eyes or your ears to comprehend new data. Those who respond better to what they see are visual learners. Those who respond better to what they hear are auditory learners. Those who are equally as good at interpreting data that they see and hear are known as “balanced” learners. Balanced learners will recognize aspects of what they’re good at in both the visual and auditory learning style descriptions.

Of course, everyone relies on their eyes at some times and their ears at others. But when faced with new information, the majority of people fall back on their dominant learning style. And as more is being studied about learning styles, some sub styles are being identified, such as kinesthetic, the learning style that relies on learning by doing.

Visual
Visual learners focus on information their eyes pick up when trying to learn new information. They learn best when they rely on visual patterns because they prefer to “see” what they are learning more than “hear” what they are learning. They respond well to symbols, written words, images, diagrams, and photos. For this reason, they probably like to have a pen and paper around to take notes, to doodle in a meeting, or to try to synthesize other data. Drawings and pictorial representations often support the information they are receiving aurally and ultimately are what might anchor their knowledge to a given subject. Even if visual learners have printed material in front of them, they still might wish to take additional notes, to add marks to the paper in order to feel they are learning what they need to.

It’s likely that visual learners prefer to write a phone number down and try to memorize the numbers on a page or the pattern they create when dialing instead of listening to the number and repeating it. They remember by writing things down and communicate well in this mode. Visual learners are often better at getting their points across through the written, more than the spoken word. This isn’t to say they don’t ever rely on their ears instead of their eyes. Of course there are numerous instances, which call for them to do so. All this really means is that they’re predisposed to learning through their sight.

About 65% of people are visual learners.

Auditory
Auditory learners tend to focus on auditory stimuli — things that they hear — when learning new information. They probably get a lot out of lectures and are able to process speeches quickly and accurately. In fact, readings might not make as much sense to them until they’ve heard a supporting lecture to emphasize the written word and they’re more likely to listen to a lecture first and then take notes once they’ve processed the information.

Auditory learners probably prefer to speak someone’s phone number out loud to memorize it than bother with writing it on a piece of paper they’re going to lose anyway. They remember things by repeating them and probably prefer hearing instructions instead of wading through a written set of rules and directions. Auditory learners are better at making their points through talking rather than writing. This isn’t to say they don’t ever rely on their eyes instead of their ears. Of course there are numerous instances, which call for them to do so. All this really means is that they’re predisposed to learning through hearing. This in part is what makes most auditory learners strong communicators, adept at socializing and communicating in face-to-face situations.

About 30% of people are auditory learners.

Kinesthetic
Kinesthetic learners tend to make choices based on touch and movement through space. They tend to learn best by imitation and practice. While kinesthetic is acknowledged as a viable type of learning, it has yet to be examined as extensively as auditory and visual learning. That said, it is an important style for you to understand as it is certain to gain more recognition beyond the educational community in years to come.

Most of us are predominantly kinesthetic learners as fairly young children. We then develop into visual or auditory learners as our nervous systems develop and grow over the course of our lifespans. It is thought that kinesthetic learners make up around 5% of the adult population. We do not delve further into the kinesthetic type in this test, but stay tuned for the Tickle Learning Style test, coming soon!

About 5% of people are kinesthetic learners.

What these differences mean for you
As a predominantly auditory learner, you likely find aural stimuli much more compelling and comprehensible than visual stimuli. To varying degrees, visual learners tend to feel that if they can’t hear it, then they won’t be able to properly synthesize it. You might feel a tenuous hold on information that is not presented aurally. You might even attempt to turn visual information into a aural cue you can use by speaking a reading out loud or listening to yourself go over the directions. These are the safeguards you might subconsciously take to trigger your memory on the subject at hand.

The flip side is that you are likely to feel quite confident when information is presented to you aurally. In fact, you are likely to feel more capable of grasping higher-level concepts that are presented through verbal words or sounds than simpler concepts that are presented in written signs.

To varying degrees, auditory learners tend to feel that if they hear it, then it might as well have not happened — that’s how shallowly the information is going to be processed if it is not presented in sound. On the other hand, when information is presented aurally, you probably find yourself having no problem remembering it. Provided you can always control how information is presented to you, this auditory dominance is not a problem. However, our lives are complex, varied, and not entirely under our control. Hence, it behooves us all to learn to learn in different ways if we hope to continue to achieve and succeed.

Auditory learning is your strong suit; view it as such, as opposed to the only way in which you can learn. Visual learning is not only another option, but it is often a necessary addition to one’s cognitive landscape. Very often, there will simply not be adequate time or opportunity to have information recited to you, and instead you will have to work off of written notes or other visual cues. It is interesting to note once again that visual learners tend to be very good writers, while auditory learners tend to excel in spoken communication. If you feel you would like to broaden you auditory-based abilities, perhaps you could consider viewing the visual process as an auditory one. When you are reading something, try to hear the words being spoken — or even consider reading them aloud to yourself, if need be. If you can transform visual processes into auditory ones using similar, creative methods, then you will be able to transition your mind into a visual modality, and thereby, vastly broaden your horizons.

Category: Analyze Self //
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