Cognitive overstimulation

Introduction

Overstimulation occurs when more stimuli arrive than the brain can process. This may occur in healthy people because the brain is temporarily overloaded. It may also arise because the brain has a lower load capacity due to a brain disorder.

There are differences between a sick and a healthy brain in overstimulation in terms of severity of the complaints, the duration of the complaints and the 'recovery time' that the brain needs to return to a resting state.

 

It should be noted that people with a damaged brain are already 3-0 behind because many of them suffer from daily fatigue, neurofatigue.
On this page we only discuss cognitive and emotional overstimulation in terms of causes and consequences.

 

There is a difference between cognitive, emotional and sensory overstimulation in brain injury:

• Cognitive overstimulation
  Cognitive cause and cognitive complaints. May be accompanied by less serious physical complaints than the sensory variant.

  The difference with sensory overload lies primarily in
  the size of the brain networks activated simultaneously.

  A cognitive task is like one large factory running at full capacity.

  Severe sensory overload is more like an entire city in which
  all power plants, traffic lights, communication networks, and emergency services are simultaneously loaded to the maximum. In a healthy brain, there is often sufficient reserve capacity for this. After a brain injury, that reserve capacity is smaller. As a result, a multisensory load is more likely to lead to a temporary disruption of vulnerable neural networks, resulting in neurological and cognitive symptoms.

 

• Sensory overstimulation
  The senses are the cause of complaints due to sensory overstimulation. May be accompanied by more serious physical complaints and cognitive complaints.

  A cognitive task is like one large factory running at full capacity.

  Severe sensory overload is more like an entire city in which all power plants, traffic lights, communication networks, and emergency services are simultaneously under maximum strain. In a healthy brain, there is often sufficient reserve capacity for this. After a brain injury, that reserve capacity is smaller. As a result, a multisensory load is more likely to lead to a temporary disruption of vulnerable neural networks, resulting in neurological and cognitive symptoms.

 

• Combination of cognitive and sensory overstimulation
  The cause lies in both sensory and cognitive stimuli. The consequences manifest themselves physically and cognitively.

 

Cognitive and emotional overstimulation

The word cognition includes everything related to thinking.
Many people with brain injury experience delayed information processing since the brain injury, which can make the pace of ordinary thinking and listening tasks intensely tiring and lead to cognitive and some physical complaints.
In general, the complaints caused by cognitive overstimulation alone are milder than the complaints caused by the combination of cognitive and sensory overstimulation.

 

• Cognitive overstimulation can occur if too many conscious thinking tasks are performed, such as memory tasks, learning tasks, tasks that require attention or to understand something. It can also occur if information is presented too quickly in relation to the person's processing speed.
• Cognitive overstimulation occurs when a person is too tired to think. The brain can no longer keep up with thinking or conscious observations.
• Cognitive overstimulation can be a cause (a stacking effect) of sensory overstimulation, where a single sensory stimulus can be too much.
• Cognitive overstimulation and sensory overstimulation can mutually influence and reinforce each other. Together they can even lead to a vicious circle of overstimulation.

 

However, many people with brain damage can still gain some benefit from this form of overstimulation by keeping a close eye on the limits. By getting to know the signals of fatigue and limits. With 'planning and not running', agenda management, clear structure and good explanation to bystanders, this form of overstimulation is more manageable. However, it is good to realize that life is unpredictable. There will always be days and weeks when it won't work.

 

Emotional overstimulation

Emotional overstimulation is classified as cognitive overstimulation of thinking.

• Emotional overstimulation occurs when there have been too many emotionally stressful moments or when someone is too tired to process the emotions.
  
• Emotional overstimulation can be a cause (for example a stacking effect) or a consequence of sensory overstimulation.
  
• In case a person has had to cognitively process too many stimuli due to, for example, a busy weekly agenda, she or he will become emotional more quickly.
  
• With too many emotional moments, one sensory stimulus can be too much for the brain.
  
• Emotional overstimulation is internationally coded under the ICD code F06.6 organic labile affect disorder. That is, the emotional lability results from an organic disorder, in this case brain dysfunction. Nevertheless, for many people with brain injury, there is often still some benefit to be gained with this form of overstimulation.

 

Implications

In general, the complaints due to cognitive overstimulation alone are milder than the complaints due to the combination of cognitive and sensory overstimulation. If there is a combination of these two forms of overstimulation, or if there is only sensory overstimulation, the following consequences may occur:

• general neurovegetative imbalance* (autonomic nervous system) with a fight, flight or freeze response and/or
• a short-term or long-term worsening of neurological and cognitive brain injury complaints and/or
• a short-term or long-term presentation of neurological and cognitive brain injury complaints.

 

Definition of overstimulation due to brain injury
Overstimulation due to brain injury is a clinical picture of an exhausting situation with a neurological origin, which arises when more cognitive, emotional, and sensory (including
proprioceptive and vestibular) information (in the form of stimuli) is received than the brain can process.

It may result in:

• general neurovegetative imbalance* (autonomic nervous system) with a fight, flight, or freeze response and/or
  
• a short-term or long-term exacerbation of neurological and cognitive brain injury symptoms and/or
  
• a short-term or long-term presentation of neurological and cognitive brain injury symptoms.

 

* definition of neurovegetative complaints: disease symptoms that can arise when the autonomic nervous system, which independently controls various organs, is disrupted.

 

 

 

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