Yes, U2 can boost your brain power as well as Mozart

Science Notebook: Feeling uninspired at work today? Try breathing only through your right nostril. The flow of oxygen will unlock the creative potential of your brain�s right hemisphere.

Feeling uninspired at work today? Try breathing only through your right nostril. The flow of oxygen will unlock the creative potential of your brain's right hemisphere.

Go on, try it now - stick a pen up your left nostril and snort a deep breath of office air. Can you feel your neurons firing? Is your imagination running freely?

If the chap opposite you is sniggering ignorantly, pay no attention. He's only using 10% of his brain, after all. Poor man. Breathe deeply and feel your artistic potential unfolding. Sketch your first masterpiece, but don't forget to wipe the pen first.

It may sound farcical but this is the kind of advice that has being offered to high-flying business executives seeking to stimulate their blue-sky thinking. It has its roots in a popular new theory of psychology - that we can unlock hidden creative potential by a subtle rewiring of our brains.

The popular myth is one of several being put on trial at a conference in Edinburgh next Thursday, entitled Tall Tales about Mind and Brain.

Respected psychology experts from around the world will put their incredulity aside and train both their right and left hemispheres towards questions such as: Does the full moon make us more violent? Can we learn languages in our sleep? And do we really use only 10% of our brain?

The driving force behind this event is Sergio Della Salla, Professor of Human Cognitive Neuroscience, at the University of Edinburgh.

"We all would like to become more intelligent," says Della Salla. "But the truth is we use all of our brain, as is proven of course, by strokes. If we only used 10% of our brain, then 90% of strokes would have no consequences. But in fact, even the loss of the most minuscule amount of tissue will always have consequences."

According to Della Salla, the idea arose from a misunderstanding of a statement in 1908 by the psychologist, William James. "James said he thought we were using 10% of our potential - but this was translated as 10% of our brains. This goes against the principles of evolutionary biology. It would be extremely costly to maintain a large organ the majority of which we have no use for."

So if we can't unlock more capacity, what of the theory that we can rebalance our brain, to place more emphasis on the creative parts than the systematic parts?

"There is a huge market for these techniques - including educational tools for children," says Della Salla. "It's a very appealing theory that we have two personalities - one is a dry accountant and the other is a hippie artist.

"It's true we have two hemispheres that do different things - the left is in charge of language and the right is in charge of spatial awareness. But there is little hint that one is more creative than the other. And the techniques for stimulating one over the other are simply mumbo jumbo. On management courses they are being taught to breathe through one nostril - which is crazy, especially when you consider that the nostrils very quickly join together as one."

So, so much for the pen, then. So is there any alternative for a sluggish day in the office?

Perhaps a Mozart CD would do the trick. Scientists have fund that listening to two Mozart sonatas can increase your IQ by eight to nine points: the Mozart Effect, as discovered by Gordon Shaw, a physicist at the University of California at Irvine.

One of the pieces in question - Sonata for Two Pianos in D major, K 448 - is now infamous for its mind-boosting ability.

"The Shaw study was robust, but the story took on a life of its own," says Della Salla. "The writer Don Gumble made a lot of money by publishing a book on the Mozart Effect. But, in fact, Shaw never claimed that Mozart makes you smarter. In fact, he even tried to stop some of the claims in the book.

"The fact that it was Mozart was by chance - in truth, listening to any type of music can temporarily improve your spatial awareness. It could be U2 or even Take That."

Indeed, there is another piece of music that has been found to have a similar effect - a song by Greek composer Yanni, entitled Acroyali/ Standing In Motion, which is featured on his album Yanni Live at the Acropolis.

It was determined, by the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, to have the Mozart Effect because it was similar to Mozart's K 448 in tempo, structure, melodic and harmonic consonance and predictability. But the song's hidden powers have remained largely a secret. After all, a book called the Yanni Effect is unlikely to sell many copies in Scotland.