biopsychology- plasticity and functional recovery

Question 1

What is plasticity?

Answer 1

-brain can change and adapt over time as a result of experience and new learning.
-brain continues to create new neural pathways and alter existing ones in response to changing experiences.

Question 2

What is functional recovery?

Answer 2

form of plasticity where following damage from trauma the brain is able to redistribute functions normally performed by damaged areas to other undamaged areas.

Question 3

Romanian orphans study for plasticity and functional recovery

Answer 3

Research shows that enriched and impoverished environments can affect the physical structure of the brain.

Question 4

when is plasticity most active?

Answer 4

During infancy the brain experiences growth in the no. of synaptic connections it has peaking at about 15,000 per neuron at 2-3 years old.

Question 5

Maguire et al. (2000) for plasticity of brain

Answer 5

-16 healthy right-handed males who were licensed London taxi drivers
-compared them to 50 healthy right-handed males who weren’t taxi drivers
-MRI used to detect changes in structure of brain
-found taxi drivers had larger hippocampi compared to control group
-correlation not causal and implies experience as taxi driver changes size of hippocampus, brain changes with new learning.
-increases the validity of theory of neuroplasticity

Question 6

Simpson’s paradox

Answer 6

-strong positive correlation with 3rd factor but not included so point can be coincidental
-called a spurious correlation as caused by a 3rd factor.

Question 7

Draganski et al. (2006) for brain plasticity

Answer 7

-imaged brains of medical students three moths before and after final exams
-learning-induced changes seen to have occurred in the posterior hippocampus and parietal cortex, presumably as a result of studying for exams

Question 8

Mechelli et al. (2004) for brain plasticity

Answer 8

-found a larger parietal cortex in the brains of people who were bilingual compared to matched monolingual controls

Question 9

neural reorganisation

Answer 9

-healthy brain areas able to take over function from damaged areas
-process occurs quickly after trauma (spontaneous recovery) then slows after several weeks/months
-atp may need may need rehabilitative therapy
-recruitment of homologous areas occurs

Question 10

what’s recruitment of homologous areas?

Answer 10

when a homologous area of the brain on the opposite side is used to perform a specific task

Question 11

neural regeneration

Answer 11

-brain able to rewire and reorganise itself by forming new neurons and/or synaptic connections close to the area of damage

Question 12

structural changes from functional recovery

Answer 12

-axonal sprouting
-reformation of blood vessels
-denervation of super-sensitivity

Question 13

axonal sprouting

Answer 13

growth of new nerve endings which connects with other undamaged nerve cels to form new neural pathways

Question 14

denervation of super-sensitivity

Answer 14

axons become more responsive to compensate for the loss of adjacent neurons

Question 15

ao3 Maguire et al. (2000) plasticity of recovery

Answer 15

-MRIs on London taxi drivers to discover changes in brain detected sue to extensive spatial info. found posterior hippocampus
- study supports as shows hippocampus, of London taxi drivers had changed as a result of driving experience. demonstrates brain is ‘plastic’ and changes w new learning
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