Booklets 7,8 and 9 Flashcards
What is plasticity?
This is the brains ability to change and adapt because of experience.
What did plasticity research by Maguire find?
He found that compared to regular men who did not drive taxis, tax drivers who had been driving for more than 1.5 years had enlarged hippocampuses (has the role of facilitating spatial memory in the form of navigation) through MRI scans supporting plasticity through the experience of driving the taxis.
What is the evaluation of plasticity?
Plasticity can have maladaptive consequences such as phantom limb syndrome where people will feel pain in missing limbs. Suggesting plasticity is not always beneficial.
Found that after playing video games for 30 minutes over two month period there was an increasing part of grey matter.
One study suggested that brain plasticity may be a lifelong ability through fMRI scans that showed golf training change the normal representation of movement in participants age 40 to 60.
What is functional recovery?
This is the transfer of functions from a damaged area of the brain after trauma to other undamaged areas.
What is neural unmasking?
When synapses that have not previously received enough input to be active open connections to compensate for a nearby damaged area of the brain
What is functional recovery an example of?
Neural plasticity
What is spontaneous recovery?
When healthy brain areas take over the functions of areas that have been damaged or destroyed quickly after trauma.
What happens during functional recovery?
The brain forms new synaptic connections close to the area of damage and neuronal unmasking takes place. this process is supported by structural changes such as: accidental sprouting, deviation supersensitivity and recruitment of homologous areas.
What is axonal sprouting?
This is the growth of new nerve endings which connect to other undamaged nerve cells to form new neuronal pathways.
What is denervation supersensitivity?
When axons that do a similar job to the ones damaged become arouse to a higher level to compensate for the ones that are lost. This can have negative consequences such as pain.
What is recruitment of homologous areas?
This is when areas on opposite sides of the brain performs specific tasks so if Broca’s area was damaged on the left side and the right side equivalent was able to carry out its function after a period of time.
What is the evaluation of functional recovery?
Level of education a person has may influence recovery rates, one study revealed people with a brain injury that it’s been more time in education were more likely to make a disability free recovery.
Research into functional recovery can be used in the field of neuro rehabilitation such as understanding axonal growth can encourage new therapies such as constraint induced movement therapy for stroke patients.
Animal studies give evidence, one study where a kittens eye was sewn shut found that the area of the brain associated with the shutdown was not idle and continued to process information from the open eye.
