Functional recovery

Question 1

Functional recovery

Answer 1

brains ability to recover from damage following trauma i.e a stroke
* this is done when unaffected areas of the brain are often able to adapt and compensate for the damaged areas
* links to plasticity because when the brain shows recovery you form new neural connections
* functional recovery can occur quickly, if the individual goes through physiotherapy, following brain trauma

Question 2

Hubel and Wiesel

Answer 2

• 1963
• carried out an animal study
• involved sewing one eye of kitten shut and analysing the brains cortical responses
• found that the area of the visual cortex associated with the shut eye continued to process information from the open eye

Question 3

Evaluation

Answer 3

-/+ Animal study
+ Lack of internal validity
+ Links in education
+ Practical application

Question 4

+/-Animal study

Answer 4

- Hubel et al’s study used cats, therefore results are harder to generalise to humans
+ however, animal studies enable us to monitor the function of the brain before and after trauma because we cause it
* ethically we couldnt do this to humans and its unlikely that we would have meausured their .. before a natural event, because we didnt know it was going to …

Question 5

- Lack of internal validity

Answer 5

study measures the brains cortical responses to cats with a damaged eye rather than a damged brain.
study doesnt measure what its supposed to measure (functional recovery)

Question 6

+ Education

Answer 6

Evidence shows that theres a link between a persons education attainment and functional recovery. For example, research has foud that there are more disablity-free recoveries following injury for patients who had more than 16 years of education
- however this is a limitation as it suggests that education is an example of a cognitive reserve, that is a crucial factor in determining how well the brain adapts after trauma

Question 7

Practical application

Answer 7

strength of plasticity and functional recovery is its practical application
* understanding processes involved in plasticity has contributed to the field of neurorehabillitation
* following brain illness/ injury to brain spontaneous recovery tends to slow down, so forms of physical therapy may be required to maintain improvements in functioning
* shows that although the brain may have ability to recover, process requires further intervention if it is to be completely successful

Question 8

Cognitive reserve

Answer 8

the brains ability to cope with either increasing activities or damage