Peak Ch. 2 Flashcards
brain adaptability and training
- There is a growing body of evidence that the structure and function of the brain change in response to mental training in the same way that muscles do
- If you practice something enough, your brain will repurpose neurons to help you with the task even if they already have another job to do
function of the hippocampus
engaged by spatial location
Maguire, 2000 London Taxi Drivers study method
used MRIs to look at the brains of 16 male London taxi drivers and compared them to the brains of 50 other males of similar ages who were not taxi drivers
Maguire, 2000 London Taxi Drivers study findings
She found that the posterior hippocampus was larger in taxi drivers than in other subjects and that the more time one had spent as a taxi driver, the larger the posterior hippocampus
Maguire London Taxi Drivers follow-up study
In a follow-up study, Maguire found that the posterior hippocampi of taxi drivers were significantly larger than bus drivers who spend their days driving around the same route
Maguire London Taxi Drivers prospective study
Maguire also conducted a prospective study and found that the posterior hippocampi of taxi drivers who had continued their training grew in size, but there was no change in size for the control group or for those who did not continue their training
brains of blind and deaf people
The brains of blind and deaf people “rewire” themselves to find new uses for the parts of the brain that are normally used for processing sight/hearing
what part of the brain to blind people use when they read in Braille?
the visual cortex
3-fingered Braille readers study
Three-fingered Braille readers experience higher sensitivity in the three fingers they use, but not in their other fingers
near-sighted patients study
A 2012 study found that near-sighted patients could read letters that were 60% smaller and read faster after 3 months of training 3 times per week
how does practice help with nearsightedness?
Blurry images result from an inability to see small details and difficulties detecting differences in contrast, which improving the image processing in the brain can help with
homeostasis
the tendency of a system to act in a way that maintains its stability
feedback mechanisms in the body
- The body is equipped with feedback mechanisms that maintain the status quo
- When you engage in sustained, vigorous physical activity, homeostatic mechanisms can no longer compensate and they activate different genes from the cells’ DNA, resulting in a change in the cell’s behaviour and the restoration of homeostasis
how do you keep a homeostatic change from reversing?
you keep pushing yourself
rat and homeostasis study
One study counted 112 genes that were turned on in response to a rat’s rapid increase in the use of a muscle in its rear legs, which eventually strengthened the rat’s muscles