Plasticity and functional recovery of the brain

Question 1

what is brain plasticity?

Answer 1

refers to the brain’s ability to modify its structure and function as a result of experience.

Question 2

what is functional recovery?

Answer 2

refers to the recovery of abilities and mental processes that have been compromised as a result of brain injury or disease

Question 3

Explore plasticity as a result of life experience

Answer 3

As people gain new experiences, nerve pathways that are used frequently develop stronger connections whereas neurons that are rarely or never used eventually die
By developing new connections and pruning away weak ones, the brain is constantly adapting to a changing environment; however, this decreases with age.

Question 4

Explore a piece of research that supports this

Answer 4

Research support from Kuhn et al in 2014 compared a control group (with no experience to the game) with a video game training group that was trained two months prior for at least 30 mins a day in the game super mario.
They found a significant increase in grey matter in various areas of the brain including the cortex, hippocampus and cerebellum, the increase was not evident in the control group
The game training resulted in new synaptic connections (spatial navigation, planning/working memory)

Question 5

Explore a second piece of research that supports this

Answer 5

Davidson et al 2004 compared eight practitioners of Tibetan meditation with 10 student volunteers with no previous meditation, both groups were fitted with electrical sensors and asked to meditate for short periods. They found that the electrodes picked up much greater activation of gamma waves (coordinate neuron activity) in the monks although the students did show a slight increase of gamma wave activity whilst meditating. Researchers concluded that meditation changes the workings of the brain in the short term but may produce permanent changes as the monks had far more gamma activity than the control group before meditating

Question 6

Briefly explore functional recovery

Answer 6

The brain also appears to show support of functional recovery. Regenerative development in brain functions arise from the brain’s plasticity

Question 7

what is neuronal unmasking

Answer 7

dormant synapses (which have not received enough to be active) open new connections to compensate for a damaged area of the brain. These can open connections to regions of the brain that are not normally activated to create a lateral spread of activation that gives way to the development of new structures

Question 8

How are stems cells linked to functional recovery

Answer 8

Stem cells are unspecialised cells that have the capacity to carry out different functions including taking on the characteristics of nerve cells. There are a number of ways in which stem cells provide treatment. They can either be directly implanted into the brain to replace dead or dying cells. The second view is that transplanted stem cells secrete growth factors that somehow ‘rescue’ the injure cells. The last view is that transplanted cells form a neural network, which links to an uninjured brain site where new stem cells are made with the damaged region of the brain

Question 9

Name a first AO3 point for brain plasticity

Answer 9

Research support from animal studies
Kempermann in 1998 found evidence of an increased number of neurons in the brains of rats in complex environments compared to rats in laboratory cages
The rats housed in the complex environment showed an increase in neurons in the hippocampus a part of the brain associated with making new memories and the ability to navigate from one area to another
Demonstrates that brain plasticity recurs as a result of experience

Question 10

Name a second evaluation for brain plasticity

Answer 10

Maguire et al in a 2000 study of London taxi drivers discovered that changes in the brain could be detected as a result of extensive spatial navigation.
They used an MRI scan to calculate the amount of grey matter in the brain of taxi drivers and control participants.
The hippocampus of taxi drivers was significantly larger than those of the control group
This showed that the highest levels of plasticity were evident in those with more extensive experience

Question 11

Name an AO3 point for brain plasticty

Answer 11

Research support from animals
Tajiri et al 2013 randomly assigned rats with traumatic brain injury to one of two groups
One group received stem cells into the region of the brain affected by traumatic injury
The control group received a solution infused into the brain containing no stem cells
Three months later the brain of the rats implanted with stem cells showed clear development this was accompanied by a solid stream of stem cells migrating to the brain’s site of injury.
This development was not evident in the control group

Question 12

Name an AO3 point for brain plasticty

Answer 12

Age differences
Huttenlocher (2002) stated that brain plasticity reduces with age
according to this view the only way to work around injury beyond childhood is to develop compensatory behavioural strategies to work around this deficit
Elbert et al in 2001 concluded that the capacity for neural reorganisation is much greater in children than adults

Question 13

Name an AO3 point for brain plasticty

Answer 13

Schinder in 2014 found that patients with the equivalent of college education are seven times more likely than those who didn’t finish high school to be disability free one year after a moderate to severe traumatic brain injury
They carried out a retrospective study in the US
769 patients were studied 214 had acheived disability free recovery after one year. Of these 39.2% with 16 or more years of education had received DFR as had 30.8% of those with 12-15 years of education
This concluded that cognitive reserve was an important factor in neural adaptation