| Life Long Learning And Brain Plasticity Neuroplasticity occurs in the brain… Through adulthood: when something new is learned Plasticity, learning and memory For a long time, it was believed that as we aged, the connections in the brain became fixed, and then simply faded. Research has shown that in fact the brain never stops changing through learning. Plasticity is the capacity of the brain to change with learning. Changes associated with learning occur mostly at the level of connections between neurons: New connections form and the internal structure of the existing synapses change. Did you know that when you become an expert in a specific domain, areas in your brain that deal with this type of skill will grow? Extensive learning of abstract information can also trigger some plastic changes in the brain. They imaged the brains of German medical students 3 months before their medical exam and right after the exam and compared them to brains of students who were not studying for exam at this time. Medical students’ brains showed learning-induced changes in regions of the parietal cortex as well as in the posterior hippocampus. These regions of the brains are known to be involved in memory retrieval and learning |
