Ever wondered what exactly is going on in the brain when you’re learning to do something?
We’ve known for some time that learning something new can strengthen the brain in adults. And, the brains of young children seem to absorb new learning like a sponge.
Why is that?
Well, researchers have recently revealed an interesting twist on what we thought we knew about how people learn.
Scott Grafton, MD and a team of researchers at UCSB’s Brain Imaging Center wanted to see exactly which parts of the brain were impacted most by new learning.
Researchers took healthy participants and had them learn a simple game that involved repeating a sequence of color-coded notes.
Participants were hooked up to fMRIs while playing the game, so that their neural activity could be tracked.
Researchers monitored participants remotely at their homes as they practiced the game and then brought them back to the Center for 2-, 4-, and 6-week follow-up fMRIs to measure brain activity as learning progressed.
By comparing activation patterns in the 112 different regions of the brain, researchers were able to determine the level to which each region interacted with the others.
They then compared the neural activity of participants who were learning the game quicker vs. those who were learning slower.
At first glance, what they found seems counterintuitive.
The participants who learned fastest were the ones who were able to shut off the frontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex. These are areas of the brain associated with cognitive function, but which weren’t required for the task being learned.
These results seem to suggest that people who “overthink” or overly rely on the cognitive parts of their brain could be at a disadvantage when learning something that doesn’t explicitly require these neural regions.
Parts of the cortex are the last brain regions to develop in humans, which may also explain why children can more easily learn new things compared to adults.
This is the first study of its kind, so much more follow-up will be needed.
However, the implications from this study highlight the importance of keeping up-to-date on the latest brain science research. It seems that the more we discover about the brain and how it works, the more we realize how much is yet to be discovered.
And in our Practical Brain Science series, we’re talking about ways that brain science can inform our interventions with patients – click here to sign up.
How have you best encouraged new learning for your patients or yourself? Please leave a comment below.
wow, you made learning such an easy concept. love your website.
Most people overthink tasks to avoid them. Confronting this is key.
If I understand the information I just read, seems if we can turn it into a game we will retain the information effectively.
Reading such amazing post 1st time, quite surprising for me to know such facts. Thanks for Sharing
As a Business Student, it is important for me to read such useful informative post to re-polish my skills and metal power.
The way you explaining things here, is awesome, thanks for sharing such an informative post.
This is best post for people who have memory issue.
Awesome information about Brain, thanks for sharing good stuff
I really like the way he explained brain. Thanks for your awesome share
I liked this line too much “The more we discover about the brain and how it works, the more we realize how much is yet to be discovered”
keep sharing keep smiling
Thanks a lot
New learning seems to require constant reminding. So staying focussed on what it is that we want to change and to use physical (sticky notes) as well as mental (Mantra’s) reminders seems to work well.
I try to teach one phrase per session – that what stands out for the patient at the end of the session. I let them write it down and encourage reminding themselves of what they have learned in the session by repeating this phrase during the week.
I often hear that they hear my voice in their heads during the week.
Dear Ruth,
We are all born with certain limited potential and capabilities. Though the control button is in our individual hand but we, like our monkey ancestors, perform and practice under the conditions that we are born in and then how we are encouraged, empowered, trained, and allowed to practice our brain, limits our individual freedom and choices that can harm or benefit the civil society. The real individual brain. How does one enjoy and adjust under such conditions is one’s own choice, the only choice an individual has to perform in one’s own national system that make us monkeys and copy-cat. But there are only few real free of the free and the greatest of the great who are not afraid and continue to delivering the best of best and beyond in a civil way and means, till the ultimate comes. One may call life and living a wonderful world or dream. The real great, live their real dream in a realistic way and continue to live in a real world in a realistic way not in an imagined hyped way. This, I think and believe, is the real grace of God or Nature for both the believers and the non-believers, the inclusive, responsible, transparent, and controllable and considerate way. May God’s/Nature’s grace be always with us to grow in a common way at least? Otherwise there is another way. I hope you and others guessed it right. My way or the highway! Thanks
This does not surprise me, although I am happy to see it put into scientific terms with the research to back it up. Shutting off the frontal cortex is what we do when we clear ourselves, as in meditation. Many types of meditation work, be it sitting still and detaching from each thought as it arises, or playing music or dancing, or other countless options.
LOVE THIS!!!
Actually, far from counter-intuitive, this makes total sense if you visualize “filing,” either by hand or how a computer functions. The more files you have, the longer it takes to find a specific one, or to file a new one. The same with a hard drive; the more data stored, the more it “looks through” other pieces before storing.
To compartmentalize the learning function process speeds up filing. Then later on, during usage and integration, we open the gates, as it’s no longer “time critical” as learning is perceived.
The more we learn about the brain, the more we have access to the mechanisms of transformation and behavior. I can honestly say I’m deeply in love with this work! 🙂
Wonder what the implications of this are on the brain during trauma, since frontal cortex goes offine…
I wonder whether the key to understanding the essence of this is in the line: when learning something that doesn’t explicitly require these neural regions. There are further considerations implicated in this reservation. The nature of the task or material stimulating the LTP and memory determines in that particular individual what extent of frontal cortex, cerebellar, limbic involvements are necessary. Moreover, as the desire, motivation for perfection and mastery of task and skill increases the conscious cortical interaction with the unconscious cerebellar and limbic systems also increases as with a dancing partner’s lead and alternation of roles. It seems to me that those tasks with more motorial and repetitive demands take less front, higher and more rear, lower brain function.
Agree with umpire qualifications. This made me think of athletes and that having to think about new skill or technique hurts performance. On the other hand, having a strategic approach (PFC/ACC) to new learning of conceptual and fact based information is necessary.
I was also wondering if the PFC and ACC regions in RH/LH were activated differently.
*umpire? thought I typed “your”
And the mind is so busy over thinking there is no opening to learn new things
San
If I understand the information I just read, seems if we can turn it into a game we will retain the information effectively.
Really interesting! I’ve often been told I have a mind that overly elaborates anything presented to me – and I’ve always had trouble learning and remembering!
How interesting! I recently tested for licensure as a Unity teacher. We were sent a Study Guide two months in advance with the advice that if we learn the information in the guide completely, we will have no problem with the written segment of the test.
I read the guide over and over and nothing seemed to be “sticking.” I felt guided to create Self-Test Quizes with fill-in-the-blanks and matching questions and answers. It became like a game to me; it added an element of fun and instant gratification when I knew the correct answer. If I didn’t know the answer, I would refer back to the Study Guide and retest again later.
I recently watched a video provided by an interfaith ministry program I am enrolled in which defined learning best achieved through shorter periods of time spent in learning with frequent repetition until the information is retained. That’s what the Self-Test Quizes provided for me. By the way, I got 100% on my exam.
Thank you, Ruth, for all the valuable information you share with us through these webinars. I appreciate it very much.
this is good news, for so long we have dismissed learning in any other way but what we have been told is the “right” way…Ignoring those who learn by watching rather than reading, those who learn by doing and therefore having to figure out through their own processes rather than follow instruction….people paint, knit, cook, play music etc without having a lesson…lessons are better after the individual has learned from their own resource
A very good question San. Perhaps we can all have fun learning how and when together.
I’ll sleep on that.
Perhaps we learn more by simply being attentive or present. Thinking while learning might simply add “static” to the input of sensory and somatic experience. Perhaps the the frontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex “learns” through later interaction with lower receptive regions of the brain. Perhaps cognitive understanding and what we might call ego functions develop at night or over time.
I surmise that this possibility is being explored.
Maybe they should hook up participants to fMRIs while sleeping. As sleeping on problems- people do find solutions in the morning. This might give insight which parts are being activated and or inhibited. San
Glenn, This makes so much sense to me! Athletes who are in “flow” later report that their perception of time and speed changed. Being fully present to the information, without the distraction of the Managing Mind, which is worried about details, may allow information to be encoded more directly.
I wonder about the type of information and needed output though.
hi,
Thank you- so how does one shut off the frontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex at will.
Regards. San
Thats a good question!
Meditation, practiced over time, will give you the effect you are looking for. Anything we practice over time with passion and focus can accomplish this same effect. It is a process of re-training the brain. Yoga, Qigong, Playing Music or many many other types of meditative activities, practiced regularly, can train the brain to quiet the frontal cortex. In my energy therapy that I practice, I often tell clients that 90% of what we think is not ours… and I believe these thoughts that are actually programs from media, social norms, family lineage, expectations, etc, can be transcended as we learn to access the very quiet still small voice of the heart.
Music! decades ago the eastern block countries (several) were doing landmark studies on this subject. By allowing students to sit ot repose in comfortable settings etc, and playing music ( in this study- classical to a 4/4 beat) the most profound results were found and re- tested for authenticity.
As these studies were not being done in an “approved’ country, no media attention was given to the results. I’m absolutely certain if this had been done in Canada, the US, Uk, or even AUstralia or Japan, a great many more folks would have become aware of these findings.