Plasticity and functional recovery of the brain -A-Level Psychology

Plasticity-the brain’s tendency to change and adapt as a result of new experiences and learning.

Functional Recovery-a form of plasticity following damage through trauma,the brain has the ability to redistribute or transfer functions from a damaged to an undamaged part of the brain.
Synaptic pruning-when a weakened synapse dies once information is learnt,more often used synapses strengthen.

Brain Plasticity:

-Gopnik et al-during infancy the number of synaptic connections peak at 150000 at the age of 2-3 years.-As we age synaptic pruning occurs as rarely used connections are deleted and frequently used connections are strengthened.
-Research has suggested that at any time in life existing neural connections can change or new neural connections can be formed ,as a result of learning and experience(plasticity)

Research into plasticity:Eleanor Maguire et al (2000):

She studied the brains of London taxi drivers through MRI scans and found more grey matter in the posterior hippocampus than in a matched control group.This part of the brain is associated with the development of spatial and navigational skills.As part of their training they have to pass a knowledge test which assesses their recall of the city and routes.Those who had been in the job longer had a more pronounced structural difference.

Positives-

-Use of control group

-The MRI scans provided scientific proof

Negatives-

-Some taxi drivers may have had existing differences which allowed them to pass the test for example IQ

Functional recovery of the brain after trauma:

Unaffected areas of the brain are able to adapt and compensate for those areas that are damaged.

Spontaneous recovery- happens quickly after trauma and then slows down after several weeks.Then rehabilitative therapy may be required.

During brain recovery these can happen:

1)axonal sprouting which is the growth of new nerve endings which connect with other undamaged  nerve cells to produce new neural pathways.

2)reformation of blood vessels

3)recruitment of homologous areas to the opposite side of the brain to perform specific functions

Evaluation:

Practical application-the understanding of brain plasticity has contributed to the field of neurorehabilitation e.g movement therapy,electrical stimulation as spontaneous recovery tends to slow down after a few weeks.This shows that even though the brain has the ability to heal itself to a certain point further intervention is also required for it to be completely successful..

Negative plasticity-prolonged drug use leads to poorer cognitive functioning as well as increased risk of dementia later in life(Medina et al 2007).60-80% of amputees develop phantom limb syndrome where they feel the missing limb as if it was there.This is thought to be due to cortical reorganization in the somatosensory cortex.

Age and plasticity-functional plasticity decreases with age.Ladina Bezzola et al(2012) provided 40 hours of golf training to 40-60 year olds.Using fMRI the researchers observed reduced motor cortex activity in the novice golfers compared to a control group,suggesting more efficient neural representations after training.This shows that neural plasticity does continue throughout the lifespan.

The concept of cognitive reserve-Eric schneider et al(2014) discovered that the more time brain injury patients had spent in education,the greater their chance of disability free recovery was.This suggested that educational attainment may influence how well the brain adapts after injury.