Brain Research and Learning Theories

"New imaging studies are revealing—for the first time—patterns of brain development that extend into the teenage years. [These patterns] may parallel a pruning process that occurs early in life that appears to follow the principle of "use-it-or-lose-it:" neural connections, or synapses, that get exercised are retained, while those that don't are lost. While it's known that both genes and environment play major roles in shaping early brain development, science still has much to learn about the relative influence of experience versus genes on the later maturation of the brain..." -- NIH Publication No. 01-4929 Teenage Brain: A work in progress

Baby brains are hard-wired for math: Experiment indicates that infants notice seeming errors in subtraction, by Sara Goudarzi, LiveScience

Through monitoring the brains of infants, researchers confirmed that infants as early as 6 months in age can detect mathematical errors.  During the tests, the babies wore a special head net containing 128 sensors that monitored their brain activity. Analysis illustrated that babies have similar brain activity to that of adults when served with correct and incorrect mathematical solutions...
 

Brain May Still Be Evolving, Studies Hint by Nicholas Wade, New York Times

Two genes involved in determining the size of the human brain have undergone substantial evolution in the last 60,000 years, researchers say, leading to the surprising suggestion that the brain is still undergoing rapid evolution...
 

Brain's Left And Right Sides Work Together Better In Mathematically Gifted Youth Science Daily

A recent study of adolescents with above-average math abilities found the right and left halves of their brains are apparently better able to interact and share information than the brains of average students... Full research Interhemispheric Interaction During Global-Local Processing in Mathematically Gifted Adolescents, Average Ability Youth, and College Students  by Harman Singh and Michael W. O’Boyle (requires ^{Adobe Reader})
 

Brain Network Related To Intelligence Identified Science Daily

Researchers report that their new Parieto-Frontal Integration Theory (P-FIT) identifies a brain network related to intelligence, one that primarily involves areas in the frontal and the parietal lobes....
 

Brainteaser: Scientists dissect mystery of genius by Sanjay Gupta, CNN

...found a strong correlation between intelligence and the size and shape of certain brain structures -- including parts of the superior parietal lobe (involved in sensory perception) and parts of the prefrontal cortex (associated with complex thinking, personality, planning, coordination).  Intelligence research is full of surprises. For example, the brains of smarter people, as measured by IQ, tend to be less active but more efficient...
 

Cargo Cult Science by Nobel Laureate Richard Feynman, from Wikipedia

In his 1974 Caltech commencement address, Feynman gave us the test of "cargo cult science."  It would be wise to apply his test to all things masquerading as "research"...  "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself--and you are the easiest person to fool.
 

Cortex Matures Faster in Youth with Highest IQ in National Institutes of Health NIH News

Youth with superior IQ are distinguished by how fast the thinking part of their brains thickens and thins as they grow up, researchers at the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) have discovered. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans showed that their brain’s outer mantle, or cortex, thickens more rapidly during childhood, reaching its peak later than in their peers — perhaps reflecting a longer developmental window for high-level thinking circuitry...
 

How the Gifted Brain Learns by David Sousa

Dispelling the myths about the nature of giftedness with credible research, Sousa provides a greater understanding of the idiosyncrasies of gifted children, and the implications for teaching and parenting them...
 

Human intelligence determined by volume and location of gray matter tissue in brain in Today @ UCI

...UC Irvine College of Medicine researchers have found in the most comprehensive structural brain-scan study of intelligence to date.  The study also discovered that because these regions related to intelligence are located throughout the brain, a single “intelligence center,” such as the frontal lobe, is unlikely.
 

Incompetent People Really Have No Clue, Studies Find: They're blind to own failings, others' skills by Erica Goode, New York Times

According to research, most incompetent people do not know that they are incompetent.  On the contrary. People who do things badly, Dunning has found in studies conducted with a graduate student, Justin Kruger, are usually supremely confident of their abilities -- more confident, in fact, than people who do things well...  Original research paper: Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments by Justin Kruger and David Dunning, Cornell University (requires ^{Adobe Reader})
 

Intelligence in men and women is a gray and white matter Today@UCI

While there are essentially no disparities in general intelligence between the sexes, a UC Irvine study has found significant differences in brain areas where males and females manifest their intelligence.
 

The Origins and Ends of Giftedness by Ellen Winner

Five issues about giftedness are discussed with reference to gifted children (including child prodigies) and autistic/retarded savants. First, the origins and causes of giftedness are explored. The view that giftedness is entirely a product of training is critiqued, and it is argued that there is indirect evidence for atypical brain organization and innate talent in gifted children: many gifted children and savants have enhanced right-hemisphere development, concomitant language-related difficulties, and auto-immune disorders. Intense intrinsic motivation, particular social and emotional difficulties, evidence for the often uneven cognitive profiles of such children, and the tenuous relationship between childhood giftedness and "big-C," or "domain" creativity in adulthood is discussed... (requires ^{Adobe Reader})
 

Recent Brain Research for Teachers & Other Curious Souls by Wenda Sheard

After a background in critiquing research, learn about dozens of recent research studies of the brain, and what they show. This presentation includes a section about Multiple Intelligence Theory and what's its proponent, Howard Gardner, has said in recent years in light of current brain research...  (PowerPoint presentation, click to download viewer)
 

Scans suggest IQ scores reflect brain structure in Nature.com (no longer available free, but for a small charge)

When the researchers split the children into three groups according to their initial IQ scores, they noticed a characteristic pattern of changes in the brains of the group with the highest scores. The thickness of the cortex — the outer layer of the brain that controls high-level functions such as memory — started off thinner than that of the other groups, but rapidly gained depth until it was thicker than normal during the early teens...
 

Teenage Brain: A work in progress by National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH)

A brief overview of research into brain development during adolescence.  ...NIMH's Dr. Judith Rapoport and colleagues were surprised to discover a second wave of overproduction of gray matter, the thinking part of the brain—neurons and their branch-like extensions—just prior to puberty...
Also read Imaging Study Shows Brain Maturing and view the time-lapse 3-D movie that compresses 15 years of human brain maturation, ages 5 to 20, and A Work in Progress: The Teen Brain in Harvard Magazine

Last updated June 05, 2009