Adult Brains Grow From Specialist Use

Xemu writes "Researchers at University College of London's Institute of Neurology have discovered that taxi drivers grow more brain cells in the area associated with memory. Dr Eleanor Maguire says, 'We believe the brain increased in gray matter volume because of the huge amount of data memorized.' She warns against the use of GPS and says it will possibly affect the brain changes seen in this study. This research is the first to show that the brains of adults can grow in response to specialist use." London cabbies, unlike their American counterparts, have to learn the layout of streets and the locations of thousands of places of interest in order to get a license.

Comments

Does this mean...

[Kiba Ruby]

Does this mean that programmers are more logical than people?

Plato/Socrates said that about writing too...

[KarmaRundi]

"Soc. At the Egyptian city of Naucratis, there was a famous old god, whose name was Theuth; the bird which is called the Ibis is sacred to him, and he was the inventor of many arts, such as arithmetic and calculation and geometry and astronomy and draughts and dice, but his great discovery was the use of letters. Now in those days the god Thamus was the king of the whole country of Egypt; and he dwelt in that great city of Upper Egypt which the Hellenes call Egyptian Thebes, and the god himself is called by them Ammon. To him came Theuth and showed his inventions, desiring that the other Egyptians might be allowed to have the benefit of them; he enumerated them, and Thamus enquired about their several uses, and praised some of them and censured others, as he approved or disapproved of them. It would take a long time to repeat all that Thamus said to Theuth in praise or blame of the various arts. But when they came to letters, This, said Theuth, will make the Egyptians wiser and give them better memories; it is a specific both for the memory and for the wit. Thamus replied: O most ingenious Theuth, the parent or inventor of an art is not always the best judge of the utility or inutility of his own inventions to the users of them. And in this instance, you who are the father of letters, from a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a quality which they cannot have; for this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners' souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, and you give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality." Translation nabbed from here

Bet he would have hated Google. All we have to remember now is how to use it and a few key words.

Re:Cause or Effect?

[slamb]

EmbeddedJanitor asked

Do taxi drivers' brains expand to provide more memory, or do people with poor memory just forget to become taxi drivers? A huge problem with any of these correlation studies is determining, accurately, which way the cause->effect relationship runs.

A good question, but RTFA:

Dr Maguire said: "We are now looking at the brains of taxi-drivers before they start training, and at those of retired cabbies to see whether that area of the brain gets smaller when it is not used."

Hopefully they'll actually follow the pre-training drivers through all the way through training so they don't compare future wash-outs with present successful cabbies rather than future successful cabbies with present successful cabbies. If so, it should go a long way toward answering your question.

The ultimate would be to compare the same population of cabbies vs. bus drivers (control group) through their entire careers. Obviously that'd be a long-term study, and it will become impossible when "the Knowledge" is obsoleted by GPS mapping software. (I say "when" rather than "if". It will happen sooner or later.)

Re:Cause or Effect?

[dirgotronix]

I'm a cabbie.

I was in a motorcycle accident in 2001 which caused serious short-term memory issues in my brain. I started driving a cab in february of 2006, and I have noticed an increase in my short term memory.

When I first started, I would have to ask my passengers to give me directions one turn at a time (and in my mind, I was repeating that single direction) in order to get to the destination. Now, I can generally get anywhere on address alone, or, at a minimum, remember the address all the way through the trip, despite having various conversations, remembering turn by turn directions, avoiding accidents, etc.

I'd say I agree with the studies, from personal experience.