The most recent issue of The Prospect, a magazine that is the U.K. equivalent to, say, The Atlantic or Harper's contains an article concerning some recent developments in neuroscience and learning, by a guy named Tom Chatfield. Interesting, especially on the issue of the effects of electronic media on the development of cognition.
A literate brain is different, structurally, to an illiterate one. How these differences arise is almost impossible to trace during childhood, when the brain is changing for all manner of reasons. But experiments comparing literate and illiterate adults show a link with the size of the angular gyrus, an area of the brain associated with language, as well as different and more intense patterns of mental activity elsewhere.
We have long accepted literacy as a fundamental building-block of civilisation. Today, however, neurologists face related questions which are deeply troubling to many observers: if literacy changes our brains, what will a digitally literate brain (one shaped by interactions with digital media such as computers and videogames) look like—and what could this mean for the way we learn?The evidence is thin, especially on the question of whether a childhood “screen culture” is developmentally damaging. Yet tantalising neurological research is beginning to emerge that uses interactive media to give us a more precise understanding of the workings of the brain and, in particular, the mechanisms underpinning memory, learning and motivation.
The NeuroEducational research network, headed by neuropsychologist Paul Howard-Jones at Bristol University, is at the forefront of this work.
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8 comments:
Still seems far-fetched -- almost Lemarckian. Perhaps one buys into "tantalising neurological research" that is merely "beginning to emerge" because it reenforces one's preconceptions? (I'll plead guilty to this if you will.)
The idea deserves more than name-calling....
Note that the article attributes nothing but good to the change and that Amis's remarks, which you were quick to criticise, are totally value-free.
These are ideas that are taken somewhat seriously in circles that do not traffic in pseudo-science. Amis, for all his manifest flaws, is fairly careful in his words.
Pointing out that one was skeptical just a few days ago of the implications of certain other neurological findings. Indeed of neuroscience in general as "reductive." Wondering what's changed.
The difference between this:
"What if an excess in the mirror neuron area (or a defect in the "special inhibitory mechanisms" we need to "keep our mirror neurons under control") could help account for the exceedingly fine grained imitative ability of a great actor, or of a writer whose dialog is uncannily authentic, or of a draughtsman who with a single pencil stroke can evoke the shape of a tree branch or the curve of a woman's hip?"
and the simple hypothesis that using the brain in different ways results in different structures?
Can't imagine the reasons for different reactions either... Puzzling...
The experiments described in the article are interesting -- though I would have like to read what they are doing regarding control groups in order to test their hypotheses.
Naturally, any applications of neuroscience have potential moral implications. If one learns how to manipulate the receptors in the brain to learn a certain way, one can use that method to educate people to particular ends...etc.
Essentially reacting to the stuff by spinning a metaphor. You read fiction and this sort of thing offends you? Sneer at this.
Besides. "People who aren't literate have different shaped brains." Nothing inimical being winked at there. God, no.
Just to be clear: Partly my skepticism stems from the perhaps outmoded image of the brain as a fleshy motherboard. Runs counter to our expectations that the circuits would change shape because different information is being stored.
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