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How Thinking Can Change the Brain
I thought it was, I don't know, karma-like to have stumbled upon this article after having posted yesterday about an internalization process I think many of us go through when we write. And how, during the cycle of knowledge acquisition-reflection-comprehension-reflection..., and so on, I believe we end up internalizing the stuff about which we write; how the theories we espouse and the positions we take add to the sum of what we are, ultimately shaping the goggles through which we see the world.
So when I came across the article above suggesting a relationship between the things we think and the shaping of the brain, I thought it was opportune to say the least. Here are the highlights:
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Through attention we choose and sculpt how our ever-changing minds will work, we choose who we will be the next moment in a very real sense...
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In the last decade of the 20th century, neuroscientists overthrew the dogma that the adult brain can't change. To the contrary, its structure and activity can morph in response to experience, an ability called neuroplasticity. The discovery has led to promising new treatments for children with dyslexia and for stroke patients, among others.
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But the brain changes that were discovered in the first rounds of the neuroplasticity revolution reflected input from the outside world. For instance, certain synthesized speech can alter (a part of the brain) of dyslexic kids in a way that lets their brains hear previously garbled syllables; intensely practiced movements can alter the motor cortex of stroke patients and allow them to move once paralyzed arms or legs.
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At the University of Toronto, Dr. Mayberg, Zindel Segal and their colleagues first used brain imaging to measure activity in the brains of depressed adults. Some of these volunteers then received...(the generic name of the antidepressant Paxil), while others underwent 15 to 20 sessions of cognitive-behavior therapy, learning...to break their habit of interpreting every little setback as a calamity....
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All the patients' depression lifted, regardless of whether their brains were infused with a powerful drug or with a different way of thinking. Yet the only "drugs" that the cognitive-therapy group received were their own thoughts.
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The scientists scanned their patients' brains again, expecting that the changes would be the same no matter which treatment they received, as Dr. Mayberg had found in her placebo study. But no. "We were totally dead wrong," she says.
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Cognitive-behavior therapy muted overactivity in the frontal cortex, the seat of reasoning, logic, analysis and higher thought. The antidepressant raised activity there.
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Cognitive-behavior therapy raised activity in the limbic system, the brain's emotion center. The drug lowered activity there.
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With cognitive therapy, says Dr. Mayberg, the brain is rewired "to adopt different thinking circuits."
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Through attention, UCSF's Michael Merzenich and a colleague wrote, "We choose and sculpt how our ever-changing minds will work, we choose who we will be the next moment in a very real sense, and these choices are left embossed in physical form on our material selves."
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The discovery that neuroplasticity cannot occur without attention has important implications. If a skill becomes so routine you can do it on autopilot, practicing it will no longer change the brain. And if you take up mental exercises to keep your brain young, they will not be as effective if you become able to do them without paying much attention.
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