Neuroplasticity – the ability of our brain to rewire itself

Neuroplasticity is the ability of brain to adapt itself. When we change our learning habits we rewire the brain. Some students want to know more about the ability of the brain to rewire. Below is an-depth discussion of the subject.

Question:

How can anyone “rewire” his/hers brain?

Answer:

Scientists call this ability neuroplasticity.  Scientists have historically believed that once a person reaches adulthood, their cognitive abilities are immutable. But beginning in the early twentieth century, that theory has been contested by evidence suggesting that the brain’s abilities are in fact malleable and plastic. According to this principle of neuroplasticity, the brain is constantly changing in response to various experiences. New behaviours, new learnings, and even environmental changes or physical injuries may all stimulate the brain to create new neural pathways or reorganize existing ones, fundamentally altering how information is processed.

Neuroplasticity occurs on a variety of levels, ranging from cellular changes due to learning, to large-scale changes involved in cortical remapping in response to injury. The role of neuroplasticity is widely recognized in healthy development, learning, memory, and recovery from brain damage. One of the fundamental principles of how neuroplasticity functions is linked to the concept of synaptic pruning, the idea that individual connections within the brain are constantly being removed or recreated, largely dependent upon how they are used. This concept is captured in the aphorism, “neurons that fire together, wire together”/”neurons that fire apart, wire apart.” If there are two nearby neurons that often produce an impulse simultaneously, their cortical maps may become one. This idea also works in the opposite way, i.e. that neurons which do not regularly produce simultaneous impulses will form different maps.

In fact I had some personal encounters with neuroplasticity when I saw Anna teaching people with various head traumas from car accidents to cancer.  These people came to Anna with little hope left, when they have been discourage they will ever function again. Lesson by lesson Anna taught them new ways to do things, to utilize their brain differently, to the point that I was amazed with their abilities. One of her students suffered from sever dyslexia: at the beginning of the course his speed was 20% and understanding 10% . The course was a long and hard one. After 3 months hew was reading 1200 words per minute with 95% understanding!