In developmental psychology they have been saying for years that as we
get older it becomes more easy to slip into old ways and rigid habit
patterns that require little processing; set in our ways. If this goes
to far it becomes hard to learn new things or "styles of learning".
Other biologists and psychologists that study aging notice that old
folks who challenge themselves with new things and subjects, physical
or mental, have much healthier brains. New connections are probably
the key here.
To a child, everything is "new" and "undiscovered," that first time
revelation and all that. Old timers who can "be thee as little
children" so to speak actually have been shown to grow "new" nerve
cells in certain regions of the brain.
In the book, link below the author says something like;
A User's Guide to the Brain: Perception,
Attention, and the Four Theaters of the Brain
by John J. Ratey
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0375701079/
when we learn a new skill, activity picks up in the outer part of the
brain (cerebrium). in the regions spread out in a network of nodes
there was detected an increase in connection concentration or more or
less a small growth or even micro lump. this would grow as long as
learning took place then it would magically start to disapear but the
skill remained, it migrated to the cerebellum, and becomes a set
style, like never forgetting how to ride a bike.
"an idle mind is the devil's plaything,"
...nuns doggedly challenge themselves
with vocabulary quizzes, puzzles,
and debates about health care.
...Sister Mary Esther Boor
still worked the front
desk at ninety-nine.
THE NUNS OF MANKATO
The brain's plasticity not only helps with recovery but may actually
play a role in preventing brain disease. For evidence, just visit the
School Sisters of Notre Dame nunnery in remote Mankato, Minnesota.
Many are older than ninety, and a surprising number reach one hundred;
on average they live much longer than the general public. They also
suffer far fewer, and milder, cases of dementia, Alzheimer's, and
other brain diseases. David Snowdon, the University of Kentucky
professor who has been studying them for years, thinks he knows why.
Spurred on by their belief that "an idle mind is the devil's
plaything," the nuns doggedly challenge themselves with vocabulary
quizzes, puzzles, and debates about health care. They hold current-
events seminars every week, and write often in their journals. Sister
Marcella Zachman, featured in Life magazine in 1994, didn't stop
teaching at the nunnery until she was ninety-seven. Sister Mary Esther
Boor, also pictured in Life, still worked the front desk at ninety-
nine. Snowdon, who has examined more than 100 brains donated at death
by nuns in Mankato and other School Sisters locations across the
nation, maintains that the axons and dendrites that usually shrink
with age branch out and make new connections if there is enough
intellectual stimulation, providing a bigger backup system if some
pathways fail.
Snowdon has found that the nuns who earned college degrees, taught
school, and constantly challenged their minds into old age lived
longer and resisted Alzheimer's disease better than the nuns who had
lower levels of formal education and spent most of their time cleaning
rooms and preparing food. Snowdon's conclusion, and that of other
scientists who have studied aging and the brain, is that any
intellectually challenging activity stimulates dendritic growth, which
adds to the neural connections in the brain. The more mentally
challenged sisters have more neural connections, which allows them to
reroute messages when the brain is damaged by stroke or disease,
counteracting the debilitating effects on the brain and thus keeping
them healthier and more active for more years. Given that the sisters
have led otherwise similar lives in the same environment for decades
minimizes the influence of any other factor.
The hypothesis that more academic challenge leads to a more flexible
brain in old age is supported by gerontologist Denis Evans, who
studied elderly residents in the working-class community of East
Boston, Massachusetts. He gave them a series of memory and mental
status tests, and repeated the testing three years later. Residents
who had fewer years of formal education consistently showed a greater
decline in test scores, independent of age, birthplace, occupation,
income, or native language.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00005QGE4/103-9631906-9263046?v=glance&vi...
-----------------------------
...we're already quite aware of a number of strategies that can
improve the way we use our brains. Thanks, in part, to George Bush's
presidential proclamation that the 1990's be designated 'The Decade Of
The Brain', scientists have been hard at work, using increasingly
powerful new technologies to examine brains. One of the most
interesting magazine articles I've read, 'Building A Better Brain' by
Daniel Golden, appeared as the cover story of the July 1994 issue of
Life magazine. The article covers a wide range of brain-related
topics, but one of its most fascinating stories concerned the School
Sisters of Notre Dame, whose headquarters is in Mankato, Minnesota.
The nearly 700 sisters in this order of nuns are the largest group of
brain donors in the world, and researchers are fascinated both by
their longevity and by their apparent resistance to the normal brain
problems common to the general population.
The article goes on to suggest that, because these nuns live
purposefully intellectually challenging lives, their brains display a
remarkable ability to continue growing stronger -- even when they're
in their 90's. The key to their success is what I like to call 'The
Dendrite Story', and it has huge implications to how we use our brains
-- in our personal lives, in the workplace and in the classroom.
The human brain is made up of between 10 and 15 billion brain cells,
called neurons. As the article explains: 'Each neuron contains at one
end threadlike appendages called axons, which send signals to other
nearby neurons. At the other end of the neuron are similar threadlike
appendages called dendrites, which receive messages from nearby
cells'.
Experiments have shown that increased intellectual activity, at any
age, induces the neurons to branch out 'like the roots of a growing
tree'. As each cell grows larger branches, improved communication
among them increases, leading to the brain's superior ability to
perform tasks and even modify its behaviour when confronted with dead
ends.
The Sisters of Mankato work at staying mentally active -- by working
at intellectually challenging jobs far past the normal retirement age
of 65, learning new vocabulary, playing card games and puzzles -- and
continue to grow dendrite branches well into old age. Here's an
example of what different brain cells can look like:
http://www.brainspeaker.com/book_sample.html
-----
...does being reared in an enriched environment translate into a
behavioral advantage? The answer to this question may be found in a
convent in Mankato, Minnesota. The now famous Sisters of Mankato
constitute a remarkable field study with far-reaching implications.
Some of the nuns living in the convent have chosen to challenge their
minds even as they grow old. These nuns earn college degrees, teach,
hold current-events seminars, play Jeopardy, and work brainteasers.
What is startling is that the nuns who have chosen this lifestyle are
living longer and do not appear to be as susceptible to
neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, when compared
to the general population. An exciting aspect of this field study is
that the nuns of Mankato have donated their brains to neuroscience.
David Snowden of the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging at the University
of Kentucky will be examining their brains in ways very similar to
those methods used in the enriched environment studies with rats. He
expects to show that these nuns have significantly more cortex,
dendritic branching, and synapses than their counterparts who have not
engaged in the brain exercises. Moreover, he expects to show the
"active" nuns recover better from strokes or other types of brain
trauma. This result would be similar to the findings that "enriched"
rats with cortical lesions show an acceleration of recovery from
either cognitive or sensorimotor deficits when compared to their
counterparts who lived in more standard housing conditions (Dalyrymple-
Alford & Kelche, 1987; Einon, Morgan, & Will, 1980; Gentile, Behshti,
& Held, 1987; Held, Gordon, & Gentile, 1985; Hughes, 1965;).
http://teachpsych.lemoyne.edu/teachpsych/faces/script/Ch04.htm
