Neuroscience is at a historic turning point. Today, a full decade after the “Decade of the Brain,” a continuous stream of advances is shattering long-held notions about how the human brain works and what happens when it doesn’t. These advances are also reshaping the landscapes of other fields, from psychology to economics, education and the law.

Until the Decade of the Brain, scientists believed that, once development was over, the adult brain underwent very few changes. This perception contributed to polarizing perspectives on whether genetics or environment determines a person’s temperament and personality, aptitudes, and vulnerability to mental disorders. But during the past two decades, neuroscientists have steadily built the case that the human brain, even when fully mature, is far more plastic—changing and malleable—than we originally thought.1 It turns out that the brain (at all ages) is highly responsive to environmental stimuli and that connections between neurons are dynamic and can rapidly change within minutes of stimulation.

Neuroplasticity is modulated in part by genetic factors and in part by dynamic, epigenetic changes that influence the expression of genes without changing the DNA sequence. Epigenetic processes are of particular clinical interest because their external triggers (such as early parental care, diet, drug abuse and stress) can affect a person’s vulnerability to many diseases, including psychiatric disorders. In addition, in contrast to genetic sequence differences, epigenetic alterations are potentially reversible, and thus amenable to public health policy interventions.

It also has become increasingly clear that the human brain is particularly sensitive to social stimuli, which likely has accelerated the rate of human brain evolution. Humans have evolved a complex neuronal circuitry in large areas in the brain to process complex social information (such as predicting others’ reactions and emotions) and to respond appropriately. New research has revealed that social stimuli (such as parenting style and early-life stress) can epigenetically modify the expression of genes that influence brain morphology and function including the sensitivity of an individual to stressful stimuli.2 In the future, this knowledge will enable us to tailor personalized prevention interventions that are based on information on how genetics and epigenetics affect brain function and behavior. For example, a recent study showed that a prevention intervention based on improving parenting style reduced the risk for substance use disorders only in adolescents with a particular variant of a gene that recycles the chemical serotonin back into the neurons, which is a variant that results in greater sensitivity to social adversity.3

In the coming decade, insights about what underlies neuroplasticity, combined with technological advances that allow us to “see” with greater precision the human brain in action, are bound to revolutionize the way we view learning and the methods we use to educate young people. New research will also show us how to help people overcome or compensate for many of the deficits associated with drug abuse, addiction and other mental disorders.4

For example, scientists are using imaging technologies in neurofeedback programs that train people to voluntarily recalibrate their neural activity in specific areas of the brain, allowing them to gain unprecedented control over, for example, pain perception5 or emotional processing.6 During drug addiction treatment, this approach could greatly reduce the risk of relapse by enabling a patient to control the powerful cravings triggered by a host of cues (e.g., people, things, places) that have become tightly linked, in the brain of the user, to the drug experience.

Other promising advances stem from ongoing research and development of direct communication pathways between a brain and external computer devices, the so called brain-computer interfaces (BCI). In a recent study, one version of BCI appeared to help paralyzed stroke victims regain some movement control.7 In the next decade, forms of BCI might help people with a variety of neuropsychiatric conditions that have proved resistant to traditional treatments. For example, early evidence suggests that BCI training could benefit patients with epilepsy or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) that is unresponsive to drugs.8

As we build on these rapid advances in neuroscience research, we must keep a watchful eye on their vast social and political implications. For example, neurologists have started to uncover the molecular components and neural circuitry that underlie the learning process.9 We also are learning how to use transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), a noninvasive method to modulate the activity within a neural circuit, more effectively.10 Should we use this knowledge to better educate young people and teach new skills to seniors, or should we use these tools only to treat people with neuropsychiatric disorders? As we begin to understand how parenting styles affect the development and function of the brain, how far should we go to protect children from the long-term and deleterious effects of bad parenting?

Recent progress in brain research and associated fields has been impressive, and we are sure to witness further acceleration in the pace of neuroscientific discovery in the next couple of decades. Indeed, we are entering a new era in which our technologies are beginning to affect our lives in profound ways. We are bound to recast our relationship with our brains and, in the process, to redraw the boundaries of human evolution.

(Note: references are available below)

Nora D. Volkow, M.D., became director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) in May 2003. Her work has been instrumental in demonstrating that drug addiction is a disease of the human brain. As a research psychiatrist and scientist, Dr. Volkow pioneered the use of brain imaging to investigate the toxic effects of drugs and their addictive properties. She also has made important contributions to the neurobiology of obesity, ADHD, and the behavioral changes that occur with aging. Article is republished with permission from the Dana Foundation.

‘A Decade after The Decade of the Brain’ series, at Cerebrum

Thursday, Feb. 18: Nora D. Volkow, M.D., National Institute on Drug Abuse

Friday, Feb. 19: Thomas R. Insel, M.D., National Institute of Mental Health

Monday, Feb. 22: Story Landis, Ph.D., National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke

Tuesday, Feb. 23: Kenneth R. Warren, Ph.D., National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Wednesday, Feb. 24: Paul A. Sieving, M.D., Ph.D., National Eye Institute

Thursday, Feb. 25: James F. Battey Jr., M.D., Ph.D., National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders

Friday, Feb. 26: Richard J. Hodes, M.D., National Institute on Aging

References

1.  A. Holtmaat and K. Svoboda, “Experience-Dependent Structural Synaptic Plasticity in the Mammalian Brain,” Nature Reviews Neuroscience 10, no. 9 (2009): 647–658; M. Butz, F. Worgotter, and A. van Ooyen, “Activity-Dependent Structural Plasticity,” Brain Research Reviews 60, no. 2 (2009): 287–305.

2. I. C. Weaver, N. Cervoni, F. A. Champagne, A. C. D’Alessio, S. Sharma, J. R. Seckl, S. Dymov, M. Szyf, and M. J. Meaney, “Epigenetic Programming by Maternal Behavior,” Nature Neuroscience 7, no. 8 (2004): 847–854.

3. G. H. Brody, S. R. Beach, R. A. Philibert, Y. F. Chen, M. K. Lei, V. M. Murry, and A. C. Brown, “Parenting Moderates a Genetic Vulnerability Factor in Longitudinal Increases in Youths’ Substance Use,” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 77, no. 1 (2009): 1–11.

4. N. D. Volkow, L. Chang, G. J. Wang, J. S. Fowler, D. Franceschi, M. Sedler, S. J. Gatley, E. Miller, R. Hitzemann, Y. S. Ding, and J. Logan, “Loss of Dopamine Transporters in Methamphetamine Abusers Recovers with Protracted Abstinence,” Journal of Neuroscience 21, no. 23 (2001): 9414–9418.

5. R. C. deCharms, F. Maeda, G. H. Glover, D. Ludlow, J. M. Pauly, D. Soneji, J. D. Gabrieli, and S. C. Mackey, “Control over Brain Activation and Pain Learned by Using Real-time Functional MRI,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 102, no. 51 (2005): 18626–18631; S. J. Johnston, S. G. Boehm, D. Healy, R. Goebel, and D. E. Linden, “Neurofeedback: A Promising Tool for the Self-regulation of Emotion Networks,” Neuroimage 49, no. 1 (2009): 1066–1072.

6. S. Johnston, S. Boehm, D. Healy, R. Goebel, and D. Linden, “Neurofeedback: A promising tool for the self-regulation of emotion networks,” Neuroimage 49 (2009):1066–1072.

7. E. Buch, C. Weber, L. G. Cohen, C. Braun, M. A. Dimyan, T. Ard, J. Mellinger, A. Caria, S. Soekadar, A. Fourkas, and N. Birbaumer, “Think to Move: a Neuromagnetic Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) System for Chronic Stroke,” Stroke 39, no. 3 (2008): 910–917.

8. N. Birbaumer, A. Ramos Murguialday, C. Weber, and P. Montoya, “Neurofeedback and Brain-Computer Interface Clinical Applications,” International Review of Neurobiology 86 (2009): 107–117.

9. C. A. Miller, S. L. Campbell, and J. D. Sweatt, “DNA Methylation and Histone Acetylation Work in Concert to Regulate Memory Formation and Synaptic Plasticity,” Neurobiology of Learning and Memory 89, no. 4 (2008): 599–603.

10. C. A. Dockery, R. Hueckel-Weng, N. Birbaumer, and C. Plewnia, “Enhancement of Planning Ability by Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation,” Journal of Neuroscience 29, no. 22 (2009): 7271–7277.

A separate study found that children who receive training to improve their focus and attention perform better not only on attention tasks but also on intelligence tests. Some researchers suggest that arts training might similarly affect a wide range of cognitive domains. Educators and neuroscientists gathered recently in Baltimore and Washington, D.C., to discuss the increasingly detailed picture of how arts education changes the brain, and how to translate that research to education policy and the classroom. Many participants referred to the results of Dana Foundation-funded research by cognitive neuroscientists from seven leading universities over three years, released in 2008.

“Art must do something to the mind and brain. What is that? How would we be able to detect that?” asked Barry Gordon, a behavioral neurologist and cognitive neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University, who spoke May 8 during the “Learning and the Brain” conference in Washington, D.C. “Art, I submit to you without absolute proof, can improve the power of our minds. However, this improvement is hard to detect.”

Study links music, brain changes

Among the scientists trying to detect such improvement, Ellen Winner, a professor of psychology at Boston College, and Gottfried Schlaug, a professor of neurology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, presented research at the “Learning, Arts, and the Brain” summit May 6 in Baltimore. Their work measured, for the first time, changes to the brain as a result of music training.

For four years, Winner and Schlaug followed children ages 9 to 11, some of whom received regular music instruction. Before training began, and then at regular intervals, the researchers tested for whether the training had affected “near transfer” domains—skills closely related to those directly trained during music education—such as fine motor control in the fingers and music listening and discrimination skills. They also tested for any changes in “far transfer” domains such as language and reasoning abilities.

In initial results from data collected after 15 months, the researchers found that the students who received music instruction performed much better in the near transfer domains; the two groups of students had performed equally before instruction began. Winner and Schlaug also observed strengthened connections in musically relevant areas of the brain among students who had received the 15 months of training, compared with the nonmusic group. These changes correlated with the children’s behavioral improvements.

“This is the first study to show brain plasticity in young children as a function of instrumental music instruction,” Schlaug said. “And this is correlated with the amount of practice.”

Previous studies had shown that the brains of adult musicians have structural and functional differences from those of nonmusicians, but Winner and Schlaug’s investigation is the first to examine changes in the developing brain in response to long-term music training. “It’d be difficult to find another activity that takes up so much real estate in the brain,” Schlaug added.

Attention and intelligence

Training can strengthen regions of the brain linked to attention, self-control and general intelligence, reported Michael Posner, professor emeritus at the University of Oregon. He speculated that the focus-intensive tasks involved in arts learning might provide some of the same effects.

“Years of neuroimaging have now given us a plausible or putative mechanism by which arts training could now influence cognition, including attention and IQ,” he said.

“The basic idea of the theory is here. There are brain network associations with each specific art form,” Posner said. “In classroom situations, children can be absorbed by practicing music,” he said. “And there are consequences to [the] effort that the child expends.” Posner’s research focused on the brain’s executive attention network, which enables a state of alertness and the ability to focus on a task. It is also linked to the self-regulation of impulses in children.

Posner found that children trained on attention-related tasks have more effective attention networks and even improved in far transfer domains. When children participated in training sessions specifically designed to improve attention, “not only did attention improve, but also generalized parts of intelligence related to fluid intelligence and IQ increased,” he said.

If controlled training can increase attention and general intelligence, Posner hypothesized, then perhaps arts training also has a far transfer effect.“If we are able to engage children in an art form for which their brain is prepared, and they have an openness and creativity, we can train them in this and see improvement in attention, as well as intelligence and cognition in general,” he said.

The Dana Press has released several articles about the event, including: “Attention May Link Arts and Intelligence”, “The Arts Will Help School Accountability,” by Mariale Hardiman, assistant dean at the John Hopkins University School of Education; and remarks given by Dr. Jerome Kagan at the event, “Six Good Reasons for Advocating the Importance of Arts in School.”

–Nicky Penttila is a senior writer and Web editor for Dana Press, part of the Dana Foundation. The Dana Foundation is a private philanthropic foundation with principal interests in brain science, immunology, and arts education.

Related articles:

» Training Attention and Emotional Self-Regulation — Interview with Michael Posner

» Arts and Smarts: Test Scores and Cognitive Development

» Musical training as mental exercise for cognitive performance