Neural Plasticity Evidence From Numerous Term Paper

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The concept of neural plasticity is central to the work of psychiatrists and psychotherapists because how they help people change involves enabling their patients' minds to develop new pathways for self-regulation that can enable them to live more rewarding lives (Beychok Pp). Whether the community utilizes the power of interpersonal relationships alone to heal and promote growth or combine this crucial aspect of clinical work with pharmacological tools to aid in therapeutic process, the community is attempting to harness the natural capacity of the brain to change in response to new conditions (Beychok Pp).

Peter Huttenlocher offers a comprehensive overview of the science of plasticity and how the most evolved part of the brain changes in response to experience (Beychok Pp). His review of research, both basic and clinical, highlights important principles of neural plasticity and the limits of present understanding (Beychok Pp). Among the principles outlined by Huttenlocher are:

More than half of our genes directly influence brain development; this is especially prevalent as a factor in utero and in the early years of life;

Plasticity involves the development of synapses, myelination, synaptic pruning and even the growth of new neurons;

Plasticity has both positive aspects (adapting to environmental changes) and negative aspects neural circuits can compete with each other for specificity of function and crowd out other functions);

Brain development in the neocortex is not uniform, involving early and massive genetically determined synaptogenesis that produces twice the number of synapses in the young child than the eventually pruned levels of the adult; and More complex cognitive functions are subsumed by more highly integrative regions that appear to have plasticity that is more prolonged in its openness to change in response to experience (Beychok Pp).

Based on numerous studies, there is clear evidence that experience alters the synaptic organization of the brain in species as diverse as fruit flies and humans, and although evidence that these changes are functionally meaningful is more difficult to collect, there is little doubt that changes in synaptic organization are correlated with changes in behavior (Whishaw Pp)..

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Activity initiated by experience or behavior could therefore increase the activity of genetic mechanisms responsible for dendritic and synaptic growth and, ultimately, behavioral change (Whishaw Pp).

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