Basal ganglia, which is the name given to a group of cells nested deep in the white matter of the frontal lobes. These cells help us organize our movements by choosing appropriate actions, and inhibiting our actions until we know that they are suitable for the situation. The basal ganglia also include the caudate nuclei, which are also involved in planning actions and in coordinating the learning of habits and rule-based actions, and the area known as the globus pallidus, which is all about regulating deliberate movement so that it is coordinated and fluid.
Cingulate cortex is a large area of the brain just above the corpus callosum. Although it is continuous with the cerebrum itself, it is often considered to belong to the limbic system, partly because of its connections and the way it works so closely with other parts of that system, like the hypothalamus and the amygdala. It is involved in emotions, memory and learning: among other functions, for example, it coordinates smells and sights with pleasant or unpleasant memories.
The cerebrum is what makes us human. It is the part of the brain that does thinking, perceiving, language, imagining and planning, decision-making, socializing, and all the other aspects of cognitive and social understanding that we use without even being aware of it.
The cerebrum itself is divided into two halves, a bit like a giant walnut. The two halves are the left and right cerebral hemispheres. They are largely separate, but they have a crossover, a thick band known as the corpus callosum. This is a mass of nerve fibres, which passes messages from one side of the brain to the other to coordinate our actions and cognitions.
Brain cells work, essentially, by using chemicals to generate electricity. Like all living cells, they have a slightly different electrical field than their surroundings. Inside the cell there’s a slightly higher concentration of potassium ions, which have a negative electrical charge. Usually, the membrane surrounding the cells stops other chemical ions from passing through. But if it is stimulated in the right way, it changes its structure, letting sodium ions through. These have a positive electrical charge, and the exchange of positive and negative ions generates a sudden burst of electricity in the cell.
Throughout the cerebral cortex – indeed, throughout the brain – there are neural pathways channeling electrical impulses from one area to another. These pathways are partly inherited but they are also strongly shaped by our experiences.
When a baby is born, its brain has far more connections between neurons than at any other time; just about every possible synapse is ‘live’. But over the first three years of life, these connections are pruned down: connections that are used become stronger, while unused connections die away. That still leaves us with billions of synaptic connections, of course; it’s only a gradual pruning, not a severe one.
Humans have an incredible capacity for learning, and that’s what the human brain is all about. Learning happens as the nerve cells in the brain strengthen particular synapses, weaken others, and channel nerve impulses through unfamiliar pathways to produce a given effect.
A lot of our learning happens when we are infants, but we continue to learn throughout our lives. This means that we are constantly placing demands on our brain cells, encouraging them to form new connections. For example, we are not born with the ability to read; neither did we evolve that capacity. If that experience is repeated exposure to the written word – and, most importantly, to its meaning – the nuclei gradually adapt to allow us to read fluently.
The more experience we have of reading, the more that group of neurons develops, until, ultimately, we end up with an area of the brain specifically adapted for decoding written words.
The ability of brain cells to adapt is known as neural plasticity, and it continues throughout our lives. It used to be thought that the brain would adapt only up to the age of puberty and that after that the function of our brain cells was largely fixed. Now we know this isn’t the case. Yes, children do recover from brain damage more easily than adults, sometimes even by regrowing areas of the brain, but adults are also able to recover from many types of damage to the brain, by rechanneling neural impulses so that they form new pathways.
Most people have a preferred hand, and sportspeople know that we also often have a preferred foot, although the two are not necessarily the same. Most people are right-handed, but many people are left-handed. Right-handed people usually have a clearly dominant left hemisphere, but left-handers show more balance between the hemispheres, with a lot of activity on the left side as well as the right.
Early brain research had to rely on damage, animal studies or EEGs, but brain scanning allows us to study the brain while it is working. There are many different types of brain scan, but PET, CAT and MRI scans are the most commonly used.
Source : Your Brain and You: A Simple Guide to Neuropsychology by Nicky Hayes
Goodreads : https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39088936-your-brain-and-you
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