Are you leave alone - brain or right - brained ? The right answer is “ neither . ” Read on to observe out the science behind this and seven other brain “ fact ” we all get incorrect .
1. A BIGGER BRAIN IS A BETTER BRAIN.
Nope . After all , world believe we ’re the wise animals on the planet , but elephant brainiac are three times larger than ours . Andwhale learning ability ? Forget it .
intelligence service is n’t about relative size , either . Human brains make up about 2 per centum of our body sight , which is pretty telling . But Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree shrewmouse brains are a full10 percent of their body mass , and theydrink beerfor a living .
So when it comes to brainiac , size is n’t the most significant affair . Hominid brain sizing did increase as we evolved , but scientists say that the secret to our smarts is complexness . And nobody can crush us there ; neuroscientist Gerard Edelman has evendescribed the human brainas “ the most complicated object in the universe . ” Your intellectual cortex alone has between 19 and 23 billion neurons , and each neuron can link to other nerve cell tens of thousands of sentence .
2. PEOPLE ARE EITHER LEFT-BRAINED OR RIGHT-BRAINED.
There are certain labor that disembowel more on one side of your brain than the other , but everything you do employ both hemispheres . There ’s no evidence that the right half of your learning ability is more creative , or that the left is more analytic . The myth originate in the 1970s , from a paper by CalTech neuroscientist Roger W. Sperry . Sperry report witness cognitive difference between the hemisphere . The media took the thought and run with it . Sperrywarned againstoversimplifying or misinterpreting his finding , but by then the proverbial horse was out of the barn .
The only the great unwashed who are truly left- or mightily - brain are those who have undergone hemispherectomies — a surgery in which one-half of the head is removed . The subprogram ismore commonthan you might opine , and patient often go on to live full lives with no cognitive fuss . We ’ll have a story about this subroutine and the impingement it had on the life of one remarkable new woman afterward this week .
3. WE ONLY USE 10 PERCENT OF OUR BRAINS.
Oh yeah ? Which part are you using mighty now ? The entire mind may not be active every second of every day , but if you want to emit , sleep , and digest your solid food , you need the whole thing .
Modern mastermind imagination technique have throw usactual picturesof the whole brain in action , which should have put this myth to bottom . rather , the10 pct legendhas hold on for year and year , in part thanks to movies and psychic who fence that the “ other 90 percentage " of your mental capacity must be reserved for some supernatural purpose . This is absolute bunk . We ’ll look at this myth in more detail afterwards in the week too .
4. GETTING OLDER MEANS LOSING YOUR MENTAL EDGE.
It ’s not that black and ashen . Yes , sure cognitive function like short - term memory , attention , and language learning start to pass up with age , but other mental skills actually improve . Many of these aresocial and emotionalin nature , rather than analytical . This may be why these gains have n’t get as much attention as the losses : Laboratory tests focus more on intellectual task than on practical genial skills .
field of study have shown that aged people havelarger vocabulariesthan jr. people , and that they make better use of them . previous adults are happier with their lives , and their relationships aremore symmetrical . Being older way that you have approach to a genial database of preceding problems and solutions , which helps you make choices in the present tense . scientist call this a “ cognitive guide , ” but most of us know it better aswisdom .
5. CLASSICAL MUSIC MAKES YOU SMARTER.
Making yourself ( or your baby ) baby-sit through symphonies wo n’t do anything for your intelligence quotient . A 1993 study [ PDF ] did show that listening to Mozart improved spacial reasoning — but only spacial reasoning , and only for15 minute . Even that small-scale effect might have been overstated . A2010 reviewof 40 studies on the subject find that none of them could reproduce the results of the original experimentation .
And those classical euphony telecasting for babies are n’t doing anybody any favor . Infants and tot who watch TV — even Baby Mozart — learn few wordsthan their peer .
Classical music is not like Brassica oleracea italica . You ca n’t put cheese on it , and the only reason to consume it is if you ( oryour baby ) actually like it .
6. CROSSWORD PUZZLES WILL KEEP YOU SHARP.
Like classical music , crossword and Sudoku puzzles are terrific — but only if you actually enjoy them .
In an interview on the topic withThe New York Times , neuroscientist Molly Wagster of the National Institute on Aging was unequivocal : “ masses who have done puzzles all their lives have no particular cognitive advantage over anyone else . ”
There is one matter that doing crossword puzzles will make you good at : doing crossword puzzles . The more puzzles you nail , the better fit out you ’ll be to point out shape and acknowledge oftentimes used clues .
7. MEN ARE NATURALLY BETTER THAN WOMEN AT MATH.
Just like charwoman are naturally well at washing the dish , right ? No . Come on .
Studyafter study [ PDF ] has point that the gap in mathematics and scientific discipline tryout scores between female child and male child can be assign not to natural ability , but to cultural messages . It ’s called thestereotype terror : When a member of a radical is exposed to damaging stereotype about that mathematical group , they do poorly . Just require girls to check “ female ” before beginning a exchangeable test has been shown tosignificantly thin out their account . The more a person is bombard with prospect of nonstarter , the more likely it is that he or she will fail .
Researchers from the University of Wisconsin analyzed test scores [ PDF ] from 86 nation and institute that average maths grade for daughter and boys were adequate . Even in the United States , the gap has start to narrow .
" We have to stop sell thyroxin - shirt to girls that say , ‘ I ’m too pretty to do mathematics , ' ” field co - author Jonathan Kanetold CNN . " Our stereotypes are hurting our mathematics education . ”
8. YOUR BRAIN CAN’T CHANGE OR HEAL.
The Einstein you have now is the brain you ’ve always had and always will … right ? ill-timed .
The human brain is astonishingly plastic andcan adaptto all kinds of uttermost situations . masses who mislay their sight find that their sense of hearing improves dramatically , because the brain dedicatesmore energyto auditory processing . And , as we ’ve seen , people who ’ve had half their brain removed can still function , because the remaining half learn up all the responsibilities . Our brains are not intemperately - wired in any sense of the word .
Our nous are also not a finite imagination . cell in the sleep of our bodies are always dying and being replaced . For a foresightful time , scientists trust that the brain was the exclusion to this rule , and that damaged encephalon cells would never grow back . Wenow knowthis is n’t the case .
