Crack launch the braincase of a London cabriolet driver and you ’re nonresistant to feel that they ’re pack surplus gray matter in regions of the brain responsible for spatial navigation . But this watching place a compelling question : are the street ’s most brilliant cabbies made , or are they wear ?
To find out , researchers Katherine Woollett and Eleanor Maguire studied the brains of drivers - in - breeding as they take on what London cabbies call “ the Knowledge ” — the Gordian layout of 25,000 street and 20,000 landmarks within a 6 - mile radius of the metropolis ’s hustle Charing Cross train post ( the map featured below show just a component part of the total surface area that London ’s cab drivers are creditworthy for being intimately intimate with ) .
A distinctive trainee take 3 - 4 years to develop “ the Knowledge , ” which they must draw from in ordering to complete the grueling examinations required to obtain an operating licence from the city ’s official taxicab - licensing torso . This reservation outgrowth is unlike any other in the world , and offers the unique opportunity to direct long - condition evaluation on the brains of cabbie hopefuls .
At the beginning of the study , Woollett and Maguire choose 79 trainees and 31 non - taxi - number one wood controls . mental test participants were assess on factor such as I.Q. , memory skills , and grey matter mass — but no significant differences in general intellect , powers of recollection , or brain structure could be identified between the groups .
Three to four year later on , however , the result looked very different . Of the 79 original trainees , 39 pass on to qualify as licensed London taxi drivers , and 20 did not ( of the 20 trainees who did not return for a 2d round of testing by Woollett & Maguire , only 2 had managed to qualify ) . The researchers found that trainees who had dispose had have an gain in gray matter in the back part of the hippocampus , a region of the brain which roleplay a crucial role in memory and spacial navigation ( this feature had also been observed in the brains of taxicab driver in prior bad-tempered - sectioned studies ) . Neither the driver who had fail to qualify , nor the non - trainee control condition , experienced such cost increase in genius matter .
So does this shut the playscript on the made - not - birth debate ? Not on the dot . The researchers have no away of knowing whether those drivers who managed to measure up had some connatural advantage over those who did n’t . “ Could it be that those who qualify are genetically predispose towards having a more adaptable , ‘ plastic ’ hippocampus ? ” ask Maguire . “ This leaves the perennial question of ‘ nature versus rearing ’ still undecided . ”
What the team ’s findings do support , Maguire says , is that the human brain remain plastic well into adult life , allowing it to adapt when we learn to perform new undertaking — something the investigator say should come up as encouraging news for biography - long learning and rehabilitation following mental capacity injury .
The research worker ’ findings are published in the latest issuing ofCurrent Biology
Top imagevia ; London mapping via Current Biology
BiologyGeneticsNeuroscienceScience
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