The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge
April 13th, 2008Title: The Brain That Changes Itself
Author: Norman Doidge, M.D.
Publisher: Penguin (2007)
I was asked to read and review The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge. At first, I wasn’t all that excited to read this book because the title seems kind of “hippie-ish” (note: I know that is not a real word. But I’m using it anyway. So there.) But as I started to read the book I realized it was a fascinating look at the plasticity of the brain (otherwise known as neuroplasticity) and written by a very accomplished psychiatrist. Doidge does a really nice job explaining things so that even dumb people like me can understand it. Also, the stories that he includes in each chapter are really interesting and inspirational.
The basic idea of brain plasticity is that our brains are constantly changing and adapting. The slightly more in depth explanation is that brain activity that is associated with functions of the body can be moved to other parts of the brain. Got it? What? That doesn’t make sense? OK…let’s try again. The old assumption of how the brain works was that all of your functions were localized into a specific region of the brain. And that is still partly correct. For instance, generally your speech control is located in what is called “Broca’s Area” (named after Broca!). What researchers/doctors/other smart people found out was that even when Broca’s Area was damaged, people could still learn to talk! That may not sound all that exciting, but what it means is that other parts of your brain will pick up functions (like speech) normally controlled by the now damaged area. Your brain is constantly changing. All you have to do is re-learn your lost function. (It’s that easy!)
The book is filled with fantastic stories of people who have overcome terrible illness through brain rehabilitation. One particular person was able to completely rehabilitate from a stroke. Normal stroke rehab doesn’t allow for this type of recovery because it doesn’t assume that a near-full recovery can be made. But when rehab includes brain exercises, it becomes far easier to re-learn those “lost” functions. This type of rehabilitation was not thought possible until smart people figured out the brain is plastic.
There are many more stories of really cool experiments where people have accomplished things never thought possible (blind people seeing through touch sensations in their back, experiencing a feeling when a dummy hand is touched, etc..) Basically, the brain is pretty awesome.
Like I said before, it is written in an easy to read manner, so you don’t have to be really smart to learn it. This book was really good and I would recommend it to anyone even remotely interested in the human body and how it works.
Rating: 4 out of 5
You might like these...
April 13th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Thanks for the review. I’ll mention this one to my son, who was nattering on about brain plasticity a day or so ago.
April 14th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Saying neuroplasticity is “that easy!” is not really honest. Rewiring the brain enough to show actual changes in movement after brain injury takes a lot of dedicated effort, many hours a day. You mention stroke. The fact is that the book does not describe full recovery. In fact, you cannot have full recovery. While the brain may make do with another area covering for the damaged area, the “original” area, and the “original” neuronal pathways are optimal. You also say that they added “brain exercises”. But they were physical exercises that drove neuroplastic change. These are the same mechanisms used by anyone to learn any novel movement skill.
August 7th, 2008 at 2:57 am
This is really a good book. People use the term ‘neuroplasticitiy’ when they talk about the physical alterations of nerve cell structures – but this is common sense when you think about it, or else you would never develop habits, get better or worse at anything, etc. Just imagine how great it would be for drug addicts if the brain didn’t change itself as a result of foreign molecules they bombard their brains with from the drugs!
So anyway, the book is beautiful, and I’d recommend it for anyone. The best part deals to the effects of imagination.
August 7th, 2008 at 2:59 am
oops. also forgot, basically the underlying mechanisms behind the change results in the creation of more receptors so the nerve cell can become more or less responsive.. this ‘receptor generation’ is called in brain gibberish as ‘long term potentiation’. Anyway, the growth of these bad boys in memory centers is literally how memory works, so without these brain adaptations, there would be no such thing as memory… basically the concept of the book is complete common sense, it was only released because idiots in the generation prior didn’t understand the brain and its potential for adaptation (i wonder if they believed in the soul too :/
November 9th, 2009 at 9:40 pm
Recursion Fantasy Reviewer — “even dumb. . .” Dumble Still: What a recommendation this book helped you get beyond Dumb and Dumber? Awe Shucks Some. Who inspired or what to pick up this tomer? Or is that a plasticity misnomer? Thought less is thy Lot. Functional “lostisity” so insightful it is frightful ly full dementiable. Boca’s Bifurcations Doctors Researchers Other Smarters Assume its Opposite == You. Takes talent to AIO Review Just Doidgeing you.Oh come up ens Confucsions it is all still “strands” a La La fun era. Bear Able Review Hogen Ben You.