Temporary Brain Changes Lead to Accelerated Learning 140
An anonymous reader writes "In an advance that could help the treatment of learning impairments, strokes, tinnitus and chronic pain, UT Dallas researchers have found that stimulating nerves in the brain accelerates learning in laboratory tests. When the juice was turned off, researchers monitoring brain activity in rats found that brain responses eventually returned to their pre-stimulation state — but the animals kept the ability to perform their newly learned tasks."
And here's what happens when you do that (Score:4, Insightful)
If you do that, if you change the state of the brain for advanced learning, the human brain -- indeed probably most animal brains -- adapt in one very predictable manner. They become excellent learners in the new state, and stop learning entirely in the old state.
Which means you'll learn great in the classroom, and you'll learn absolutely nothing from normal experiences -- when you're off the juice.
Which is crazy dangerous, since it'll basically erase the expertise part of experience.
Again, and as usual, this is a great idea for immediate safety-related stuff. Teach CPR this way, train soldiers this way. But normal learning is a different animal. Slower learning isn't usually a lack of learning skill -- it's often a stubborness to stick with existing knowledge, and that is most often a very good thing. You don't want to lose that in general.