Derek Burnett
Derek Burnett is a Contributing Writer at Bottom Line Personal, where he writes frequently on health and wellness. He is also a contributing editor with Reader’s Digest magazine.
As you contemplate the changes that the brain undergoes as we age, it’s all too easy to focus on the negative…It’s all downhill from here…I’m having another senior moment…Things are only going to get worse…But it’s worth remembering that our brains have a remarkable ability to adapt to change and to forge new connections. This ability is called neural plasticity or brain neuroplasticity, with “plasticity” referring to flexibility, to the ability to be molded. Brain plasticity persists throughout the human lifespan, allowing us to adapt to everything from aging to psychological trauma to physical injury, making our cognition far more resilient than most of us would assume.
Scientists once believed that our brains changed and developed only during childhood, after which they became rigid and fixed. As the thinking went, once you were well into adulthood, you were an old dog who couldn’t learn new tricks. Worse, when you lost brain cells, they were gone for good. And worse yet, once you lost a connection in your brain associated with a skill, the skill was lost forever. Today, we understand that this point of view is outdated. In important parts of the brain, cells regenerate throughout a person’s life. The brain is not a static entity but rather a dynamic, ever-evolving organ whose basic functioning relies on its ability to change. In other words, neuroplasticity is not an occasional, exceptional phenomenon, but rather, the natural state of the brain as it learns new things and stores information. Neuroscientists call these processes whereby the brain reorganizes its connections as “wiring” and “rewiring.”
In 2007, the Lancet published an astonishing case study about a 44-year-old French man who visited the doctor because of weakness in his leg. Upon examination, doctors revealed to him that 90% of his brain was gone. A condition known as hydrocephalus had left his skull filled mostly with liquid, with only a thin layer of matter containing functioning neurons. Yet the man was living normally, working as a civil servant, a husband and father. Somehow, despite the incredible deficit, his brain had found workarounds for the vast majority of the complex operations that gave the man his personality and intellect.
Of course, not all examples of neuroplasticity are quite so extreme. Really, any time you pick up a new pattern of thinking, your brain is making new connections, which quite literally represents a structural change to the organ’s architecture. Many forms of therapy are based upon the idea of helping people deal with stress, anxiety, and depression by reframing their thoughts and building new and healthier thought patterns. This requires rewiring the brain.
Although neuroplasticity continues throughout adult life, researchers believe that our brains naturally become less plastic with age. Note that they’re “less” plastic, not “non”-plastic. Most neurologists agree that we can keep our brains supple and adaptable by continuing to challenge them in the later decades of life. Intellectual and physical pursuits that force us to make new neural connections help maintain our neuroplasticity. Learning new dance moves, solving new kinds of puzzles, taking up a foreign language, tackling a difficult video game, and studying new subjects are all ways of keeping our brains flexible.
Interestingly, maintaining neuroplasticity is not an entirely cerebral affair. Research suggests that physical exercise boosts production of a brain protein called brain-derived neurotropic factor (BDNF), which promotes the formation of new connections in the brain. Regular moderate exercise also supports a healthy hippocampus, the part of the brain associated with learning and memory.
As you contemplate boosting your neuroplasticity to keep your brain young, let “novelty” be your watchword. Doing the same old thing in the same old way causes us to dig deep ruts in our brain wiring and lose the ability to make new connections. Novelty can take many forms, of course. It might mean doing something you’ve always done, but doing it in a different way. It might mean being playful. It might mean seeking out new people…especially new kinds of people, with different perspectives and backgrounds. Give yourself new challenges regularly. Look for things that aren’t exactly up your alley. If you were abysmal at math in school, see if you can redeem yourself by taking a first-level algebra course. If you don’t “get” modern art, take an appreciation course. If you’ve got a tin ear, take up piano anyway. The goal for all these things is not to achieve mastery…You’re not trying to become a concert pianist or art critic or math professor or chess master. You’re merely trying to force your brain to make new connections in areas it’s not accustomed to, hopefully having some fun and becoming a more well-rounded person along the way.
The ideal exercises for neuroplasticity are those that entail the trifecta of physical technique, mental application, and social involvement. Classes or clubs where you can learn yoga, dance, tai chi, golf, skeet, or similar pursuits are great because they force you to move your body in a disciplined way, to think about technique, and to mix with people who may not be very much like you.
Mental-health counseling can have a doubly positive effect on neuroplasticity. Stress, anxiety, and depression are associated with a kind of “negative plasticity” possibly related to inhibited BDNF production, so treating or preventing them can stave off the loss of plasticity. On top of that, gaining new perspectives and shaping new thought patterns under the auspices of therapy amounts to a kind of guided neuroplasticity. And most antidepressant medications are found to increase BDNF levels.
