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malaise

(267,827 posts)
Fri Aug 19, 2016, 09:23 PM Aug 2016

Artists 'have structurally different brains'

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-26925271
<snip>
The research, published in NeuroImage, suggests that an artist's talent could be innate.

But training and environmental upbringing also play crucial roles in their ability, the authors report.

As in many areas of science, the exact interplay of nature and nurture remains unclear.

Lead author Rebecca Chamberlain from KU Leuven, Belgium, said she was interested in finding out how artists saw the world differently.

"The people who are better at drawing really seem to have more developed structures in regions of the brain that control for fine motor performance and what we call procedural memory," she explained.

In their small study, researchers peered into the brains of 21 art students and compared them to 23 non-artists using a scanning method called voxel-based morphometry.
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Artists 'have structurally different brains' (Original Post) malaise Aug 2016 OP
thank goodness for that. I thought I was A. B. Normal nt msongs Aug 2016 #1
"Innate" isn't the right word here. Igel Aug 2016 #2
Good spot malaise Aug 2016 #3

Igel

(35,197 posts)
2. "Innate" isn't the right word here.
Sat Aug 20, 2016, 10:08 AM
Aug 2016
"It falls into line with evidence that focus of expertise really does change the brain. The brain is incredibly flexible in response to training and there are huge individual differences that we are only beginning to tap into."


This means it's learned. Whether there's some innate (or "in-born&quot component remains to be seen.

Perhaps the most excellent user of English that wrote the article meant something like "physiological" and not that such structures were present at birth.

Might be additional connections formed from practice and use. Might be that connections that would have formed anyway weren't pruned. Might be that there is enough variation that variation, practice and formation of new connections, plus maintenance of connections that were already there (and standard equipment, so to speak) work together.

Silly reporters.
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