Today was my first day of Lamaze class, and I couldn’t help but feel excited. I didn’t know why other than, to be supportive of my girlfriend and our baby. I do understand the process of child birth, but what I didn’t know, is that is where our past conditioning began… in the womb. Some of the first circuits the brain builds are those that govern the emotions. Emotions tell us we are alive, and through our feelings our brains create logic, where we store information, not create it, based on our emotional responses to experience. The first two emotions are opposites: feeling calm and relaxed and feeling distress. Beginning around two months of age, these start to evolve into more complex feelings. Ironically the same way our brains are developed, is the same way we maintain the strength of those bonds between our feelings and thoughts as we age, through our feelings. Brain cells are “raw” materials — much like lumber is a raw material in building a house.
Heredity may determine the basic number of “neurons” (brain nerve cells) children are born with, and their initial arrangement, but this is just a framework. A child’s environment has enormous impact on how these cells get connected or “wired” to each other. Many parents and caregivers, as I have understood intuitively that loving, everyday interactions — cuddling infants closely or singing to toddlers—help children learn. As I stated, a brain is not a computer. The brain begins working long before it is finished. And the same processes that wire the brain before birth also drive the very rapid growth of learning that occurs immediately after birth. At birth, a baby’s brain contains 100 billion neurons, roughly as many nerve cells as there are stars in the Milky Way. Before birth, the brain produces trillions more neurons and “synapses” (connections between the brain cells) than needed. During the first years of life, the brain undergoes a series of extraordinary changes. Then, through a process that resembles Darwinian competition, the brain eliminates connections that are seldom or never used.
“Windows of opportunity” are critical periods in children’s lives when specific types of learning take place. For instance, scientists have determined that the neurons for vision begin sending messages back and forth rapidly at 2 to 4 months of age, peaking in intensity at 8 months. It is no coincidence that babies begin to take notice of the world during this period. Scientists believe that language is acquired most easily during the first ten years of life. During these years, the circuits in children’s brains become wired for how their own language sounds. An infant’s repeated exposure to words clearly helps her brain build the neural connections that will enable her to learn more words later on. For infants, individual attention and responsive, sensitive care giving are critical for later language and intellectual development.
Research does not suggest drilling children in alphabet songs from different languages or using flash cards to promote rote memorization of letters and numbers. Children learn any language best in the context of meaningful, day-to-day interactions with adults or other children who speak the language. Schools can take advantage of this window of opportunity to teach language. If children are to learn to speak a second language like a native, they should be introduced to the language by age ten. Early stimulation sets the stage for how children will learn and interact with others throughout life.
A child’s experiences, good or bad, influence the wiring of his brain and the connection in his nervous system. Loving interactions with caring adults strongly stimulate a child’s brain, causing synapses to grow and existing connections to get stronger. Connections that are used become permanent. If a child receives little stimulation early on, the synapses will not develop, and the brain will make fewer connections. Recent research on one of the body’s “stress-sensitive” systems shows how very stressful experiences also shape a child’s developing brain. When children are faced with physical or emotional stress or trauma, one of these systems “turns on” by releasing the hormone cortisol.High levels of cortisol can cause brain cells to die and reduces the connections between the cells in certain areas of the brain. Babies with strong, positive emotional bonds to their caregivers show consistently lower levels of cortisol in their brains. While positive experiences can help brighten a child’s future, negative experiences can do the opposite.
Too much cortisol in the brain can make it hard for children to learn and to think. And they may have trouble acting appropriately in stressful situations. Healthy relationships during the early years help children have healthy relationships throughout life. Deprived of a positive, stimulating environment, a child’s brain suffers. Rich experiences, in other words, really do produce rich brains. Helga and Tony Noice, both Elmhurst College faculty members, believe that the specialized techniques that actors use to bring their characters to life may also be employed to delay or even reverse cognitive decline among the aging. They are engaged in a collaborative research project that draws creatively on their respective expertise in psychology and the theatre.The Noices are investigating whether training in various acting techniques—from role-playing skills to interpretive methods—might have a positive effect on cognitive functioning in older people. Over the last seven years, they have completed a series of three related studies, one in Switzerland and two in the Chicago area.
They discovered that after their elderly research subjects received instruction in acting—a new experience for them—the subjects experienced significant improvement in memory and other cognitive functions. Their general sense of psychological well-being also improved. “The more stimulation you offer the brain, the more you increase the chances that the brain will remain healthy throughout your life,” says Helga Noice, a professor of psychology. “The acting process produces a particularly high degree of stimulation.” An actor, she notes, needs to be engaged on many levels: emotional, physical, and intellectual. All of this complex activity appears to alter neural connections in the brain. Their innovative, interdisciplinary research project is a perfect fit for Helga Noice, a cognitive psychologist with expertise in human memory, and Tony Noice, a professional actor who teaches theatre and speech as an adjunct professor at Elmhurst. The couple spent many years studying acting from a theoretical point of view, looking at how the expertise of actors differs from that of scientists, musicians, and visual artists.
In 1996, the government of Switzerland invited them to conduct a pilot study in which they taught the techniques of stage acting to older adults. The subjects’ verbal recall and recognition improved, even though they were not taught any memory techniques. “New research indicates that the brain is much more plastic than we thought,” says Tony Noice. “The brain can literally be modified through activity. This is what we are trying to do with acting. In the training we emphasize that the participants must actively put themselves in the place of the character—to intimidate, placate, or plead with someone for real.”
In 2001, Helga Noice received a three-year grant from the National Institute of Aging (NIA) to conduct further research, this time including the visual arts. The 124 participants in the NIA study were predominantly college-educated older adults who lived independently in the western suburbs of Chicago, drove themselves to the training site, and were an average of 73 years old. One group acted as a control and received no training. A second group received visual arts training twice a week for four weeks. Lynn Hill, an associate professor of art at Elmhurst, led the visual arts component; she had the participants view and evaluate paintings. The third group was trained in the theatre, also for four weeks. Tony Noice encouraged each of his subjects to go well beyond the scripts, to interpret each character’s personality and motivations.When the subjects were tested at the end of the study, the visual arts group showed measurable improvement in cognitive skills.
The theatre group showed, as it were, dramatic improvement. Their word recall improved by 18 percent; their problem-solving ability by 55 percent. In addition, the theatre students showed a substantial improvement in their perceived quality of life. All of these benefits continued to be observed four months after the sessions ended. Recently, supported by a grant from the Elizabeth Morse Charitable Trust, the couple went to work with residents of Plymouth Place, a continuing-care community in LaGrange Park. The study group included 18 people—average age, 82. They came from both the independent living and the assisted living sections of Plymouth Place. This time, the participants studied acting only. As in the earlier study, the cognitive skills of the participants improved in several areas, including word recall, working memory, and problem solving. Their self-esteem also improved. What’s more, a little theatre group has sprouted at Plymouth Place, with Tony Noice providing direction. In December the group staged the short melodrama The Widow’s Plight.
In future research, the couple would like to study less educated populations, to see if they can obtain the same improvement in mental and emotional well-being. They also hope to compare the impact of acting with that of other creative activities, such as painting, music, and creative writing. The impact of their findings may someday have a substantial impact on an aging population. “If we can keep our cognitive powers as long as possible,” says Helga Noice, “we can avoid premature loss of independence and lead more fulfilling lives.” So you see, to disconnect from how we feel, is to stop exercising our brains. We think that continually educating ourselves or storing mass amounts of information into our brains is what makes us smart, when in actuality…just the opposite is true. It is like putting a band aid on a big wound.
It is through emotional availability, that we train our brain, and build a powerful mind muscle. Of course IQ is important for problem solving, but evolution happens through EQ…the same way we are wired since the 7th week after conception. If we went back to our origins, maybe mankind would not be defining it’s self through war, and focus more on FETAL BRAIN &COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT through our behavior for life. We would see that the cures for infectious disease lie in our brain, not in technology…don’t take my word for it…just look around at the world today…how is this working? Today more than ever I am grateful, that I am emotionally available for myself, and then for others by listening and communication.
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