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Sugar makes you stupid: Study shows high-fructose diet sabotages learning, memory

Attention, college students cramming between midterms and finals: Binging on soda and sweets for as little as six weeks may make you stupid.

Health created May 15, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (43) | comments 26 | with audio podcast

Learning high-performance tasks with no conscious effort may soon be possible (w/ video)

(Medical Xpress) -- New research published today in the journal Science suggests it may be possible to use brain technology to learn to play a piano, reduce mental stress or hit a curve ball with little or no ...

Neuroscience created Dec 08, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (38) | comments 26 | with audio podcast

Take your time: Neurobiology sheds light on the superiority of spaced vs. massed learning

(Medical Xpress) -- College and cramming – often where’s there’s one, the other is not far behind. That said, however, it has been recognized since the late 1800s that repeated periodic exposure ...

Neuroscience created Mar 28, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (21) | comments 3 | with audio podcast feature

How the brain makes memories: Rhythmically!

The brain learns through changes in the strength of its synapses -- the connections between neurons -- in response to stimuli.

Neuroscience created Oct 03, 2011 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (16) | comments 7 | with audio podcast

Brain's connective cells are much more than glue; they also regulate learning and memory

Glia cells, named for the Greek word for "glue," hold the brain's neurons together and protect the cells that determine our thoughts and behaviors, but scientists have long puzzled over their prominence in ...

Medical research created Dec 29, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (13) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

It’s official: Learning languages makes you smarter

New research has shown that learning a language may subtly change, and possibly improve, the way we think.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Oct 06, 2011 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (14) | comments 44 | with audio podcast

Brain rhythms are key to learning

Neuroscientists have long known of the existence of brain waves — rhythmic fluctuations of electrical activity believed to reflect the brain’s state. For example, during rest, brain activity slows ...

Neuroscience created Sep 27, 2011 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (11) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

New connections between brain cells form in clusters during learning

New connections between brain cells emerge in clusters in the brain as animals learn to perform a new task, according to a study published in Nature on February 19 (advance online publication). Led by resear ...

Neuroscience created Feb 19, 2012 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (11) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Learning best when you rest: Sleeping after processing new info most effective, new study shows

Nodding off in class may not be such a bad idea after all. New research from the University of Notre Dame shows that going to sleep shortly after learning new material is most beneficial for recall.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Mar 23, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (10) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Neurons that can multitask greatly enhance the brain's computational power, study finds

Over the past few decades, neuroscientists have made much progress in mapping the brain by deciphering the functions of individual neurons that perform very specific tasks, such as recognizing the location ...

Neuroscience created 19 hours ago | popularity 4.9 / 5 (10) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Now see this: Anti-inflammatory treatment reverses stroke-induced compromise in sensory learning

(Medical Xpress) -- One of the many potential consequences of ischemic stroke – a lesion, or localized pathological change in the brain, in which blood flow insufficient to meet metabolic demand leads ...

Inflammatory disorders created Sep 22, 2011 | popularity 4.1 / 5 (10) | comments 2 | with audio podcast feature

Prospective Alzheimer's drug builds new brain cell connections

Washington State University researchers have developed a new drug candidate that dramatically improves the cognitive function of rats with Alzheimer's-like mental impairment.

Alzheimer's disease & dementia created Oct 11, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (8) | comments 7 | with audio podcast

Newly found 'volume control' in the brain promotes learning, memory

Scientists have long wondered how nerve cell activity in the brain's hippocampus, the epicenter for learning and memory, is controlled—too much synaptic communication between neurons can trigger a seizure, and too little ...

Neuroscience created Jan 09, 2013 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (8) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Fast and painless way to better mental arithmetic? Yes, there might actually be a way

In the future, if you want to improve your ability to manipulate numbers in your head, you might just plug yourself in. So say researchers who report in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on May 16 on studies of a harm ...

Neuroscience created May 16, 2013 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (8) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

What makes self-directed learning effective?

In recent years, educators have come to focus more and more on the importance of lab-based experimentation, hands-on participation, student-led inquiry, and the use of "manipulables" in the classroom. The underlying rationale ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created Oct 04, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (8) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

Learning

Learning is acquiring new knowledge, behaviors, skills, values, preferences or understanding, and may involve synthesizing different types of information. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, animals and some machines. Progress over time tends to follow learning curves.

Human learning may occur as part of education or personal development. It may be goal-oriented and may be aided by motivation. The study of how learning occurs is part of neuropsychology, educational psychology, learning theory, and pedagogy.

Learning may occur as a result of habituation or classical conditioning, seen in many animal species, or as a result of more complex activities such as play, seen only in relatively intelligent animals and humans. Learning may occur consciously or without conscious awareness. There is evidence for human behavioral learning prenatally, in which habituation has been observed as early as 32 weeks into gestation, indicating that the central nervous system is sufficiently developed and primed for learning and memory to occur very early on in development.

Play has been approached by several theorists as the first form of learning. Children play, experiment with the world, learn the rules, and learn to interact. Vygotsky agrees that play is pivotal for children's development, since they make meaning of their environment through play.

For more information about Learning, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Related topics: memory , brain , neurons , students , nerve cells