I've observed that by putting great effort into learning concepts

[CrimpJiggler]

I've observed that by putting great effort into learning concepts which initially seem incomprehensible or very difficult to conceptualise, even if it may at first appear like I made little or no progress, I usually end up with enhanced cognitive abilities which extend beyond the concepts I was training myself to comprehend. For example I'm a chemistry student and although my thinking style (which is a combo of visual and kinaesthetic) gives me an edge in some areas of chemistry, it seems to make others areas a huge challenge, to overcome which I have to spend a long time contemplating the concepts from different angles until I eventually gain an intuitive understanding of them. I've noticed on numerous occasions that as a result of my arduous efforts to gain this intuitive understanding, I not only gain the intuition necessary to contemplate these particular chemistry concepts, I find myself with the ability to think about things that I was previously incapable of contemplating dexterously. These cognitive abilities only become available to me days later. I suspect neuroplasticity may play a role in all this. I think that I end up with these additional cognitive abilities days later because my brain has literally formed the connections necessary to think in such a way. I'm guessing plenty of you here have observed this kinda thing too.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

I don't know if you can call it enhanced cognitive abilities, you aren't gaining any abilities but understanding something new. Neuroplasticity is bound to be involved in this as contrary to popular opinion this happens all the time in normal functioning. However considering the current lack of evidence for how exactly neural structure relates to knowledge we can't really say "I understand X because my brain grew new connections".

 

[Pythagorean]

yes, I think it has a lot to do with generalization, when your hippocampus "writes" to your neocortex during sleep.

 

[Pythagorean]

Sorry for the short, seemingly speculative post. I was on my iphone:

Hippocampal --> Neocortical "writing"

There is now compelling evidence that sleep promotes the long-term consolidation of declarative and procedural memories. Behavioral studies suggest that sleep preferentially consolidates explicit aspects of these memories, which during encoding are possibly associated with activation in prefrontal–hippocampal circuitry. Hippocampus-dependent declarative memory benefits particularly from slow-wave sleep (SWS), whereas rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep seems to benefit procedural aspects of memory. Consolidation of hippocampus-dependent memories relies on a dialog between the neocortex and hippocampus. Crucial features of this dialog are the neuronal reactivation of new memories in the hippocampus during SWS, which stimulates the redistribution of memory representations to neocortical networks; and the neocortical slow (<1 Hz) oscillation that synchronizes hippocampal-to-neocortical information transfer to activity in other brain structures.

The contribution of sleep to hippocampus-dependent memory consolidation
Lisa Marshall, Jan Born
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
Volume 11, Issue 10, October 2007, Pages 442-450

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364661307002124

Hippocampus and generalization:

Specific reductions in hippocampal volume in nondemented elderly individuals with mild cognitive impairment have been shown to correlate with future development of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Hippocampal atrophy (HA) is also correlated with cognitive impairments, leading to the promise of behavioral markers for early AD. Prior theo retical work has suggested that hippocampal dysfunction may selectively impair generalization involving novel recombinations of familiar stimuli. In this study, nondemented elderly individuals were trained on a series of con current visual discriminations and were then tested for transfer when stimulus features were recombined in new ways. Presence or absence of HA, revealed by neuroimaging, was not correlated with concurrent discrimination per formance ; however, individuals with mild HA showed significant decreases in transfer performance relative to nonatrophied participants. These preliminary results suggest that even very mild degrees of hippocampal atrophy may be associated with subtle behavioral impairments. .

Hippocampal Atrophy Disrupts Transfer Generalization in Nondemented Elderly
Catherine E. Myers, PhD
Alan Kluger, PhD
James Golomb, MD
Steven Ferris, PhD
Mony J. de Leon, EdD
Geoffrey Schnirman, PhD
Mark A. Gluck, PhD
(J Geriatr Psychiatry Neurol 2002; 15:82-90)
http://jgp.sagepub.com/content/15/2/82.short

Gluck has done similar experiment with Parkinsons and Alzheimers patients, he talks about it in his presentation here:

 

[Dropout]

Man.

I smoked for 20 years, about half a pack a day. I quit smoking about a month ago, am doing just fine.

Then I was randomly surfing YouTube and came across theme from Civilization II, It's a PC game that came out in 1996 that I use to play while smoking. Waaaay back in 1996.

As soon as I started hearing/see'ing that video, BAM nostalgia and a huge urge to smoke. I didn't, but I found it fascinating after 1 month of quitting it suddenly felt like day 1. Apparently I'm going to have to do every single activity (like after eating, driving, playing specific games) without smoking to retrain my brain to no longer associate smoking with that activity.

I'm guessing it will take like me like 10 hours of doing that specific activity and not smoking to retrain brain; if I quit last month or 10 years ago. Well I found it interesting, and scary. Nicotine is insidious for screwing around with the reward circuits of brain, and more.

 

[Pythagorean]

Yeah, I'm five months without a cigarette now, I know exactly what you mean. Because nAchR receptors are so prevalent in our body, cigarettes affect us in many strange ways.

 

[rhody]

I've observed that by putting great effort into learning concepts which initially seem incomprehensible or very difficult to conceptualise, even if it may at first appear like I made little or no progress, I usually end up with enhanced cognitive abilities which extend beyond the concepts I was training myself to comprehend. For example I'm a chemistry student and although my thinking style (which is a combo of visual and kinaesthetic) gives me an edge in some areas of chemistry, it seems to make others areas a huge challenge, to overcome which I have to spend a long time contemplating the concepts from different angles until I eventually gain an intuitive understanding of them. I've noticed on numerous occasions that as a result of my arduous efforts to gain this intuitive understanding, I not only gain the intuition necessary to contemplate these particular chemistry concepts, I find myself with the ability to think about things that I was previously incapable of contemplating dexterously. These cognitive abilities only become available to me days later. I suspect neuroplasticity may play a role in all this. I think that I end up with these additional cognitive abilities days later because my brain has literally formed the connections necessary to think in such a way. I'm guessing plenty of you here have observed this kinda thing too.

Crimpjiggler,

This is a little late, but have you seen my thread, https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=422276&highlight=adaptive" about the subject, there may be things of interest to you there.

Rhody...