Your brain on knowledge
I’m researching about expertise to improve my own logical and reasoning skills. That’s how I found this paper on how the brain changes while learning:
Hill NM, Schneider W. Brain Changes in the Development of Expertise: Neuroanatomical and Neurophysiological Evidence about Skill-Based Adaptations. In: Ericsson KA, Charness N, Feltovich PJ, Hoffman RR, eds. The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance. Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology. Cambridge University Press; 2006:653-682.
And that’s how I picked up this marvelous brain scan that shows you the difference between how hard a beginner has to work to learn something new and how effortlessly a master practices their craft, from the same paper:
Naturally, beginners are at capacity, or easily overwhelmed. This is what interface writers and designers know all too well – how hard it is for people to experience something new. The reason why you have to design an experience.
And the experts? They’re not overloaded. They have the breadth and space to think strategically while they pull up their know-how.
Remember this comparison. In a real-world setting, this is the difference between dabbling and making an educated guess that wins against what everyone else thinks is going to happen.
Read the full paper:
