Don Tapscott Made Me Yell at My Radio
Heather M. Ross,
McToonish,
Nov 06, 2008
OK, people like Don Tapscott say things like how the net generation youth "have different brains than us old folks." This is true, but only in a certain sense, and in this sense, is to a large degree irrelevant. To begin with, most of what makes up the youth brain is not different from previous generations. Same neurons, same chemical reactions, same overall structure. What does change is the specific set of connections in the brain. This is because the youth of today have learned different things in different ways. So they have different knowledge, different ways of understanding the world - different connections. But, big deal. We all have different connections. We learn - we form connections - as a result of our experiences, and our experiences are all different. So, while it is true that the brains of the young are wired differently, it's irrelevant (far more important, for example, would be how brain chemistry and configuration changes as a result of malnutrition in childhood, and that sort of thing).
Today: 5 Total: 91 [Direct link] [Share]
