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Research Article

Learning new color names produces rapid increase in gray matter in the intact adult human cortex

Veronica Kwok, Zhendong Niu, Paul Kay, Ke Zhou, Lei Mo, Zhen Jin, Kwok-Fai So, and Li Hai Tan
  1. aState Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Sciences,
  2. bDepartment of Linguistics, and
  3. iDepartment of Anatomy, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China;
  4. cSchool of Computer Science and Technology, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 100081, China;
  5. dDepartment of Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720;
  6. eInternational Computer Science Institute, Berkeley, CA 94704;
  7. fState Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China;
  8. gCenter for the Study of Applied Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China;
  9. hMRI Division, Beijing 306 Hospital, Beijing 100101, China; and
  10. jJoint Laboratory for Brain Function and Health, Jinan University and The University of Hong Kong, Guangzhou 510632, China

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PNAS first published April 4, 2011; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1103217108
Veronica Kwok
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Zhendong Niu
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Paul Kay
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  • For correspondence: paulkay@berkeley.edu tanlh@hku.hk
Ke Zhou
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Lei Mo
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Zhen Jin
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Kwok-Fai So
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Li Hai Tan
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  • For correspondence: paulkay@berkeley.edu tanlh@hku.hk
  1. Contributed by Paul Kay, February 28, 2011 (sent for review February 2, 2011)

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Abstract

The human brain has been shown to exhibit changes in the volume and density of gray matter as a result of training over periods of several weeks or longer. We show that these changes can be induced much faster by using a training method that is claimed to simulate the rapid learning of word meanings by children. Using whole-brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) we show that learning newly defined and named subcategories of the universal categories green and blue in a period of 2 h increases the volume of gray matter in V2/3 of the left visual cortex, a region known to mediate color vision. This pattern of findings demonstrates that the anatomical structure of the adult human brain can change very quickly, specifically during the acquisition of new, named categories. Also, prior behavioral and neuroimaging research has shown that differences between languages in the boundaries of named color categories influence the categorical perception of color, as assessed by judgments of relative similarity, by response time in alternative forced-choice tasks, and by visual search. Moreover, further behavioral studies (visual search) and brain imaging studies have suggested strongly that the categorical effect of language on color processing is left-lateralized, i.e., mediated by activity in the left cerebral hemisphere in adults (hence “lateralized Whorfian” effects). The present results appear to provide a structural basis in the brain for the behavioral and neurophysiologically observed indices of these Whorfian effects on color processing.

  • neuro-plasticity
  • brain development
  • Whorf hypothesis
  • anatomy

Footnotes

  • ↵1V.K. and Z.N. contributed equally to this work.

  • ↵2To whom correspondence may be addressed. E-mail: paulkay{at}berkeley.edu or tanlh{at}hku.hk.
  • Author contributions: V.K., Z.N., P.K., K.Z., L.M., Z.J., K.-F.S., and L.H.T. designed research; V.K., K.Z., and L.H.T. performed research; V.K., Z.N., and L.-H.T. analyzed data; and V.K., Z.N., P.K., K.Z., L.M., Z.J., K.-F.S., and L.H.T. wrote the paper.

  • The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Learning new color names produces rapid increase in gray matter in the intact adult human cortex
Veronica Kwok, Zhendong Niu, Paul Kay, Ke Zhou, Lei Mo, Zhen Jin, Kwok-Fai So, Li Hai Tan
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Apr 2011, 201103217; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1103217108

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Learning new color names produces rapid increase in gray matter in the intact adult human cortex
Veronica Kwok, Zhendong Niu, Paul Kay, Ke Zhou, Lei Mo, Zhen Jin, Kwok-Fai So, Li Hai Tan
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Apr 2011, 201103217; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1103217108
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