Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogel bomb here. Considering the popularity of brain teasers
Speaker 1: and brain training apps, you'd think that people would know
Speaker 1: quite a bit about the brain's role in education, But
Speaker 1: according to a recent study, the general public and even
Speaker 1: educators have a hard time squashing misconceptions about the brain
Speaker 1: and learning. For instance, many of the research participants believed
Speaker 1: that students brains shrink without sufficient water and the kids
Speaker 1: are less attentive after devouring sugary treats. Both of these
Speaker 1: statements are totally false, by the way. The brains behind
Speaker 1: the study, published in the journal Frontiers of Psychology, gave
Speaker 1: a survey featuring thirty two true or false brain related
Speaker 1: statements to three different groups of people, educators, the general public,
Speaker 1: and people with high neuroscience exposure, that is, those who
Speaker 1: had taken many college level neuroscience courses. Of those thirty
Speaker 1: two statements, the researchers focused on seven common myths that
Speaker 1: stem from what they call single explanatory factors, that's ones
Speaker 1: that reduce the complexity of human behavior to a single explanation.
Speaker 1: Those seven myths are the following, and note these are
Speaker 1: total myths one that individuals learn better when they receive
Speaker 1: information in their preferred learning style. Two that children have
Speaker 1: learning styles that are dominated by particular senses. Three that
Speaker 1: a common sign of dyslexia is seeing letters backwards. Four
Speaker 1: that listening to classical music increases children's reasoning ability. Five
Speaker 1: that children are less attentive after consuming sugary drinks and
Speaker 1: or snacks. Six that some of us are left brained
Speaker 1: and some are right brained, and that this helps explain
Speaker 1: differences in learning, and seven that we only use ten
Speaker 1: percent of our brain. Of the three thousand and forty
Speaker 1: five general public respondents, an average of sixty percent believed
Speaker 1: these brain myths. Fifty of the five hundred and ninety
Speaker 1: educators surveyed believed in them, and forty six percent of
Speaker 1: the two hundred and thirty four neuroscience exposed group believed
Speaker 1: that they were true. Some of the most commonly held
Speaker 1: misconceptions among these seven or those about learning styles, dyslexia,
Speaker 1: and classical music's affect on reasoning. Let's unpack a couple
Speaker 1: of those. There's a theory about learning styles called vac visual,
Speaker 1: auditory and kinesthetic a k A. Tactile. The vac theory
Speaker 1: suggests that students have a primary way of grasping information visually, auditorially,
Speaker 1: or kinesthetically. The myth is that some students may not
Speaker 1: learn as effectively if their style is not emphasized. Of
Speaker 1: public respondents believed this myth, in addition to seventy percent
Speaker 1: of teachers and seventy eight percent of people educated in neuroscience,
Speaker 1: and of the participating educators believed in the Mozart effect,
Speaker 1: the idea that kids spatial reasoning skills improve when they
Speaker 1: tune into classical music. However, these myths both hit sour
Speaker 1: notes research does not corroborate these beliefs. The researchers did
Speaker 1: find that having a graduate degree, taking neuroscience courses, having
Speaker 1: exposure to peer reviewed science, and being younger all helped
Speaker 1: when it came to telling neuroscience fact from fiction, but
Speaker 1: those factors didn't completely help. Lead study author Lauren McGrath
Speaker 1: said in a press release. The myths that respondence with
Speaker 1: neuroscience experience believed were related to learning and behavior and
Speaker 1: not the brain, so their training in neuroscience doesn't necessarily
Speaker 1: translate to topics in psychology or education. Since many school
Speaker 1: districts put time and resources towards pegogical techniques based on
Speaker 1: these myths. The researchers suggest that this study may help
Speaker 1: neuroscientists and educators work together to come up with cross
Speaker 1: disciplinary training modules that provide more accurate information and thus
Speaker 1: better education for our students and better understanding of ourselves.
Speaker 1: Today's episode was written by Shelley Danzy and produced by
Speaker 1: Tyler Clang with kind engineering assistance I Ramsey Youngt. For
Speaker 1: more on this and lots of other brainy topics, visit
Speaker 1: our home planet, how stuff Works dot com