Practice makes a hemisphere perfect: The advantage of interhemispheric recruitment is eliminated with practice
As task performance improves with practice, oftentimes fewer brain areas are recruited to aid in processing. However, relatively little research has investigated how practice affects interactions between brain regions. Given prior work indicating that interhemispheric division of processing
is most advantageous when task demands are high, we predicted that interactions between the cerebral hemispheres would be less advantageous after practice than before practice. This hypothesis was confirmed by reanalysis of data from two previously published studies. Practice reduced (1) the
degree to which interhemispheric interaction facilitated performance for two letter-matching tasks (Experiment 1), and (2) the extent to which interhemispheric interaction reduced interference in a global-local perception task (Experiment 2). These findings illustrate the dynamic nature of
neural recruitment in response to changing task demands.
Document Type: Research Article
Affiliations: 1: Duke University, Durham, NC, USA 2: Haverford College, Haverford, PA, USA
Publication date: 01 October 2003
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