Until now, science believed that the cerebellum was only related to movement, but a new study shows that the region also has a role in learning
Until then, it was believed that an important part of the brain called the cerebellum only acted in coordinating motor functions such as balance and movement. However, a collaboration between the University of Pittsburgh and Columbia University has led to the discovery of a previously unheard of role for science: helping to control the way we think.
Photo: Pete Linforth/Pixabay / Canaltech
The cerebellum is a part of the nervous system located at the base of the skull (behind the junction of the larger brain and spinal cord), and the new feature — announced through an article in the journal Nature Communications — is that some parts of the cerebellum evolved along with areas of the brain that control the way we think.
Scientists have trained monkeys to move their left or right hand based on the image they see on a screen. If they moved the right hand, the animals received a reward (a sip of juice).
The monkeys also received a placebo or a drug capable of temporarily blocking the activity of a region of the cerebellum, called posterolateral.
Inactivated cerebellum prevents learning
With the placebo, the animals learned to make the right movement after 50 to 70 attempts. But with their cerebellum blocked, they had difficulty learning the new association.
The conclusion is that when this area of the cerebellum is deactivated, new learning is impaired and performance does not reach the same level.
And there is a detail: when this region became inactive, it did not cause changes in the way movements were performed, only in the learning itself. On the other hand, inactivation of other cerebellar regions did not impair learning.
Scientists discover previously unknown function of the cerebellum (Image: Vecstock/Freepik)
Photo: Canaltech
“When the posterolateral cerebellum was inactivated, the monkeys had difficulty learning even the association that presented the least difficulty,” the article mentions.
“These results demonstrate a causal role for the primate posterior lateral cerebellum in non-motor reinforcement learning,” the material concludes.
The authors recognize that discovering this novel function of the cerebellum may help explain some of the non-motor difficulties in people with certain disorders, so we can hope that future studies will investigate this relationship further.
Source: Nature Communications
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