The Taxi Driver's Brain

Cabbies Prove Brain Regrowth Theories
14th March 2000
Revised June 2000

By Lewis Leather

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Drivers of London black cabs, have an unusual and intense ritual of graduation. They have to retain in their heads, a vast amount of routes around London. This process is called gaining " THE KNOWLEDGE ", and can often take many years. Drivers who are on the knowledge, can be seen scooting around London on little moped style honda plastic motorbikes, with an A to Z guide and a list of routes pinned to the screen.

The knowledge is learned and examined, by official examiners, area by area because of the vastness of the city, and the sheer volume of the thousands of routes that must be learned. The London Cabbies are renowned around the world for their efficiency, and their ability to navigate in and out of the traffic snided capital with speed and efficiency.
They are also known for their incredible anacdotes, their ability to recognize a vast number of faces, their general knowledge, their often well researched opinions on the most complicated of subjects, and their bottomless supply of jokes.

For the first time ever, these attributes have been linked. It seems that the act of learning The Knowledge, actually physically reprogrammes the brain to retain extraordinary amounts of information. And because London Cabbies are acutely trained in route finding ( a very abstract concept ) a physical anomaly in their brain scans has shown up an enlargement in a particular region called the Posterior Hippo campus. It is thought that this area becomes very dense as new connections and links are made to retain the cabbie's specialist knowledge.

What is new about this research is that the brain, physically altering itself due to received knowledge, in adult life has never been recorded before. It has been known however, that musicians have certain physical brain anomalies, but they were widely rumoured to be from birth. Now we know that it is possible to alter and perhaps improve the brain with mental effort, neuroscientists can consider the possibilities of finding ways to repair injured or flawed brains with mental training.

June 2000
Related Findings

It has always been assumed that difficult, moody teenagers act that way because of hormonal changes in their blood. But new research has found evidence that it may be largely because the brain is undergoing a rewiring episode, which leads to these symptoms.
This information could have major implications for education, if the brain is found to be constantly rewiring itself, either up to puberty, or for the full lifetime of the host.

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