Long Term Potentiation

Cells that fire together, wire together. Has anyone done much research on plasticity/neuroscience? I find the concept fascinating.

 

The synaptic connections between the dendrites and the axon of adjacent neurons supposedly cause memory and the ability to adjust those connections correlates to the ability to learn.




Mirror Neurons - Social adaptation, learning, empathy

Spindle Neurons - Snap Judgement

 

http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/v4/n11/abs/nm1198_1313.html

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080831114717.htm

 

So Long Term Potentiation (LTP) can explain many ritualistic or habitual activities that are formed with humans. The neuronal connections create associations between things, such as memory and action. So every time you recall a certain memory, it might naturally lead to a procedural memory of action which has become the natural response due to LTP.

OCD has been overcome by redirecting thoughts/memories/feelings to actions different from that linked through LTP. This sort of redirection is referred to as Long Term Depression (not in the psychological sense) by ignoring and consciously choosing other action, over time the habitual urges lessen. OCD is more than that though, I can't remember the exact cause, but some part of the prefrontal cortex (I think) has an overactive pathway that causes high anxiety which would make that natural procedural association seem so urgent.