Physics may help boost brain activity

Parts of the brain can become more active when it is exposed to physics problems.

According to a research conducted by Drexel University, the brain's activity can be modified by different forms of instruction.

The researchers marked the areas that become more active when completing a physics reasoning task, both before a course on the concepts and after.

"One of the keys seemed to be an area of the brain, the dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex, that generates mental simulations. This suggests that learning physics is an imaginative process, which is not typically how people think of it," said Brewe, an associate professor.

The aim of the study was to further explore how the form of teaching called 'Modeling Instruction' encourages students to use their own mental models to understand new concepts.

According to the research, the brain networks are associated with learning math and reading. But mental modeling lends itself to physics.

The findings were published in the Journal of Frontiers in ICT.