Rosenzweig, Bennet, and Diamond (1972)

Aim:
Discover a relation of the environment on the brain.

Procedure:
The rats were placed into three different environments: malnourished, a control, and an enriched environment. The malnourished environment had a singular rat in a small cage without any toys, a control with some rats in a larger cage, and an enriched large environment with toys constantly replaced and many rats to interact with. Each environment was provided food and water. The scientists periodically chose rats and dissected their brains to measure brain composition and weight.

Results:
Rats in the enriched environment had significantly heavier frontal cortex as opposed to the rest of their brain and the malnourished rats, the area of the brain responsible for learning, memory, and spatial recognition.

Ethics:
Animal research was used, but only in the fact that this experiment cannot be done on humans and as little harm as possible was performed on the rats.

Application to humans need to be researched as what happens in rats does necessarily mean it will happen in humans.

Application:
Demonstrates that better environments increase the capability to learn.

Connected Prompts:
Explain one study related to localization of function in the brain, Discuss ethical considerations in research into genetic influences on behavior