健康与遗传心理学研究室知识库

运动与脑的关系一直是脑科学中“认识脑”的研究热点之一，但长期以来仅停留在对正常人以及脑损伤病人的分析，研究对象的局限性很大程度上阻碍了探索的脚步。运动专家是在某一领域从事十年以上的专业运动学习且具有与该项技能相关的专家知识结构的职业群体。本研究借助于神经科学的技术手段，结合认知行为科学的研究范式，选取以技能为主导的跳水运动员为研究对象，从大脑结构和功能两个角度对运动专家的大脑可塑性进行了系统的研究。

第一部分研究采用功能性磁共振技术，引入动觉表象任务—专业动作表象和简单动作表象，对12名(男女各6名)年龄在I3-17岁之间、国家健将级别、平均训练年限达到10年以上的优秀跳水运动员和12名中学生对照组进行了大脑活动模式的差异分析，研究结果发现:(1)运动专家知识系统具有特殊的神经表征，该表征形式与技能特点密切相关;(2)专家在表象专业动作和一般动作时都会显著激活PFC，而新手在表象两种动作时均未激活PFC，提示AFC可能参与了运动专家动觉表象的调控，运动专家表现出更加优化的大脑活动模式。

第二部分研究沿用“专家一新手”的系统研究范式，通过基于体素的形态学( VBM)分析，对这两组人群进行核磁共振的对照研究，结果发现，优秀跳水运动员的大脑结构与普通人之间具有显著性差异，运动员在双侧丘脑和左侧运动前区(BA6)上的灰质密度显著高于普通人。

总之，在某些脑区和形态结构上，运动专家和与普通人之间出现了显著性差异，运动专家表现出更为优化的大脑结构和网络激活模式。此外，研究者还建议运动专家可以作为大脑可塑性研究的理想被试模型。

Over the past 20 years, there has been a growing interest in the study of the neurosubstrate of movement the subjects of the findings, however, are still confined within the normal or the patient. Sport experts are the kind of population who are involved in professional motor training for at least decades and acquired motor expertise and good vision. Therefore, they could be regarded as ideal subjects to study the relationship between the movement and the brain. In our studies, we recruited elite diving players and the controls matched in the age9 gender and weight as the subjects to explore the difference of cerebral structure and function with the help of the MRI and functional MRI.

In study 1, we compared, through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), the pattern of cerebral activations in 12 professional divers and 12 normal people without extensive training, during imagery of professional skills and imagery of simple motor skills. The sport experts showed significant activation in the parahippocampus during imagery of professional skills relative to the novices, which might reflect the representation adapted to experience-related motor tasks. No significant difference was found between experts and novices when they imagined simple motor skills. These results indicated the experts might utilize their kinesthetic imagery more efficiently than novices, but only for the activity in which they had expertise. The sport experts also demonstrated more focused activation patterns in prefrontal areas in both of imagery tasks, which may be relevant to higher order of motor control during motor imagery.

In study 2, based on voxel-based morphometric (VBM) technique, structural MRIs of the brains of 12 elite diving players with professional training were analyzed and compared with those of control subjects without any professional physical training. Diving players showed significantly increased gray matter density in thalamus and left precentral gyros than control subjects. However, future researches are needed to prove the contribution of preposition and practice.

In brief, there are significant differences between sport experts and the general people in cerebral stricture and the function related to the movement. Moreover, this study suggested that the brains of sport experts could be regarded as the ideal subjects to explore the relationship between cerebral plasticity and learning of complex motor skills.