Q4 - Hippocampal Plasticity in London Taxi Drivers

Theoretical A Real exam question - full text reproduced under IBO's CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license

The 2014 Nobel Prize winners in medicine demonstrated that, the hippocampal (HC) region in the human brain stores spatial memory and facilitates spatial orientation. People using space extensively such as taxi drivers may depend on a well-developed HC. A study focused upon differences in HC between London taxi drivers and a control group, and its results are shown in Figs A-B. A, variation between taxi drivers and others in size of the entire hippocampus (HC, body) and its anterior and posterior parts separately (*, significantly different); B, correlation between volume change (grey matter) of posterior part of HC and employment time as taxi driver.

Figure 1. Figure 1.

Using the information and data, determine which of the statements are true or which are false.

A. Taxi drivers have significantly larger hippocampus than the control group

B. Spatial navigation may be located in the posterior part of hippocampus

C. The study provides evidence that some people are predisposed genetically to become better London taxi drivers than others in the population

D. The study supports the traditional view that the hippocampus is only involved in short-term memory

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Question reproduced from IBO 2015, Theoretical Exam A, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 - attributed to the International Biology Olympiad. Open the full exam PDF · Community solutions (unofficial)