Brain learns more from success not failure

BOSTON, July 31 (UPI) -- Some say there is something to learn from every failure, but people learn more from successes than failures, U.S. researchers suggest.

Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory said brain cells may only learn from experience when animals do something right and not when animals fail.

Earl K. Miller and colleagues Mark Histed and Anitha Pasupathy created a unique snapshot of the learning process that shows how single cells change their responses in real time as a result of information about what is the right action and what is the wrong one.

"We have shown that brain cells keep track of whether recent behaviors were successful or not," Miller said in a statement. "Furthermore, when a behavior was successful, cells became more finely tuned to what the animal was learning. After a failure, there was little or no change in the brain -- nor was there any improvement in behavior."

The findings are published in the journal Neuron.