Children are easily surprised, but adults are harder to surprise because of how their brains develop.
Recognizing surprises is an important skill, as new things can sometimes be dangerous.
Let's find out more about how it works.
Surprising surprises
As we get older, our brains get better at dealing with surprises.
We quickly decide if something is important or not, and if we've seen it before, it's less surprising.
Scientists studied mice to learn how the brain handles surprising sounds as it grows.
They discovered that the brain's reaction to unexpected sounds gets smaller as it gets older, and different parts of the brain develop at different times.
The inferior colliculus, an early processing area, matures first, while the primary auditory cortex, a higher-level processing area, matures later.
It's also about the experience
Experiences also play a role in the development of the surprise response.
Mice raised in a noise-neutral environment had delayed processing of unexpected sounds.
The brain forms an internal model of the world during growth, and surprises arise when external stimuli don't match this model.
Without exposure to sounds, the brain is unable to develop a proper model of the world, leading to difficulties in categorizing sounds as familiar or unexpected.
Previously, we talked about traveling more.
