New research is trying to find how we learn and make decisions exactly. To the brain, a new thought or idea is like a spider. If it works hard enough, a web of knowledge spins off from it. Photos of the brain taken during learning actually show a kind of nerve cells firing, growing, and forming new connections. This is fascinating in itself, but what’s even more fascinating is that failure can cause this to happen. That’s right;failure can enhance your brain. Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck has compared the brain waves of people with growth and fixed mindsets. She finds that, when those with growth mindsets fail at a task, they would enter a more focused mental state. And as they try again and again, they improve. In effect they’ve learned, and their brains have “grown”. Those with fixed mindsets, however, never enter this focused state of learning and show little advancement. Antoine Bechara, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of Southern California, has taken Dweck’s work a step further. He recently isolated two equally sized centers in the brain. These areas interact during the decision-making process. Although more research is needed these centers may turn out to be the physical locations for Dweck’s twin mindsets. “We always knew people could learn from their mistakes, but now were finding out exactly how and where this happens,”explains Bechara.“In a normally functioning brain, failure is taken as an opportunity for learning and strengthening the species.“