A recent study, Learning Morse Code Alters Microstructural Properties in the Inferior Longitudinal Fasciculus, has shown that learning Morse Code increases neuroplasticity, which is the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. I’m not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV, but from what I’ve read neuroplasticity is a good thing. It helps us learn new things, recover more quickly from injury, and overcome some brain deficits, depression and addictions, and reverse obsessive compulsive patterns.
In this study, researchers used Morse Code as a substitute for language learning while measuring changes in the brain’s white matter structure. One of the reasons for using Morse Code is that they felt that learning the code was a much better controlled and much faster way to experimentally assess learning a new language. The study showed that learning Morse Code increased white matter plasticiity. In a previous study, they showed that processing acoustically presented Morse Code activated a higher cognitive (and language related) network in the brain.
So, again, I’m not a doctor or a neuroscientist, but it sounds to me that learning and operating Morse Code is a good thing to keep the brain active and flexible. It’s another good reason for me to stay active on CW.
Almost as important, this study shows that the same neural pathways are engnged learning Morse Code/ CW as those activated in learning other languages.
Morse Code / CW is a language!
CW is mostly English, with different phonemes, and a bit of slang. That actually makes the comparison to learning other languages more interesting.
Having just stumbled across your article, I endorse it fully from personal experience. It’s not easy but worthwhile. It’s primarily to get my brain working, rather than any ambitions to become a a radio amateur.
I am a language graduate, and yes, I do find it to be like learning a foreign language, one with an alien script. The fact that the language happens to be English is immaterial. It is a new means of expression.
With Morse Code, there is one difference for me: when learning a foreign language one always understands more than one can express. In Morse Code, I find that I can say more fluently than I can grasp.
Thank you for your article.