Brain Data: Scanning, Scraping, and Sculpting the Learning Brain With Neurotechnology in Education

• In Event: 28.090 - MTCC Roundtable Session Nine
  In Roundtable Session: 28.090-1 - Biosocial Futures: The Policy Implications of the Life Sciences in Education

Abstract

Objectives: Neuroscientific knowledge is beginning to feed into educational policy and practice (Marope 2016). In coming decades, ‘pervasive neurotechnologies’ may open new opportunities to access, collect, and manipulate information from the human brain (Ienca & Andorno 2017) and usher in a new era of neural ‘augmentation,’ ‘enhancement,’ ‘optimization’ and ‘upgrades’ (Williams et al 2011). Within education, neurotechnology is being promoted to: (1) ‘scan’ the structure and functioning of the ‘learning brain’; (2) ‘scrape’ the brain for neural data to ‘personalize’ learning; and (3) ‘sculpt’ the unique brain of an individual learner. The purpose of the paper is to examine neurotechnology in education within broader policy strategies of ‘neurogovernance’ and ‘neuropolitics’ whereby programs that target the ‘plastic brain’ for ‘rewiring’ are intended to achieve political goals (Pitts-Taylor 2016; Rose & Abi-Rached 2014).

Perspective(s): The paper builds on ‘biosocial’ accounts of the interpenetration of the biological body with social environments (Meloni et al 2016). The concept of ‘cognitive assemblages’ (Hayles 2017) is utilized to designate the biosocial dynamics that occur when technical systems designed to emulate the neurobiological plasticity of the human learning brain act recursively to ‘rewire’ the neurobiological correlates of learning and cognition.

Techniques: Documentary analysis of texts advocating neurotechnology in education is provided that examines the political objectives with which it is associated.

Data sources: The sample of texts includes academic special issues on neuroscience in education, reports from influential think tanks and scientific societies, commercial websites from neurotechology vendors, and project websites from ongoing R&D programs on educational neurotechnologies.

Results: The results demonstrate how the normative aspiration of educational neuroscience is to reform educational systems and practices in order to ‘sculpt’ the neurobiological structure, functioning and connectivity of the ‘learning brain’ with the competencies to deal with increasingly complex social, technical, political and economic landscapes and challenges. In the context of neurogovernance and neuropolitics, neurotechnology is being positioned to rewire the learning brain for political objectives.

Scholarly significance: Neuroscientific knowledge and neurotechnology open new opportunities for political interference in the learning brain. This paper sets out an agenda for research, a conceptual framework and a series of emerging ethical challenges for future inquiries into the intersections of neurotechnology and education policy.

Author

• Ben Williamson, University of Edinburgh