But there is specialization.
It is the case that our brain takes on functions,
specifically language, for which it needs to, the brain needs to adapt and
do things a little differently than it does for other animal species.
What happens, because our brain has to adapt and
do things differently than it does for other animal species,
is that it needs to take on functions on the left, right, and functions
on the right that are slightly different than those seen in other animal species.
Specifically language has to be crowded into an areas all across the left that
are generally devoted to other processes in other species, and presumably,
if we didn't have language, would be devoted to other processes as well.
So you have this hemispheric specialization,
these differences across these hemispheres.
And we'll talk a little bit about that, it's a very interesting topic of research.
But again its something we should be mindful of.
We should know that in general when we talk about these right and
left differences we're talking about the left being more involved in language and
the right being more involved in what's thought of as visual-spatial processing.
But, again, these two hemispheres coordinate and
they work together in pretty much anything that we do.
It's not that just one hemisphere is acting in isolation, but
rather that they coordinate, and one may be more dominant.
So let's consider two different measures of brain development.
Think about myelination.