How does Steph Curry, the NBA’s most dominant point guard, still miss a three-pointer? A recent study in the journal NEURON may shed some light on how individuals make errors even after thousands of reps. A study by Duke University neurobiologist Stephen Lisberger analyzed electrical activity in monkeys’ brain cells while the subjects watched a dot move across a computer screen. The study found that when a monkey’s neuron misfired while tracking, neighboring neurons also misfired. Sometimes a single brain cell, even when engaged in simple, repetitive tasks, can set off a chain reaction of hiccups in neighboring neurons. The result is a noisy brain region—a distraction—that can make you act unpredictably.
