The powerful tool we now refer to as the Global Positioning System has been used in multiple situations, and often in a capacity of over-reliance. The GPS is used in many convenient and harmless situations, such as locating a restaurant on Yelp, or perhaps finding your way to a brand new destination. However, for individuals who overuse this tool, recent studies have shown a possible detriment to the brain. For example, delivery drivers, taxi or Uber drivers, or general individuals will plug in a destination when they already have a vague idea of how to navigate themselves to this spot. These individuals, in particular, might find it interesting that in recent years, neuroscientists have established a correlative link between the over use of the GPS and diminished function in the Hippocampus (less gray matter).

The hippocampus is the portion of the brain that is responsible for navigation and memory, and is also the immediate part of the brain to be effected by Alzheimers. There are two functions of navigation in the brain, the spatial and stimulus response. Spatial navigation relies on the recognition of landmarks to locate a destination, whereas stimulus response is utilized when the individual is repeatedly using a single route to locate a destination. To note a few of these curious studies, one experiment was conducted using the fMRI, where the brain of older adult GPS users was scanned as well as adult non-GPS users; the non-GPS users demonstrated a greater level of brain activity (more gray matter). Another interesting study was conducted by researchers out of the University of London, where taxi cab drivers who had navigated the the streets of London for three years without a GPS were compared to drivers who had fully relied on the GPS to move about London. Again the hippocampus was larger in those who did not rely on GPS technology to move from destination to destination. These findings are certainly intriguing and there are a few measures one can take to increase activity within this portion of the brain. Such as using the spatial recognition function in the hippocampus. As well as limiting the use of the GPS to only locating destinations that one has never visited, then finding those same destinations by memory in the future, as well as utilizing memory when leaving that new location. While technological advancements are a wonderful and convenient factor of modern society, one must remain aware of the ways in which these advancements can impact our abilities to function as evolved human beings.