Neuroplastic Capability Development: Extending the SHAPE Framework for Learning, Cognitive Adaptation, and Expertise
Abstract
Trinanjan Gupta
Neuroplasticity provides a biological basis for continued learning and adaptation across adulthood, yet its implications for the development of professional expertise remain underdeveloped in workforce capability models. This conceptual paper extends the Strategic Human Ability and Profile Enablement (SHAPE) Framework by introducing neuroplastic adaptation as a foundational dimension linking experience-dependent learning with changing patterns of specialist depth, integrative breadth, multi-domain expertise, and adjacent capability development. The framework retains four heuristic capability profiles: I-shaped specialists, T-shaped integrators, M-shaped multi-specialists, and V-shaped adaptive specialists, while reframing them as evolving behavioral configurations rather than neural types or fixed employee categories. Drawing on research on neuroplasticity, cognitive flexibility, expertise development, social cognitive theory, psychological safety, person-environment fit, and the Job Demands-Resources model, the revised framework proposes a multilevel pathway in which learning experiences and work demands interact with neurocognitive processes, psychological enablers, and organizational conditions to shape how expertise is maintained, integrated, extended, and applied. Neuroplasticity is treated cautiously as a theoretical foundation for experience-dependent change, not as evidence that capability profiles correspond to brain structures or neural phenotypes. The paper develops twelve propositions for future empirical testing and proposes a neurobehavioral research agenda combining behavioral measures of capability with validated measures of cognitive flexibility, executive control, learning, cognitive load, and, where appropriate, neuroimaging or physiological methods. The extended SHAPE Framework offers a bridge between cognitive neuroscience and workplace capability development while preserving a human-centered principle: adaptive capability should emerge through meaningful learning and supported development, not through unlimited expectations for versatility.