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year 1 - biological bases of behaviour > Touch, Temperature and Pain > Flashcards

Touch, Temperature and Pain Flashcards

1
Q

How do structural constraints shape our evolution/human development?

A

Affect the nature of info we might take in and perceive/learn from

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2
Q

What is sensation?

A

Arriving info from senses

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3
Q

What is perception?

A

Conscious awareness of a sensation - info taken to brain, where processing takes place

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4
Q

What does stimulation occur through?

A

Tactile, auditory, visual and chemical sensation - specialised receptors for each sensation which transduce info

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5
Q

What are the mechanical senses?

A
  1. vestibular sensation
  2. Somatosensation
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6
Q

What is the vestibular system made up of?

A

Receptors in inner ear that respond to body position and movement/tilt of head

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7
Q

How is information in the vestibular system used?

A

It is used alongside other senses to perceive what is happening + aids balance (why inner ear infections cause dizziness and a loss of balance)

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8
Q

What 2 organs does the vestibular organ consist of?

A

Semicircular canals
Otolith organ

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9
Q

What are the semicircular canals?

A

3 canals filled with endolymph (fluid) with hair cells in it.

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10
Q

What does movement cause in the semicircular canals?

A

Endolymph moves against hair, bending it
Oriented on 3 planes - comparative stimulation gives brain info about movement of head

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11
Q

What does the otolith organ do?

A

Sends messages about our position in 3D space

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12
Q

What are otolith organs sensitive to?

A

acceleration, deceleration and direction changes

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13
Q

Where are the otolith organs?

A

Utricle (horizontal plane) and saccule (vertical plane) - different orientations
(similar to endolymph but are glutinous)

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14
Q

What happens in the otolith organ when the head is upright?

A

Equilibrium (everything in normal position)

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15
Q

What happens in the otolith when the head is bent forward?

A

Gravitational forces pull the membrane in the same direction (otolithic membrane sags) and stereocilia of hair cell bands stimulating organs (opposite when the head is bent back)

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16
Q

What make up the vestibulocochlear nerve?

A

Vestibular afferent fibres

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17
Q

Where are the vestibular nuclei located?

A

In medulla and pons (hindbrain)

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18
Q

What do the vestibular nuclei do?

A

Integrate vestibular info and somatic receptor info from cerebellum, nuceli of cranial nerves and the ventral posterior thalamus to vestibular area of primary sensory cortex (S1).

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19
Q

In the vestibular pathway, what is the cerebellum responsible for?

A

Balance/posture - sends corrective adjustments to motor cortex

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20
Q

In the vestibular pathway, what are the nuclei of cranial nerves responsible for?

A

Coordinating eye movement and to help equilibrium

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21
Q

In the vestibular pathway, what is the ventral posterior thalamus to vestibular area of S1 responsible for?

A

Conscious awareness of head position

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22
Q

What are the modalities of somatosensation?

A

Hapsis (fine touch/pressure)
Kinesthesis, vestibular (movement, position and spatial orientation/balance)
Proprioception (awareness of our body in space)
Temperature
Pain

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23
Q

What are the different varieties of receptors? (according to location of stimulus)

A

Interoceptors & Proprioceptors - stimuli inside body
Exteroceptors - stimuli outside of body eg. touch

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24
Q

How many different types of receptors are there and where?

A

20 (sensory neurons) in all parts of the body other than the brain (vary in density and sensitivity to stimuli)

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25
Q

What are the 2 types of skin?

A

Hairy and glabrous

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26
Q

What is glabrous skin?

A

Hairless (eg. palms) - sensitive (used to explore objects)

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27
Q

What are the functions of glabrous skin?

A
  • protective
  • prevents evaporation of bodily fluids
  • provides direct contact with the world
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28
Q

How would you test the sensitivity of skin?

A

2 point sensitivity test - how close can the 2 points get with the ability to perceive both as separate sensations?
- weaker in hairy skin (2-5cm)

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29
Q

What is the epidermis?

A

Top layer of skin - contains cells that produce pigment and protect the immune system

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30
Q

What is the dermis?

A

Contains much of our nerve endings, oil and sweat glands, and hair follicles

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31
Q

what is subcutaneous tissue?

A

Fat, connective tissue and blood vessels

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32
Q

What are cutaneous receptors?

A

Found in dermis and epidermis
can be:
encapsulated (surrounded by a capsule)
Unencapsulated (includes free nerve endings)

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33
Q

What are free nerve endings?

A

Unencapsulated ends of dendrites
Most common in skin
not specialised (polymodal) - sensitive to painful stimuli, hot and cold and light touch
SLOW to adjust to a stimulus

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34
Q

What is an example of a specialised variety of a free nerve ending?

A

Hair follicle receptor

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35
Q

What are the 4 primary tactile mechanoreceptors in the skin?

A
  • Pacinian corpuscles
  • Ruffini’s corpuscles
  • Merkel’s disks
  • Meissner’s corpuscles
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36
Q

What are pacinian corpuscles and where are they found?

A

Specific capsule involved in pressure detection - important for detecting deep touch and vibration
Rapidly adapting
Involves both superficial and deep layers and hair

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37
Q

What are pacinian corpuscles also known as?

A

Lamellar corpuscles (lamellar = thin layer structure)

38
Q

What are Ruffini’s corpuscles also known as?

A

Ruffini’s ending

39
Q

What are Ruffini’s corpuscles and where are they found?

A

Sensitive to stretching and sustained deep touch
- found in dermis and subcutaneous tissue in both hairy and glabrous skin
Slow adapting

40
Q

what are Merkel’s Disks and where are they found?

A

Merkel cells + nerve endings
Unencapsulated
Found in epidermis and deeper in glabrous and hairy skin
Slow adapting (tonic) receptors - sustained light touch

41
Q

What are Meissner’s corpuscles also known as?

A

Tactile corpuscles

42
Q

What are meissner’s corpuscles and where are they found?

A

Encapsulated, found high within dermis particularly in glabrous skin and finger pads
Rapidly adapting and sensitive to light touch
- sensitive to shape and textural changes in exploratory and discriminatory touch

43
Q

What is discriminative touch?

A

Stimuli from skin and body tissue

44
Q

What is discriminative touch facilitated by?

A

Specialised touch receptors with different structures
Only surface of sensory dendrite or includes other tissue

45
Q

What are hair receptors and how do they work?

A

Dendrite attached to hair on skin
Object moves across skin, hairs move, sending a nerve impulse - detect direction as there are specialised receptors for each direction eg. leftwards

46
Q

What are touch receptors? (hapsis)

A

receptors on skin that detect vibration and pressure (hapsis)

47
Q

What is affective touch?

A

Low threshold receptors in hairy skin (afferent C fibre family)
- slower touch system
- includes pleasant touch, pain, temperature and itch
Important in many forms of social communication

48
Q

What do nociceptors detect?

A

pain and temperature

49
Q

What do thermoreceptors detect and how are they separated?

A

Temperature
Separate for hot and cold

50
Q

What temperature do the end-bulbs of Krause detect?

A

Cold - found in specialised regions

51
Q

What temperature do Ruffini’s corpuscles detect?

A

Warmth

52
Q

What is proprioception?

A

awareness of the relative position of parts of the body and movement of the body - i.e. the sense of awareness of where limbs are

53
Q

What are proprioceptors?

A

Encapsulated nerve endings which are sensitive to stretch of muscles/tendons and joint movement

54
Q

Which fibres are fastest?

A

Proprioceptors

55
Q

What would someone living without proprioception experience?

A

A lack of awareness of where their limbs are in relation to their body
Would struggle to move without concentrating on the action

56
Q

What is kinesthesis?

A

Sensation of muscles, tendons and joints moving - allows coordinated movement

57
Q

How is kinesthesis different to proprioception?

A

Kinesthesia focuses on bodily movements and motion (behavioural) whilst proprioception focuses on awareness of these movements and behaviours (cognitive)

58
Q

In kinesthesis, what detect the movement of muscles, tendons and joints?

A

Specialised receptors

59
Q

How is pain defined?

A

“an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage” (IASP)

60
Q

What are the 2 types of pain?

A

Chronic (long term)
Acute (short term)

61
Q

What is one positive aspect of pain?

A

Has adaptive value - usually trying to tell you something

62
Q

What do those without nociceptors experience?

A

Deformity through failure to adjust posture + acute injuries due to failure to avoid harmful situations

63
Q

When would peptides and other chemicals be released by cells?

A

When cells are damaged/irritated

64
Q

What is the process of cells releasing peptides and other chemicals?

A

irritation in surrounding tissue –> stimulate chemical release
Excites free nerve endings that function as nociceptors (triggers action potentials along dorsal root ganglion) –> stimulates blood flow and pain fibres (why we experience pain, redness and swelling)
Pain fibres release neurotransmitters and neuromodulators in spinal cord (dorsal horn) - info travels up to thalamus

65
Q

Which other sense contributes to pain sensation?

A

Hapsis –> location and type

66
Q

What is gate theory (Malzack & Wall, 1965)

A

can inhibit pain through pain gates

67
Q

Where are the pain gates according to gate theory (Malzack & Wall, 1965)?

A

Spinal cord
Brain stem
Cortex

68
Q

According to gate theory (Malzack & Wall, 1965) how would you inhibit pain in the spinal cord?

A

Epidural

69
Q

According to gate theory (Malzack & Wall, 1965) how would you inhibit pain in the brainstem?

A

Electrical stimulation

70
Q

According to gate theory (Malzack & Wall, 1965) how would you inhibit pain in the cortex?

A

distraction

71
Q

What type of function does thermoregulation have? (Arancibia et al., 1996; Mogenson, 1977)

A

Homeostatic function

72
Q

How does thermoregulation operate?

A

Through automatic response of hypothalamus (with preoptic regions - contains temperature-sensitive neurons) and behavioural responses such as stamping feet to stay warm

73
Q

How does the hypothalamus aid thermoregulation?

A

Contains temperature sensitive neurons - integrates info with input from skin receptors - releases pituitary hormones to regulate energy, metabolism and heat production

74
Q

How does the body respond to an increase in heat?

A

Rate of metabolic activity decreases
Blood vessels dilate to transfer heat to body surface
Sweat production and evaporation increase - triggers thirst and panting

75
Q

How does the body respond to cold?

A

Increases secretion of thyroid hormones
Increases discharge of sympathetic nervous system - shivering, piloerection (erection or bristling of hairs due to the involuntary contraction of small muscles at the base of hair follicles), blood vessels constrict to reduce heat loss

76
Q

How do senses change as we age?

A

Vaguely - they decrease in quality (full tactile ability when young, tactile defect when old)
Altered detection, reduced sensory conduction, abnormal efferent response

77
Q

What are the 2 receptor specialisations?

A

Rapidly adapting receptors - beginning and end of touch (produce bursts of action potential) and slowly adapting receptors - as stimulus is occurring

78
Q

What are rapidly adapting receptors involved in + examples?

A

Detecting discriminate touch (Meissner’s corpuscles) and fluttering (Pacinian corpuscles)

79
Q

What are slowly adapting receptors involved in + examples?

A

Light pressure (eg. Merkel’s receptors and hair receptors)
Firmer pressure (eg. Ruffini’s corpuscles - vibration due to stretching)

80
Q

What is the pathway to the brain?

A

Receptors carry somatosensory info to cell body of neuron just outside spinal cord - neuron contains a single long dendrite with only the tip responsible to sensory stimuli - each segment of spinal cord has one dorsal root per side with many dorsal-root ganglion neurons each responsible for one stimuli type

81
Q

What is the pathway to the brain (from spinal cord) in haptic-proprioception?

A

Axons for haptic-proprioception located in dorsal portion of spinal cord. Synapse at base of brain in dorsal-column nuclei - cross to other side of brain stem through medial lemniscus in medulla - synapse in ventrolateral thalamus sends axons to somatosensory and motor cortex

82
Q

What is the pathway to the brain (from spinal cord) in nociception?

A

Nociceptor synapse in dorsal (top) part of grey matter in spinal cord. Axon sent to ventral (bottom) part of spinal cord + some to somatosensory cortex and insular and anterior part of cingulate cortex

83
Q

What do lesions in the somatosensory cortex cause?

A

Impaired somatic sensatons

84
Q

Where is the primary somatosensory cortex?

A

In postcentral gyrus

85
Q

What does the posterior parietal cortex do?

A

Informs attended spatial aspects of touch

86
Q

What is a homunculus?

A

A somatosensory map of the body - the more emphasised senses are made larger on the body eg. larger hands, lips and tongue as they are more sensitive

87
Q

What are type A fibres?

A

Large, well-myelinated axons - faster for rapid response. eg. Haptic and proprioception

88
Q

What are type C tibres?

A

Smaller axons with littel or no myelination - sensation occurs for a long time so no need for rapid response eg. nociception

89
Q

What is the general pathway for touch and pain?

A

Somatosensory receptors –> Spinal column –> thalamus –> somatosensory cortex

90
Q

What is the difference between the pathway of fine touch and nociceptive info?

A

Fine touch info ascends spinal cord ipsilaterally via dorsal column medial lemniscal pathway whereas nociceptive info ascends contralaterally via spinothalamic pathways

year 1 - biological bases of behaviour (11 decks)

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