Chapters 1-2 Flashcards
(62 cards)
What is a neuron?
A cell that receives and transmits electrochemical signals.
What was the case of Jimmie G?
Extreme short-term memory loss; Kosakoff’s syndrome. Related to alcoholism and thiamine (b1) deficiency.
What are the four themes of the text?
Thinking creatively, clinical implications, evolutionary perspective, neuroplasticity.
What is biopsychology?
The scientific study of the biology of behavior.
What types of research characterize the biopsychological approach?
Comparative approach, experiments, quasiexperimental studies, case studies.
How do biopsychologists study the unobservable workings of the brain?
Scientific inference-basically an educated guess.
Critical thinking about biopsychological claims: Case 1
Jose and the Bull, believed he had discovered a caudate taming center of a bull.
Critical thinking about biopsychological claims: Case 2
Egas Moniz won the Nobel Prize for the prefrontal lobotomy. Transorbital lobotomy was popularized by Walter Freeman.
The case of the man who fell out of bed:
Asomatognosia-losing awareness of parts of your body. caused by damage to right parietal lobe.
Case of chimps with mirrors
Proved self-awareness (“mind”) in chimps.
Three factors of behavior:
genetic endowment (evolution), experience, perception of the current situation.
What are the three major contributions of the Human Genome Project?
New techniques for DNA, humans have relatively few genes (about same as mice and less than corn), discovery of multiple genes for each disease.
Epigenetics:
The study of all mechanisms of inheritance other than the genetic code and its expression.
Epigenetics have led to these discoveries:
Non-gene DNA still important/active, multiple RNA types, proteins and DNA-tightness affecting gene expression, can be passed on.
What did the maze bright/dull experiment prove?
Behavioral traits can be selectively bred; genes influence the development of behavior.
Main point of PKU example
a recessive gene, early detection and diet changes can reduce effects of the disorder.
Birdsong example
Males learn from others, predisposed to learn from own species, brain plasticity in response to environment
What are the two main parts of the nervous system?
Central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) and peripheral nervous system (somatic and autonomic)
What is the somatic system?
Connects our body to outside world (senses), both afferent and efferent.
What is the autonomic system?
Regulates internal functions. Two parts: sympathetic and parasympathetic.
What are the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems?
Para=rest and digest, symp=fight or flight
What are meninges?
The three protective membranes that encase the brain and spinal cord.
What is cerebrospinal fluid?
Fills the spinal cord and ventricles of the brain, protects and supports.
What are ventricles?
Four large inner chambers of the brain, filled with cerebrospinal fluid.
