TOPIC: BIOPSYCHOLOGY Flashcards

Question

THE FUNCTION OF THE ENDOCRINE SYSTEM : What is the function of the thymus gland?

Answer 1

stimulates the development of T cells that work in the immune system helping with disease resistance, active until puberty

Answer 2

regulates blood sugar levels problems with this system lead to diabetes

Answer 3

regulates biological effects of the fight or flight response, increase heart rate, blood + supply to muscles + sweating etc

Answer 4

reproductive glands develop secondary sexual characteristics in both males + females appearing in puberty

Answer 5

a threat is percieved by the higher brain function the hypothalamus is then alerted. this recognises the situation is acute so it activates the sympathomedullary (SAM) Pathway this activates the sympathetic branch of the ANS. ANS stands for autonomic nervous system this then stimulates the adrenal medula which is part of the adrenal gland. these are located just above the kidney the adrenal medula secretes the hormones adrenaline and noradrenaline into the bloodstream this prepares the body for flight or fight and as such causes a number of physical (bodily) changes, including... - increase in blood flow ( and oxygen ) to muscles - reduce activity in digestive system in order to conserve energy - increase heart rate and raised blood pressue

Answer 6

if the threat then goes away, the parasympathetic nervous system kicks in and returns the body to it's normal state = know as rest adn digest if the threat is still presnt, then the body must find another way of coping

Answer 7

GRAY ( 1988 ) : argues that the first phase of the reaction to a threat is not fight or flight but to avoid confrontation he suggests that most animals ( including humans ) typically display a freeze response this allows them to ' stop, look and listen ' and this allows time to gather more information before making a decision on whether to then run or stay and fight HOWEVER, Von Dawan et al ( 2012 ) challeng this view - response inhibits fight and the release of the hormone oxytocin reduces fearfulness and stress acute stress can lead to greater cooperation and friendly behaviour, even in men. this could explain the human connection that happens during times of crisis such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks in new york BUT Lee and Harley ( 2012 ) found evidence of a genetic gender SRY gene found on male Y chromosome promotes fight or flight relaease of hormones in addition, the fight or flight response can have a negative effect on our health, especially in modern day life while it use to be a useful survival mechanism for our ancrstors, it is rare for a sistuation to require such an intense response it can end up doing more harm than good

Answer 8

the knee-jerk reflex is an example of a reflex arc: - a stimulus, such as a hammer, hits the knee - this is detected by sense organs in the peripheral nervous system which convery a message along a sensory neuron - the message reaches the central nervouse system where it connects with an relay neuron - this then transfers the message to a motor neuron - this then carries the message to an effector such as a muscle, which causes the muscle to contract and, hence, cause the knee to more or to jerk

Answer 9

- action potential moves down the axon of the presynaptic neuron to the terminal button. moving the vesicles towards the membrane - vesicles merge with the membrane + release neurotransmitters into the synapse - neurotransmitters are picked up by complimentary receptors on the post synaptic neuron - they work like a lock + key - neurotransmiters can have on excitory effect which increases the chances of the post synaptic neuron firing or they can have on inhibitory effect which decreases the chances of the post synaptic neuron firing - the overall effect is determined by the process of summation - neurotransmitters are either broken down in the synapse or taken back up into the presynaptic neuron + repackaged into vesicles

Answer 10

a technique which measures brain activity, while a person performs a particular task this technique measures blood flow changes in the brain to indicate neural activity if a particular brain region is more active, there is an increased blood flow in that region researchers can map these changes to show which regions of the brain are active, during a particular task the brain responds to this demand by increasing blood flow, delivering oxygen in the red blood cells

Answer 11

POSITIVES: its non-invasive - it means that individuals behaviours can be investigated without their physical, mental or psychological health being placed at risk more objective/ reliable = fMRI's are a useful way of investigating psychological phenomena that people would not be capade of providing in verbal reports while also removing chances of bias good spatial resolution of approx X 1mm NEGATIVES: fMRI's are not a direct measure of neutral activity in particul.ar brain areas = it is not a quantative measure of mental activity small sample sizes = research becomes difficult to generalize / gives research low population valididty machines are very expensive to build and operate = as the partcipants need to be still, experiments with body movement are not possible poor temporal resolution = refers to the accuracy of the scanner in relation of time, or how quickly the scanner can detect changes in brain activity.

Answer 12

a technique which measures electrical activity in the brain. typical activity patterns include: alpha, beta, delta and theta waves a technique which used an EEG to measure small voltage changes to specific events or stimuli the signals (data generated) are graphed and can be used to detect certain types disorders ( e,g Alzheirmer's disease ) an adavantage of this technique is that it shows real time activity through electrical activity

Answer 13

used to record a persons' brain activity carried out by attacing electrodes to the scalp which record tiny electrical produced by the brain, allowing researchers to view general brainwaves' patterns brainwaves are viewed at different points, like sleep waves, alertness and cognitive processes frequency and amplitude of the waves and depicts them onto a graph to compare the existing normal brainwaves

Answer 14

point: the procedure is painless, comfortable an generally very safe example: no electricity is put into your body while its carried out; you normally will not experience any side effects explain: this means that EEGs are a non-invasive method for studying the brain as they do not require any surgery or insertion, unlike other neuroimaging techniques link: therefore, EEGs are a safer option for studying the brain compared to other scanning techniques

Answer 15

point: EEGs have low spatial resolution example: the exact location of brain activity within the brain cannot be located evidence: this means that the result of the scan is unable to be recognised to be localised to a specific area of the brain and that external factors like muscle tension can interfere with the signals from the scan link: therfore, EEGs could impact giving correct diagnoses as a result of innacuracies caused by the unspecified location of brain activity

Answer 16

a technique which used an EEG to measure small voltage changes to specifc events or stimuli waves which occur within 100 milliseconds are termed sensory waves which occur after 100 milliseconds are termed cognitive this technique can demonstrate how human processing is effected by specific stimuli

Answer 17

similar to the EEG, the ERP uses elctrodes connected to the scalp however in an ERP ppts are presented with a stimulus, which stimulates a response from the brain from these readings, researchers can determine how the brain processes stimuli over time

Answer 18

they are non-invasive this is good because we can study the brain without damaging it, so multiple tests can be run on the same brain, making the results more valid high temporal resolution takes very little time for it to pick up neutral activity, so the readings are much more time - accurate

Answer 19

low spatial solution means that it can only pick up activity in superficial regions of the brain, and not deeper regions such as the hypothalamus makes this technique limited in comparison with others eliminate extraneous neural activity in order to gain a better, more accurate picture of what's going on this means this method is more experimentally robust and the results are less affected by confounding variables and are therefore more valid

Answer 20

used when a person dies examination of the actual physical brain for example, broca examined his patient ' Tan' who had a lesion in the Broca's area which is responsible for speech production enables researchers to perform a more detailed examination of the anatomical structure of the brain, in particular deeper regions like the hypothalamus and hippocampus

Answer 21

One limitation of post-mortem examination is the with causation the fault within a person's behaviour that is displayed throughout their lifetime e.g. Tan's inability to say anything other than 'Tan' may not be linked to the deficit in their brain. These deficits could've been due to another illness, and therfore psychologists cannot be certaon that this is caused by damaged founded in the brain this meanse that unusual behaviour is not dependent on a brain deficit and may habe other contributing factors as this not invasive, some ehtical issues in relation to informed consent and whether a patient has provided consent beforehis/her death too add post-mortems are often carried out on patients with severe psychological deficits, who may not have the capability to give consent or understand what they are consenting to

Answer 22

they provide a detailed examiniation of the anatomical strucure and neurochemical aspects this is crucial as this cannot be done with other scanning techniques this is because post-mortem can access areas sich as the hypothalamus and hippocampus which scanning cannot this means that there is mroe detailed research for psychologists and a deeper insight into brain regions is given e.g Iverson found a higher concentration of dopamine in the limbic system of patients with schizophrenia which has since prompted a whole new area of research looking into the neutral correlates of this disorder

Answer 23

This refers to the principle that specific functions have specific locations with in the brain originally it was thought that brain functions was holistic - all parts of the brain were involved in the porcessing of thought and actions

Answer 24

the brain is divided into two halves known as hemispheres the outer layer of the heispheres is called the cerebral cortex it is about 3mm thich and is much more developed in humans than other animals it appears grey in colour, hence the term ' grey matter '

Answer 25

comunication pathway to hemisphere can exchange information

Answer 26

located in the left frontal lobe and is thought to be involved in language production

Answer 27

located in the temporal lobe and is responsible for analysing and processing acoustic information

Answer 28

located in the frontal lobe, and it is responsible for voluntary moments by sending signals to the muscles in the body

Answer 29

located in the parietal lobe and recieves incoming sensory information from the skin to produce sensations related to presure, pain + temperature

Answer 30

located in the occiptal lobe is the visual area, which recieves and processes visual information

Answer 31

located in the left temporal lobe and is involved in language processing/ comprehension

Answer 32

Gage survived a freak accident ( 1848 ) when the iron rod he was using to compress dynamite into rock blew black the rod entered under his left eye, continuing through his frontal lobe and then landing over 30 feet behind him he made a miraculous recovery from the accident with very little effect on his mental and physical health his behaviour had changed >> he became more rude, irresponsible and reckless damage to the connections between the frontal cortex and limbic system is in keeping with such behaviour as these pathways are now know to be involved in the regulation of our emotions

Answer 33

this tells us about the localisation of brain functioning, that different parts of the brain have different functions because the pole had damaged his frontal lobe, which had changed his personality/ behaviour hard to draw a general conclusion from the case of Gage because the sample is limited and not replresnetative of wider population and it is difficult to generalise results form the individual as each case is unique

Answer 34

language processing tends to be located in the left hemisphere two areas have been identified as particularly important, Broca's area and Wernicke's area

TOPIC: BIOPSYCHOLOGY Flashcards

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