Week 4 Flashcards
(71 cards)
genetics
- exact genetic basis of most psychiatric disorders remains unclear
- family members of individuals who have major mental disorders increased risk for the same disorder (ex: schizophrenia, bipolar disorder)
epigenetics
- challenges the ancient ‘nature/nurture’ debate
(it is not either/or but about interactions of genes with an individual’s environment) - cells w identical genetic make-up (genotype) can function in radically different ways
- genotype is influenced by environment and lifestyle prenatally and across the life span
- chemicals that change or mark a genome in a way that directs genetic expression (methyl groups, histones)
- epigenome marks (turns on or off) the genome directly through DNA methylation and indirectly through histone modification
what is the autonomic nervous system
linkage between brain and internal organs that allows for maintenance of homeostasis
2 divisions of ANS
- PSNS - rest + digest
- SNS - fight or flight
occipital lobe
visual area
- sight
- image recognition
- image perception
temporal lobe association area
- short term memory
- equilibrium
- emotion
motor function area
initiation of voluntary muscles
broca’s area
muscles of speech
left frontoral lobe
speech production and articulation
somatosensory association area
- evaluation of wt, texture, temperature, etc for object recognition
wernicke’s area
written and spoken language comprehension
describe the frontal cortex
- “guide behaviour” in absence of, or despite discriminative environmental stimuli
- orbitofrontal: contain olfaction, reward value of smell, taste, and other sensations, “personality” or other social-emotional changes
- humour
- judgement
- abstract thinking
- creativity
- maintaining social appropriateness
- contains “motor cortex”
prior to the 1970’s what did neurologists and neurosurgeons think about the frontal cortex
that this area was “silent,” often sacrificing them in surgery
whats the L prefrontal in frontal cortex do
fluency in spontaneous speech
whats the R prefrontal in frontal cortex do
fluency in design
what can happen after frontal lobe damage occurs
personality changes after frontal lobe damage (ventromedial and orbitofrontal regions
- disinhibition
- emotional instability
- aggression
- irritability
- impulsiveness
describe the parietal lobe
- all about understanding the world around you
- coordinates processing of sensory information (including spatial relationships, sensory inputs, interpreting visual and mathematical information)
- proprioception and body awareness
describe the temporal lobe functions
- visual recognition
- auditory
- emotion
- memory
- olfaction
what is the limbic sys
- helps modulate basic emotions and memory
- regulates autonomic and endocrine function in response to emotional stimuli and also is involved in reinforcing behaviour
- compromises several small structures that work in a highly organized way: include hippocampus (storing memories), thalamus (relays sensory info), hypothalamus (basic human activities such as a sleep-rest patterns, body temperature and physical drives), amygdala (primitive center of the brain sense of smell)
what are 2 subcortical temporal lobe limbic structures
1) hippocampus
2) amygdala
what’s the hippocampus
learn and remember thoughts, events, things, places
amygdala
emotions, feelings attached to thoughts, events, things, places
occipital lobe
- visual processing center
- damage to this area causes cortical blindness: retina and optic nerve are intact but the person cannot see
object agnosia
- pt can see (acuity, colour, and motion preserved)
- can not recognize (name, describe, demonstrate use of an object)
- can not copy an object or picture
- may only be able to draw from memory only
prosopagnosia
inability to recognize faces including self in mirror, friends, famous people