Brain Chapter Flashcards
Cerebellum
produces fine control over muscle action, stores memories of movement patterns, equilibrium and posture, awareness of body position. Alcohol impairs these synapses.
Pons
regulates muscles in breathing
Medulla Oblongata
responsible for autonomic functions (heart rate, bp, breathing rate, coughing, sneezing, swallowing, vomiting, fight or flight
Limbic system
several small parts of the brain that are not related, but sometimes come together for a bigger purpose to control key areas of the brain. Controls odors that provoke emotion; especially for long term memories. Store memories (sensory, short, long)
Short term memory
lasts about 20 seconds
Long term memory
anything longer than 20 seconds, does not mean that you will be able to recall information.
midbrain
makes dopamine that helps with movement, emotions, pleasure, and pain. Also turns head and eyes to respond to what you see or hear, it is responsive.
Parkinson’s disease
One part that makes up dopamine is not synthesized enough and so only half of the dopamine particle is released.
Diencephalon
Middle of the brain made of the hypothalamus, thalamus, and “epithalamus” (pineal gland and habenular nuclei.
Pineal gland
secretes melatonin, responsible for circadian rhythms.
Habenular nuclei
very small group of neurons, create emotional responses to odors.
Thalamus
5 groups of nuclei that help with processing information. Consists of anterior group, medial group, ventral group, posterior group, lateral group.
Anterior group
sends info to the limbic system to process incoming info with emotions (attaches emotion to info)
Medial group
provides awareness of emotional states
Ventral group
relays general sensory info (temp, touch, pressure, pain).
Posterior group
relays specific info (sensory, visual, auditory) and goes to specific lobe for processing.
Lateral group
affects emotional states and integrates sensory information. Sensory overload occurs when thalamus can’t filter and relay sensory info fast enough.
Hypothalamus
regulates pineal gland. Deals with autonomic nervous system (hr, bp, digestion, respiration) endocrine control, body temp., emotional behavior (pleasure, aggression, fear, rage, sex drive) hunger and thirst
Cerebrum
responsible for higher thinking: intelligence, reasoning, thoughts, memory, judgement, voluntary motor control, visual and auditory.
cerebral lateralization
both hemispheres look the same physically, but don’t do the same thing.
insula lobe
memory, interpretation of taste.
occipital lobe
visual info, tells you what you see. stores visual memories.
temporal lobe
hearing, smell
parietal lobe
general sensory (touch, temp, pressure, pain) and shapes and textures.
frontal
voluntary motor, concentration, verbal communication, decision making, personality, and planning.
functional areas
process info for higher thought (conscious thinking)
Sensory functional areas
primary gustatory cortex, primary olfactory cortex, primary somatosensory cortex, primary visual cortex, primary auditory cortex.
primary gustatory cortex
processes taste/flavors
primary olfactory cortex
process smell
primary somatosensory cortex
balance, touch, pressure, pain, pressure, temp (all sensory info)
primary visual cortex
process sight
primary auditory cortex
process sound areas
motor areas
primary motor cortex, motor speech area (broca area), and frontal eye field.
primary motor cortex
command voluntary muscle movement
motor speech area (broca area)
talking
frontal eye field
reading and genicular vision (tunnel vision)
association areas
somatosensory, visual, auditory, gnostic
somatosensory association area
allows you to identify something without seeing it
Visual association area
allows us to identify people and things
auditory association area
allows us to interpret characteristics of sound and store them as memories
gnostic association area
allows you to read a room and adapt (filter) - Phineas gage injured his
Sensory pathways
ascend towards brain, have 2 categories (somatic and visceral)
motor pathways
descend from brain
pathway characteristics
are paired up, one for each body side, process info, made of a chain of 2 or more neurons
upper and lower neurons
upper goes to higher brain and lower goes to lower.
Somatic sensory (somatosensory) pathway receptors
2 types, tactile receptors (detect characteristics of an object) and proprioceptors (detect strength in joints, muscles and tendons.
Visceral sensory receptors
detect changes in internal organs such as stretching.
