Ch. 2 Methods

Question 0

What type of network was believed to be continuous, connecting to one another, and is a complex pathway for conducting signals uninterrupted?

Answer 0

The nerve net.

Question 1

What did cajal develop and how did he use his techniques? What did he discover, and what became the centerpiece after his finding? What are the 3 things he concluded about neurons?

Answer 1

Interested in investigating the nerve net, he developed the Golgi stain.

Looked at slices of brain and studied brains of newborn animals to compare density of cells w adults.

Saw that it is not continuous but individual units connected. This was the centerpiece to the Neuron Doctrine- the idea that ind. cells transmit discontinuous signals in the nervous system.

He concluded 1 there’s a small gap bw ends of neurons axon and dendrites(synapse). 2 neurons only form connections to specific neurons (neural circuits). 3 specialized neurons in eye ear skin (receptors).

Question 2

Describe basic parts of neuron:
Cell Body
Dendrites
Axons
Synapse
Neural circuits
Receptors

Answer 2

Cell body is center and keeps cell alive.

Dendrites receive signals.

Axons (nerve fibers) are processes that transmit signals to other neurons.

Synapse is the gap bw axon and dendrite.

Neural circuits are the interconnected neurons that specialize in specific neurons.

Receptors are specialized neurons for the ears eyes and skin.

Question 3

Edgar Adrian developed what type of recording?

Answer 3

Single cell recordings using micro electrodes to pick up electrical signals at the tip which relayed signals back to recording device.

Question 4

Action Potentials! Describe each step.

Resting potential

Answer 4

Resting potential, neuron has charge that’s 70mV more negative than the outside.

Question 5

What are feature detectors? Explain each. What do they respond to?

Answer 5

Feature detectors refer to hubel and weizels experiments with cats, in which they found that each neuron in the visual area of the cortex responded to specific types of stimulation presented to a small area of the retina.

They respond to orientation, movement, and length.

Question 6

When looking at a tree, each neurons fires at different features of the tree. Some fire to vertically oriented trunk and so on. What does this refer to?

Answer 6

Feature detectors

Question 7

What does hierarchical processing have to do with feature detectors? Give an example of this. Explain what is happening.

Answer 7

Neurons in the visual cortex respond to simple stimuli like oriented bars.

neurons in the Temporel lobe respond to complex geometrical stimuli and

neurons in another area of the Temporel lobe respond to faces.

What’s happening is that neurons in the visual cortex that respond to relatively simple stimuli send their axons to higher levels of the visual system where signals from many neurons combine and interact neurons at this higher level which respond to more complex stimuli then sends enough to hire area combining and interacting further and creating your own star respond to even more complex than realize like faces.

The key is that there is combining in interacting with simple and complex stimuli.

Question 8

The idea that an object is represented by firing of specialized neurons that respond only to that object is also referred to as grandma cell but what is it called?

Answer 8

Specifity coding

Question 9

Define population coding and an advantage. What type of evidence do we have that this works?

Answer 9

Population coding represents an object by pattern of firing of a large number of neurons.

An advantage of population coding is that a large number of stimuli can be represented because large groups of neuron can create a huge number of different pattern.

There is good evidence for population coding in the senses and for cognitive functions as well

Question 10

What is sparse coding? Can a particular neuron respond to more than one stimulus?

Answer 10

During sparse coding, majority of neurons remain silent and when a particular object is represented, a pattern of firing of only a small group of neurons occurs.

One particular neuron can respond to more than one stimulus.

Question 11

Only neuron number five responds to Dennis’s face and only number respond to Corey’s face. what type of coding does this represent?

Neuron’s number 2468 respond to Steve’s face. Neuron number 3478 respond to cartels face. number seven 810 and four respond to Perkins face what type of coding is this?

Answer 11

Specifity coding

Sparse coding

Question 12

Gil sees Mary because light reflected from Mary enters the gills eyes and Mary’s images focus into his retina the important word here is image what is this an example of?

Answer 12

Neuro representation

Question 13

Specific functions that are served by specific areas of the brain is a basic principle of brain organization of what?

Answer 13

Localization of function you can find localization of function from Neuro psychology

Question 14

Damage to the Brokas area Warnicke’s in damage to the occipital lobe which causes blindness is an example of what?

Answer 14

Localization of function

Question 15

1. Which lobe receives signals from all senses and is responsible for coordination as well of higher cognitive functions like thinking and problem-solving?
2. The blank cortex which receives signals from the skin is in the blank lobe and is responsible for perceptions of touch pressure and pain.
3. The auditory cortex which signals from ears is located where?

Answer 15

Frontal lobe

Somatosensory cortex,. Parietal love

Temporel lobe

Question 16

True or false one of the goals of neuropsychology research is to determine whether a particular area of the brain serves every cognitive function.

Answer 16

False, one of the goals of neuropsychology research is to determine whether a particular area of the brain is specialized to serve a particular cognitive function.

Question 17

How does a double dissociation occurr?

What is the importance of demonstrating a double dissociation

Answer 17

Double dissociation occurs if damage to one area of the brain causes function A to be absent while function B is Present, and damage to another area causes function B to be absent while function A is present.

To demonstrate a double dissociation it is necessary to find two people with brain damage that satisfy the above conditions

The whole point is that we can conclude that functions A and B are served by different mechanisms which operate independently of one another

Question 18

True or false

Face recognition is served by one area in the temporal lobe and its function is separate from mechanism associated with recognizing other types of objects which is served by a different area in the parietal lobe.

Answer 18

False both are served by different areas in the temporal lobe

Question 19

Describe how FMRI work. How is it different from MRIs?

Answer 19

Functional magnetic resonance imaging takes advantage of the fact that bloodflow increases in areas of the brain activated by cognitive task. This measurement of blood flow is picked up on when it reads the iron levels/magnetic field when there is a presence.

Question 20

Where is the fusiform face area located? What happens if this area gets damaged?

Answer 20

FFA is located in the fusiform gyrus’s on the underside of the Temporel lobe it is the same part of the brain that is damaged in cases of prosopagnosia.

Question 21

Which area of the brain is activated when looking at pictures representing indoor and outdoor scenes? The apparent important information is spatial layout because this area is activate it whether the room is empty or not.

Answer 21

PPA parahippocampal place area

Question 22

Alex Huth and colleagues conducted and FMRI experiment using film clips. What did the voxels in the fMRI show?

Answer 22

He was able to determine what kinds of stimuli each each voxel responded to. For example one Voxel responded to streets buildings roads interiors and vehicles

Question 23

Which area of the brain is localized to be activated by pictures of bodies and parts of buddies but not faces?

Answer 23

EBA Extrastriate body area

Question 24

Objects and actions similar to each other are located near each other in the brain and the reason there are two areas for humans into for animals is what? Provide examples for the label human at the bottom of the brain.

Answer 24

The reason there are two areas for humans into for animals is that each area represents different features related to humans or animals. For example the area labeled human at the bottom of the brain corresponds to the fusiform face area which response to all aspects of faces the human area higher on the brain response pacifically to facial expressions.

Question 25

What is distributed representation? How does this idea seemingly compliment the idea of localization of function

Answer 25

Distributed representation is the idea that specific on the new functions activate many areas of the brain. An example is the FFA area FFA area is strongly activated by faces and responds more weakly to other types of stimuli but just because there is an area that specialize to respond to faces doesn't mean the faces activate only that area. Faces strongly activate FFA area plus other areas as well.

Question 26

What's technique is based on detection of how water fuses along the length of nerve fibers?

Answer 26

DTI or diffusion tensor imaging can trace the pathways of the nerve fibers that create communication between different structures.

Question 27

What is the design of the greeble experiment? What is the IV and the DV of this experiment? What is the Main Effect? Is the interaction significant, rather does the effect of one independent variable depend on the level of another-is the activation in the FFA in response to The different stimuli type dependent on Pretraining repost training?

Answer 27

This is a 2 x 2 factorial design. The first two refers to before and after training the two after refers to the stimulus the Greeble is and faces. The DV is the FFA activation in response to stimulus. The main effect refers to the effect of an independent variable. The main effect shows that faces respond to faces much more than they do to Greebles. The main effect of training is hard to tell because there is not that much of a difference in numbers. It does look like there is more stimulation post training. There is an interaction in training especially to Greebles.

Question 28

How do you calculate main effects?

Answer 28

You find the mean of each IV level. Will be the difference bw the 2 averages. Overall the FFA responded much more to faces. ( main effect, we only describe 1 IV).

Question 29

Is there a significant interaction aka does the effect of one IV depend on the level of the other? Before training: 15(g), 95(f) After training: 65(g), 70(f) Main effect of stimulus type: 40(g), 82.5(f) Main effect of training: 55(before), 67.5(after)

Answer 29

There is an interaction. In the graph, it does intersect. The activation in the FFA in response to diff. Stimuli type is dependent on pre and post training. Before training the FFA responded strongly to faces but weak to Greebles. Post training the FFA responded to both faces and Greebles almost equally. ( need to mention all 4 IV)

Question 30

Who studied insight problem solving and advocated a configural approach to perception where perception was more than the sum of its parts?

Answer 30

Kohler