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Psych 367 > Chapter 14 > Flashcards

Chapter 14 Flashcards

1
Q

What is the breakdown of the somatosensory system?Include the three parts

A

1) Cutaneous senses
- >touch and pain

2) Proprioception
- >sense body position and limb position

3) Kinesthesis
- >movement of body and limbs

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2
Q

What is the heaviest organ of the body?

A

-the skin

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3
Q

What is the layer of dead skin cells? What layer is below it?

A
  • the layer of dead skin cells is the epidermis

- below it is the dermis

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4
Q

Where are mechanoreceptors found?

A

-in the dermis and the epidermis

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5
Q

What are Merkel receptors referred to? Do they have a large receptive field?

A
  • slowly adapting fiber
  • SA1 fibers
  • the nerve fiber fires continuously as long as the stimulus is on
  • have a small cutaneous receptive field

-involved with fine details, texture and shape

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6
Q

What are Meissner corpuscle receptor referred to? Do they have large receptive fields?

A
  • fast adapting fibers
  • RA1
  • the nerve fiber fires only when the stimulus is applied and when it is removed

-involved with handgrip control, and perceived motion across the skin

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7
Q

Describe the Ruffini cylinder

A
  • it is a mechanoreceptor
  • > fires to stretching
  • a SA2 fiber
  • deeper in the skin
  • > has a larger receptive field than Merkle and Meissner
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8
Q

Describe the Pacinian corpuscle

A
  • it is a mechanoreceptor
  • a RA2 fiber
  • deeper in the skin
  • responds to biration
  • fine texture moving across the fingers
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9
Q

Differentiate th emedial lemniscal pathway and the spinothalamic pathway

A
  • lemniscal pathway has large fibers
  • > carry signals related to proprioception and perceiving touch
  • spinothalamic pathway carries signals related to pain and temperature
  • > smaller fibers
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10
Q

Are there pain receptor in the brain

A

-no

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11
Q

What is the homunculus

A

-it shows the areas of the skin that project to areas of the brain

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12
Q

How does using a function more often contribute to its cortical organization

A
  • if a function is used more often

- >that area of the cortex becomes larger

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13
Q

What is the Braille characters used for

A
  • it is used by blind people to read
  • consists of a cell made up of one to six dots
  • different arrangements represents different letters of the alphabet
  • all of this depends on tactile detail perception
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14
Q

How does grating acuity relate to Merkel receptors and Paccinian receptors

A

-better acuity is associated with less spacing between Merkel receptors

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15
Q

How does the cortex relate to tactile acuity

A
  • there is a relationship between tactile acuity and the cortical homunculus
  • > the smaller the receptive field
  • > the less the overlap in the cortex
  • > so more firing of neurons in the cortex
  • eg; fingers have small receptive fields
  • > so the neurons in the cortex wouldn’t overlap and would fire separately
  • > can’t say the same for the receptive fields of an arm
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16
Q

Why does the Pacinian receptor respond to rapid vibrations but not constant stimulations

A
  • due to the corpuscle fibers
  • > they have a series of layers
  • > fluid between each layers
  • > transmits rapidly repeated pressure like vibrations
  • > does not transmit continuous pressure
  • therefore, the pacinian responds well
  • > at the beginning when a stimulus first fires
  • > and when the stimulus ends

-or it responds well to a vibration

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17
Q

What is surface texture

A

-it is the physical texture of a surface created by peaks and valleys

18
Q

What provides a more accurate assessment of surface texture? Touch or vision?

19
Q

Describe the duplex theory of texture perception

A
  • perception of texture depends on
  • > spatial cues
  • > temporal cues
20
Q

What are spatial cues

A
  • provided by large surface elements
  • > eg; bumps and grooves
  • > felt when the skin moves across surface elements
  • > feel different shapes, sizes and distribution of surface elements
21
Q

What are temporal cues

A
  • fingers moved across textured surface
  • > like fine sandpaper
  • > perception of fine texture that cannot be detected unless the fingers are moving across the surface

-fine textures sensation was due to the role of vibtation

22
Q

How does adapting the Pacinian corpuscle receptor affect our ability to tell the difference between two fine textures

A
  • it removes that ability

- Pacinian receptors play a huge role in temporal cues

23
Q

Contrast active touch with passive touch. What kind of perception do you engage in the active touch.

A

Active touch

  • > touch in which person actively explores an object
  • > with fingers and hands
  • > you engage in haptic perception
  • > experience the objects you are touching

Passive touch

  • > when touch stimuli are applied to the skin
  • > experience stimulation of the skin
24
Q

Describe the haptic perceptual system. What parts of the body work together in this system?

A

-it is when the sensory system, the motor system and the cognitive systems work all together

25
What are exploratory procedures
- people use a number of distinctive movements - >when they are involved in the process of active touching - these distinc movements are exploratory procedures
26
What kind of receptive fields do ventral posterior thalamus neurons respond to
-they respond to center surround receptive fields
27
What kind of receptive fields have been found in the somatosensory cortex of monkeys
- center-surround - others that respond more to specialized stimulation of the skin - >eg; neurons that respond to specific orientations - >neurons that respond to movement across the skin in a specified direction - >neurons that respond to monkeys grasping a specific objects
28
How does attention affect cortical responding?
Without attention or being distracted - >the stimulation of receptors may trigger a response - >but the size of the response can be affected by the processes such as attention, thinking and other actions of the perceiver - attention influences what stimuli stimulate the receptors - it also stimulates the processing that occurs once the receptors are stimulated
29
How does watching someone else be touched affect the somatosensory cortex?
-it activates areas in the somatosensory cortex of the observesr that would also be activated in the somatosensory cortex of the person actually being touched
30
What are the three types of pain? Describe them
1) Inflammatory Pain - >damage to tissue - >tumor cells - >inflammation of joints 2) Neuropathic Pain - >caused by lesions or damage to the nervous system - >eg; carpal tunnel syndrome 3) Nociceptive pain - >activation in the receptors called nociceptors - >responds to tissue damage or potential damage
31
Describe the direct pathway model of pain
- pain occurs when nociceptor receptors in the skin are stimulated - >send their signals directly from the skin to the brain - >but not all pain arises from damage to the skin -cannot explain phantom limbs
32
Describe Phantom Limbs
- pain occurs without any transmission from receptor to brain - >occurs with people who have had limb amputations - signals are still sent from part of the limb that remains gone - >cutting the nerves that used to transmit signals from the limb to the brain does not eliminate the phantom limb or the pain
33
Describe the gate control model to pain
- pain signals enter the spinal cord from the body - >then move from the spinal cord to the brain - >there are additional pathways that influence the signal from the spinal cord to the brain - >these additional pathways can act as a gate -note the dorsal horn of the spinal cord controls the pain coming up to the spinal cord
34
How does input occur to the gate control system along three pathways
1) Nociceptor - >fibers from nociceptors activate a circuit consisting entirely of excitatory synapses - >send excitatory signals to the transmission cells - >excitatory signals in the dorsal horn open the gate - >increase the firing of transmission cells 2) Mechanoreceptors - >nonpainful tactile stimulation - >signals from these receptors reach the innhibitory neurons in the dorsal horn - >inhibitory signals are then sent to transmission cells - >this closes the gate - >decreases the firing of transmission cells 3) Central control - >fibers - >carry signals down from the cortex - >activity coming down from the brain closes the gate - >decreases transmission cells activity
35
What is the placebo effect
- decrease in pain from a substance that has no pharmacological effect - >patient believes that the substance is effective therapy - >decrease in pain from a positive efffect
36
What is the nocebo effect
- negative placebo effect - negative expectation instructions - >results in negative effect
37
Can attention be used to distract an individual from a sense of pain
- yes | - >for example, burn victims using virtual reality techniques
38
Can emotions play a role in pain
- yes - >more positive emotions=less perception of pain - >eg; looking at pleasant pictures and not being reminded that your whole god damn hand is in a bucket of ice - >same experiment occurred with shocks -there is also evidence that listening to positive music can decrease the sensation of pain
39
Describe the multimodal nature of pain
- pain is a sensory and emotional experience - >proven by how people describe pain - sensory= throbbing, prickly, hot, or dull - emotional=torturing, annoying, frightful or sickening - changes with sensory component is involved in the somatosensory cortex - changes in the emotional aspect is involved in the anterior cingulate cortex
40
How does nalaxone work
- it attaches to same receptor sites as heroin - >because it has a similar structure - >therefore, preventing heroin from binding to those receptors - it can increase pain - >as it prevents the binding of opioids - >it also decreases the analgesic effect of placebos
41
What are endorphins
- naturally occuring morphine | - >endogenous morphine
42
Is the placebo effect related to endorphin release?
- yes - >because increasing nalaxone decreased this effect - the brain can signal specific areas in the body where there will be pain - >therefore, release endorphins in these areas - >creating th eplacebo effect

Psych 367 (3 decks)

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