Intro to Sensory Systems

Question 1

Difference between sensation and perception

Answer 1

sensation: reception, transduction, transmission
perception: organisation, perception

Question 2

What’s transduction

Answer 2

When one energy form is converted to another

Question 3

Describe transduction in terms of sensory systems

Answer 3

sensory receptors convert physical stimuli into a change in membrane potential

Question 4

Do all sensory receptors produce action potentials?

Answer 4

No.
mechanoreceptors are spiking - produce ap’s
photoreceptors and hair cells are non spiking - don’t produce ap’s; nt release proportional to change in membrane potential

Question 5

What helps transmission of info

Answer 5

Anatomical structures eg cornea, ear shape

Question 6

Describe Muller’s law of specific nerve energies

Answer 6

Basically believed that there were specific nerves to each sensory system - eg different visual nerves

Question 7

Explain how Muller was wrong and right

Answer 7

Wrong as neurons aren’t specific to a particular sensory system
Right as sensory info is segregated (visual info mainly processed in visual cortex)

Question 8

Distinguish rate coding and temporal coding theories

Answer 8

It’s the rate (no ap’s per time) vs timing (specific timing) of APS that matter to a sensory system
- different systems can use one or the other, or both

Question 9

How does the nervous system account for the fact that the same neuron can fire differently when exposed to the same stimulus?

Answer 9

Multiple neurons respond to a single stimulus

Question 10

Name of the topographic maps for vision, aomatosensation and hearing?

Answer 10

Retinotopic map
Tonotropic map
Somatotropic map