Lecture 9

Question 1

Brain size and evolution

Answer 1

-Succeeding members had increasing brain size.
-Modern human brain size is larger compared normal body-weigh.
-Pre-frontal and frontal brain was the last one to develop and the most complicated one.

Question 2

Was better social intelligence the cause of larger brain?

Answer 2

No. Larger brain is correlated to more social cognition but not better or worse.

Question 3

What is clear about the brain and evolution research?

Answer 3

-Once larger brains developed so did the culture.
-Humans used larger brains for social cognition.

Question 4

Memes (Richard Dawkins)

Answer 4

1- Ideas and behaviors that are passed easily from person to person in a culture.
2-Allows rapid social transmission
3-“Selfish gene”

Question 5

3 types of cultural transmission?

Answer 5

1- Vertical
2-Oblique
3-Horizontal

Question 6

Vertical

Answer 6

from parents to children

Question 7

Oblique

Answer 7

From older generation (non-parent) to younger generations

Question 8

Horizontal

Answer 8

between parents

Question 9

What could go wrong with the cultural transmission

Answer 9

They can be disrupted by many clinical disorders.

Question 10

How is culture transmitted?

Answer 10

1-Memes
2-Traditions

Question 11

What are types of intelligence?

Answer 11

It is unclear if the brain size is tied to intelligence.
1-Musical
2-Verbal
3-Mathematical
4-Spatial
5-Logical
6- Social etc.

Question 12

What is actually related to brain size?

Answer 12

1-Good nutrition and culturally enriched environment
2- Helps to form new connections which helps with learning and memory that results in bigger brain size.

Question 13

What are major frontal lobe functions?

Answer 13

1- Top-down process
2-Planning, selecting, reasoning, judgement
3-Ignoring stimuli/task focus and persistence
4-Tracking past events and behaviors
5- Self-other related process.

Question 14

Prefrontal cortex functions

Answer 14

1-Internal cues
2- External cues
3- Context cues
4- Self awareness

Question 15

Dorsolateral PFC?

Answer 15

1-Working memory, attentional selection, planning
2- Self-regulation (resisting to urges)
3-Problem solving

Question 16

Orbifrontal cortex

Answer 16

1-Close to the limbic system
2-Forming social attachments
3- regulating emotions
4- flexible behaviors and adaptation

Question 17

Ventrolateral PFC

Answer 17

1-Arousal- alertness
2-Emotion, rewards, motivation, threat detection and fear
3- Context-based memory retrieval
4- Lesion to this area causes insomnia

Question 18

Ventromedial prefrontal cortex

Answer 18

!!!! Each part of the medial prefrontal cortex contributes to processing self-identity.
1-Self perception
2-Self referential
3-Social decision making, social emotion regulation
4-Lesions make it harder to remember self-relevant information

Question 19

Anterior cingulate cortex (medial)

Answer 19

1-Emotional expression
2-attention alocation
3-mood regulation
4- self conscious (emotional reaction)
5-lesions can cause lack of empathy

Question 20

Dorsomedial prefrontal cortex

Answer 20

1-Conducts signals between cognitive control and affective brain regions
2-Generates and regulates emotions
3-self-identitiy processing
4-Distinguishes self from other

Question 21

Medial premotor cortex

Answer 21

1-Connects to parietal lobe
2-Mediates self-motivated movements

Question 22

Lateral premotor cortex

Answer 22

1-Selects movement sequences
2-Plans, organizes and optimizes behaviors

Question 23

Primary motor cortex

Answer 23

1- Adjacent to and organized like somatosensory cortex
2-Generates signals to initial body movements
3-controls muscle activity
4-Acquisition and p
erformance of skilled movements
5-Has the mirror neuron system (faciliates skill learning)

Question 24

Broca’ s area

Answer 24

Broca’s area is largely located in the premotor cortex.

Question 25

Old emotion theory (Paul Eckman)

Answer 25

1-state based theory
2- basic emotions are recognizable cross-culturally.

Question 26

Dimensional theory of emotions

Answer 26

1-There is a range of emotions
2-Less or more aroused, more or less pleasant

Question 27

Modern emotion research

Answer 27

1- Motor behaviors matter (resting face, voice tone)

Question 28

Emotion

Answer 28

1- Complex reactions that are physiological,experiential, neurobehavioral
2- early evolutionary benefits

Question 29

Social emotions

Answer 29

1- Emotions that depend on other people.

Question 30

Helmholt’s unconscious inference

Answer 30

Using intuition when interpreting others emotions

Question 31

Psychological projection

Answer 31

projecting your own feelings on others and thinking they feel how you actually feel.

Question 32

Self-reported cognition

Answer 32

One’s subjective evaluation of their cognitive abilities and mental processes.

Question 33

Symptoms of fronttemporal dementia

Answer 33

1-Extreme changes in behavior and personality. (inappropriate social behavior, lack of empathy)
2-affects men and women equally
3- 10-30% of cases have genetic causes

Question 34

Symptoms of Frontal Lobe lesion

Answer 34

1-Motor disturbances (movements, voluntrary gaze, speech,corollary discharge)

2-Thinking alterations ( decrase in IQ, loss of divergent thinking, loss of behavioral spontaneity)

3-Difficulty using environmental cues (response inhibition, risk taking, decrease self-regulation, decrease associative learning)

4- Poor temporal memory (Delayed response, recency memory)

5-Impaired social & sexual behavior (pseudo depression, orbifrontal syndrome)

Question 35

Corollary discharge

Answer 35

Motor related timing knowing when something occured or is it due to your actions

Question 36

Pseudo

Answer 36

not genuine, false (not depression but depression like traits)

Question 37

Orbifrontal syndrome

Answer 37

brain lesion that causes disinhibition

Question 38

What’s the difference between dementia &lesion and tumour

Answer 38

1-Dementia and lesions have interventions but not treatments
2-Brain tumour can be benign (non-cancerous)
3- Tumours can be removed with surgery

Question 39

Chronic stress

Answer 39

PFC neurons generate top-down process through repeated excitatory connections on dendrites spines. Chronic stress causes loss of spined and dendrites.