Lesson 2.11 The Mind Body Connection Flashcards
How are emotions shared with the immune system?
Through the autonomic nervous system.
What are the detriments of the autonomic nervous system?
Grief and other painful emotions can cause our immune system to shut down, putting us at risk for a whole host of illnesses.
What are the benefits of the autonomic nervous system?
Conversely, a healthy emotional outlook boosts our resistance to disease.
What is PNI?
The new field of psychoneuroimmunology (PNI), which seeks to map out the connection between psychological processes like emotions and the body’s natural defences.
How does healing with mind-body begin?
Healing with mind-body medicine often begins by promoting physical and mental relaxation and developing better ways of coping with stress.
Name some if the techniques of mind-body medicine?
Includes biofeedback, body psychotherapy, hypnotherapy, guided imagery, breathing, and meditation.
How do psychologists define emotions?
Psychologists define emotions as mental responses to events, circumstances, people, or our own thoughts and memories.
How do biologists define emotions?
Biologists tells us that our emotions are rooted in self-preservation, triggering physiological reactions that enable us to find food, escape danger, and reproduce.
Name one way that emotions are expressed?
Emotions have also evolved into facial expressions and body language so that each member of a social group can signal his or her wants and needs to other members.
What is the Limbic system?
In the human brain, learning, memory and emotions are housed in the limbic system surrounding the brainstem.
Describe amygdalae.
Within the limbic system, emotional impulses originate in the amygdalae, two almond-shaped structures that trigger the physiological reactions associated with emotions.
What else are the amygdalae responsible for?
The amygdalae are also responsible for imprinting emotions onto memories by releasing some of the same neurochemicals when an event is recalled as when it occurred.
What are the amygdalae connected to?
A network of neural pathways connect the amygdala to the neocortex, the “thinking brain,” allowing us to reflect on our feelings and to think before acting.
How do neuro pathways react in a crisis?
In times of perceived crisis, however, those pathways are bypassed and impulse overrides reason. When we succumb to an irrational experience such as road rage, it is the amygdala that takes over the thinking brain.
Are emotions and their physiological effects indistinguishable from each other?
No.
