Midterm 1.

Question 1

Define chromosomes and genes.

Answer 1

Chromosomes: are complex structures containing a single molecule of DNA.
Genes: the section of DNA molecules that describes the structure of a protein and its control sequences.

Question 2

Explain the factors that affect gene expression.

Answer 2

1) The environment just outside of the cell (what cells are nearby, what state of development the organism is in).
2) The organism’s overall development (social world) and its behavior.

Question 3

Define genotype, phenotype.

Answer 3

Genotype: specific sequence of genes and chromosomes.

Phenotype: what the organism actually ends up to be like… genotype + environmental context.

Question 4

READ ABOUT THE LOCUS ON PAGE 6.2

Answer 4

READ ABOUT THE LOCUS ON PAGE 6.2

Question 5

Define homozygous, heterozygous, alleles.

Answer 5

If paired genes are identical, they’re homozygous, and if they aren’t, they’re heterozygous. An allele are variations of a specific gene.

Question 6

READ ABOUT PKU’S RECESSIVE GENE ON 6.3

Answer 6

READ ABOUT PKU’S RECESSIVE GENE ON 6.3

Question 7

Explain codominant genes and incomplete dominance.

Answer 7

Codominant genes see both alleles affect a phenotype (think blood type AB); incomplete dominance shows a person who has a phenotype between two different alleles.

Question 8

What is polygenic inheritance?

Answer 8

Polygenic inheritance is inheriting a certain trait through many genes in a genetic pattern rather than a single gene. Most of our traits are found this way.

Question 9

Explain proximate vs. ultimate causes.

Answer 9

Proximate causes are the mechanisms within an organism’s lifetime that led to its phenotype.

Ultimate causes are the reasons why a particular trait or behavior would have helped members of a population to survive and reproduce.

Question 10

What are Darwin’s three principles of evolution?

Answer 10

1) There must be variation among individuals in a population.
2) The variants must survive and reproduce at higher rates than others inthe population, due to adaptation to survival.
3) Parents must pass traits to offspring.

Question 11

Give pieces of evidence for evolution by natural selection.

Answer 11

Successful successive breeding; birds and crocodiles share more in common than most mammals due to a close evolutionary relationship (same with hippos and whales); the similarity of genomes at a molecular level of various organisms.

Question 12

What are the most BASIC needs for survival of all quasi-stable entities?

Answer 12

1) Protection.
2) Replication.
3) Renewal.

Question 13

Explain an organism’s need for homeostatic regulation.

Answer 13

Set points maintain an internal environment… departing from it is a disadvantage for survival. Homeostatic mechanisms give negative feedback to reverse or stop that action; sensing devices initiate negative feedback when set points are absent. When the goal is achieved, positive feedback is conveyed.

Question 14

Give examples of self-regulation, self-preservation, self-restoration, and replication.

Answer 14

Self-regulation: proper body temperature maintenance.
Self-preservation: A response to threat.
Self-restoration: sleep.
Replication: Sex. Hide your kids, hide your wife… you know, if you’re a bad human.

Question 15

How does a comparative approach to human behavior and animal behavior work?

Answer 15

Our similarities encourages examining the forces of the natural world; our differences bear the influence of culture and natural learning.

Question 16

Explain the difference between the Central and Peripheral Nervous System.

Answer 16

CNS is all neural tissue lying inside the spine and crainum; PNS is all neural tissue lying outside of that region.

Question 17

Explain different types of nerves: there are three types… afferent, efferent, and cranial.

Answer 17

Afferent nerves are PNS nerve fibers that transmit info from the sense organs to the CNS.

Efferent nerves are fibers that take messages from the CNS to effectors (muscles and glands in action).

Cranial nerves are types of these two nerves that don’t go through the spine but go directly through the brain.

Question 18

The _______ division are the set of nerves that control __________________ and transmission of info from sense organs; autonomic division (or the ANS) is the set of ______ and ______ nerves that inform the brain about the _______. This includes the heart and lungs, blood vessels, disgestive systems, and sex organs.

Answer 18

Somatic; skeletal musclature; cranial, spinal; viscera.

Question 19

What are the three parts of the hindbrain?

Answer 19

The medulla, the pons, and the cerebellum.

Question 20

Explain the medulla and its functions.

Answer 20

The medulla controls heartbeat, circulation, respiration, head and limb position among other vital bodily functions, and receives all taste input from the tongue.

Question 21

Explain the pons and its functions. Through what process does this occur?

Answer 21

The pons, via reticular formation, helps control the brain’s overall level of attentiveness and the time of sleep and dreaming.

Question 22

The __________ controls bodily balance and muscular coordination but also is involved in _________________, discriminating sounds, and input from sensory systems. The ‘hindbrain animal’ can make limb/trunk movements that’s required for standing or crouching… but it can’t put them together coherently.

Answer 22

Cerebellum; spatial reasoning.

Question 23

The midbrain receives _____ signals from ______. It _______ our _______, particularly what sense?

It serves as what for the forebrain?

Answer 23

Auditory, ears and eyes, coordinates, movements… the eyes in exploring the outside world.

It serves as the relay station to give information to appropriate areas of the forebrain for fuller analysis.

Question 24

The forebrain has four cortical lobes. What are they?

Answer 24

Frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal.

Question 25

The cerebral cortex is critical for _______________, which are what, exactly?

Answer 25

Higher learning processes.

Thinking, feelings, moral values, many aspects of memory, planned and voluntary action, and the most sophisticated anlyses of stimulus information from the senses.

Question 26

Below the cortex lies the ______________ structures. What are these structures?

Answer 26

Subcortial.

The thalamus, a center for relaying sensory information to the cortex; the hypothalamus is involved in eating, drinking, thermoregulation, and sexual activity, and the basal ganglia, which is relevant for both Parkinson’s and Huntington’s.

Question 27

The _____ system surrounds the hypothalamus and thalamus; it includes the ________ and amygdala, playing a crucial part in _______, memory, and _________ processing.

Answer 27

Limbic; hippocampus; learning; emotional.

Question 28

What are the two more visible landmarks of the forebrain?

Answer 28

The longitudinal fissure separating the two halves of the brain and the central fissure which divides the frontal lobes on each side of the brain, from the parietal lobes.

Question 29

READ ABOUT LATERALIZATION, ON 7.2 AND PAGE 116-118 IN THE TEXTBOOK.

Answer 29

READ ABOUT LATERALIZATION, ON 7.2 AND PAGE 116-118 IN THE TEXTBOOK.

Question 30

What negative feedback is necessary to achieve homeostasis?

Answer 30

1) A set point: a pre-set, a thermostat that your body keeps as constant to achieve in a specified dimension.
2) A sensor to measure what the actual value is at any given time.
3) A comparator to compare that actual value with the set point, which detects discrepancy.
4) A restitution response mechanism that will work to change the value back to the set-point, which can be achieved through behavrioral responses or internal physiological responses. This is the negative feedback.

Question 31

Explain the difference between sympathetic and parasympathetic actions in the ANS.

Answer 31

Sympathetic reactions ‘rev up’ bodily activities in preparation for vigorous action, and parasympathetic reactions restore the body’s internal activities to normal after the action has been completed. It also regulates normal functioning among organ systems in general.

Question 32

The _______________________ turns out to be the main aggressor in fever to respond to ________ released into the bloodstream at sites of bacterial and viral invasions.

Answer 32

Anterior hypothalamus; pyrogens.

Question 33

Explain the processes behind the use of glucose in the liver as a self-management signal for hunger and motivation to eat. Glucose is also constantly monitored by _________________ in the ______________.

Answer 33

Immediately after meals, glucose is plentiful. Some is put to use, but most is converted to glycogen and fatty acids for stored energy use.

Glucoreceptors; hypothalamus.

Question 34

If the liver has enough glycogen, a _______ signal is sent and the animals stops eating/eats more. Where do these signals end up?

Answer 34

Satiety; stops eating.

The signals end up in the hypothalamus, specifically in the lateral region (that initiates feeding) or the ventromedial region (which tells the animal to halt feeding).

Question 35

How does satiety come about? What would happen if satiety didn’t come about fast enough?

Answer 35

Satiety comes about when nutrients dissolved in stomach digestive juices trigger receptors to signal the brain that food is about to enter the intestines. Satiety stops eating; if energy satisfaction was the factor, achieved only at the cell level, the organism would have literally eaten food until it had split a gut.

Question 36

________ tissue, or fat cells, serves as a repository for fatty acids, which store nutrients for future needs. When these fat cells are full, what chemical do they excrete in the bloodstream?

Answer 36

Adipose.

The chemical they secrete is leptin; this serves as negative feedback for a body’s set point in terms of maintaining a particular weight.

Question 37

What is the role of neuropeptide Y (NPY)?

Answer 37

Neuropeptide Y is the most potent appetite stimulant ever discovered.

Question 38

In rats, destruction of the ______ region of the hypothalamus causes _______ (refusal to eat) while destruction of the _______ region of the hypothalumus causes _______ (excessive eating).

Answer 38

lateral; aphagia; ventromedial; hyperphagia.

Question 39

The memory of just having eaten a meal is one factor that controls our reluctance to eat a full meal soon after. What disease inhibits this mechanism?

Answer 39

Clinical amnesia.

Question 40

_______ plays an important role in determining what foods people like, dislike, find disgusting… even who they eat around.

Answer 40

Culture.

Question 41

How do we find BMI?

Answer 41

Divide kg by meters.

Question 42

Body weight is governed by more than just eating behavior and morality issues. What other factors could determine a root for obesity?

Answer 42

Hereditary factors concerning metabolic efficiency may explain why some people gain weight and some people do not while intaking the same amount of food.

Question 43

Explain the “thrifty gene.”

Answer 43

The “thirfty gene” is a metabolically efficient gene adaptive for low-energy-source environments… put that person in a high-energy-source environment, and they’re more prone to obesity.

Question 44

Explain behaviors of someone with anorexia nervosa.

Answer 44

Victims may only eat low-calorie food, induce vomiting, use laxatives, and engage in strenuous exercise, all leading them to dwindle to as little as 50% of what is consiered a normal weight.

Question 45

The __________________ in the mid- and hindbrain has branches that alert the entire brain, and work with ______ stimuli to determine the meaning of these alerts of activation to the rest of the brain.

Answer 45

Reticular activation system (RAS); sensory.

Question 46

__________ rhythms are sleep-wake rhythms spanning about a 24-hour day… what is it regulated by? What hormone is it mediated by?

Answer 46

Circadian… Suprachiasmatic nucleus; melatonin.

Question 47

What is paradoxical sleep?

Answer 47

Paradoxical sleep is active sleep, or dream sleep… by submitting an EEG very similar to an active person, it’s paradoxical because they’re still asleep.

Question 48

A person in deep but _____ sleep exhibits waves of _ or fewer cps. This is _____ or ______ sleep.

Answer 48

quiet; 4; delta; slow-wave.

Question 49

When in paradoxical sleep, a person is ______ to wake up and shows ____________________ below closed eyelids. Several cycles of this are exhibited during a night’s sleep, and each cycle gets progressively longer and longer as the night goes on.

Answer 49

Harder; rapid-eye movements (REM).

Question 50

In the normal course of a night’s sleep, sleep alternates between ______ and _________ sleep. If ___ sleep is disturbed, the person will try to recover by spending more of the night in it.

Answer 50

REM; slow-wave; REM.

Question 51

An explanation for why we dream is that largly random activity in the ______ when the rest of the brain is cut off from being driven by normal waking sensory input, dictating the ____________ rather than unfulfilled wishes left over from the day gone by.

Answer 51

cortex; dream state.

Question 52

Another theory to explaining dreams is ______________________, holding that the dream is simply a reflection of the brain’s _____________ during active sleep.

Answer 52

activation-synthesis hypothesis; aroused state.

Question 53

“PGO” may influence the content of dreams. What exactly is PGO, in detail?

Answer 53

Bursts of activity in the (P) pons activate areas in the lateral geniculate nucleus (G), then stimulating the visual processing occipital cortex (O)… this accounts for the visual aspect of most dreams.

Question 54

Biological mechanisms that activate or inhibit violent emotions of rage and fear include parasympathetic/sympathetic systems. Explain what both of these do?

Answer 54

The parasympathetic system handles vegatative functions of ordinary life; sympathetic system has an activating function of summoning the body’s resources to ready the organism for the possibility of “fighting or fleeing.”

Question 55

Long-term automatic arousal has negative affects on the human body; the mobilization for long-term fear and anger, for example, causes what effects?

Answer 55

Impotence or frigidity, or actual physical effects like peptic ulcers, colitis, asthma, hypertension.

Question 56

Parasympathetic rebound from intense suppression is due to sympathetic ______________ as a cause of sudden heart stoppage in animals. This is an explanation for a rather stupid phenomenon… what is it?

Answer 56

Overstimulation.

Voodoo death.

Question 57

A ______________ is a physical and behavioral way of advertising to an actual or potential competitor one’s intent and ability to defend oneself or one’s offspring or to fight for food, a mate, rank, or territory. What is the opposite of this?

Answer 57

Threat display; appeasement display.

Question 58

Which gender has the finaly say in mating procedures, sexually? And why?

Answer 58

Females do, if only because she bears the greater burden of the “cost” of mating; she can less afford a mistake. This is not cultural: the female literally has less eggs to draw upon than the male.

Question 59

For a male, the function of courtship rituals reveal two important functions. What are they?

Answer 59

1) First, he likely has the ability to acquire and defend territory and reap from it the provision to feed their young. 2) He has genes, or coding, that if passed on to the female, will promote her offspring to survive and pass those traits further on.