Psych Midterm 1.1 Flashcards
1
Q
What acts as a cushion for the brain, providing it protection against sudden impacts or jolts?
A
The CSF: cerebrospinal fluid.
2
Q
The brain has many pain receptors. True or false?
A
False, it has no pain receptors. Neurons within the brain don’t sense pain signals.
3
Q
The brain’s protective coverings, the meninges, contains pain receptors. True or false?
A
True.
4
Q
What is the brain stem?
A
A vital part of the brain that’s responsible for controlling essential functions like heartrate, breathing, and consciousness.
Any damage can lead to immediate death.
5
Q
What does neuroplasticity allow?
A
It allows healthy brain regions to compensate for damaged ones.
For example, if one area is injured, neighbouring regions can take over its functions.
6
Q
What are the 4 main structures of the brain? What does each do?
A
- Brainstem - Serves as a communication hub, sending information in and out of the brain.
- Hindbrain - Controls the absolute functions we need to survive and is the first part to evolve in all humans.
- Midbrain - Involved in dopamine regulation and contributes to visual and auditory processing.
- Forebrain - Largest part of our brain where all our thinking and sensory information is processed, and where our motor commands are produced.
7
Q
Which part of the brain is unique to humans and what does it do?
A
The frontal cortex is larger in humans and controls our ability to plan, rationalize, and engage in complex decision-making.
8
Q
Where is the cerebellum in the brain and what does it do?
A
It’s behind the pons, near the brainstem and is responsible for motor control, balance, and posture, eye movements, and our learning and cognitive abilities.
8
Q
The cerebellum only produces motor commands, but does not fine-tune them. True or false?
A
False, it fine-tunes them but does not produce them.
9
Q
What does the pons do in the brain?
A
It serves as a bridge between the brain and spinal cord.
It’s responsible for sleep regulation, pain signals and sensation, and cranial nerve connections.
It is very active while we’re sleeping.
9
Q
Neurons in the cerebellum are constantly changing and adapting. This neuroplasticity allows the brain to adjust and learn from experiences. True or false?
A
True.
10
Q
What is the role of the medulla in the brain?
A
It’s located at the base of the brain and is connected to the spinal cord. It regulates essential processes which keep us alive, such as cardiovascular control, respiratory regulation, autonomic processes, and nerve connections.
Any damage to it can have life-threatening consequences.
11
Q
What is reticular formation?
A
A complex network of neurons that extends from the spinal cord to the thalamus.
It ensures that we’re awake and sufficiently aroused to take in information and send it throughout our body.
12
Q
What are the 3 parts of the midbrain?
A
- Superior Colliculi, which is responsible for orienting our visual attention.
- Inferior Colliculi, which is responsible for orienting our auditory attention.
- Substantia Nigra, which produces dopamine that has significant effects on our movement and muscle tone; it’s responsible for our voluntary movement and reward processing. It’s involved in cognitive functions like learning, judgement, and decision-making.
13
Q
What are the 4 sub-cortical structures? (Thalamus, hypothalamus, pituitary gland, limbic system).
A
- Thalamus, which is the brain’s relay station for all sensory information except smell. It processes and organizes the information from our sensory nerves.
- Hypothalamus, which plays a crucial role in maintaining our stability and balance (homeostasis). It controls/communicates with our pituitary gland.
- Pituitary Gland, which releases hormones throughout the body. It regulates our metabolism, water and salt balance, and labour/childbirth.
- Limbic System, which controls our emotion and memory.
14
Q
What are the 2 parts of the Limbic System?
A
- Amygdala, which plays a crucial role in processing emotions; mostly fear and aggression. It controls our emotions related to our flight or fight response.
- Hippocampus, which stores our declarative and spatial relationship memories. It converts short-term memories to long-term ones and sends them elsewhere.
15
Q
What are declarative memories?
A
Memories related to facts and events.
16
Q
What are spatial relationship memories?
A
Memories involving pathways or routes.
17
Q
What is the largest part of your brain?
A
The cerebrum, arguably the most important part of the brain to us humans.
18
Q
What are the parts of the cerebrum?
A
The 2 cerebral hemispheres, the corpus callosum, frontal lobe, parietal lobe, temporal lobe, and occipital lobe.
19
Q
What is the corpus callosum?
A
The bundle of nerve fibers that connects the 2 hemispheres and allows them to communicate.
20
Q
What is the cerebral cortex?
A
The outermost layer of the cerebrum, covering the entire surface like a wrinkled sheet.
It’s responsible for our conscious experiences, thoughts, and perceptions.
21
Q
What are the 4 major LOBES of the brain?
A
- Frontal Lobe - Located just behind the forehead, and is the powerhouse of our cognitive processes.
- Parietal Lobe, which plays a crucial role in sensation, perception, integration, and interpretation.
- Temporal Lobe - Processes auditory information and is involved in our perception of time. It also stores smell memories.
- Occipital Lobe - The visual processing centre.
22
Q
What are the parts and their functions in the frontal lobe? (Primary motor cortex, prefrontal cortex, broca’s area)
A
The Primary Motor Cortex plans and initiates our voluntary movements.
The Prefrontal Cortex is responsible for executive functions like memory, reasoning, problem-solving, attention, concentration, and self-awareness.
The Broca’s Area controls speech production.
23
What are the parts and their functions in the parietal lobe? (Somatosensory cortex, and visual association cortex)
The Somatosensory Cortex is made of afferent sensory nerves that process touch and proprioception (our awareness of our body position).
The Visual Association Cortex (V2) gives meaning to visual information (recognizing objects, interpreting spatial relationships, and understanding visual scenes).
24
What are the parts and their functions in the temporal lobe? (Primary auditory cortex, visual association cortex, and wernicke's area)
The Primary Auditory Cortex processes sound from our ears.
The Visual Association Cortex (V2) gives meaning to visual information.
The Wernicke's Area is in the LH and is focused on language comprehension.
25
What are the parts and their functions in the occipital lobe? (Primary visual cortex, and visual association cortex)
The Primary Visual Cortex (V1) controls our initial processing of visual information. (When you seen an image, the V1 stars deciphering it, turning light patterns into meaningful neural signals).
The Visual Association Cortex (V2) processes the features of visual stimulus. (It analyzes shapes, colours, and textures).
26
What is lesioning?
Deliberately damaging specific areas of the brain to study the resulting behavioural changes.
27
What is electrical stimulation of the brain (ESB)?
It studies brain function by applying weak electrical currents to specific brain regions.
They implant small devices, like metal plates, into specific brain regions, which control electrical stimulation.
The external validity of these studies is low.
28
What happened when ESB was used on cats? On rats?
On cats, it made them super angry when their amygdala was stimulated.
On rats, it showed that people put pleasure before pain.
29
What is electrocephalography (EEG)?
A way to study brain activity measuring electrical signals generated by neurons.
Electrodes are placed on the scalp to detect electrical fluctuations.
30
What are the different brain waves that EEG measure?
Alpha waves, which are seen during wakefulness when your eyes are closed and the mind is relaxed. A low amplitude.
Beta waves, which are associated with active thinking, problem-solving, and alertness. Also a low amplitude.
Theta waves occur during light sleep, daydreaming, or deep relaxation. A moderate amplitude.
Delta waves, which are associated with deep sleep and healing. A high amplitude.
31
What is a Computerized Axial Tomography (CT scan)?
A non-invasive diagnostic imaging procedure that uses special x-rays to produce horizontal images (like slices) of the brain.
It provides detailed information about brain tissue and structures.
The person will take a contrast in order to enhance the visibility of specific brain areas.
32
What is a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)?
It uses a large magnet, radio waves, and a computer to create high-quality images of the brain and brainstem without using ionizing radiation. It can create 2D or 3D images of the brain structures.
33
What is a Positron Emission Tomography (PET scan)?
A nuclear medicine imaging, where you inject a small amount of radioactive tracer, like glucose, into the bloodstream. This tracer emits positrons (positively charged particles), and when they collide with an electron, they will release gamma rays, which the PET scan can detect.
The radioactive tracer will accumulate in areas with high metabolic activity, so it can show functional activity.
34
What is a functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI)?
It tracks blood flow in different brain regions. It's the same as an MRI, but with a specialized focus.
When neurons in the brain are active, they consume more oxygen, which the fMRI can see.
It is not skilled at one specific aspect.
35
What is lateralization?
The unequal distribution of functions between the L and R hemispheres of the brain.
36
What is contralateral processing?
The way our brain handles sensory information and motor commands: when you do something on the left side of your body, the signals will be sent to the right hemisphere of your brain.
37
What is vision lateralization?
When we fix our gaze on a specific point, our visual field will be divided into our left and right visual field. If a bird flies in your left VF, the information from both eyes will go and be processed in your right hemisphere.
38
What is the optic chiasm?
A crucial structure where the optic nerves from both eyes intersect, and is located down the corpus callosum, which is the bundle of nerves that connect the 2 hemispheres.
39
What is a corpus callosotomy?
Cutting the corpus callosum because of severe seizures, to stop communication between the 2 hemispheres of the brain.
40
What does hemispheric lateralization do?
It ensures efficient processing by allowing each hemisphere to specialize in specific functions.
41
Which hemisphere is visual letter recognition more pronounced in?
The left, by around 20%
42
Which hemisphere is visual face recognition more pronounced in?
The right, by around 20%
43
Which hemisphere is auditory letter recognition more pronounced in?
The left, by 80%
44
Which hemisphere is auditory melody recognition more pronounced in?
The right, by around 20%
45
What are psychoactive drugs? What are the 3 types?
Substances that affect the brain and can alter awareness, thoughts, mood, and behaviour.
They're substances that contain chemicals, like neurotransmitters, that effect synapse.
Depressants, stimulants, and hallucinogens.
46
What can depressants do?
They can slow down brain activity and cause sedation.
They work by inhibiting/depressing the CNS function, which can lead to drowsiness, decreased inhibition, and impaired coordination.
47
What are two examples of depressants and what is the difference between them?
Morphine and heroin. Morphine goes through the metabolism, whereas heroin hits the brain at full effect.
48
What can stimulants do?
They can increase the activity of the brain and spinal cord. They'll enhance alertness, attention, motivation, cognition, mood, and physical performance.
They work by affecting the levels of certain neurotransmitters in the synapses between neurons.
49
What are some examples of stimulants?
Nicotine, amphetamines (used to treat ADHD), cocaine and caffeine.
50
What do hallucinogens do?
They alter the way people perceive reality by affecting the brain's perception areas.
51
What are the 3 types of hallucinogens?
Psychedelics like psilocybin and LSD
Dissociates like ketamine and PCP
Deliriants like estacy or plants.
52
What are the 5 ways that psychoactive drugs can affect the process of a synapse?
1. They can increase or prevent the synthesis and storage of neurotransmitters.
2. They can alter the release of neurotransmitters into the synaptic left.
3. Certain drugs can mimic neurotransmitters and bind at receptor sites, either activating or blocking them.
4. They can activate or remove neurotransmitters, affecting how long they linger in the synaptic cleft.
5. They can block reuptake and keep neurotransmitters in the synaptic cleft.
53
What do agonistic drugs do? What are the 3 things agonistic drugs can influence?
They enhance or mimic the effects of neurotransmitters.
They cause neurotransmitters to be more active and have a greater effect.
1. They can cause a neuron to synthesize, store, and release more neurotransmitters.
2. They can bind to receptor sites and cause action.
3. They can block reuptake and prevent the cleaning up of used neurotransmitters.
54
What is acetylcholine (ACh) and what 3 drugs affect it? Are they agonistic or antagonistic drugs?
It's a neurotransmitter that plays a role in voluntary movement, attention, and arousal.
The venom from a black widow spider will stimulate the release of ACh, causing massive post-synaptic potentials. It's lethal because it causes our nervous system to become overloaded, and we die. It's an agonistic drug.
Botox prevents the release of ACh, so it's an antagonistic drug.
Nicotine causes more action potentials and mimics the effects of ACh, so it's an agonist of ACh.
55
What do antagonistic drugs do?
They inhibit or block neurotransmitter effects.
They interfere with and impair a neuron's ability to synthesize neurotransmitters, store them properly, and release them into the synaptic gap.
They can bind to receptor sites, but they don't activate them.
56
What is dopamine and what 2 drugs affect it? Are they agonist or antagonist drugs?
Dopamine is a chemical messenger that is involved in voluntary movements and our reward and pleasure centres.
Cocaine blocks the reuptake of dopamine, leading to more post-synaptic potentials and is an agonist of dopamine.
Amphetamines are stimulants that both increase the release of dopamine and block its reuptake, and it's an agonist of dopamine.
57
What causes the degeneration of dopamine?
Parkinson's disease. It leads to tremors, rigidity, and reduced motor control.
58
What do antipsychotic drugs do? What can they be used to relieve?
They bind to post-synaptic receptors and reduce post-synaptic potentials. They can be used to relieve symptoms of schizophrenia.
59
What is norepinephrine and what 2 drugs affect it? Are they agonistic or antagonistic drugs?
It's a neurotransmitter that plays an important role in the regulation of attention, emotion, sleeping pattern, dreaming, and learning.
Cocaine and amphetamine block the reuptake at synapses, and affect the levels of NE in the brain. They are agonists of NE.
60
What is serotonin and what drug affects it? Are they agonistic or antagonistic drugs?
It plays a crucial role in regulating mood, appetite, sleep, and other bodily functions.
Prozac interferes with the reuptake of serotonin, and can be used to increase levels of serotonin in the brain, so it's an agonistic drug.
61
What is GABA and what 3 drugs affect it? Are they agonistic or antagonistic drugs?
It's a neurotransmitter that plays a crucial role in regulating mood, anxiety, and sleep. It helps reduce the activity of other brain cells, making you feel relaxed and less anxious.
Alcohol is a GABA agonist that prevents its reuptake. It can cause you to be very relaxed, and your behaviours will become slowed.
62
What is sensation?
The initial process of detecting physical energy by our sense organs (like our skin, nose, tongue, and ears).
The sensory input is then sent to your brain for further processing.
63
What is perception?
The brain's interpretation of raw sensory inputs. It's the brain attaching meaning to what we sense.
63
Is light a form of electromagnetic radiation?
Yes.
63
Where do visible light wavelengths span from?
From around 380 to 700 nanometers (NM).
63
What wavelengths do violet, green, yellow, and red correspond to?
Violet: 380 NM
Green: 500 NM
Yellow: 600 NM
Red: 700 NM
64
What is transduction?
The conversion of environmental energy (light, sound, or pressure) into neural activity that our brain can understand.
64
As objects get hotter, they emit energy dominated by longer wavelengths. True or false?
False, they're dominated by shorter wavelengths.
65
What are photoreceptors?
Sensory receptors responsible for detecting light. They absorb photons when light enters our eyes.
66
What is the cornea and what are its 2 main roles?
It's the eye's protective shield.
The first role is in shielding the eye and preventing dirt from potentially damaging the retina.
The second role is to act as a fixed lens and bend light as it enters the eye.
67
What is the pupil?
It's the dark circular opening in the centre of the eye. It can change size on up to a 16-fold scale.
68
What is the iris?
A ring of muscles that control the size of the pupil. It's job is to adjust the pupil based on light conditions.
69
What happens to the lens with age?
The lens begins to harden, and loses its ability to accommodate and see things close-up.
70
What is the lens?
It sits behind the pupil, and it focuses light onto the retina.
71
What is the retina?
It's the most important part of our eye for vision and contains photoreceptors, which transducts light into electrical signals that our brain can understand.
72
What is the fovea?
A tiny area at the centre of the retina that aligns with the object that we're looking at: it's where our vision is the sharpest.
73
What is the optic disk?
It's the eye's blind spot. where the optic nerve exists the eye. It transmits visual information to the brain.
74
What is the choroid?
A layer behind the retina that is responsible for nourishing the retina by providing nutrients and oxygen. It absorbs excess light to prevent reflections within the eye.
75
What are the 3 main layers of the retina and what do they do?
1. Photoreceptors are the back layer. They're the rods and cones that're responsible for transducting light into electrical signals.
2. Bipolar cells are the middle layer and they take the neural signals that're generated by the photoreceptors and relay them to the ganglion cells.
3. Ganglion cells are at the front of the retina and they collect information from the bipolar cells to send away from the eye. They send information to the optic disk.
76
How many rods and cones are in a typical human eye?
125 million rods and 6.4 million cones.
77
What are rods?
They're our go-to cells for night vision and are highly sensitive to light. They're not very good at seeing colour.
78
What are cones?
They help with our daytime vision and colour perception.
79
What does the duplicity theory of vision say?
That rods and cones have distinct functions: night and day.
80
Most cones are found in the fovea. True or false?
True.
81
Where do rods begin to appear?
Around 20-30 degrees away from the fovea. Most rods are in the periphery.
82
What is our ability to see fine details called?
Visual acuity.
83
Cones have poor visual acuity and rods have high visual acuity. True or false?
False, cones have high and rods have low visual acuity.
84
What is convergence?
The degree to which photoreceptor cells (cones and rods) are connected to ganglion cells in the retina. Cones are only connected to a single bipolar cell, whereas many rods connect to a single cell.
85
Visual information from the eye will travel to the thalamus, from where some will be sent to the superior colliculi for rapid, reflexive responses, but most information will be sent to the occipital lobe. True or false?
True, the occipital lobe is the primary visual processing area.
86
What is rhodopsin? What are its 2 main parts?
A visual pigment that is found in rods. It's what absorbs the photons that line the membranes of the rods.
1. The retinal, which is what flips from a bent shape to a straight one.
2. Opsin, which is a protein that binds to the retinal.
87
When retinal absorbs a photon of light, it changes shape. True or false?
True.
88
Cones only have one type of visual pigment. True or false?
False, they have many types.
89
What are the 3 phases of dark adaptation?
1. 3-4 minutes in the dark, both your rods and cones will become more sensitive. After 5-10 minutes, your cones will reach their max sensitivity, which is the rod-cone break.
2. 7-10 minutes in, the rods will continue to adapt and create rhodopsin. They become the most sensitive cells in the retina.
3. After 30 minutes, the rhodopsin has mostly been replenished, and you'll be around 90% dark-adapted.
90
Initially, the retinal is curved, but when it absorbs a photon of light, it straightens out. True or false?
True.
91
Why does the retinal detach from the opsin after isomerization?
To prevent further signal transduction.
92
When do your visual pigments regenerate their fastest?
When we're in a dark environment, because there's very little light to be taken in and absorbed by our pigments.
93
What are bleached pigments?
Pigments that have absorbed light (photons) and undergone the isomerization process, which is where the retinal changes shape.
94
What are unbleached pigments?
Pigments that have not absorbed light.
95
How long does it take cones and rods to regenerate?
Cones take 6 to 8 minutes to fully regenerate, and rods take 20 to 30 minutes.
96
What is a hue?
A wavelength of light. It allows us to distinguish between different colours.
97
What is saturation?
The purity of the light. High saturation means the colour is pure and vivid. Low saturation results in less vivid or diluted colours.
98
What is brightness?
It's the intensity of the light. A bright light is intense, whereas a dimly lit room appears darker.
99
What does the subtractive colour mixing theory say?
That we can combine different pigments to create new colours. Some wavelengths are absorbed by the object's surface, whereas others bounce of the surface and into our eyes to create the colour of the object.
100
What does the additive colour mixing theory say?
It says that we combine different wavelengths of light to create new colours. The 3 primary colours combine to create the colour of the object we see.
101
What does the trichromatic theory say?
That any colour we perceive is a result of the 3 primary colours. It says we have 3 types of cones and if we see more than one colour, it's because multiple receptors are firing simultaneously.
102
What is the issue with the trichromatic theory? What theory was created to make up for this?
The presence of afterimages. If you stare at a red dot and then look away, you'll see a green dot.
The opponent process theory was created to address these limitations and says that there're opponent cells that respond to opposing colours.
103
In our vision, attention acts as the halfway point between sensation and perception. True or false?
True.
104
What are the 2 types of processing?
1. Bottom-Up, where our perception is shaped by the raw sensory input from our environment and it relies solely on sensation.
2. Top-Down, where our perception is influenced by our past, and involves both our sensation and perception.
105
How long does it take to refocus our attention from one task to another?
At least 200-500 milliseconds.
106
What is a salient?
A stimulus that stands out, or is unique.
107
Which type of processing is selective attention a part of and what does it do?
It's a crucial function of top-down processing and it allows us to focus on specific information while ignoring the background.
108
What is inattentional blindness?
When our top-down attention is so focused on something that we miss the other changes.
109
What does the primary visual cortex (V1) do?
It's where visual information initially goes, and the neurons in it are sensitive to very basic visual features.
It's where raw visual signals are processed and turned into something the brain can understand.
110
What happens in the visual association cortex (V2)?
Stimulus features like colour, shape, and motion are further processed from the V1.
111
What are the 2 distinct streams that most believe visual processing occurs through?
1. Where Pathway. This processes spatial information related to object location and movement. It's located in the parietal lobe.
2. What Pathway. This processes object recognition and identification and is crucial for understanding what we see.
112
What is perception?
Our brain's way of making sense of the world around us. It's able to fill in gaps where sensory information is missing, like where our nose is.
113
What is a perceptual set? What are 3 different sets?
The factors that determine what we perceive when processing a stimulus.
1. Context: depending on what we're told to focus on, our perception will shift. For example, the duck or rabbit illusion.
2. Experience: Our past experience guides our perception. Example, seeing the panda in the black blob.
3. Emotions: When we're anxious, we tend to be more aware of potential threats.
114
What is form perception?
Recognizing the shape and features of an object.
115
What is depth perception?
It allows us to perceive the distance between objects.
116
What are monocular and binocular cues?
Monocular: Using one eye
Binocular: Using both eyes.
117
What is constancy perception?
It allows us to determine that stimuli remains the same despite changes in viewing conditions.
118
What are perceptual cues?
Information in our environment that helps our perception function.
119
What are the 6 Gestalt Principles?
1. of Similarity - If objects share similar features, we perceive them as forming a pattern, or belonging together. (Like picturing rows of dots as lines).
2. of Proximity - If objects are close together, we perceive them as forming a pattern, or belonging together. (Like seeing an eye in a collection of dots).
3. of Common Region - If objects are enclosed in something, we perceive them as forming a pattern.
4. of Continuity - When objects look like a line, we perceive them as single, uninterrupted lines instead of separate parts.
5. of Closure - When we encounter a group of objects or shapes that vaguely resemble something familiar, our brains will close the gaps and perceive the whole object, even if parts are missing.
6. of Figure-Ground - Our tendency to separate visual input into distinct elements: the figure (main object of interest) and the ground (the background).
120
What is retinal disparity?
Our eyes are slightly apart from each other, and so when we look at an object, each eye receives a slightly different view of that object. These different views create a disparity: a difference in the position of the object on our retinas.
121
What are sound waves?
Mechanical disturbances that propagate through a medium, like air, water, or solids.
When the sound wave reaches our ears, it causes our eardrums to vibrate.
122
What is the range of frequencies that our ears are sensitive to?
From around 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz.
123
Large amplitudes (heights of sound waves) create smaller sounds. True or false?
False. Large amplitudes create large sounds.
124
What are the 3 structures of the ear? What are the parts of each?
1. Outer Ear. It serves as the initial receiver of sound. It has 3 parts: the pinna, which collects sound waves and funnels them into the second part, the ear canal. The ear canal then channels the sound waves into the eardrum, slightly amplifying the sound. The eardrum vibrates in response to the frequency of the incoming sound waves.
2. Middle Ear. It's responsible for amplifying the sounds that we hear. It contains the ossicles: the hammer, anvil, and stirrup. They amplify the sound vibrations by a factor of 30 as they transmit them from the large eardrum to the small oval window.
3. Inner Ear. This is where sound transduction happens, and it has two main parts: the oval window, which vibrates in response to the frequency of sound sent by the ossicles, and the cochlea, which contains receptors responsible for hearing.
125
What is the cochlea and what are the parts of it?
It plays a crucial role in our ability to hear by converting sound waves into electrical signals that our brain can interpret.
It has hair cells, which are lined with cilia. When a sound wave enters the cilia, it causes the fluid inside to move, and this movement bends the cilia, generating electrical signals (action potentials) that travel to the brain.
126
Where are sound waves transformed into neural signals?
The cochlea.
127
What is tinnitus?
A common symptom associated with hearing damage that appears as constant ringing , buzzing, or roaring in the ears.
128
What is the cocktail party effect?
No matter where you are or how loud it is around you, your attention will always be involuntarily drawn to the source of your spoken name. This is because of top-down processing: Our names are important to us.
129
Music has a powerful impact on our emotions. True or false?
True.
130
What are the 2 types of nerve fibers that affect our perception of temperature?
Warm fibers respond to warmth and heat, and cold fibers respond to cold temperatures.
131
What are A-delta fibers?
They're myelinated nerve fibers. They transmit information quickly due to their myelination. They're responsible for our sensation of sharp, initial pain.
132
What are C fibers?
They're unmyelinated nerve fibers that transmit signals slower than A-delta and are associated with aching or burning pain.
133
What is the Gate Control Theory?
It suggests that pain signals can either be amplified or inhibited at the spinal cord level. The spinal cord acts as a gate, allowing or restricting pain signals from reaching the brain. Factors like attention, emotions, and cognitive processes can manipulate this gate.
134
What are papillae?
Small raised bumps on the tongue's surface.
135
What are the 5 primary tastes that our taste buds can detect?
Sour, sweet, salty, bitter, and umami (savoury).
136
The tongue only contains one type of papillae, true or false?
False, it contains different types, and each has a unique distribution of pain receptors.
Example: The edge of the tongue is where the most sweet flavours are detected.
137
What are olfactory receptors?
They're found throughout our nose, and each receptor is specialized to recognize a specific odour.
138
How many different odours can humans detect?
From 2000 to 4000 different odours.
139
Where does smell go in our brain?
Unlike other sensory information, it does not go to the thalamus: instead, it travels directly to the limbic system and temporal lobe, which explains why smells can evoke vivid memories and emotions.
140
Taste is influenced by cultural factors, true or false?
True.
