Sperry (1968) Background Flashcards
What does neuroanatomy suggest about the brain?
that each part of the brain performs a different role / function
What does the spinning dancer test?
which part of your brain is more dominant
What does the direction you see the dancer spin in show?
clockwise - right brain
anti-clockwise - left brain
What are the characteristics of a left brain person?
- uses logic
- values facts
What are the characteristics of a right brain person?
- uses feeling
- values imagination
Why is the spinning dancer test not accurate?
complex mental activity requires cooperation from both sides of the brain
What was a common belief about the brain during Sperry’s study?
that the different hemispheres of the brain were responsible for different skills, jobs, and roles
What was the left hemisphere often believed to be responsible for?
language, reason, maths and science ability
What are left hemisphere people said to be good at?
maths and science
What was the right hemisphere often believed to be responsible for?
pictures, symbols, emotion, intuition, arts, and music
What are right hemisphere people said to be good at?
arts and humanities
What is the theory called that believes the right and left hemisphere are responsible for things?
lateralisation of functioning
What is a key component of the background to Sperry?
language
Who was Broca?
a researcher who carried out post-mortems on patients who had severe speech production problems but understood speech
What did Broca find?
that the patients had damage to the lower point of the left frontal lobe
What did Broca conclude?
that this part of the brain (lower left frontal lobe) is critical to successful speech production, such as how you move your mouth and tongue
Who was Wernicke?
a neurologist and psychiatrist
What did Wernicke do?
published work on his patients who had severe defect in speech comprehension, such as decoding what sounds mean in language
What did Wernicke find?
identified an area in the left temporal lobe
Where are language areas to someone who is right handed?
left hemisphere
How were language areas discovered?
people who had a stroke in their left hemisphere
- some demonstrated they knew what to say but could not make their mouths say it
- others demonstrated they can hear speech but cannot understand it (sounds garbled)
What is the corpus callosum?
a thick band of nerve fibres which connects the left and right hemisphere
What does the corpus callosum do?
allows signals to be transmitted and communicated from one to the other
What does the corpus callosum act as?
a bridge between the two hemispheres
Why is the corpus callosum important?
because the right hemisphere controls the left side of the body and the left controls the right
How is the visual pathway similar to the corpus callosum?
everything perceived by the LVF or RVF is processed in the opposite hemisphere (LVF = right hem & RVF = left hem)
What do LVF and RVF stand for?
LVF - left visual field
RVF - right visual field
What is the distribution of visual pathways like?
in each of your eyes there is a right and left visual field
Where is the retina?
at the back of the eye
Where does information pass down that hits the retina?
optic nerve
How does information pass visually?
1- light hits retina
2- info passes from retina down optic nerve
3- crosses over at the optic chasm
4- processed by hemisphere
