Student Presentations Flashcards
Brittney’s Porn Presentation
1) Which areas of the brain respond to viewing pornography? Dorsal striatum (reward & motivation), mirror neurons (desire to simulate),
2) Does one sex respond more strongly to pornography than the other? Men have increased BOLD responses, correlational arousal, activation of the reward system, and hypothalamus reaction
The effect of touch on infant brain development: 1) Why is the study of touch important for preterm infants? 2) What is one specific aspect of preterm infant brain development affected by touch? 3) What is the long-term developmental impact of touch on skills such as emotional regulation?
1) Preterm infants have a unique set of needs and challenges that they face, perhaps in part due to decreased synaptic development and decreased myelination 2) Touch has been shown to encourage brain maturation and myelination, and improves autonomic reactivity, cortisol reactivity. 3) Increases in brain maturation can lead to improvement in self-regulation.
Alfonso - Adolescent Stress 1) Role of stress and internal stress regulating systems : 2) Neurological Effects of repeated stressful situations: 3) Adverse coping mechanisms (drugs): 4) Effect of mother’s stress on child’s brain:
1) Stress response system, HPA axis, responds to stress by releasing cortisol to return body to homeostasis state. (Overproduction of cortisol can be harmful). 2) Repeated exposure to stress can lead to multiple outcomes: regulation of both cortisol and dopamine to resolve stress 3) Marijuana and alcohol use produces salient responses for adolescents due to underdeveloped brain (May result in neurological damage to hippocampus). 4) Environmental and emotional state of mother can affect HPA axis production of child as early as prenatal stage. (Moms in stressful environments w/ issues will likely have stressed kids).
Charlynn’s Gender/Math 1) What biopsychological influences amplify biological differences in math? 2) How can we adjust for these gender differences?
1) General areas of agreement between researchers: the influence of testosterone, the differences in brain connectivity and right hemisphere activations, and the environmental influences that may amplify biological differences. 2) There are solutions to this gender gap through altering math tasks, visuospatial training, fighting stereotypes, and changing gender norms for behavior.
Rusty’s Moral Presentation 1) What areas of the brain are most active during moral processing? 2) What happens with PFC damage? 3) What happens with vmPFC damage?
1) The orbitofrontal cortex (emotional / affective) and the prefrontal cortex (cognitive). OFC activates during more emotionally salient stimuli, PFC during more abstract dilemmas. 2) Impaired reasoning, judgment, norms, and BEHAVIOR regulation issues. 3) Impaired moral behavior, but understanding of norms remains intact. Additionally, they make utilitarian judgments on moral dilemmas.
Jarrett: Violent images & child brains 1) Simulated violence affects which types of neural processing? 2) What role does the amygdala play in viewing violent images?
1) Motor, Visual, Auditory, Emotion 2) Stimulus interpretation rewards/punishment, threat detection in environment.
Culture, emotion, and the brain 1) Comparison study of Japanese in Japan with Caucasians in the United States and their response to fear stimuli 2) Emotion regulation strategies 3) MPFC vs. ACC activation
1) More neural activity when participants shown stimuli with same cultural background But, Regardless of culture, the same brain region related to fear and emotion will be activated 2) Cultural norms shape emotion regulation strategies, which in turn evoke different physiological outcomes. 3) MPFC activated during judgment task on both individual and social connections in Chinese, but not Western, Ss. ACC was same for both.
Sydney— The Effects of Early Life Stress on the Structure & Function of the Hippocampus 1) Evidence that hippocampus is highly vulnerable to the effects of early life stress and trauma
1) Hippocampal volume & neurogenesis tends to be reduced or impaired after early life stress—immediate effects or develop over time 2) Neuronal factors and processes implicated in the growth & synaptic plasticity of the hippocampus are shown to be impaired after early life stress, which results in learning and memory dysfunction 3)These impairments are associated with the development of psychopathology
Draycen: What is Plasticity? What are factors that increase plasticity?
Main points: Factors that increase plasticity: Simultaneous firing, BDNF, aerobic exercise, cognition, LDOPA, antidepressants, TMS, DBS, young age Multiple methods can (theoretically) be used simultaneously to further enhance or alter plasticity Drugs can prep specific neurons, then stimulation (e.g., TMS) can trigger the plasticity Plasticity can result in changed thresholds or signal strengths (LTP), and/or increased dendrite formation
Lauren: What are the physical and cognitive effects that can happen in the brain when engaging in exercise?
brain plasticity increases by an increase of grey matter in the prefrontal and temporal cortices, improve higher order cognitive functions, mostly memory exercise alters the perception of pain by either ß endorphin or AEA exercise can become addictive by ß endorphin or dopamine
Rae: Mindfulness practices have elicited changes in gray matter density within brain regions involved in…?
Mindfulness practices have elicited changes in gray matter density within brain regions involved in: -learning and memory processes -emotion regulation -self-referential processing -perspective taking Significant changes in gray matter density have been found following the practice of mindfulness: Prefrontal cortex (medial, ventro-medial, ventro-lateral) Anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) Posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) Temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) Insula Hippocampus Cerebellum Amygdala (decrease/mixed findings)
Nataly: Depression What parts of the brain are involved?
Yunyi: Who most commonly suffers from insomnia? What are some other physiological symptoms? What are the four proposed models of the regulation of sleep?
Insomnia is a prevalent sleep disorder that the elderly and women are more likely got trouble in this problem. Hyperarousal is a typical symptom of insomnia, people suffered in such problem demonstrated more active mental level in metabolic rate, heartbeat, urinary free cortisol levels and glucose metabolism in cerebral cortex. There are four proposed model of the regulation of sleep and wakefulness that related to insomnia: 1) disruption of the sleep homeostat; 2) disruption of the circadian clock; 3) disruption of intrinsic systems responsible for the expression of sleep states; or 4) disruption (hyperactivity) of extrinsic systems capable of over-riding normal sleep–wake regulation.
Tiamo: Sexual Abuse
There are significant effects on the brain that in many cases relate to behavioral symptoms There has to be more done to figure out what kinds of abuse relate to problems in which part of the brain ABUSE IS BAD
