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PSYCH 367 > The Visual Cortex > Flashcards

The Visual Cortex Flashcards

1
Q

What are two ways we can record electrical activity in the brain?

A

EEG
Intra/extracellular recordings

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2
Q

What is an EEG?

A

Amplifies evoked potentials produced by large numbers of neurons

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3
Q

What are intra/extracellular recordings?

A

Measure activity of a single neuron, using a microelectrode

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4
Q

What do both PET and fMRI show?

A

Metabolic activity

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5
Q

How does PET work?

A

Takes a radioactive form of glucose
X-rays cause positron to be emitted

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6
Q

Where do optic nerves from the retinal ganglion cells meet?

A

The optic chiasm

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7
Q

Where are images from the left visual field processed?

A

In the right hemisphere

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8
Q

Where are images from the right visual field processed?

A

In the left hemisphere

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9
Q

Where do optic tracts from the optic chiasm project to?

A

The lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) in the thalamus (90%)
The superior colliculus (10%)

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10
Q

Where do visual signals from the LGN travel?

A

The occipital lobe, the visual receiving area

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11
Q

What is the visual receiving area also called?

A

The striate cortex due to its striped appearance

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12
Q

What cells are present in the LGN?

A

Parvocellular and magnocellular

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13
Q

What is the cell body size, number, conduction speed, response type, receptive field size, percepts, and colour of p-cells?

A

Cell body = small
Number = many
Conduction = slow
Response = sustained
Receptive field = small
Percepts = high spatial detail
Colour = colour

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14
Q

What is the cell body size, number, conduction speed, response type, receptive field size, percepts, and colour of m-cells?

A

Cell body = large
Number = few
Conduction = rapid
Response - transient
Receptive field = large
Percepts = motion sensitive
Colour = black and white

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15
Q

What is the geniculostriate pathway?

A

P-cells and some m-cells go to the LGN
Then project to the primary (V1) and secondary (V2) cortex in the occipital lobe

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16
Q

What are the layers of the LGN?

A

6 layers, each with a retinotopic map
Magno -> 4Calpha, Parvo -> 4Cbeta

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17
Q

What is a retinotopic map?

A

Adjacent neurons correspond to spatially related points on the retina

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18
Q

What is the tectopulvinar pathway?

A

Remaining m-cells project to the superior colliculi of the tectum (part of brainstem, guides visual attention)
Then projects to thalamus: pulvinar and lateral posterior nuclei
Then to V2 and beyond

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19
Q

What does the tectopulvinar path control?

A

Eye movements, fixations, detection/orientation to visual stimuli, motion and location

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20
Q

What do layers 2 and 3 of the striate cortex contain?

A

Blobs = sensitive to wavelength but not orientation
Interblobs = area between blobs, sensitive to orientation but not wavelength (parvo only)

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21
Q

What did Hubel and Wiesel do?

A

Found cells in V1 that responded well to certain stimuli

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22
Q

What are simple cells?

A

Layer 4
Respond to a bar or line in a particular location on the retina in a specific location

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23
Q

What are complex cells?

A

Layers 2/3
Responds to a line or bar in a particular location on the retina that has a specific orientation and is moving in a certain direction

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24
Q

What are hypercomplex (end-stopped) cells?

A

Beyond V1
Responds to a bar, corner, or angle having a certain length or width in a particular location on the retina that has a specific orientation and is moving in a certain direction

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25
What is a location column?
Cells respond to stimuli from the same retinal location
26
What is an ocular dominance column?
Cells respond to stimuli presented to one eye only
27
What is an orientation column?
Cells respond to line stimuli having the same orientation -orientation columns differ in orientation selectivity by 10°)
28
What is a hypercolumn?
A region containing a single location column, which contains left and right ocular dominance columns, which contain the set of orientation columns from 0° to 180°
29
What is V3 sensitive to?
Moving edges of a certain orientation?
30
What is V3 believed to handle?
Perception of forms and local motion
31
Where does V3 project?
To the temporal lobe
32
What do cells in V4 respond to?
Perceived colour of a surface but not the wavelength
33
Where does V4 project?
To the temporal lobe
34
What is cerebral achromatopsia?
Unable to see colour in the right half of the visual field (V4)
35
What is the inferior temporal cortex involved in?
Identifying stimuli
36
What did Gross, Rocha-Miranda, and Bender discover?
Cells that responded best to a silhouette of a monkey's paw when waved goodbye to an unresponsive cell
37
What do primary cells in the IT respond to?
To simple stimuli like dots, squares
38
What do elaborate cells in the IT respond to?
Complex shapes or shapes with colour or texture
39
What is prosopagnosia?
Inability to recognize faces due to IT damage in the fusiform gyrus
40
What is the medial temporal cortex sensitive to?
Overall motion and direction of an object but not colour
41
Where does the medial temporal cortex project to?
The parietal lobe
42
What is cerebral akinetopsia?
Unable to see objects in motion
43
What is the ventral (temporal) pathway?
Parvo -> V1 -> V2 -> V4 -> IT
44
What is the ventral (temporal) pathway concerned with?
Object recognition and identification What system
45
What is the dorsal (parietal) pathway?
Magno -> V1 -> V2 -> V3 -> V4 -> MT (V5) -> parietal lobe
46
What is the dorsal (parietal) pathway concerned with?
Locating objects, motion, spatial relationships, depth Where system
47
What were Pohl's lesion studies?
Object discrimination = shown object, presented choice task, if target was selected then reward Landmark discrimination = object presented, food hidden in well closest to object Monkeys trained then task was reversed, after learning lesion on temporal or parietal lobe
48
What are the effects of a lesion on an object task?
Temporal = a lot of impairment Parietal = minimal impairment What pathway affected
49
What are the effects of a lesion on a landmark task?
Unoperated = no impairment Temporal = minimal impairment Parietal = a lot of impairment Where pathway affected
50
How did Kohler's neuroimaging provide evidence for what-where distinctions?
Objects were presented in two frames, either changed objects or changed locations Object task = IT cortex region Spatial task = parietal lobe
51
What is visual agnosia?
Failure or deficit in perceiving or recognizing visual objects
52
What is apperceptive agnosia (visual form agnosia?
Deficit in perception of whole objects Can't recognize, discriminate, or copy complex visual forms Can grasp objects but can't identify them
53
What is the neuropathy of apperceptive agnosia?
Caused by widespread damage to the posterior occipital complex due to CO or mercury poisoning Failure of binding features together in early visual processing
54
What is associative agnosia (visual object agnosia)
Deficit in associating percept with meaning Cannot draw from memory Can copy pictures but can't identify them
55
What is the neuropathy of associative agnosia?
Not consistent Whole object is not identified due to damage in late visual processing
56
What is category-specific agnosia?
Inability to identify objects from specific categories
57
What is orientation agnosia?
Able to recognize drawings of objects rotated but impaired in recognizing the picture's orientation Often copies drawings in perpendicular orientation
58
What is simultanagnosia?
Inability to perceive more than one aspect of a visual stimulus and integrate details into coherent whole
59
What is dorsal simultanagnosia?
Can only perceive one of a number of overlapping objects
60
What is vental simultanagnosia?
Can perceive more than one object at a time but cannot identify more than one
61
What is pure alexia?
Cannot read words, must do a letter-by-letter reading May be the same as ventral simultanagnosia
62
What is topographic agnosia?
Impaired recognition of scenes and landmarks Gets lost easily
63
What is a double dissociation study?
In one case study, one ability is working while another is not and vice-versa in another case study
64
What is Balint's syndrome?
Patient had bilateral damage to the superior posterior parietal lobes Optic ataxia Optic apraxia Simultanagnosia Can recognize objects but not tell where they are located Intact what but damaged where system
65
What is optic ataxia?
Inability to reach for and grasp objects in field of view
66
What is optic apraxia?
Inability to guide eye movements or change visual fixations
67
What was wrong with Milner and Goodale's patient DF?
Had CO poisoning, damage in occipitotemporal region Visual form agnosia Can perceive colour and texture Can accurately reach for and grasp objects
68
What was DF tested on?
Orientation matching - hold the card at the same slant as slot, did poorly Visuomotor posting - put the card into the slot, did well Damaged what system, intact where
69
What was wrong with Weiskrantz's patient DB?
Had right striate cortex removed Stimuli can't be detected in right visual field Could identify light even if he said he couldn't see it Blindsight
70
What is blindsight associated with?
V1 damage
71
How can people with blindsight "see"?
Due to tectopulvinar pathway bypassing V1 Implies that some visual information is processed at an unconscious level
72
What is an orientation tuning curve?
Indicates relationship between orientation and firing, determined by measuring the responses of a simple cortical cell to bars with different orientations
73
What is selective adaptation?
Firing causes neurons to become fatigued which results in decreased firing rate and the neuron will fire less when presented with the stimuli immediately again
74
What is selective rearing?
If an animal is raised in an environment that contains only certain types of stimuli, then neurons that respond to those stimuli will be more prevalent
75
What is cortical magnification?
Apportioning a large area on the cortex to the small fovea
76
What is cortical magnification factor?
The size of the magnification
77
What are hypercolumns well suited for?
Processing information from a small area in the visual field
78
What is tiling?
Columns working together to cover the entire visual field
79
What areas are in the extrastriate column?
V2, V3, V4, V5
80
What happens as we move from V1 to higher-level extrastriate areas?
The receptive field sizes gradually increase
81
What is ablation?
Destruction or removal of tissue in the nervous system
82
What is the how (action) stream?
Determines how a person carries out an action We aren't aware in daily behaviour as the what and how streams work together seamlessly
83
What area of the brain has the largest receptive fields?
The inferotemporal cortex (IT) Encompasses entire receptive field

PSYCH 367 (27 decks)

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