U1 AOS 2 (Chapter 4)

Question 1

What are the 3 zones of the brain?

Answer 1

Forebrain, forebrain, hindbrain

Question 2

What is the role of the cerebellum?

Answer 2

Coordinate balance and movement

Question 3

What is the role of the medulla?

Answer 3

Controls vital bodily movements, in charge of subconcious actions

Question 4

What is the role of the pons?

Answer 4

Sleep, dreaming, breathing and coordination.

Question 5

What is the role of reticular formation?

Answer 5

Screens information to not overload the brain - helps maintain consciousness and muscle tension.

Question 6

What is the role of the hypothalamus?

Answer 6

Homeostasis, regulates secretion of hormones for basic biological needs

Question 7

What is the role of the Thalamus?

Answer 7

Process sensory and motor information from cerebral cortex

Question 8

What is the role of the cerebrum?

Answer 8

A network of neurons, primarily responsible for conscious thoughts, feelings, actions

Question 9

What are the main cortexes/lobes of the brain?

Answer 9

Cerebral, frontal lobe, Parietal lobe, occipital lobe and temporal lobe.

Question 10

What is the role of the frontal lobe?

Answer 10

Regulation of emotions, aspects of personality, planning + initiation of voluntary bodily movements.

Question 11

What is the role of the prefrontal cortex?

Answer 11

Involved with sophisticated mental abilities e.g reasoning, problem solving

Question 12

What does the primary motor cortex do?

Answer 12

Initiates, controls voluntary movements through skeletal muscles.

Question 13

What is Broca’s area?

Answer 13

A part in the brain that has a crucial role in articulating speech. Only in left hemisphere.

Question 14

Role of the parietal lobe

Answer 14

recieves and processes bodily (somatosensory) information. e.g body’s position or temperature.

Question 15

What is the role of the primary somatosensory cortex?

Answer 15

Receives and processes sensory information from skin, body parts.
processing sensations from the body

Question 16

What does the occipital lobe do?

Answer 16

Devoted to the sense of vision.

Question 17

What does the primary visual cortex do?

Answer 17

Visual information from eyes. Comes from visual sensory receptors located on retina of eye.

Question 18

What is the function of the temporal lobe?

Answer 18

Auditory perception, emotional responses to sounds and memory

Question 19

What is the function of Wernicke’s area?

Answer 19

Comprehension of sounds of speech, interpreting speech

Question 20

What is CT scan?

Answer 20

Computerised tomography. A non-invasive structural neuroimaging technique where dye is ingested.

Question 21

What is an MRI?

Answer 21

Magnetic resonance imaging. Uses harmlessmagnetic fields to vibrate atoms in brain’s neurons. In colour and structural. Cannot be used on people who have metal.

Question 22

What is an fMRI?

Answer 22

Functional magnetic resonance imaging. Detects and records brain activity by measuring oxygen consumptions across brain. Takes many photos over rapid succession.

Question 23

What is a PET scan?

Answer 23

Position emission tomography. Produces colour images showing brain structure, activity and function. Areas that require increased blood flow have increased neuronal activity.

Question 24

Name the first brain experiments.

Answer 24

Brain ablation/lesioning, electrical stimulation of brain (ESB), split-brain research

Question 25

What is brain ablation and lesioning?

Answer 25

Ablation -surgical removal, destruction or cutting of region of brain.
Lesioning - studying effects of induced and/or existing damage to areas of brain.

Question 26

What is ESB?

Answer 26

Weak electrical signals generated continuously by neurons throughout brain to see if brain activity can be stimulated.

Question 27

What is split-brain research

Answer 27

Where people with severed corpus callosum, experiment to discover hemispheric specialisation.