PL1101E INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY SEM.

2 AY2010/2011 WEEK 2

Lecturer: Dr. Travellia Tjokro. E-mail: psytft@nus.edu.sg Office: AS4-03-41.

TODAYS AGENDA

Biopsychology: The Brain & Behavior. Ch. 4 of your textbook. Focus today: Structure of a neuron & neuronal information conduction brief. Structure of the nervous system brief. Brain: Basic neuroanatomy. Hemispheric lateralization.

STRUCTURE OF A NEURON
Neurons:

the basic building blocks of the nervous system. Three main parts:

Soma: the cell body. Dendrites: specialized receiving units. Axon: conducts electrical impulses away from the cell body to other neurons, muscles, or glands.

Myelin sheath.

A motor neuron

NEURONAL INFORMATION CONDUCTION

Resting potential: Cell membrane. At rest, the membrane maintains an electrical polarization or a difference in the electrical charge of two locations (i.e., inside the cell membrane and outside the cell membrane). The inside of the membrane is slightly negative with respect to the outside. (approximately -70 millivolts).

NEURONAL INFORMATION CONDUCTION

Action Potential. The electrical shift that occurs when a neuron is stimulated. Positive sodium ions enter the neuron, causing brief depolarization. Information is propagated down the axon.

Refractory periods:
Absolute. Relative.

NEURONAL COMMUNICATION
Neurotransmitters:

chemical substances that carry messages across the synaptic space to other neurons, muscles, or glands.

Step 1: synthesis: the transmitter molecules are formed. Step 2: storage: transmitter molecules are stored in synaptic vesicles (in axon terminal). Step 3: release: action potential causes transmitter molecules to move from synaptic vesicles across the gap. Step 4: binding: transmitter molecules bind themselves to receptor sites embedded in the receiving neurons cell membrane.

Neurotransmitters:

Excitatory.

Inhibitory.

Likelihood of AP. Likelihood of AP.

STRUCTURE OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM

Lets now focus on the brain anatomy

THE BRAIN: BASIC NEUROANATOMY

The orientation in the brain.

TO PUT THINGS IN PERSPECTIVE

BASIC NEUROANATOMY
Three

major subdivisions of the brain: Hindbrain Midbrain Forebrain

HINDBRAIN
Lowest and most primitive level of the brain. Consists of:

Medulla oblongata (medulla) Pons Cerebellum

Medulla: plays an important role in vital body functions such as heart rate and respiration. Pons: carries nerve impulses between higher and lower levels of the nervous system. Cerebellum: concerned with muscular movement coordination, learning, and memory.

Regulates complex movements that require precise timing.

MIDBRAIN
Midbrain: contains clusters of sensory and motor neurons. Example:

Reticular Formation: alerts higher centers of the brain that messages are coming and then either blocks or allows those messages.

Hindbrain structures, the midbrain and other central structures of the brain combine and make up the brain stem.

Centered roughly in the pons. The reticular formation is the core of the brainstem running through the mid-brain, pons and medulla.

BRAINSTEM

Image Source: http://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/a/a_11/a_11_cr/a_11_cr_cyc/a_11_cr_cyc_1b.jpg

FOREBRAIN

The brains most advanced portion from an evolutionary standpoint. Cerebrum: the major structure of the forebrain.

FOREBRAIN

Subcortical structure examples.

Thalamus: switchboard that organizes inputs from sensory organs and routes them to the appropriate areas of the brain. Hypothalamus: plays a major role in motivation and emotion.

Controls hormonal secretions that regulate sexual behaviour, metabolism, reactions to stress, and pleasure/pain.

Limbic System: helps coordinate behaviors needed to satisfy motivational and emotional urges that arise in the hypothalamus.

Hippocampus: involved in forming and retrieving memories. Amygdala: organises motivational and emotional response patterns

Aggression and fear.

Cerebral Cortex: a 1/4 in. sheet of gray, unmyelinated cells that form the outermost layer of the human brain Fissures: folds in the cerebral cortex; allows greater surface area in a smaller space Fissures separate the brain into four lobes: frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal

THE FOUR LOBES

Occipital Lobe

Parietal Lobe

Posterior end of cortex. Striate cortex / primary visual cortex. Visual input processing. Postcentral gyrus / primary somatosensory cortex. Lateral portion of each hemisphere - near the temples. Processing of auditory info, spoken language, complex vision.

Temporal Lobe

Frontal Lobes: 29% of human brain; less in all other mammals Least understood part of the brain Damage can result in loss of intellectual abilities, such as planning and carrying out action sequences Involved in emotional experience.

Prefrontal cortex executive functions.

Lets look at some sample areas in the four lobes

Motor Cortex: controls the 600 or more muscles involved in voluntary body movements. Sensory Cortex: receives input from our sensory receptors.

Wernickes area: an area in the temporal lobe that is primarily involved in speech comprehension. Brocas Area: an area in the frontal lobe that is involved in the production of speech through its connections with the motor cortex region.

Broca

Wernicke

HEMISPHERIC LATERALIZATION

Lateralization of function:

Lateral to the side. Lateralization specialization of function.

L hemisphere A

R hemisphere

CORPUS CALLOSUM: THE BRIDGE

Corpus Callosum: a neural bridge that acts as a major communication link between the two hemispheres and allows them to function as a single unit

Left hemisphere: Verbal abilities, speech, mathematical and logical abilities Aphasia: the partial or total loss of the ability to communicate; results from damage to Brocas or Wernickes areas in the left hemisphere. Right hemisphere: spatial relations, faces, mental imagery, musical and artistic abilities.

So, how does each hemisphere get information from the environment? Each hemisphere of the brain gets input from the opposite half of the visual world. The visual field is what is visible at any moment.

Out in the environment.

A lot of what we now know about the left and right brain functional specialization come from studies done on split brain people. Split brain people: people with severed corpus callosa. To help in cases of severe epileptic seizures.

So, how does an experiment with split brain people go?

ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF HEMISPHERIC LATERALIZATION Brain damaged patients. Not split brain. Spatial processing.

Other lateralized functions:

Language. Emotions. Spatial relations.