Nature, Nurture & the Nervous System
The brain and spinal cord make up this division of the nervous system.
CNS
These branching structures receive incoming messages from other neurons.
Dendrites
This lobe at the back of the brain primarily processes visual information.
Occipital Lobe
This roughly 24-hour biological cycle helps regulate when you feel sleepy and awake.
circadian rhythm
Detecting light, sound, pressure, and other physical stimuli begins with this process.
Sensation
These retinal receptors are especially useful for seeing in dim light.
Rods
Practice, parenting, education, and other environmental influences represent this side of the nature–nurture discussion.
Nurture
This insulating covering helps neural impulses travel faster along an axon.
Myelin Sheath
This structure helps coordinate balance and smooth movement when you ride a bicycle.
Cerebellum
Rapid eye movements, vivid dreams, and reduced skeletal muscle activity characterize this sleep stage.
REM Sleep
Sensory receptors convert physical energy into neural signals through this process.
Transduction
These retinal receptors support color vision and sharp detail in bright light.
Cones
This division allows you to voluntarily raise your hand during class.
Somatic Nervous System
These neurons carry information from sensory receptors toward the central nervous system.
Sensory Neurons
This structure is especially important for forming new explicit memories.
Hippocampus
Repeated interruptions in breathing during sleep characterize this disorder.
Sleep Apnea
After entering a room with a strong smell, you gradually stop noticing it because the stimulation remains constant.
Sensory Adaption
The lens changes shape to focus on a nearby worksheet after you look at the distant board.
Accomodation
Your heart races and digestion slows when you hear someone trying to open your locked door. This division has activated.
Sympathetic Nervous System
A neuron fires a full-strength action potential once its threshold is reached. A stronger stimulus does not produce a bigger action potential.
All or nothing principle
This structure helps regulate hunger, body temperature, and other aspects of homeostasis.
Hypothalamus
After several nights with too little REM sleep, a person spends an unusually large amount of time in REM.
Rem Rebound
This is the minimum stimulation needed to detect a stimulus 50 percent of the time.
Absolute Threshold
After staring at a red image, you see a green afterimage. Which color-vision theory best explains this?
Opponent Process theory
After discovering it was your family member at the door, this division helps slow your heart rate and resume digestion.
parasympathetic nervous system
After releasing neurotransmitters, a sending neuron absorbs some of them back into its terminal through this process.
Reuptake
A researcher places electrodes on a participant’s scalp to record the brain’s electrical activity. Name the method.
EEG
A dream theory proposes that the brain creates a story to make sense of internally generated neural activity during sleep.
activation-synthesis theory
You add sugar until you can just detect a change in your drink’s sweetness. Name the minimum detectable difference.
just-noticeable difference, or difference threshold
Your brain identifies where a sound originated partly by comparing when it reaches each ear.
sound localization
Across generations, inherited characteristics that improve survival and reproduction become more common through this process.
Natural Selection
One is the brain’s main excitatory neurotransmitter; the other is its main inhibitory neurotransmitter. Name both.
Glutamate and gaba
After an injury, undamaged brain areas form new connections and help compensate for lost abilities.
Neuroplasticity
Over time, someone needs more of a substance to achieve the same effect. After stopping, the person experiences unpleasant symptoms. Name both processes in order.
Tolerance & Withdrawl
Adding one book to an empty backpack is noticeable, but adding one to a very heavy backpack may not be. This law explains why detectable differences depend on a proportion of the original stimulus.
One sense tells you where your arms and legs are positioned; another helps you maintain balance and orientation. Name both in order.
kinesthetic sense and vestibular sense
A psychologist explains a common human fear by considering how it may have helped our ancestors survive. Name this perspective.
Evolutionary Perspective
These two appetite-related hormones send different messages: one stimulates hunger, while the other signals energy stores and helps reduce appetite.
Ghrelin & Leptin
A person has difficulty producing speech after damage to one language area; another person has difficulty understanding language after damage to a different area. Name the two areas in order.
Brocas area/Wernike's Area
One substance activates a receptor by mimicking a neurotransmitter; another blocks the receptor. Name these two types of substances.
Agonist & Antagonist
Food tastes less flavorful when a stuffy nose reduces your ability to smell. Name this relationship between senses.
Sensory Interaction
A theory proposes that activity in larger touch fibers can reduce pain transmission through a spinal “gate,” helping explain why rubbing an injured area may reduce pain.
gate-control theory
Identical twins show greater similarity in a trait than fraternal twins. This suggests a contribution from this influence, but does not prove the environment has no role.
Heredity/Nature
After a neuron fires, it briefly cannot fire another action potential, even with additional stimulation. Name this recovery interval.
Refractory Period
A split-brain patient with typical left-hemisphere language dominance sees a key briefly flashed in the left visual field. Which hand can select the key, and can the patient usually name it aloud?
left hand, and the patient usually cannot name it aloud
A substance blocks a sending neuron from reabsorbing a neurotransmitter, leaving more available in the synapse. Name this mechanism.
reuptake inhibition
For one person, hearing particular musical notes consistently and automatically produces experiences of specific colors.
synesthesia
Earwax prevents sound from reaching inner-ear structures in one case; damaged cochlear hair cells cause hearing loss in another. Identify both types of hearing loss in order.
conduction hearing loss and sensorineural hearing loss