Psychology 321 Exam #2
What is a dermatome?
An area of the skin innervated by a given spinal nerve
What is the shape of the receptive field to which a simple cell in the primary visual cortex responds?
Bar in a particular orientation
What type of cell responds to a pattern of light in a particular orientation anywhere within its large receptive field, regardless of the exact location of the stimulus?
Complex
An object's location, color, and movement are all processed in the same part of the visual cortex.
False
Parvocellular cells respond strongly to moving stimuli and large overall patterns.
False
The coding of visual information in your brain results in an exact duplicate of the object's shape on the surface of the cortex.
False
How do sound waves ultimately result in the production of receptor potentials?
Hair cells in the cochlea vibrate, causing ion channels to open in their membrane.
Which structure has the largest receptive fields and the greatest preferential sensitivity to highly complex visual patterns, such as faces?
Inferior temporal cortex
Professor Woodby is lecturing about the fovea. Which is she most likely to say?
It has the greatest perception of detail.
What is the major problem for the frequency theory of sound perception?
It requires that neurons respond as quickly than they are able to do.
What is responsible for sharpening contrast at visual borders?
Lateral inhibition
Why is it important for sound vibrations to be amplified as they pass through the ear?
More force is needed to create waves in fluid.
What process is predicted by the gate theory of pain?
Non-pain information can inhibit pain information.
Where are the auditory receptor cells located?
On the basilar membrane
Lynn was developing film in a room with red light. When she came out of the room, everything looked a little green for a while. Which theory explains why this is happening to her?
Opponent-process theory
In depth perception, different views are received by each eye, depending on the distance of the object being viewed. What is this called?
Retinal disparity
Loudness is to ____ as pitch is to ____.
amplitude; frequency
According to the frequency theory, the ____.
basilar membrane vibrates in synchrony with a sound, producing action potentials at the same frequency
Parvocellular neurons most likely receive input from ____.
bipolar cells that receive input from cones
Although he has been blind since birth, Alden can experience _____, which is ______.
blindsight; the ability to respond in limited ways to visual information without perceiving it consciously
Large-diameter pain axons ____.
carry sharp pain information
In adult humans, the taste buds are ____.
concentrated along the outside edge of the tongue
Tinnitus may be ____.
due to a phenomenon like the phantom limb
When Ileen sees something that looks like a face, she has had activation of her _____.
fusiform gyrus
A mild degree of pain releases the neurotransmitter ____. A more intense pain also releases ____.
glutamate; substance P
The one additional feature that hypercomplex cells have that complex cells do not is that hypercomplex cells ____.
have a strong inhibitory area at one end of its receptive field
Olfactory information is coded in receptor cells through ____.
hundreds of types of receptor molecules, each responsive to a different chemical
Once within the cerebral cortex, the magnocellular pathway continues, with a dorsal branch important for ____.
integrating vision with action
Branches of the optic nerve go directly to what areas of the brain?
lateral geniculate and superior colliculus
The optic nerve sends most of its information to the _____ of the _____.
lateral geniculate nucleus; thalamus
Morphine and other opiate drugs decrease sensitivity to pain by ____.
mimicking the effects of endorphins at the synapses
The taste nerves initially project to the ____.
nucleus tractus solitarius
Once within the cerebral cortex, the parvocellular pathway continues, with a ventral branch important for ____.
object recognition
The optic nerves from the right and left eye initially meet at the ____.
optic chiasm
In the back of each of Teresita's eyes, the axons of her ganglion cells all leave in one large bundle called the ______. As a result, this causes her to experience a _____.
optic nerve; blind spot
According to the trichromatic theory of color vision ____.
our perception of color depends on the relative activity of three types of cones
Humans localize low frequencies by ____ differences and high frequencies by ____ differences.
phase; loudness
Color constancy is the ability to ____.
recognize the color of an object despite changes in lighting
Someone with prosopagnosia has difficulty with ____.
recognizing faces
Taste perception in the brain depends on ____.
relative activity of different taste neurons
V1 neurons would be most strongly activated by viewing ____.
repeating stripes on a flag
In order to be able to see things in her periphery, Pauline's _____ need to be activated.
rods
Horizontal cells receive their input from ____, and they send output to ____.
rods and cones; bipolar cells
Professor Gerke is giving a lecture on the vestibular system. He tells the class that both the ____ are needed for vestibular information.
semicircular canals and otolith organs
Since taste receptors are modified _____, they are replaced approximately every _____.
skin cells; two weeks
The sensory aspect of pain activates the ____ cortex, whereas the emotional aspect activates the ____ cortex.
somatosensory; cingulate
One hypothesis of synesthesia is that ____.
some of the axons from one cortical area have branches into another cortical area.
The primary visual cortex is also known as the ____.
striate cortex
Timing differences can be used most accurately for localizing ____.
sudden-onset sounds
The lateral geniculate nucleus is part of the ____.
thalamus
In vertebrate retinas, receptors send their messages ____.
to bipolar cells within the retina
A distinctive feature of the itch is that it relies on ____.
unusually slow axons
An inability to recognize objects despite otherwise satisfactory vision is called ____.
visual agnosia
We can identify a wide variety of bitter substances because ____.
we have many different bitter receptors
Humans have a sense of taste so that ______.
we know what to eat and what to spit out
The current view of how we perceive high frequencies is based on ____.
where along the basilar membrane neurons fire most rapidly
According to the law of specific nerve energies, the brain tells the difference between one sensory modality and another by ____.
which neurons are active
Cells in the inferior temporal cortex that are sensitive to a particular shape are also likely to respond to the shape's ____.
mirror-reversal
What does the vestibular system detect?
movement of the head
The vomeronasal organ (VNO) is a set of receptors located ____.
near, but separate from, the olfactory receptors
Many women living in a college dormitory will gradually begin to synchronize their menstrual cycles. The research indicates that this is, at least in part, based on ____.
pheromones
____ are chemicals that release energy when struck by light.
photopigments
Professor Utz is giving a talk about how the eye processes light. He tells the class that once the bipolar cells receive input from ______, they send the message on to ______.
photoreceptors; ganglion cells
Visual information from the lateral geniculate area goes to the ____.
primary visual cortex
Pacinian corpuscles respond best to ____.
rapid mechanical pressure
Brittanie has had damage to the dorsal stream of her visual system. She now has trouble with _____.
reaching out to grasp an object
The ____ of any neuron in the visual system is the area of the visual field that excites or inhibits it.
receptive field
Wanetta has had damage to the ventral stream of her visual system. She now has trouble with _____.
the ability to describe the shape or size of an object
Cortical neurons in the visual cortex of a kitten or a cat will lose the ability to respond to stimuli in one eye if the eye is sutured shut for ____.
the first month of life