AP Psych Unit 3 Test

Antagonists function by

blocking receptors to prevent other neurotransmitters from binding to the neural receptors

what are the functions of the cortex?

movements or speech, motor cortex= voluntary movements?

what does the corpus callosum do in the brain?

a wide band of axon fibers that connects the two brain hemispheres and carries messages between them

Which of the following is the closest voltage to the threshold for firing inside a nerve cell?

-50 millivolts

explain mutation.

A random error in gene replication that leads to a change.

what is the molecule that inhibits or blocks a neurotransmitter's action?

Antagonists

What is the correct sequence of parts of a neuron firing?

Dendrites, soma, axon, vesicles, neurotransmitters

what are some epigenetic environmental factors that can affect gene changes?

Diet, drugs, and stress.

what is the neurotransmitter that influences movement, learning, attention, and emotion (decreased mobility in parkinson's disease and oversupply linked to schizophrenia)?

Dopamine

how do EEG, MEG, CT, PET, and fMRI differentiate in the ways that they function?

EEG-measure of electrodes, MEG- measures magnetic fields, CT- series of x-rays taken at different angles and put together, PET- Visual display that detects where a radioactive form of glucose goes, MRI- magnetic fields and radioactive waves to produce an image, FMRI- type of MRI while doing a task.

what type of twins develop from a single fertilized egg that splits?

Identical twins

Which of the following best describes a major role of the thalamus?

It relays most sensory signals to the cortex.

What is natural selection?

The principle that inherited traits that batter enable an organism to survive and reproduce in a particular environment will most likely be passed on to succeeding generations.

What is heritability?

The proportion of variation among individuals in a group that we can attribute to genes.

What are epigenetics?

The study of environmental influences on gene expression that occur without a DNA change.

how many neurons can be found in the brain?

billions

the paralyzing effect of poison is caused by its ability to

block the action of acetylcholine at neuron-muscle synapses.

The medulla oblongata is a part of the

brain stem

The psychodynamic theory of dreaming would postulate that

dreams fulfill unconscious wishes

Mrs Johnson took her husband to see a doctor after he ran red lights and drove past the building he was supposed to drop her off at. where did his brain tumor likely begin?

hippocampus

what is the psychosocial approach?

looks at individuals in the context of the combined influence that psychological factors and the surrounding social environment have on their physical and mental wellness and their ability to function.

The fatty casing that helps speed up the neural transmissions of a neuron is called the

myelin sheath

anya has green eyes and black hair and is short. These characteristics are examples of

phenotypic traits

The parietal lobe is most involved in

processing sensory information

Maria has not been sleeping well. She hears everything at night and has trouble getting up in the morning. What part of the brain is not functioning properly?

reticular activating system

Jon has a fear of spiders. One day a spider fell on his bed and he jumped as a result of his fear. When his mother came in to ask what was wrong, he could not understand her words. What part of the brain did the poison from the spider affect?

Amygdala

what are some differences between male and females sexuality?

Men think more about sex, masturabte more often, initiates more sex, and view more pornography than women do.

what is the name of the gland, also known as the "master gland", that controls growth hormones and directs other endocrine glands?

Pituitary gland

what is the brain's ability to change by reorganizing after damage or by building new pathways based on experience?

Plasticity

The idea that there is a part of the mind that is not directly accessible to awareness but still drives a person's thinking and behavior is most directly attributable to

Sigmund Freud

what is the job of behavioral genetics?

Study our differences and weight the effects and interplay of heredity and environment.

what are molecular genetics?

The subfield of biology that studies the molecular structure and function of genes.

What process takes place when excess neurotransmitters finally drift away, are broken down enzymes, or are reabsorbed by the sending neuron?

reuptake

Liz is a high school tennis player. She loses weight rapidly and cant control her actions. Which part of the brain are new studies focusing on in understanding the role of the brain in this eating disorder?

hypothalamus

what are the brain's neurons that cluster into work groups?

neural networks

some peripheral nerves can regenerate after being damaged because of the presence of

neurilemma

Mr. Murphy suffered a stroke and can no longer communicate the ideas he has in his head. He cannot speak. What part of the brain has been damaged?

Broca's Area

Which hormone is released when a person is under stress?

Cortisol

what are some functions of the right hemisphere of the brain?

Excels in making inferences, helps us modulate speech to make meaning clear, helps orchestrate our self-awareness

what is it called when tissues in the brain are destroyed? this process can be natural or experimentally causes.

Lesion

what are the two lima-bean-sized neural clusters that are linked to aggression and fear?

amygdala

Dr. Ramachandran needs to examine a patient's brain to find a tumor. What method should he use?

CT scan

what makes up the common sequence of DNA?

Chromosomes are composed of a coiled chain of the molecule DNA. Genes are small segments of the giant DNA molecules. Some genes are expressed and others are inactive.

what is the interdisciplinary study of the brain activity linked with out mental process called?

Cognitive Neuroscience

what part of the brain is severed to cure severe epilepsy?

Corpus Callosum

what process enables your mind to take care of routine business?

Parallel Processing

What effect do agonists have?

They increase the likelihood that a postsynaptic neuron will fire.

communication within a neuron is _____, while communication between neurons is _____.

electrical; chemical

Carl Wernicke discovered the region of the brain that is responsible for

language comprehension

what are the steps for nerves to process neural signals?

neuron sends a message by firing and impulse (action potential), a brief electrical charge that travels down the axon.

What is phrenology?

the study of bumps on the skull- could reveal a person's underlying brain size and associated with mental abilities and character traits.

if changes to -55 millivolts, the neuron will reach its ______ for firing

threshold

how do nerve cells communicate with other nerve cells?

through the synapse?

The phenomenon of declining physiological effects of taking a drug after sustained use is referred to as

tolerance

what is the direction of action potential towards?

travels down the axon?

sasha has tried every diet in the book. She eats but is constantly hungry. What part of the brain might be damaged?

ventromedial hypothalamus

men pair________ while women pair ________.

widely; wisely

In a study mimicking Roger Sperry's work, Dr. Kornhauser compared the responses of split-brain patients against a control group of neurotypical participants. In his study, participants focused on a dot in the center of a computer screen and objects are presented in either the left or right visual field. After seeing the object, the participants named the object. The results of the experiment are presented below. What is the most appropriate conclusion Dr. Kornhauser can draw from the results?

Because the connection between the right visual cortex and language center has been severed, split-brain patients are not able to retrieve the name of objects seen in the left visual field.

Dr. Kovacs is conducting a study of how the brain responds to reading. He records subjects' brain activity using electroencephalography (EEG) while they read sentences. He is looking for the N400 signal, a negative EEG spike that occurs 400 milliseconds after someone processes something semantically surprising. There are two conditions in the study. The two figures below show average EEG activity for the subjects in the two conditions (Condition A on the left; Condition B on the right). The x-axis indicates time in milliseconds; time 0 indicates when the subjects first read the last word in each sentence. Which of the following pairs of conditions would produce results such as the ones Dr. Kovacs found?

Condition A included sentences such as "Strawberries are sweet," and Condition B included sentences such as "Strawberries are nervous."

how are fraternal twins similar versus identical twins?

Fraternal twins develop from separate fertilized eggs and share a prenatal environment and can be opposite or same sex. Identical twins develop from a single fertilized egg that splits in two, creating two genetically identical organisms. These are same sex only.

A drug that is used to treat seizures functions by preventing inhibitory neurotransmitters from returning to the presynaptic neuron. This slows the rate of neurons firing by increasing the amount of the inhibitory neurotransmitter in the synapse. The drug is most likely to be classified as a

GABA reuptake inhibitor (GRI)

how are genetic and environmental relatives different?

Genetic relatives are biological parents and siblings. Environmental relatives are adoptive parents and siblings. People who have been adopted are more similar to their biological parents than their caregiving adoptive parents.

Madeline has previously been diagnosed with major depressive disorder. She has an identical twin sister, Josephine, and a nonidentical sister, Abigail. Neither of Madeline's sisters have previously been diagnosed with major depressive disorder. Which of the following statements is true of Madeline's sisters?

Josephine is more likely to be diagnosed with major depressive disorder than Abigail in response to a stressful or traumatic event.

when there is a split brain, how do both the left and right hemisphere act against each other?

The hemispheres work completely separate, information sharing does not occur.

Which of the following describes what happens when a neuron sends a signal?

The neuron goes from being negatively charged to briefly being positively charged, and finally returns to being negatively charged again. The magnitude of the negative charge is fixed regardless of the strength of the input signal it receives.

If a body does not have enough potassium, how might that affect neuronal firing?

The neurons will struggle to fire because there will not be enough positively charged ions to trigger the firing of the neuron.

At a synapse, neurotransmitters released by the sending neuron do which of the following?

They bind to receptors at the receiving neuron, which opens ion channels.

An adult with a healthy sleep cycle is most likely to enter REM sleep

after cycling through the NREM sleep stages

what are the areas of the cerebral cortex which are not involved in primary motor/sensory functions but are rather involved in higher mental functions such as learning, remembering, thinking and speaking?

association areas

A neuron sends a signal along its

axon

the branching fibers of the _______ end in _________ and link with parts of other neurons.

axon; terminal branches

valerie is a dancer. One day she falls on her head. she now feels like someone is directing her every movement. What area of the brain was damage by her fall?

cerebellum

what is the "little brain" that functions sensory input, coordinating movement and balance, and memory?

cerebellum

what is social script?

culturally modeled guide for how to act in various situations

what stimulates a specific area of the brain when placed inside? it stimulates muscles that activate a paralyzed limb, control a tv.

electrodes-microelectrodes

what is the name of the body's slow communication system that has sets of glands that secrete hormones into the bloodstream?

endocrine system

the release of ____ seems to underlie the "runners high", the effects of placebos, and the occasional euphoria associated with childbirth.

endorphins

carlos is stressed at work. the brain produces opiate-like neural regulators called _____ to help relieve stress and pain.

enkephalins

The hormone most associated with the fight or flight response is

epinephrine

A person whose body is not producing enough testosterone is most likely to exhibit

fatigue

damage to what lobe will cause unrestrained moral judgement?

frontal lobe

what lobe is behind the forehead and involved in speaking, muscle movement, and making plans and judgements?

frontal lobe

susie works in an ice cream shop and suffered brain damage from an accident. She doesn't know how to problem solve. Where did susie suffer brain damage?

frontal lobes

what is the name of the seahorse shaped brain structures that processes, explicit memories, and decreases in size and function as we grow older?

hippocampus

Johnny often hits his brother even though his brother does not do anything to antagonize him. Johnny's aggression is most likely due to a combination of

his genetic makeup, the environment he grew up in, and the fact that aggression can be evolutionarily adaptive

where are reward systems in the brain and what do they do?

hypothalamus- directs several maintenance activities (eating, drinking, body temperature), helps govern the endocrine system via pituitary gland, linked to emotion and reward.

what are the neurons within the brain and spinal cord that communicate internally and process information between the sensory inputs and motor outputs?

inter neurons

Ruth and Debbie are identical twins who were raised by the same family. Vince and Frankie are identical twins who were separated at birth and raised by different families. According to research on the heritability of personality traits, Ruth's and Debbie's personalities are statistically

likely to be as similar and dissimilar to one another as are Vince's and Frankie's personalities

what is the communication network that takes in information from the world and the body tissues and makes decisions and sends back information and orders to the body tissues?

nervous system

what are the building blocks of our bodies neural information system?

neurons (nerve cells)

What do glial cells do for neurons?

neurons can not feed themselves, glial cells provide nutrients and insulating myelin. Guide neural connections and mop up ions and neurotransmitters. Info transmission and memory.

Researchers trained monkeys to perform two tasks: an object-matching task and a location task. In the object-matching task, the monkeys are given an object and must choose a matching object from two objects placed in front of them. In the location task, an object is placed near one of two locations, and the monkeys must reach toward the location the object is closest to. Separating the monkeys into two groups, researchers created a lesion in one area of the brains of the monkeys in one group and a lesion in a different area of the brains of the monkeys in the second group. The researchers then tested the monkeys' performance on the two tasks. The figures below show the monkeys' accuracy on the two tasks. The lesions were most likely performed in the

parietal lobe for Group 1 and the temporal lobe for Group 2

Waking up frequently, loud snoring, silent pauses in breathing, and sleepiness during the day are symptoms of

sleep apnea

Michael Gazzaniga is best known for

studying split-brain patients

Hakim's career as a violinist is over. he no longer can compose music and gets confused because he cannot retain what he hears. What part of the brain is implicated?

temporal lobes

what is a pair of egg-shaped structures that sit atop the brainstem and act as the brain's sensory control system?

thalamus

which section of the brain does the right hemisphere control?

the left section (and left side of the body)