BioPsych Exam 2

is about 40 years old

we’re now living long enough to see ourselves fall apart

Heart Disease

• genetics

• infectious agents

• environmental toxins

• immune responses

• personality

• attitudes

• stress levels

• behavioral habits

• coping strategies

• reactions to illness

health defeating OR promoting behaviors

“a way of life oriented toward optimal health and well-being”

the tendency for people to underestimate their vulnerabilities

the belief that bad things only happen to others

health professionals take recent life stressors into account

how peoples environment influences them

• when a treatment/substance brings relief because the person believes it will

• can be prescribed

• works best if pills are yellow and expensive 💵

unwelcome side effects of a placebo

physical symptoms or disorders that may have neural causes

when a natural response is triggered by a formally neural stimulus

• Hans Selye

• 3 stages that happen when the body is exposed to stress

• Alarm stage

  • body responds to the initial threat of stress

• Resistance stage

  • body heightens resistance to illness

• Exhaustion stage

  • resistance levels drop and body becomes vulnerable

the part of the peripheral nervous involuntary neurons that control bodily functions and operate below consciousness

• ½ of the Autonomic Nervous system that is turned ON

• 🧠 → spine → goes out branching out to every organ

• Epinephrine, norenephrine, and DA are important neurotransmitters for sympathetic “arousal”

• NE and DA turn on the amygdala and off in the prefrontal cortex

• ½ of the Autonomic Nervous system that is OFF

• it’s chill 😎

• classic stress hormone

• released from the HPA

• classic steroid hormone

• great for mobilizing energy

• Glucagon

• Prolactin

• ADH

• endorphins and enkephalins

Reproductive hormones

cause different responses

• the response depends on how a stressor is appraised

• threat vs challenge (primary)

• coping possibility (secondary)

• the stress response causes sympathetic arousal

  • increases in heart rate (HR)

  • increases in blood pressure (BP)

CVD

when blood forcefully pushes through veins to the ❤

smaller blood vessels bulk up 💪 → causes blood flow problems (vascular resistance)

left ventricle hypertrophy

an enlargement of the heart that causes:

• irregular heartbeat

• not enough blood for bigger ❤

due to small tears in points of bifurcation

• where branch points of the vessels further ➗ inflammatory response

  • pulls in extra cells (like cholesterol)

narrow

it’s harder for blood to get through

a clot is formed (thrombus)

heart attack

stroke

pumps blood to the peripheral organs

pumps blood through the 🫁

• increase in HR

  • increase in force

• decreased blood flow to kidneys

blood is distributed to places that need it

• arteries to muscles dilate so more blood is available

increases, bad

blood vessel, circulatory system

C-reactive protein (CRP)

chest pain or discomfort that keeps coming back

• the ability to differentiate self from non-self

• exhibit specificity and memory

• Helper T’s

  • help with immune responses

• Cytotoxic

  • help with your own cells being altered by things like Cancer

produce antibodies

• destroy some antigens

• help T and B cells combat antigens too

a behavioral psychologist (Dr. Ader) studying classical conditioning

condition

• E

• NE

• DA

• etc

• cortisol

released as part of the stress response

• Rats and control

  • stressor and cancer

• Girl with Lupus

  • Cytoxan

physical energy from the world → electrical signals → 🧠

sensory neurons transform physical energy → neural impulses

smallest amount of change we can detect

smallest amount of sensation we can detect

smallest amount of sensory stimulation to activate sensory neurons

idea that a new stimulus must differ by a constant fraction from the original to be detected

idea that the deduction of a sensory stimulus involves some amount of decision making

smell

touch

hearing

taste

sight

information flows from sensory receptors ↑ smarter processing in the 🧠

information flows from higher-level brain structures ↓ lower-level brain structures

enhancement of 1 or more sense after losing one

occurs when stimulating one sense triggers another

a theory of color vision based on the eyes’ red, green, and blue sensitive cones

information about color is processed through signals in the visual receptors in an incompatible manner

detect sound waves

• caused by damage to the ear drum or ossicles

• prevents vibrations from reaching cochlea

• caused by damage to middle ear

• a result of an exposure to loud noise

90%, inner ear

smell and taste

specialized nucleated cells of the mucous membrane of the nose that serve as the receptors for the smell

registers smell by sending impulses for the sense of smell from 👃 → 🧠

loss of sense of smell

taste receptors and taste buds

ability to sense chemicals in the environment that are odorless and tasteless

a sense that tracks the position and orientation of your body parts

sensory receptors found in muscles, tendons, and joints that detect the motion or position

a sensory system involving the inner ear that registers the orientation of the head

result of a number of different types of receptors

an insensitivity to pain

a model that proposes a neutral gate in the spinal cord can modulate incoming pain signals

• chronic

• accute

painkillers

• temporarily releases pain with tiny needles

  • releases endorphins

  • sends messages through smaller nerve fibers that close senses to the spine

the tendency to perceive objects as being either in the foreground or the background

• nearness

• similarity

• closure

• continuity

objects that are close together in space or time are grouped together

objects that are similar to each other are grouped together

the brain will close gaps in order to show us the whole object

the brain would prefer to see one continuous movement rather that broken up parts

long lasting changes to the brain’s perceptual systems that improve the ability to respond to the environment