PSYC 200 Final Review: Neuroscience, Perception, Cognition, Memory and Language

Terms in this set (33)

1. Central vs peripheral nervous system, and somatic vs autonomic divisionsThe CNS is the brain and spinal cord; the PNS is all the nerves outside them. The PNS divides into the somatic system (voluntary movement and sensory input) and the autonomic system (involuntary control of organs and glands).
2. Sympathetic vs parasympathetic nervous systemThe sympathetic system drives fight-or-flight: it raises heart rate, dilates the pupils and slows digestion. The parasympathetic system drives rest-and-digest: it slows the heart, stimulates digestion and conserves energy.
3. What maintains a neuron's resting potential of about -70 mV?The sodium-potassium pump (moving 3 Na+ out for every 2 K+ in) and K+ leak channels that let positive charge escape. The inside of the cell ends up negative relative to the outside.
4. What is the absolute refractory period?A brief period right after an action potential when the neuron cannot fire again, because the Na+ channels are inactivated. It limits the maximum firing rate and keeps signals moving in one direction.
5. EPSP vs IPSP, and how does a neuron decide to fire?An EPSP depolarizes the membrane (making firing more likely) and an IPSP hyperpolarizes it (making firing less likely). The neuron sums these inputs over space and time, and fires if the axon hillock reaches threshold.
6. What is reuptake, and how do SSRIs work?Reuptake is the presynaptic neuron reabsorbing its released neurotransmitter, which ends the signal. SSRIs block serotonin reuptake, so serotonin stays in the synapse longer; they are used to treat depression.
7. What is the hippocampus mainly responsible for?Forming new explicit (declarative) long-term memories and spatial memory. Damage to it causes anterograde amnesia, while older memories and motor skills are largely spared.
8. What is the amygdala's main role?Processing emotion, especially fear and threat detection, and attaching emotional significance to memories. Damage reduces fear responses and fear conditioning.
9. What does the hypothalamus regulate?Homeostatic drives such as hunger, thirst, body temperature and sexual behaviour. It also controls the pituitary gland, linking the nervous system to the endocrine system.
10. What does the cerebellum do?It coordinates smooth, timed movement, balance and posture, and it supports motor learning. Damage produces clumsy, uncoordinated movement (ataxia).
11. What is the role of the thalamus, and which sense bypasses it?The thalamus is a relay station that routes incoming sensory information to the correct cortical areas. Smell (olfaction) is the main sense that does not relay through the thalamus first.
12. EEG vs fMRI: what is each best at?EEG records electrical activity at the scalp with excellent timing resolution (milliseconds) but poor spatial resolution. fMRI measures blood-oxygen changes (the BOLD signal) with good spatial detail but slower timing.
13. What is neuroplasticity?The brain's ability to change its structure and function with experience, learning or injury, for example by strengthening synapses or reorganizing cortical maps after damage. It is greatest in childhood.
14. Trace the path of light to the optic nerve.Light passes through the cornea, pupil and lens to the retina. There photoreceptors (rods and cones) signal bipolar cells, which signal ganglion cells. Ganglion cell axons form the optic nerve, and where they exit there are no receptors (the blind spot).
15. What did Hubel and Wiesel discover?Feature detector neurons in the visual cortex that respond selectively to particular features such as lines at specific orientations, movement or edges. This showed that visual perception is built up hierarchically.
16. Dorsal stream vs ventral stream in visionThe dorsal ("where/how") stream runs to the parietal lobe and processes location, motion and visually guided action. The ventral ("what") stream runs to the temporal lobe and processes object identity and recognition.
17. How does the ear code pitch and loudness?Frequency corresponds to pitch and amplitude to loudness. Sound vibrations move fluid in the cochlea, bending hair cells on the basilar membrane, which transduce the motion into neural signals.
18. What is the gate control theory of pain?Neural "gates" in the spinal cord can block or let through pain signals going to the brain. Input from touch fibres (for example rubbing an injury) and signals coming down from the brain can close the gate and reduce pain.
19. What is perceptual constancy?Perceiving objects as having a stable size, shape, colour and brightness even when the image on the retina changes. For example, a door still looks rectangular as it swings open.
20. What did Garcia's taste aversion research show?Rats learned to avoid a taste after a single pairing with illness, even with a long delay, but not to avoid lights or sounds paired with illness. This showed biological preparedness: some associations are learned more easily.
21. What is latent learning (Tolman)?Learning that happens without reinforcement and is not shown until there is a reason to show it. Rats that explored a maze without reward ran it quickly once food was added, suggesting they had formed cognitive maps.
22. Name the components of Baddeley's working memory model.The central executive (controls attention), the phonological loop (verbal and auditory information), the visuospatial sketchpad (visual and spatial information) and the episodic buffer (combines information and links it to long-term memory).
23. What is the serial position effect?Better recall of the first items in a list (the primacy effect, due to more rehearsal and transfer to long-term memory) and of the last items (the recency effect, because they are still in short-term memory).
24. What is encoding specificity, and what is a classic example?Recall is best when the cues at retrieval match the conditions at encoding. Divers who learned words underwater recalled them better underwater than on land, and the reverse was also true (context-dependent memory).
25. What is the misinformation effect (Loftus)?Misleading information given after an event changes later memory of it. Asking how fast cars were going when they "smashed" rather than "hit" led to higher speed estimates and false reports of broken glass.
26. Episodic vs semantic vs procedural memoryEpisodic: personal events tied to a time and place. Semantic: general facts and knowledge. Procedural: skills and habits, shown through performance (implicit). The first two are both explicit (declarative).
27. What does prototype theory say about how we form concepts?We categorize items by comparing them to a prototype, the most typical example of a category. A robin is judged to be a bird faster than a penguin because it is closer to the prototype.
28. Functional fixedness vs mental setFunctional fixedness: seeing an object only in terms of its usual function (not thinking of a coin as a screwdriver). Mental set: sticking with a problem-solving approach that worked before, even when a better one exists.
29. Algorithm vs heuristicAn algorithm is a step-by-step procedure that guarantees a solution but can be slow. A heuristic is a mental shortcut that is fast but can lead to errors.
30. Confirmation bias vs framing effectConfirmation bias: seeking or favouring evidence that supports what we already believe. Framing effect: decisions change with how options are worded, for example a 90% survival rate versus a 10% death rate.
31. Define phoneme, morpheme, syntax and semantics.A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound. A morpheme is the smallest unit of meaning (for example "un-" or "dog"). Syntax is the rules for combining words into sentences. Semantics is the meaning of words and sentences.
32. Chomsky vs Skinner on language acquisitionSkinner argued that language is learned through reinforcement and imitation. Chomsky argued for an innate language acquisition device and a universal grammar, pointing to rapid learning and novel errors such as "goed".
33. What is the linguistic relativity (Whorfian) hypothesis?The idea that the language we speak shapes how we think and perceive. The strong version (language determines thought) is largely rejected; weaker effects, for example on colour categorization, have some support.