...method and has been criticized for being too reductionist and for using non-human animals. Strengths By knowing the physiological basis of behaviour we can treat symptoms with drugs evolutionary theory can explain things that would otherwise be unexplainable Weaknesses It is difficult to seperate genetic influence from environmental influence It's reductionistic Can't explain altruism well Historical Context The biological perspective was created as a reaction to the theory of dualism, that the mind and the brain are two seperate entities. Some important researchers in the development of the biological perspective are: Plato-nativism Darwin- Outlined evolution and the idea of nativism and heredity Jean Baptiste Lamarck-studied heredity Phineas Gage- Brain injury has the ability to affect behaviour II. Key Concepts Heredity- influence of genes Nativism- certain traits are inately hardwired at birth Evolution Hemisphere specialization Neurotransmission Localization Evolution Selye’s General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS = Alarm, Resistance, Exhaustion) Biological preparedness Basic Assumptions There are four main basic assumptions of the biological perspective: Behavior is biologically determined Behavior has a genetic basis Localization of function Animals may be used to help understand human behavior Which basic assumption would be the easiest to write an essay about? -Behavior is biologically determined Research to use in supporting this assumption: ...
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...stimulation in mice with reduced dopamine transporter expression ------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------- Abstract Background The dopamine transporter (DAT) plays a critical role in regulating dopamine neurotransmission. Variations in DAT or changes in basal dopaminergic tone have been shown to alter behavior and drug responses. DAT is one of the three known high affinity targets for cocaine, a powerful psychostimulant that produces reward and stimulates locomotor activity in humans and animals. We have shown that cocaine no longer produces reward in knock-in mice with a cocaine insensitive mutant DAT (DAT-CI), suggesting that cocaine inhibition of DAT is critical for its rewarding effect. However, in DAT-CI mice, the mutant DAT has significantly reduced uptake activity resulting in elevated basal dopaminergic tone, which might cause adaptive changes that alter responses to cocaine. Therefore, the objective of this study is to determine how elevated dopaminergic tone affects how mice respond to cocaine. Results We examined the cocaine induced behavior of DAT knockdown mice that have DAT expression reduced by 90% when compared to the wild type mice. Despite a dramatic reduction of DAT expression and marked elevation in basal dopamine tone, cocaine produced reward, as measured by conditioned place preference, and stimulated locomotor activity in these mice. Conclusion ...
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... Historical Perspectives of Abnormal Psychology Introduction In psychology, there are many branches such as cognitive psychology, behavioral psychology, and developmental psychology, but the most difficult would be abnormal psychology. It is difficult because the word “abnormal” is difficult to define. Defining “abnormal” is difficult because it means an individual is not following what is socially normal, but with different cultures, there is no way to set a normal standard of socially acceptable behavior (University of Texas, n.d.). “Abnormal” can be defined as expressing behavior that is either destructive to themselves, family, friends, or co-workers (University of Texas, n.d.). With this definition, individuals need to be able to understand the origins of abnormal psychology, the challenges in defining and diagnosing normal and abnormal behavior, how it has evolved into methodical discipline today, and the theoretical models that help diagnose and treat irregular behaviors. Ancestries of Abnormal Psychology Historically, abnormal psychology is a reasonably young science of approximately one hundred years, although there have been abundant recognized incidents of emotional disorders (Hansell & Damour, 2008). These incidents found in the Bible, which describes people suffering from illnesses known as depression and schizophrenia in today’s world (Hansell & Damour, 2008). In some cultures, individuals believed in animism, which was the conviction of the presence...
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...The Fluidity of Neuroscience Gender Norms & Racial Bias in the Study of the Modern "Neuroscience" Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system. Traditionally, neuroscience has been seen as a branch of biology. However, it is currently an interdisciplinary science that collaborates with other fields such as chemistry, computer science, engineering, linguistics, mathematics, medicine and allied disciplines, philosophy, physics, and psychology. The term neurobiology is usually used interchangeably with the term neuroscience, although the former refers specifically to the biology of the nervous system, whereas the latter refers to the entire science of the nervous system. The scope of neuroscience has broadened to include different approaches used to study the molecular, cellular, developmental, structural, functional, evolutionary, computational, and medical aspects of the nervous system. The techniques used by neuroscientists have also expanded enormously, from molecular and cellular studies of individual nerve cells to imaging of sensory and motor tasks in the brain. Recent theoretical advances in neuroscience have also been aided by the study of neural networks. Given the increasing number of scientists who study the nervous system, several prominent neuroscience organizations have been formed to provide a forum to all neuroscientists and educators. For example, the International Brain Research Organization was founded in 1960, the International Society...
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...This idea is exemplified and explored in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World where the characters in the World State are deeply addicted to a substance, similarly to people in today’s society. The addicts of soma often remind others how “a gramme is better than a damn (Huxley).” This reveals that the drug replaces all human emotions, and are a better alternative than exploring an individual's feelings. Behaviors people were addicted to in Brave New World include: sex, working, and power; this is similar to the modern world’s addictions to shopping, gambling, and technology. As seen today and in Brave New World, people develop addictions to numb their emotions, feeling in control. Drugs and compulsive behaviors are reliable because they will never let one down. Unlike people, who and uncontrollable and often unreliable, substances and compulsions will always be there to...
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...Neurological Processes Ugur Unal PSY/340 July 15th, 2016 Neurological Processes The brain is the most complex part of the body. This organ is the center of intelligence, interpreter of the senses, initiator of body movement, and controller of behavior. For centuries, scientists and philosophers have been infatuated by the brain, but until recently the brain has been viewed as perplexing. Now, however, the brain is beginning to show its secrets. Scientists have learned more about the brain in the last few years than in all previous centuries because of the accelerating pace of research in neurological and behavioral science and the development of new research techniques. The brain is like a committee of experts. All the parts of the brain work together, but each part has its own special properties. Biological causes of clinical depression continue to be studied extensively. Great progress has been made in the understanding of brain function, the influence of neurotransmitters, and other biological processes, as well as how they may relate to the development of depression. Depression or anxiety causes individuals to have many changes in their behaviors. They tend to become isolated from their family, friends, or be social. Their eating patterns lead to either weight gain or loss; and sleeping patterns change where they either do not sleep or sleep excessively. They become agitated, irritable, and fatigue or have lack of energy. Biological psychology aims at finding the...
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...Case Study of John Hinckley Janeen Tipton PSY/410 July 22, 2012 Dr. Johnson Case Study of John Hinckley In the field of psychology, a science evolved nearly 100 years ago, named Abnormal Psychology. This field addresses those with mental illnesses/disorders with diagnosing, treatment, and other forms of therapies such as behavioral and cognitive therapies. In order to properly diagnose an individual with any form of disorder, if one exists, it is imperative that the client divulge all feelings, behaviors, thoughts, and emotions for a proper diagnosis. There are individuals who are predisposed for certain disorders which are found at an early age, and then there are others that symptoms seem to arise later in life such as in the case of John Hinckley, who also failed at being honest about symptoms, behaviors, thoughts which due to this, proper psychiatric care could not be implemented leading to the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, a former U.S. President. John Hinckley’s Childhood John Hinckley had what is to be considered a normal childhood as that of his peers. By the age of nine years Hinckley and his family had moved twice within the same State; however the second move at nine years of age seemed hard for Hinckley as he lost some of his friends and social status (Meyer, Chapman, & Weaver, 2009, p. 325). After graduating high school in 1973, he moved again to Colorado only to return in 1974 to attend college. Hinckley only...
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...7: States of Consciousness CHAPTER PREVIEW Consciousness is our awareness of ourselves and our environment. Conscious information processing enables us to exercise control and to communicate our mental states to others. Beneath the surface, unconscious processing occurs simultaneously on many parallel tracks. Our daily schedule of waking and sleeping is governed by a biological clock known as circadian rhythm. Our sleep also follows a repeating cycle. Awakening people during REM sleep yields predictable “dreamlike” reports that are mostly of ordinary events. Freud’s view that dreams can be traced back to erotic wishes is giving way to newer theories, for example, that dreams help us process information and fix it in memory or that dreams erupt from neural activity. Studies of hypnosis indicate that, although hypnotic procedures may facilitate recall, the hypnotist’s beliefs frequently work their way into subjects’ recollections. Hypnosis can be at least temporarily therapeutic and has the potential of bringing significant pain relief. Hypnosis may be an extension both of normal principles of social influence and of everyday splits in consciousness. Psychoactive drugs also alter consciousness. Depressants act by depressing neural functioning. Although their effects are pleasurable, they impair memory and self-awareness and may have other physical consequences. Stimulants act at the synapses by influencing the brain’s neurotransmitters. Their effects depend on...
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... ii. Not because common sense is usually wrong, but because common sense more easily describes what has happened than what will happen b) Overconfidence iii. We tend to think we know more than we do c) The Scientific Attitude iv. Curiosity 1. Empirical approach v. Skepticism = persistently asking two questions: What do you mean? How do you know? 2. Scientific attitude: being skeptical but not cynical, open but not gullible vi. Humility = an awareness of our own vulnerability to error and an openness to surprises and new perspectives d) Critical Thinking ii. How Do Psychologists Ask and Answer Questions? e) The Scientific Method vii. A scientific theory explains through an integrated set of principles that organizes observations and predicts behaviour or events. viii. Hypotheses ix. We should be aware that it can bias subjective observations x. Operational functions = a statement of the procedures used to define research variables. For example, human intelligence may be operationally defined as what an intelligence test xi. Replicate – repeat xii. Finally – organizepredictionsrevised theory xiii. We can test our hypotheses and refine our theories using … f) Description xiv. The Case Study 3. The case study examines one individual in depth in hopes of revealing things true of us...
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...General Psychiatry William a. Kehoe, Pharm.D., m.a., FCCP, BCPS University of the Pacific stockton, california © 2009 American College of Clinical Pharmacy 1-281 General Psychiatry Learning Objectives: 1. Describe pharmacotherapeutic options for managing the following psychiatric problems: depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, anxiety disorders, insomnia, and alcohol withdrawal. Describe the drugs used to treat the above disorders in terms of unique pharmacological properties, therapeutic uses, adverse effects, and cognitive and behavioral effects. Formulate a pharmacotherapeutic treatment plan when presented with a patient having depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, an anxiety disorder, or insomnia. Discuss the treatment of substance abuse using alcohol abuse as a model. 4. 2. C. Theophylline. D. Pseudoephedrine. Which one of the following antidepressants would be least likely to cause drug-disease or drug-drug interactions for T.N.? A. Venlafaxine. B. Fluvoxamine. C. Phenelzine. D. Fluoxetine. Which one of the following periods represents the continuation therapy phase for T.N.’s depression? A. 6–12 weeks. B. 12–16 weeks. C. 6–12 months. D. 2−3 years. T.N. will be seen initially at monthly intervals to assess antidepressant therapy. Which one of the following instruments is a patient-completed measure of depressive symptoms that could be used to assess his response? A. Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression. B. Montgomery-Åsberg Depression Rating Scale...
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...Stress (biology) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia This article is about biological stress. For stress in physics and mechanics, see Stress (mechanics). |[pic] |This article needs attention from an expert on the subject. See the talk page for details. | | |The following WikiProjects or Portals may be able to help recruit one: | | |• WikiProject Biology· Biology Portal • WikiProject Medicine· Medicine Portal •WikiProject | | |Neuroscience· Neuroscience Portal | | |If another appropriate WikiProject or portal exists, please adjust this template accordingly. | Stress is defined as an organism's total response to an environmental condition or stimulus, also known as a stressor. Stress typically describes a negative condition that can have an impact on an organism's mental and physical well-being. |Contents | | [hide] | |1 Ambiguity of the word | |1.1 Biological background | |2 Neuroanatomy | |2.1 Brain ...
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...Learning that lasts through AGES Dr. Lila Davachi, Dr. Tobias Kiefer, Dr. David Rock and Lisa Rock NeuroLeadershipjournal issue THREE 2010 The attached copy is furnished to the author for non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the author’s institution, sharing with colleagues and providing to institutional administration. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or thirdparty websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post a version of the article to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding the NeuroLeadership journal’s archiving and management policies are encouraged to send inquiries to: support@neuroleadership.org www.NeuroLeadership.org © NeuroLeadership Institute 2010 For Permissions, email support@neuroleadership.org This article was published in the © NeuroLeadership Institute 2010 For Permissions, email support@neuroleadership.org This article was published in the NeuroLeadership journal. The attached copy is furnished to the author for non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the author’s institution, sharing with colleagues and providing to institutional administration. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or thirdparty websites...
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...THE NERVOUS SYSTEM The nervous system allows the animal to quickly detect, communicate and co-ordinate information about its external and internal environment so it can make efficient appropriate responses for survival and/or reproduction. The two major parts of our nervous system are the central nervous system (CNS) and peripheral nervous system (PNS). The CNS is made of the brain and spinal cord. The cranial nerves, spinal nerves and ganglia make up the PNS. The cranial nerves connect to the brain. The cranial and spinal nerves contain the axons (fibres) of sensory and motor nerve cells. Nerve cells areas are also known as neurons. Neurons are the basic unit of the nervous system. They carry information or impulses as electrical signals from one place to another in the body. There are 3 types of neurons: Sensory Neurons- Sensory neurons carry electrical signals (impulses) from receptors or sense organs to the CNS. Sensory neurons are also called afferent neurons. The cell body of sensory neurons is outside the CNS in ganglia. Motor Neurons- Motor Neurons Carry Impulses From The CNS To Effector Organs Motor Neurons Are Also Called Efferent Neurons. The Cell Bodies Of Motor Neurons Are Inside The CNS. Interneurons- These are also called intermediate, relay, or associative neurons. They carry information between sensory and motor neurons. They are found in the CNS. TOP The Structure of Neurons A Neuron consists of THREE MAIN PARTS: A. CELL...
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...Table of Contents Conditioning 3 Memory 14 Thought 21 Perception 25 Sensation 33 Personality Theory 39 Abnormal Behavior 49 Psychotherapy 56 Emotion 59 Motivation 62 Social Psychology 70 Intelligence 75 Physiology 78 States of Consciousness 84 Statistics 88 Human Development 91 Conditioning What are the laws of learning? What are the things that glue in our knowledge of the world? We are talking about the role of experience in shaping our lives. The rules of learning give us great adaptability. There are three basic types of learning. They are habituation, classical conditioning, and instrumental conditioning. Imagine a worm. When the tide is in, it comes out. It has extensions from its head, getting particles from the outside. So it comes out of its hole to snatch these particles. It has one fear though: seagulls. The worm is delicious to them. They see him and they eat him. The worm has a detection system wired in though. When there is a shadow, he ducks. It is a hard-wired reflex. Sometimes, however, shadows don’t mean a darn, like on a cloudy day. If it doesn’t come out because of the shadows, it will get nothing done and starve to death. Therefore, if the shadows are too frequent, it will ignore them. There...
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...Overview Hypercalcemia is the most common life-threatening metabolic disorder associated with neoplastic diseases, occurring in an estimated 10% to 20% of all adults with cancer. It also occurs in children with cancer, but with much less frequency (approximately 0.5%–1%).[1-3] Solid tumors (such as lung or breast cancer tumors) as well as certain hematologic malignancies (particularly multiple myeloma) are most frequently associated with hypercalcemia.[4] Although early diagnosis followed by hydration and treatment with agents that decrease serum calcium concentrations (hypocalcemic drugs) can produce symptomatic improvements within a few days, diagnosis may be complicated because symptoms may be insidious at onset and can be confused with those of many malignant and nonmalignant diseases. However, diagnosis and timely interventions not only are lifesaving in the short term but also may enhance the patient’s compliance with primary and supportive treatments and may improve quality of life.[5] When a patient has a refractory, widely disseminated malignancy for which specific therapy is no longer being pursued, the patient may want to consider withholding therapy for hypercalcemia. For patients or families who have expressed their wishes regarding end-of-life issues, this may represent a preferred timing and/or mode of death (as compared with a more prolonged death from advancing metastatic disease). This option is best considered long before the onset of severe hypercalcemia or...
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