Category: Uncategorized

Clock Ticking Adaptation

Early last year, I purchased a Penn State Analog clock I found at Walmart. I’ve never owned an analog clock and thought it would look cool on my wall. When I got home, I set it up and left my house for the night. At the end of the day, I went back and got in my bed. When I closed my eyes to try and fall asleep, all I could hear was the ticking from the clock. Eventually, I fell asleep. For a few nights, I struggled to ignore the constant sound. Finally, I completely forgot the clock was even there and never noticed to sound. This concept is called sensory adaption.
Sensory adaptation is when humans are exposed to unchanging stimuli over some time; our brains reduce the sensitivity to the stimuli. Hearing is not the only sense we can adapt to. We can change our sensitivity to smell in the air or get used to the cold on an autumn morning. Arguably, sight and hearing are the most critical adaptations we make. When we are exposed to a loud sound over some time, the muscles in our ears limits the amount of vibration. This adaptation is done to protect our eardrums from any damage. Our sight adapts to allow us to see better in the dark. Our pupils open wider to let more light in. Our rods and cones also become more sensitive to pick up light better. In my case, being exposed to the constant ticking of the clock over some time, my brain reduced to the sensitivity of the sound so that I can fall asleep. Sensory adaptation is an essential function that our minds have. If we didnt have sensory adaptation, certain stimuli would be overbearing to withstand. Being able to desensitize ourselves to certain stimuli allow us to focus on the things we want to focus on. Imagine if I didn’t adapt to the clock. The ticking would drive me insane and force me to take it down.

https://explorable.com/sensory-adaptation

https://www.khanacademy.org/science/health-and-medicine/nervous-system-and-sensory-infor/sensory-perception-topic/v/sensory-adapting

Sarah Mae Sincero (Jun 6, 2013). Sensory Adaptation. Retrieved Sep 18, 2019 from Explorable.com: https://explorable.com/sensory-adaptation

Sahyouni, Ronald. “Sensory Adaptation.” Khan Academy, Khan Academy, www.khanacademy.org/science/health-and-medicine/nervous-system-and-sensory-infor/sensory-perception-topic/v/sensory-adapting.

Applying Sensory Adaption

Throughout the class discussions of the brain, we have discussed many different topics involving the senses the their perception. One example of how our brain interprets our senses is through sensory adaption. All five of our senses are constantly receiving a response from a stimuli. However, sometimes the receptors receive a prolonged and persistent stimuli. This results in diminished sensitivity and the receptors then block out the stimulus. One simple example of this would be putting a bandaid on a cut or scrap. At first, you can feel the bandaid as it pulls on the hairs of your skin, making you constantly aware of the bandaid sticking to you. Over time, you adapt to the feeling of the bandaid on your skin and you forget that it is even there. Another example of sensory adaption is taken from a personal experience. When I was in seventh grade, I broke my wrist. After I went to the doctor, I found out that I needed to get a cast and wear it for a certain amount of time until my wrist was completely healed. The first couple days and weeks with the cast, was so uncomfortable and felt so different. However, as time went on living with the cast, I did not even know the difference of not having it on my arm. When it was time to get the cast off, it felt so weird, yet again, having a drastic change to my arm. But yet again, sensory adaption took place and I was used to not having the cast on anymore. In conclusion, getting the cast on and then off again are both examples of sensory adaption. This is because the body sensed a stimulus, but then quickly became used to the sensation and reduced the sensitivity due to the prolonged state of the stimulus.

Frontal Lobe

The Frontal Lobe

The brain is something that controls basically our entire body. However, there are certain parts of the brain that control different parts of the body. For example, the frontal lobe is a section of the brain that controls cognitive skills in humans. Cognitive skills include things like emotional expression, problem solving, memory, language, judgment, and sexual behaviors. It could be considered the control room of personality and ability to communicate. The frontal lobe also controls primary motor function, which is the ability to move muscles consciously. It also involves the Broca’s area, which has to do with spoken and written language. The human frontal is more developed than any other organism on the planet. That is why it has so many functions and is so complex. Obviously like its name suggests it is in the front of the brain. The left and right hemispheres of the frontal lobe control their opposite sides. For example, the left hemisphere controls the right side of the body and the other way around. The frontal lobe is the most common place for brain injury, which is extremely dangerous because it causes changes in personality, limited facial expressions, and difficulty in interpreting surroundings. Damaging it could also lead to not being able to asses risk and danger. That is why in 7th grade my English teacher would tell us to tap our frontal lobe twice if we ever did something unintelligent. This is because at that age our frontal lobe is not fully developed, which is the reason why kids do dumb things and cannot explain why they did it. For example, when I was 12 years old, I jumped down a flight of stairs and hurt myself for absolutely no reason. When my friends asked me why I jumped I truly could not think of a reason. That is because the frontal lobe controls things like judgment, which was not fully developed in my situation. Even with the length of time that has gone past, every time I hear the words “frontal lobe” I tap my head twice unconsciously.

 

 

Sources:

“Medically reviewed by Healthline’s Medical Network”. Healthline. 2 March 2015. Medically reviewed by Healthline’s Medical Network March 2, 2015 https://www.healthline.com/human-body-maps/frontal-lobe#1

What Neurotransmitter Is Affected by a Traumatic Brain Injury?

In order to understand what neurotransmitter is affected by a Traumatic Brain Injury, one must understand the basic functions of a neurotransmitter. A neurotransmitter is a chemical that sends signals across the synapses, a structure that enables a neuron to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another neuron, between neurons. These travel across synaptic spaces through a terminal button of one neuron and the dendrite, the branched projections of a neuron that act to conduct electrochemical stimulations that have been received from another neuron, of other neurons binding to the dendrites in neighboring neurons. Different buttons release different transmitters. Also, different dendrites are sensitive to different transmitters. Another important term to understand is an agonist. An agonist is a drug that has chemical properties similar to a particular neurotransmitter which mimics the effects of the neurotransmitter. These agonists bind receptor sites in dendrites that will excite the neuron. An antagonist is a drug that reduces or stops the normal effects of a neurotransmitter. There are six different types of neurotransmitters each serving their own functions and receiving different electrochemical signals and expressing different reactions.

Now that there is an understanding of how neurotransmitters operate, we can find the answer to what neurotransmitter is affected by a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). One of the six neurotransmitters that is mostly affected by a Traumatic Brain Injury is Dopamine. Dopamine’s function is that it is involved in the movement, motivation, and emotion. Dopamine produces a feeling of satisfaction and is also involved in learning. A dysfunction that is contributed to posttraumatic brain injury includes damages in the hippocampus, (located under the cerebral cortex), striatum (nucleus in the subcortical basal ganglia of the forebrain), and the frontal cortex. Together these mediate attention, executive functions, learning abilities, and memory. The use of a Dopamine agonist has benefits in memory and attention recovery. Although Dopamine has a commonly known relation with Parkinson’s disease, there is not an increased risk of this disease due to a Traumatic Brain Injury. There are other deficiencies of Dopamine transmission that are related which include PTSD, substance abuse, and short-term memory loss. With these deficiencies there are two phases that can divide brain injury. Phase one also known as the primary phase is a direct mechanical damage of neurons. Phase two includes the promotion of cell death which regress over time.

A scientific study (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5657731/) has found some ways that hold therapeutic value of targeting the dopamine system include a treatment with a low dose of methamphetamine that can improve behavioral and cognitive functions after Traumatic Brain Injury while being able to restore learning and memory functions to near normal levels. Another way is Bromocriptine which is an agonist with significant antioxidant properties that enhance spatial learning and hippocampal neuron survival.

How is this related to me personally? I have endured two Traumatic Brain Injuries playing soccer. The first concussion was in high school and I did suffer from some deficiencies, I was monitored over several months to see any improvements in brain activity, I also was advised to do exercises that would help improve some functions that were damaged such as memory loss and everyday movements. For example, I had to do eye exercises to help strengthen my eye movement. Another exercise I had to do was a memory test then I would have to work out for a certain amount of minutes then try to remember some of the information before the workout in order to improve my short-term memory under stress. Overtime the workouts would increase in time and the memorization of the information would increase due to improvement in dopamine releasement. Although I underwent all that observation, due to the traumatic brain injury I noticed I was having difficulty reading and having my eyes focus on the words on a page, so I was given reading glasses that had a special prescription to help reduce headaches. After the second traumatic brain injury, my eyesight continued to get worse.

Neurotransmitters are an important part in our body’s functions. Every action has a reaction.

Blog 1: Sensory Adaptation

Sensory adaptation is the diminishing of sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation. What this means is our brain can adapt to certain situations and can choose to ignore some information coming in through our senses. This is why it may feel really chilly when you first walk outside but after several minutes the cold is far less noticeable. You didn’t get any warmer, (with respect to a situation where you aren’t exerting a lot of energy) but your brain decided to ignore that information coming in and as a result, you don’t feel as cold.  Personally, I have dealt with sensory adaptation many times. In May of this year I got an ear infection that left me with fluid in my left ear, making it very difficult to hear for several months. At first, I was constantly annoyed by the fact I could barely hear out of my left side and what little sound I could make out was muffled. It was terribly aggravating until sensory adaptation took over. I slowly stopped noticing the lack of hearing until after a month or so, I would often forget my one ear was not functioning properly. Additionally, after 3 months of not hearing correctly from my left ear, I had a procedure done to fix my hearing. During the procedure, I also experienced sensory adaptation. At first, the doctor set up a device in my ear that sat still and was very uncomfortable. I sat there waiting, for the doctor to gather his tools, with this device stationary in my ear. After about 15 minutes of waiting I had completely forgot the device was even in my ear. In reality, my brain didn’t forget the device was there but instead decided to ignore that information coming in, which is known as sensory adaptation.

Lateralization of the Brain for Lefties

Our brain is divided in two hemispheres. Within this structure comes a unique kind of processing called contralateral processing. Contralateral processing explains that the brain processes on the opposite side of the body. So, the left arm is controlled by the right side of the brain while the right arm is controlled by the left side of the brain. The corpus collosum is a mass of neural fibers that is located in between the two hemispheres. The corpus collosum is the communication site between the left and right hemisphere of the brain.

Because of this hemispheric specialization, there is lateralization between the two hemispheres. Lateralization refers to the specialization of some cognitive processes on one side of the brain. In class, we discussed that the left side of the brain is linked to spoken and written language, mathematical thinking, logical thought processes, analysis of detail, reading, and right-hand control. While, the right side of the brain is linked to art, creativity, imagination, insight, holistic thought, music, and left-hand control.

Because the left-handed population only takes up 10% of the world population, most of the studies were done on right-handed people. When left-handed people were studied, it was found that there was less lateralization in their brains. In other words, left-handed people tend to use both the left and right regions of the brain instead of only one side (also called bilateral language function or reversed lateralization) For example, Oxford conducted a study to compare left-handed and right-handed people on brain lateralization during face perception. Face perception, in right-handed individuals, is processed on the right side of the brain. But, they found that left-handers tend to use both regions of the brain when they see a face.

When I was looking into anxiety treatment options, I decided to look into how each medication would work in my brain. I was interested to see how there is a common theme of increasing activity on the left hemisphere with medication. The left hemisphere is associated with motivation. So, it would make sense that medication would increase activity in this area of the brain.

As I am a left-handed person, I was interested to dive into the idea that there could be less lateralization of my brain, especially when looking at medication. A 2012 study published in the journal PLoS ONE explains that motivation shows more activity in the right hemisphere for left handed people, while the opposite is true of right-handed people. Because anxiety treatment is usually targeting to increase neural activity in the left hemisphere, the attempt would be to increase motivation for right-handed people. Because this research proposes that left-handed peoples’ brains organize emotion differently than the majority, I talked to my doctor about the effectiveness of each proposed anxiety medication. I was able to be in a more engaged part of the conversation as my doctor and I talked about how this could affect my prescribed medication.

 

 

Sources:
Willems, R. M., Van der Haegen, L., Fisher, S. E., & Francks, C. (2014). On the other hand: including left-handers in cognitive neuroscience and neurogenetics. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 15(3), 193.

 

Brookshire, G., & Casasanto, D. (2012). Motivation and motor control: hemispheric specialization for approach motivation reverses with handedness. PLoS One, 7(4), e36036.

 

File:Brain Lateralization.svg. (2018, November 22). Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository. Retrieved 00:30, September 19, 2019 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Brain_Lateralization.svg&oldid=328835878.

 

 

 

 

 

Psychoanalysis

What many people fail to realize is that Psychology has many branches of study that all focus on different parts of behavioral and mental processes. The five roots of Psychology include the following: structuralism, functionalism, psychoanalysis, behaviorism, and Gestalt psychology. Focusing on Psychoanalysis, which emphasizes unconscious conflict and past events, scientists see how past events, mainly childhood experiences, affect the influence of personality traits and psychological problems in humans. More often than not, the reason why people develop psychological problems is because they have unresolved issues from a traumatic experience. Many people try and talk to Psychoanalytic Psychologists about the problems rooted in their minds in order to help them. While Psychoanalytic Psychologists are not always the solution to people’s problems, there is a direct connect to traumatic experiences and people’s future psychological problems (simplypsychology.org). 

Many people in the United States experience a car accident in their lifetime, and when I was 16 years old, I flipped my car while my sister Sam and my friend Erin were in the car. Not only was it a traumatic experience for myself, but also my sister and Erin. Thankfully, none of us were hurt, not even a scratch or concussion, but there was a dramatic mental toll on us, especially myself. After the accident, I refused to drive anywhere for about three months and hated driving with anyone but my parents. The accident also happened in the snow so now I am even more cautious and paranoid when I drive in the snow. I also hate when people make sharp turns because I have this paranoia of the car flipping, like it did in the accident. Affecting my sister as well, Sam is not very trusting of anyone driving, and sometimes not even myself. She too fears cars flipping and becomes very uncomfortable when people exceed high speeds in cars. 

Due to this traumatizing car accident, my sister and I have now developed certain psychological problems and characteristics traits. From this past event, I still have unresolved psychological problems, like my fears of getting into another car accident as well as being claustrophobic. Always being claustrophobic, I think the accident only increased my level of claustrophobia because we were trapped upside down in my car until the fire department came to rescue us. Although I was a teenager, my sister was a child at the time, but regardless, both of us are forever going to remember this car accident, and have influenced our personalities. Another important aspect or term to understand is unconscious conflict, which is a personal inner mind conflict that is buried deeper into the mind and allows people to process or cope with what they have traumatically experienced. Where unconscious conflict comes into play in our accident is the fact that I tried to bury this experience and pretend it didn’t happen, which in return was a catalyst to the growth of my psychological problems (quora.com). Psychoanalysis can become an extreme issue for people who go through things such as abusive relationships or traumatic loss of a family member. Although not all people are affected by traumatic events in their child, many causes for people’s future personality traits and psychological problems are due to these experiences.

Attention

An important factor that affects our everyday lives is where we focus our attention. Are we focused on one thing at a time, or many things at a time? Trying to focus on many things at once can result in us not focusing on any one thing well. How much effort we put into our attention is also important. In other words, are we trying to focus and pay attention, or are we distracted by other things in our surroundings? While our brains are incredibly powerful, they can only allow us to process a little bit of information at a time from our environments. Selective attention allows us to focus in on something specific while blocking out other, less important, information. When a person experiences selective attention, it can be positive or negative. When selective attention allows a person to gather more details about the main subject, it is a positive experience. However, when selective attention prevents a person from gathering all the information necessary, it is a negative experience.

A friend of mine shared an example that illustrates attention, or lack thereof, from her work. She was attending a meeting with a large group of people that covered an important project that applied to everyone at the meeting to some degree. While my friend came to the meeting prepared to take notes with a pen and paper, almost everyone else brought their laptops. You would think this would be fine and shouldn’t create a problem, right? Unfortunately, that appears to have not been the case for everyone. My friend, as usual, sat in the back of the room. This gave her, unintentionally, a view of many people’s laptop screens. She noticed that many people appeared to be using their laptops not to take notes on the meeting, but rather, to work on other projects during the meeting.

This example relates to the class topic of attention. During this meeting, many people were not focusing their attention where it belonged – on the meeting presenters. In addition, by trying to pay attention to multiple things at once, were the attendees really listening to or doing any of them well?  Finally, those members of the audience using selective attention techniques were not getting the complete message of the presentation.

Blog Post #1

It is estimated that our body contains around 1 billion neurons with about 1 trillion connections between them. When you feel that itch on your nose, it is because of neurons, when you feel the heat of the sun during a warm day, it is because of neurons, when you stub your toe and feel that excruciating pain, it is because of neurons. However, when we feel our emotions, it is also because of neurons. When you feel something, whether it be emotions, pain, an itch, or being tickled, it is because neurons are transmitting and receiving signals between each other. A neuron receives a signal through the dendrites. Once a signal is received, it sparks an action potential that travels down the axon to the terminal branches at the end of the neuron. These terminal branches connect to the dendrites of other neurons and this is how the signal travels. This junction between the dendrites and the terminal branches of neurons is called the synapse. Signals from one neuron are released by way of neurotransmitters which travel to the connecting neuron. The neurotransmitter connects to the dendrites of the receiving neuron and releases the signal which triggers another action potential. This process continues until the signal has reached its destination and proper action is taken.

As I previously mentioned, neurons are one of the factors for why we feel when we feel it. Depression affects millions of people around the world. One of the causes of depression are due to a lack of serotonin within certain people. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that affects mood, hunger, sleep, and arousal. A lack of this neurotransmitter can lead to feelings of sadness or lack of feeling, lack of appetite, troubles sleeping, and other symptoms. One of the reasons people may have a lack of serotonin is due to serotonin uptake from the neuron. Once serotonin is released from the neuron, there are serotonin re-uptake sites that serotonin bind to. This means that some of the serotonin never reaches the next neuron, causing pretty much a serotonin deficiency in some people. However, there are certain drugs that can help. Prozac, which is one of the most commonly prescribed drug for depression is known as a SSRI (selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitor). It is an antagonist drug that inhibits the effect of a neurotransmitter. Prozac blocks the serotonin re-uptake sites so that it cannot re-enter the cell and can proceed to the connecting neuron.

My best friend since middle school has suffered with depression and anxiety for pretty much her entire life, as has her sister (names will not be mentioned for confidentiality purposes). When either of their depression gets bad, they describe their symptoms as feelings of sadness, lack of motivation, lack of appetite, and too little or sometimes too much sleep. They usually feel these symptoms when they have failed to take their medication for an extended period of time. They are both prescribed with Prozac. They likely are prescribed with Prozac in order to prevent the re-uptake of serotonin within their neurons. However, when they are properly taking their medication, they describe that they feel “normal” in a sense. They have a regular mood and appetite. This could be due to the fact that since Prozac is a SSRI, then their serotonin may reach a normal level.

(Please refer to this image for a visual of how serotonin affects the neurotransmitters and neuron)

Image result for how does prozac work on neurotransmitters

Copeland, M., editor. “The Effects of Prozac on the Brain.” Packer
Intersections, 2019, www.packerintersections.com/
the-effect-of-prozac-on-the-brain.html. Accessed 19 Sept. 2019.

Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS)

The sympathetic nervous system the part of the nervous system that deals with heart rate, blood pressure, and how your blood vessels constrict.The sympathetic nervous system is located in your spinal cord. This part of the nervous system is also know as your fight or flight response. What the fight or flight response is is your body’s defense system with it senses fear. You feel this way because there is a sudden hormone which is activating your bodies sympathetic nervous system.

This fight or flight response can happen to anybody at anytime that they fell as if they are in danger. One time when I was younger we use to go to livestock shows all over the east coast so we had to get up early in the mornings to do barn work. And it was usually pitch black out and one time I was walking into to one of our barns and I though I heard a noise coming from the dark shadows. When I heard this noise my body froze, heart started to beat faster cause I had no idea what was out there that I couldn’t see. The only thing that I could think to do was to run into the barn and turn on the lights so I could figure out. This was an example of the flight part of the sympathetic nervous system because it was telling me to get out of there because what was making that noise could potentially hurt me.

After I ran into the barn and turned on the light I realized that there was nothing out there that could harm me. Once realizing that my heart rate went back down and I was no longer scared of what could be out there. I believe that this is a good example of the body’s natural protection. My experience shows how the body uses its natural functions to help protect us from danger.