Biopsychology

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  • Created by: IB122
  • Created on: 09-11-16 15:04
Localisation of function
The theory that different areas of the brain are responsible for different behaviours, processes or activities.
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Motor area
A region of the frontal lobe involved in regulating movement.
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Somatosensory area
An area of the parietal lobe that processes sensory information such as touch.
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Visual area
A part of the occipital love that receives and processes visual information.
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Auditory area
Located in the temporal lobe and concerned with the analysis of speech-based information.
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Broca's area
An area of the frontal lobe of the brain in the left hemisphere (in most people) responsible for speech production.
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Wernicke's area
An area of the temporal lobe (encircling the auditory cortex) in the left hemisphere (in most people) responsible for language comprehension.
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Plasticity
(also referred to as neuroplasticity or cortical remapping) This describes the brain's tendency to change and adapt (functionally and physically) as a result of experience and new learning.
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Functional recovery
A form of plasticity. Following damage through trauma, the brain's ability to redistribute or transfer functions usually performed by a damaged area(s) to other undamaged area(s).
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Hemispheric lateralisation
The idea that the two halves of the brain are functionally different and that certain mental processes and behaviours are mainly controlled by one hemisphere rather than the other, as in the example of languge which is lateralised and localised.
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Split-brain research
A series of studies which began in the 1960s involving epileptic patients who had brain experienced a surgical separation of the hemispheres of the brain. This allowed researchers to investigate the extent to which brain function is lateralised.
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Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)
A method used to measure brain activity while a person is performing a task that uses MRI technology (detecting radio waves from changing magnetic fields). This allows the detection of regions in the brain that are rich of oxygen and are thus active.
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Electroencephalogram (EEG)
A record of tiny electical impulses made by the brain's activity. By measuring characteristic wave patterns, EEGs can help diagnose conditions of the brain.
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Event-related potentials (ERPs)
The brain's electrophysiological response to a specific sensory, cognitive or motor event can be isolated through statistical analysis of EEG data.
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Post-mortem examinations
The brain is analysed after death to determine whether certain observed behaviours during the patient's lifetime can be linked to abnormalities in the brain.
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Biological rhythms
Distinct patterns of changes in body activity that conform to cyclical time periods. Biological rhythms are influenced by internal body clocks (endogenous pacemakers) as well as external changes to the environment (exogenous zeitgebers).
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Circadian rhythm
A type of biological rhythm subject to a 24-hour cycle which regulates a number of body processes e.g. sleep/wake cycle and changes to the core body temperature.
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Infradian rhythm
A type of biological rhythm with a frequency of more than once cycle in 24 hours, e.g. stages of sleep.
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Ultradian rhythm
A type of biological rhythm with a frequency of less than one cycle in 24 hours such as menstruation and seasonal affective disorder.
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Endogenous pacemakers
Internal body clocks that regulate many of our biological rhythms such as the influence of the suprachiasmatic nucleus on the sleep/wake cycle.
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Exogenous zeitgebers
External cues that may affect or entrain our biological rhythms such as the ingluence of light on the sleep/wake cycle.
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Sleep/wake cycle
A daily cycle of biological activity based on a 24-hour period that is influenced by regular variations in the environment such as the alternation of night and day.
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Card 2

Front

A region of the frontal lobe involved in regulating movement.

Back

Motor area

Card 3

Front

An area of the parietal lobe that processes sensory information such as touch.

Back

Preview of the back of card 3

Card 4

Front

A part of the occipital love that receives and processes visual information.

Back

Preview of the back of card 4

Card 5

Front

Located in the temporal lobe and concerned with the analysis of speech-based information.

Back

Preview of the back of card 5
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