Answer:
<h2>When I think of my brain and spinal cord, I am thinking of my:</h2>
<h3>Central Nervous System</h3>
The Central Nervous System is composed of the brain and the spinal cord. They are responsible for processing and interpreting incoming and outgoing nerve signals. The other division of the Nervous System is the Peripheral Nervous System which is composed of the spinal nerves branching off the spinal cord in the body.
<h2>Julie is walking down the street when a large dog runs out of the bushes, barking at her. Julie finds herself frozen, unable to run, though she is petrified. Which nervous system is causing her to freeze?</h2>
<h3>Sympathetic Nervous System</h3>
The Sympathetic Nervous System is a branch of the <em>Autonomic Nervous System</em> that is responsible for the fight-or-flight response of the body. It is activated during<em> </em><u>episodes of extreme stress, a threat to life, or an unfavorable event</u>.
<h2>Paula has a hard time reading the tiny print in her book. She squeezes her eyes into a squint, which helps. Paula has control of squinting, so what nervous system is involved?</h2>
<h3>Somatic Nervous System</h3>
The Somatic Nervous System is a branch of the <em>Central Nervous System</em> that supplies nerves to the skeletal system. <em>Squinting</em> is a somatic type of response which involves the <em>extraocular muscles of the eyes</em>. This helps in focusing the light entering the eye, making the image clearer as processed by the brain.
<h2>My heart is RACING, my hands are sweaty, and I am shaking. Which nervous system do I need to engage?</h2>
<h3>Parasympathetic Nervous System</h3>
The Parasympathetic Nervous System is a part of the Autonomic Nervous System that is responsible for the rest-and-digest response of the body. This means its effects are related to relaxing and saving energy. It slows down the heartbeat, relaxes muscles to lessen shaking, and lessens sweat production.
<h2>How is it when I’m watching my favorite show the information gets through my eyes and into my brain? Do I have a TV in there?</h2>
<h3>No, your eyes use a chemical process to change the information.</h3>
While watching TV, images are transmitted to the eyes as light and is received by the photoreceptors (rods and cones) in the retina. A series of chemical reactions transform the light to an electrical impulse that is carried to the visual center at the occipital lobe of the brain. It is processed and interpreted as an image displayed like in the TV.
<h2>Why can’t I see reddish-green? Why do I see afterimages? Which theory of color vision best answers my questions?</h2>
<h3>Opponent Process theory</h3>
The Opponent Process theory states that a color always has a corresponding pair, e.g. <em>yellow-blue, black-white, and green-red</em>. <u>When</u> <u>one of the colors in the pair is excited e.g. red, the green is then suppressed, and vice versa</u>. That’s why we cannot see reddish-green colors. The afterimages are remnants of excitation of the encountered color stimulus. Example of this phenomenon would be <em>staring at a bright light and immediately closing your eyes.</em>
<h2>After the pinna collects sounds that travel through the auditory canal which part transduces sound waves into neural impulses that go to our brains?</h2><h3>
Auditory Nerve</h3>
The Auditory Nerve, also known as <em>Cranial Nerve VIII</em>, <em>Cochlear nerve or Acoustic nerve</em>, transmits sound from the ears to the midbrain to be processed by the <em>primary auditory complex</em> at the <em>temporal lobes of the brain</em>.
<h2>How are taste and smell different from touch, sight, and hearing? They are:</h2>
<h3>Chemical Senses</h3>
The Taste and Smell senses are able to transmit signals to the brain by binding chemical molecules with their corresponding receptors. For taste, this occurs when molecules come in <u>contact with water or fluids</u> in the different kinds of <u>tongue papillae receptors</u>. They can recognize <em>salty, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami</em> tastes. For the smell, the <u>olfactory receptors</u> can gather <u>volatile air molecules</u> of different kinds of odors like <em>woody, pungent, fragrant, chemical, or minty</em> smells.
<h2>How can an understanding of our perceptions of sensations be used in a practical way?</h2><h3>
Sensory processes can be used to influence our perception.</h3>
When the sensory processes are interpreted in our brain, it may help us <em>interpret if our current situation is safe or dangerous, satiated or hungry, loud or quiet, etc.</em>
<h2>We are bombarded with hundreds of sensations every day, but we dismiss far more than we remember? Why is that?</h2><h3>
We only remember the sensations we perceive to be important somehow</h3>
This process is called selective filtering or selective attention. This process happens in the <u>thalamus and cerebral cortex</u>, wherein these signals are then <u>interpreted if it needs attention or not</u>. An example would be <u>watching a movie</u>. If you wanted to focus on the movie, the cerebral cortex would block out other unrelated signals like people giggling behind you, smell of popcorn, etc. This is done by directing GABA to the reticular nucleus (part of thalamus), suppressing these unnecessary signals, and selectively focusing your attention to the movie.
