Physio/Psychopharmacology

Agnosias

Partial or complete inability to recognize sensory stimuli, unexplained

by a defect in elementary sensation or by a reduced level of alertness;

not to be confused with aphasia, which is the inability to speak or

comprehend language

Apperceptive Agnosia

Failure in object recognition but basic

visual functions (acuity, color, motion) preserved; results from

gross bilateral damage to the lateral parts of the occipital lobes

Simultanagnosia

Inability to perceive more than one object at

a time

Associative Agnosia

Inability to recognize an object despite

its apparent perception; caused by lesion in the anterior

temporal lobe

Prosopagnosia

Inability to recognize faces

Visuospatial Agnosia

Lack of the ability to analyze and orient using visual representations and their spatial relationships

Asomatognosia

loss of knowledge or sense of one's own body and bodily condition

Anosognosia

A condition in which a person with an illness seems unaware of the existence of his or her illness.

Autopagnosia

Inability to localize and name body parts

Agonist

Any substance that enhances the function of a synapse

Antagonist

Antagonist

Any substance that blocks the function of a neurotransmitter

Anterograde Amnesia

Inability to acquire new memories subsequent to a disturbance such

as head injury, ECT, or certain degenerative diseases

Retrograde Amnesia

Inability to remember events that took place before the onset of amnesia

Antidepressants

Medicines that treat depression, the most common being SSRIs,

selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.

Antipsychotic Medication

Medicine developed to counteract symptoms of psychosis. Long-term use is associated with tardive dyskinesia and metabolic syndrome.

Neuroleptics

Drugs that alleviate the symptoms of psychosis and severe disorders such as schizophrenia.

Tardive Dyskinesia

Involuntary movements of the facial muscles, tongue, and limbs; a possible neurotoxic side effect of long-term use of antipsychotic drugs that target certain dopamine receptors

Basal Ganglia

Collection of nuclei below the cortex in the forebrain; caudate nucleus,

putamen & globus pallidus; involved in the control of movement;

Parkinson's disease

Broca's Area

Controls language expression - an area of the frontal lobe, usually in the left hemisphere, that directs the muscle movements involved in speech.

Wernicke's Area

Controls language reception - a brain area involved in language comprehension and expression; usually in the left temporal lobe

Broca's Aphasia

Condition resulting from damage to Broca's area, causing the affected person to be unable to speak fluently, to mispronounce words, and to speak haltingly

Wernicke's Aphasia

Condition resulting from damage to Wernicke's area, causing the affected person to be unable to understand or produce meaningful language

Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome

Organic brain syndrome resulting from prolonged heavy alcohol use, involving confusion, unintelligible speech, and loss of motor coordination. It may be caused by a deficiency of thiamine, a vitamin metabolized poorly by heavy drinkers.

Corpus Callosum

The large band of neural fibers connecting the two brain hemispheres and carrying messages between them

Cerebellum

A large structure of the hindbrain that controls fine motor skills. Also receives visual, auditory, vestibular, and somatosensory information.

Dopamine

A neurotransmitter associated with movement, attention and learning and the brain's pleasure and reward system.

Dopamine Hypothesis

The theory that schizophrenia results from excessive activity of the neurotransmitter dopamine

Frontal Lobe Injury

Results in problems with activities involving planning, organizing and problem solving,

poor attention, and personality changes

Phineas Gage

1823-1860; Field: neurobiology; Contributions: 1st person to have a frontal lobotomy (by accident), his accident gave information on the brain and which parts are involved with emotional reasoning

Huntington's Disease

A human genetic disease caused by a dominant allele; characterized by uncontrollable body movements and degeneration of the nervous system; usually fatal 10 to 20 years after the onset of symptoms.

Limbic System

A doughnut-shaped system of neural structures at the border of the brainstem and cerebral hemispheres; associated with emotions such as fear and aggression and drives such as those for food and sex. Includes the hippocampus, amygdala, and hypothalamus.

Midbrain

A small part of the brain above the pons that integrates sensory information and relays it upward.

Mirror Neurons

Frontal lobe neurons that fire when performing certain actions or when observing another doing so. The brain's mirroring of another's action may enable imitation, language learning, and empathy. Problems with mirror neurons may be related to autism.

Phenylketonuria (PKU)

A hereditary metabolic illness characterized by an insufficient amount of an enzyme required to use the amino acid phenylalanine; unless it is identified in infancy, it can cause intense cognitive retardation and

other nervous-system illnesses and dysfunctions.

Seizure Disorders

Any medical condition characterized by sudden changes in behavior or consciousness as a result of uncontrolled electrical activity in the brain.

Types of seizures

-Partial; focal localized in one area

-Generalized; starts in all parts of the brain.

-Tonic/Clonic; muscle spasms, LOC, contraction of limbs. Confusion. Bladder incontinence.

-Atonic; Sudden drop to the floor, no LOC, No convulsions, "stare". Several times per day "petit mal"

-Tonic/myoclonic/clonic; "grand mal". Stiffness.

Stroke

A sudden attack of weakness or paralysis that occurs when blood flow to an area of the brain is interrupted

Eight Principle Symptoms of Temporal Lobe Damage

1) disturbance of auditory sensation and perception

2) disturbance of selective attention of auditory and visual input

3) disorders of visual perception

4) impaired organization and categorization of verbal material

5) disturbance of language comprehension

6) impaired long-term memory

7) altered personality and affective behavior

8) Altered Sexual Behavior

Gerstmann Syndrome

Agraphia, acalculia, finger agnosia, left-right disorientation.

Damage to dominant- parietal temporal cortex.

Balint's Syndrome

A condition caused by brain damage in which a person has difficulty focusing attention on individual objects.

Contralateral Neglect

A disturbance of the patient's ability to respond to visual, auditory, and somatosensory stimuli on the side of the body opposite to a site of brain damage, usually the left side of the body following damage to the right parietal lobe.

Constructional Apraxia

The inability to reproduce geometric figures and designs. A person is often unable to visually analyze how to perform a task

Optic Ataxia

Spatial disorientation in which the patient is unable to accurately reach for objects using visual guidance

Thalamus

Makes up the dorsal part of the diencephalon; two lobes; a midline symmetrical structure of two halves, within the vertebrate brain,

situated between the cerebral cortex and the midbrain.

Some of its

functions are the relaying of sensory and motor signals to the cerebral

cortex, and the regulation of consciousness, sleep, and alertness.

Evolutionary Theory of Emotion

Emotion is Response to Stimuli that has Evolved through Natural Selection.

James-Lange Theory of Emotion

Suggests that when you perceive an external stimuli, its

perception leads to a physiological reaction and your emotional reaction is dependent on how you interpret those

physical reaction;

"You're not trembling because you are

frightened, you are frightened because you are trembling."

Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion

Suggested that emotional responses occur much too quickly

for them to be a product of physical states;

Suggests that

physical and psychological experiences happen together and

that one does not cause the other

Schachter-Singer (Two-Factor) Theory of Emotion

Suggests that physiological

arousal occurs first, and then the individual must identify the

reason for this arousal to experience and label it as an

emotion; a stimulus leads to a physiological response that is

then cognitively interpreted and labeled which results in an

emotion.

Cognitive Appraisal Theory of Emotion

The theory that emotional responses are triggered by a cognitive evaluation (a thought leads to a physiological response and then an emotion)

Facial-Feedback Theory of Emotion

Suggests that facial expressions are connected to

experiencing emotions; why forcing yourself to smile can lead

to you feeling happier.