Intro to BioPsych

biological psychology

the study of biological processes regarding/causing the influence of the mind and behaviour

what kind of science is biological psychology

it is an experimental science and uses theoretical frameworks, such as active inference, to define behaviour/cognition in relation to biology

is biological psychology religion free

yes

what makes biological psychology different from other similar fields of study (i.e. neuroscience, neuropsychology)

biological psychology looks at the whole body in relation to the brain and behaviour (such as sensory regions, behaviour, etc.) and looks at “biological mechanisms of behaviour”.

Ernst weber studied…

perception

Gustav Fechner studied…

perception

William James studied…

Emotion

Ivan Pavlov studied…

learning

Herman Helmholtz studied

Predictive and Bayesian brain

3 Rs of animal research

replacement with models, reduction in numbers, refinement of practice

what are the two organismic states

life and death

Living and non-living matter that can be dynamically perceived by organisms

time dependant 

perception

inference about the unobserved causes of internal and external sensory information. ie. sensory simulation is translated into biological meaningful info

time

relationship between the body 

active inference 

A normative framework about how the organism (c.f., the brain) avoids ‘surprise’ to self-preserve (to remain in a ‘living’ state).

what is a unifying theory

A unifying theory reconciles contradictory theories through more general and overarching principles. It requires abstract concepts to connect them

how does active inference play a role in dopamine in learning and decision making?

rat in T maze example:

→ if rat makes no prediction and receives reward, better than expected, dopamine occurs. reinforces 

→ if rat makes prediction and receives reward, no new learnign and as expected

→ if reward predicted and no reward occurs, promotes aversive learning 

these trigger a biological response in the brain

Generalities of the biological implementation of the action-perception cycle

The instruction sets the preferred states

The brain commands the eyes to search for evidence

The picture causes sensory impressions (observations)  on the retina

Via bottom-up vs. top-down surprise-minimization loops, the brain inspects the sensory information (not the picture) and infers whether the picture actually provides the sensory observations in support of the preferred states

Decision is made ‘F’  when the enough evidence is found

The instruction sets the preferred states, repeat

Formal definition of ‘perception’

the inference about whether the hidden states of the world cause the sensory information in support of the organism’s preferred states

sensory epithelia

sensory receptors

sensory observation

impressions that either the external or internal environment cause in the sensory epithelia

the sensory epithelia of vision are…

the retinae which transform light waves into electrical signals (messages)

the sensory epithelia of audition are…

the basilar membrane of the cochlea which transform sound waves into electrical signals (messages)

the sensory epithelia of spatial orientation are

the otolith organs and semicircular canals which transform changes in gel-like membranes and fluid levels into electrical signals (messages)

the sensory epithelia of  the body-world mechanical contact are

the somatosensory receptors which transform mechanical and temperature stimuli into electirical signals, (messages)

the sensory epithelia of the chemical world are

the taste buds and olfactory cells which transform chemical signals into electrical signals (messages)

self-evidencing during the action-perception cycle

•we must search for evidence in support of our ‘selves”. This is referred to as ‘self-evidencing’ during the action-perception cycle

action perception cycle in action

-define preferred states

expect no surprise

evidence found

action

actively search for evidence

expect no surprise etc

hierarchal message passing

bottom up → forward processing, from world to epithelia to brain

top down → backward processing, from brain (expected) to epithelia to world

prediction errors and predictions have cycle loop

entropy in hierarchal message passing

reality differs from predicted state, causes conflict in processing which generates surprise, action to correct uncertain is taken to minimize surprise

after, learning occurs to correct predicted state