BBB - week 1 L1

What is biological bases of behaviour?

The study of how structures and actions of the brain/body produce behaviour and experiences

what are the 3 approaches to studying brain to behaviour relationships?

Somatic intervention, behavioural intervention, correlation

What is somatic intervention?

It is when the brain is manipulated to change behaviour

Which is an example of Somatic Intervention?

applying stimulation to motor cortex to move limbs, intentionally damaging specific brain areas in animals to see how behaviour is affected, drugs/alc tests

What is behavioural intervention?

It is when behaviour is manipulated to change the brain

What is the correlation approach to to studying brain to behaviour relationships?

It examines the brain and body together, looking at parallel changes in brain/behaviour

Which is an example of behavioural interventions?

experiencing changes in activation of different brain areas, eg, London taxi drivers, token economy systems

Which is the example of correlation when studying brain-behaviour relationships?

severity of disorder and size of brain change, cortical thickness and impulsivity 

What are the levels of analysis (in explaining brain to behaviour relationships) in order?

Social, organ, neural systems, brain region, circuit, cellular, synaptic, molecular

What is phrenology?

A discredited pseudoscience claiming a person’s personality, intelligence and character could be determined by the shape/bumps on their skull

What are the 3 CLASSIC theories on causes of behaviour?

Mentalism, dualism, materialistic monism

What is mentalism?

That a soul, a non-material entity, produces behaviour

What is dualism?

That both the MIND (non-material) and body (machine like, eg, breathing) produce behaviour

What is materialistic monism? (materialism)

mind and body not separate, the mind is just what the brain does, everything/all behaviour can be explained by physical processes in brain/body