Psychology- The brain and neuropsychology

What is the role of the occipital lobe?

The role of the occipital lobe is to help us see and process visual information and help us to understand what we are seeing.

What is the role of the parietal lobe?

It’s role is to help us perceive the world around us such as recognising faces and is also responsible for our sense of touch

What is the role of the cerebellum?

The cerebellum plays a role in movement coordination and balance, which are our motor skills. It uses information from different senses to coordinate our behaviour.

What is the role of our temporal lobe?

The temporal lobe plays a role in hearing and understanding sounds as well as understanding and producing speech.

What is the role of the frontal lobe?

Role of the frontal lobe is decision-making, problem-solving and impulse control.

What is the corpus callosum and what is its role?

It is a thick bundle of nerve fibres which allows communication between both hemispheres of the brain so the brain can work as one whole organ

What are the roles of the left hemisphere?

1. Control of the right hand

2. Right visual field

3. Understanding written language

4. Logical thinking

5. Speech

6. Understanding what is heard

What are the roles of the right hemisphere?

1. Left visual field

2. Spatial awareness

3. Musical ability

4. Creativity

5. Recognising faces

6. Control of the left hand

What is broncas area?

Broncos area is an area in the left hemisphere of the brain that controls the production of speech.

What happens if Broncas area is damaged?

If Broncas area is damaged, people might find it difficult to talk

What is the central nervous system?

The central nervous system is made up of the brain and the spinal cord when messages are relayed between the brain and the body via the spinal cord so that the brain can send message to make the body do an action.

What is the peripheral nervous system?

The peripheral nervous system is the nerves that connect the brain to the skin muscles and organs and makes the body do the action in the brain is telling it to do.

What is a neurotransmitter?

A neurotransmitter is a chemical in the nervous system which passes messages from neuron to neuron across a synapse.

What is the definition of synaptic functioning?

How one neurone communicates with another neurone across the synapse.

Describe the pathway of synaptic functioning

1. Electrical impulse travels along axon

2. Electrical impulse reaches terminal button

3. This causes neurotransmitters to be released from the vesicles

4. Neurotransmitters cross the synapse and attach to the receptors of the second neurone.

5. Then the cycle repeats

What is asymmetrical functioning?

The two hemispheres of the brain are not exactly the same. Which makes them asymmetrical and each hemisphere has different functions.

What is visual agnosia?

Is a problem with the way the brain process is sensory information. It is a disorder where a person can see perfectly well but cannot understand what they are seeing.

What are the symptoms of visual agnosia?

1. Patient might not be able to recognise the colour of an object

2. Patient might not be able to recognise objects and name them

3. Patient might not be able to recognise places they are familiar with

What is prosopagnosia?

It is when people are unable to recognise faces even though they can see them and they do not know who the face belongs to sometimes people don’t even recognise family members

What are the symptoms of prosopagnosia?

Patient find it difficult to identify people from their faces. Some people see all faces as the same and can’t tell them apart.

What is the role of the prefrontal cortex?

Prefrontal cortex helps to control our impulses and our emotions so we don’t act impulsively or get too emotinal

What happens if someone has damage to their pre-frontal cortex?

If damaged people can become impulsive and aggressive.

What are the strengths of using lateralisation for an explanation of sex differences between men and women?

1. Harasty suggested women had a bigger section of the brain for language than men.

2. Rilea found that males performed better in spatial tasks.

3. Brain scans and laboratory experiment were used therefore the findings can be seen the scientific

What are the weaknesses of using lateralisation as an explanation of sex differences between men and women

1. Men did not always do better than women in Rileas spatial task study

2. Sommer study shows no strong evidence that females use both hemispheres for language tasks meaning it’s not a good explanation