Week 2

• Biological psychology


  The study of the biology of behavior; it focuses on the nervous system, hormones, and genetics
• Biological psychology


  Examines the relationship between mind and body, neural mechanisms, and the influence of heredity on behavior
• Biological approach


  • Believes behavior to be a consequence of our genetics and physiology
  • The only approach in psychology that examines thoughts, feelings, and behaviors from a biological and thus physical point of view
  • All that is psychological is first physiological
  • All thoughts, feelings & behavior ultimately have a biological cause
• Ways a biological perspective is relevant to the study of psychology

  • Comparative method - different species of animal can be studied and compared
  • Physiology - how the nervous system and hormones work, how the brain functions, and how changes in structure and/or function can affect behavior
  • Investigation of inheritance - what an animal inherits from its parents, mechanisms of inheritance (genetics)
• Biological explanations of behavior


  • Physiological Explanation
  • Functional Explanation
  • Ontogenetic Explanation
  • Evolutionary Explanation
• Consciousness


  Your awareness of your unique thoughts, memories, feelings, sensations, and environment
• Consciousness is subjective and unique to you, and your conscious experiences are constantly shifting and changing
• Mind-body dualism


  The idea that while the mind and body are separate, they do interact
• The study of the conscious experience became one of the first topics studied by early psychologists
• Introspection


  A process used by structuralists to analyze and report conscious sensations, thoughts, and experiences
• Integrated Information Theory


  Looks at consciousness by learning more about the physical processes that underlie our conscious experiences, and attempts to create a measure of the integrated information that forms consciousness
• Global Workspace Theory


  Suggests that we have a memory bank from which the brain draws information to form the experience of conscious awareness
• Chromosomes


  Structures in the nucleus of a cell containing DNA coiled around histone proteins, which transmit genetic material
• Human beings have 46 chromosomes (23 pairs)
• Types of human chromosomes

  • Autosomes
  • Sex chromosomes
• Chromosomal abnormalities can result in genetic conditions such as Down syndrome
• Sex-linked genes


  Genes that are carried by either sex chromosome
• Men normally have an X and a Y combination of sex chromosomes, while women have two X's
• 1. linked recessive traits


  Primarily expressed in the observable characteristics, or phenotype, of men because men only have one X chromosome
• There are about 1,098 human X-linked genes, many of which are responsible for abnormal conditions
• Sex-limited genes


  When the characters are physically expressed in one sex only, due to the presence of hormones
• Sex-limited traits are autosomal, meaning genes are absent on the X or Y chromosomes
• Passive gene-environment correlation


  An association exists between a person's genetic makeup and the environment in which he or she is raised
• Evocative gene-environment correlation


  An individual's (heritable) behavior evokes an environmental response
• Active gene-environment correlation


  A person's genetic makeup may lead them to select particular environments
• Behavioral genetics


  Studies the heritability of behavioral traits, and overlaps with genetics, psychology, and ethology
• Genetics plays a large role in when and how learning, growth, and development occur
• Classical, or Mendelian, genetics


  Examines how genes are passed from one generation to the next, and how the presence or absence of a gene can be determined via sexual reproduction
• Physiological Explanation


  Relates the behavior to an activity of the brain or other organs, correlates with the mechanics of the body, the chemical reaction that allows hormones to trigger the brain activity, and the path by which brain activity controls the movement of muscles through contractions
• Physiological Explanation


  • The hormone testosterone is associated with aggression and dominance in both males and females
• Functional Explanation


  Defines or elaborates why a behavior evolved in the way that it did
• Genetic drift


  A gene that spreads by pure accident within a small population
• The larger the population or community


  The less impact or powerful the genetic drift is
• Functional explanation


  Can pinpoint the advantage
• Ontogenetic Explanation


  Describes the development of a behavior or structure, maps the influences of nutrition, genes, experiences, and the correlations or interactions of these factors in producing behaviors
• Ontogenetic Explanation


  • In specific species, a young male bird learns songs by listening to the adult males, being able to develop the song and sing it requires both the genes that make it possible and the chance to hear it early in life when it can be learned
• Evolutionary Explanation


  Looks at behavior or structure by way of evolutionary history
• Evolutionary Explanation


  • When a cat becomes frightened its hairs will stand up on its body, when a person becomes frightened they get goosebumps, this erection of hairs makes an animal look larger to its predator, this leads to the belief that our ancestors were hairier and thus our goosebumps were at one time a defense mechanism where hairs would stand out just as the cats do