biological bases

• Biological psychology


  Concerned with links between biology and behavior
• Neuron


  Building blocks of the nervous system
• Dendrite


  • Branches designed to receive/send/and transport information
• Axon


  • Transports messages to different muscles/glands in the body
• Action potential


  A neural impulse; a brief electrical charge that travels down an axon. The action potential is generated by the movement of positively charged atoms in and out of channels in the axon's membrane
• Myelin sheath


  • A layer of fatty tissue segmentally encasing the fibers of many neurons; enables vastly greater transmission speed of neural impulses as the impulse hops from one node to the next
• Threshold


  The level of stimulation required to trigger a neural impulse
• Synapse


  The junction between the axon tip of the sending neuron and the dendrite or cell body of the receiving neuron. The tiny gap at this junction is called the synaptic gap or cleft
• Neurotransmitters

  Chemical messengers that traverse the synaptic gaps between neurons. When released by the sending neuron, neurotransmitters travel across the synapse and bind to receptor sites on the receiving neuron, thereby influencing whether it will generate a neural impulse
• Acetylcholine


  A neurotransmitter that, among its functions, triggers muscle contraction
• Endorphins


  "Morphine within" - natural, opiate-like neurotransmitters linked to pain control and to pleasure
• Nervous system


  The body's speedy, electrochemical communication system, consisting of all the nerve cells of the peripheral and central nervous systems
• Central nervous system (CNS)


  The brain and spinal cord
• Peripheral nervous system (PNS)


  The sensory and motor neurons that connect the central nervous system (CNS) to the rest of the body
• Nerves

  Neural "cables" containing many axons. These bundled axons, which are part of the peripheral nervous system, connect the central nervous system with muscles, glands, and sense organs
• Sensory neurons


  Neurons that carry incoming information from the sense receptors to the central nervous system
• Interneurons

  Central nervous system neurons that intervene between the sensory inputs and motor outputs
• Motor neurons


  The neurons that carry outgoing information from the central nervous system to the muscles and glands
• Somatic nervous system


  The division of the peripheral nervous system that controls the body's skeletal muscles
• Autonomic nervous system


  The part of the peripheral nervous system that controls the glands and the muscles of the internal organs (such as the heart). Its sympathetic division arouses; its parasympathetic division calms
• Sympathetic nervous system


  The division of the autonomic nervous system that arouses the body, mobilizing its energy in stressful situations
• Parasympathetic nervous system

  The division of the autonomic nervous system that calms the body, conserving its energy
• Reflex

  A simple, automatic, inborn response to a sensory stimulus, such as the knee-jerk response
• Neural networks

  Interconnected neural cells. With experience, networks can learn, as feedback strengthens or inhibits connections that produce certain results. Computer simulations of neural networks show analogous learning
• Phrenology

  An ill-fated theory that claimed bumps on the skull could reveal our mental abilities and our character traits
• Lesion


  Tissue destruction. A brain lesion is a naturally or experimentally caused destruction of brain tissue