BioPhysio

• Physiological Explanation


  Explanation of a person's physiology functions and how those functions affect the person's behavior
• Ontogenetic Explanation


  Describes how behavior develops over a lifetime. This includes the genes, nutrition and experiences of a person
• Evolutionary Explanation


  Focuses upon the genetic history of a behavior
• Functional Explanation


  Describes why a structure or behavior evolved as it did
• Mendelian Genetics


  Gregor Mendel demonstrated that inheritance occurs through genes. Genes come in pairs because they are aligned along the chromosomes (strands of genes) that also come in pairs
• DNA


  Deoxyribonucleic Acid, a double-stranded chemical that contains genetic information
• RNA


  Ribonucleic Acid, a single stranded chemical that can serve as a model for the synthesis of proteins
• Homozygous


  A person has an identical pair of genes on two chromosomes
• Heterozygous


  A person has an unmatched pair of genes on two chromosomes
• Dominant Genes


  Shows a strong effect in either the homozygous or heterozygous condition
• Recessive Genes


  Shows its effects only in the homozygous condition
• Types of Genes


  • Sex-limited
  • Sex-linked
  • Auto-somal
• Mutation


  Change in a single gene that is rare, random and independent of the needs of the organism
• Recombination


  New combination of genes in the off-spring that yield characteristics not found in parents
• Epigenetics


  The study of how your behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work. It deals with changes in gene expression
• Histosones


  A family of basic proteins that associate with DNA in the nucleus and help condense it into chromatin, they are alkaline (basic PH) proteins, and their positive charges allow them to associate with DNA
• Heredity


  The mechanism used to pass the message of inheritance from one generation to the next
• Hereditability


  A measure of how well differences in people's genes account for differences in their traits
• Monozygotic (MZ) Twins


  Conceived when a single egg fertilized by a single sperm splits into two after fertilization. Also called identical twins because of the same features of each twin
• Dizygotic (DZ) Twins


  Conceived when two egg are fertilized by two different sperms. Also called fraternal twins of its different feature of each twin
• Phenylketonuria (PKU)


  An inherited disorder that increases the levels of a substance called phenylalanine in the blood
• Phenylalanine


  A building block of proteins that is obtained through the diet (amino acids)
• A gene produces a protein that interacts with the rest of body chemistry and with the environment
• A gene could influence your behavior even without being expressed in your brain
• Genes, via their influences on morphology and physiology, create a framework within which the environment acts to shape the behavior of an individual animal
• Genes also create the scaffold for learning, memory, and cognition, remarkable mechanisms that allow animals to acquire and store information about their environment for use in shaping their behavior
• The environment can affect morphological and physiological development; in turn behavior develops as a result of that animal's shape and internal workings
• Biological purpose of life

  To procreate
• We have to evolve to behave in ways that are going to help our survival
• Survival = procreation
• Survival of the fittest = survival of the best adapted to procreate
• To give an evolutionary explanation of a behavior, you must explain how that behavior helps us to survive and/or procreate
• Evolution and Behavior


  1. Behavior

  2. Helps procreation

  3. Genes passed on

  4. Biology that helps behavior also passed on

  5. Offspring show same behavior
• Brain


  An organ of soft nervous tissue contained in the skull of vertebrates, functioning as the coordinating center of sensation and intellectual and nervous activity
• Spinal Cord


  The central processing and relay station
• Parts of the Peripheral Nervous System

  • Cranial nerves
  • Spinal nerves
• Somatic Nervous System


  Consists of the axons conveying messages from the sense organs to the CNS and from the CNS to the muscles
• Afferent


  From body to CNS
• Efferent


  CNS to body
• Autonomic Nervous System


  Consists of neurons that receive information from and send commands to the heart, intestines, and other organs