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BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Sleep

Now's a good time for a nap.

Why do we spend 1/3 of our lives being unconcious?

Sleep is an automatic process we try to control but probably need to increase.

We get so focused on our tasks and activities, we try to limit the amount of sleep we get. But this mysterious process of sleep is not optional. It’s good for us.

  • light therapy
  • limbic system
  • lowest body temp
  • melatonin
  • memorable dreaming
  • memory consolidation
  • N1
  • N2
  • N3 (delta)
  • narcolepsy
  • NREM
  • oral appliance therapy (OAT)
  • paralysis
  • pineal body
  • pineal gland
  • pinealocytes
  • rapid eye movements
  • REM
  • serotonin
  • sigma bands or sigma waves
  • sleep apnea
  • sleep debt
  • sleep deprivation
  • sleep disorders
  • sleep duration
  • sleep spindles
  • sleep study = polysomnogram
  • somnolence
  • stages
  • sunlight
  • threat-simulation theory
  • total sleep time
  • transducer
  • transitions
  • trans-meridian distance (west–east)
  • tremors
  • turbinate surgery
  • turbinates
  • unconscious wishes
  • yawning

 

NOTES

  • Limbic System (con’t)
  • Pineal Gland
    • Also called
      • pineal body
      • epiphysis cerebri
      • epiphysis
      • third eye
    • Endocrine gland
    • Produces melatonin
      • Derivative of serotonin
      • Affects modulation of wake/sleep
    • Shape of pine cone
      • Size of grain of rice
      • Reddish-gray in color
    • Calcifies as get older
      • “Brain sand”
      • Tumors are rare
    • Composed of:
      • Pinealocytes
        • cell body with 4–6 processes
        • produce & secrete melatonin
      • Interstitial cells
        • between pinealocytes
    • Conjecture
      • Near death experience?
      • Psychedelic experiences?
      • Antidepressants (Prozac)?
      • Cocaine?
    • Transducer
      • Like adrenal medulla
      • Converts sympathetic nervous system to hormones
    • How it works
      • Hypothalamus to spinal cord
        • To superior cervical ganglia
          • To pineal gland
      • Mature by age 2 yrs.
      • Lots of melatonin may inhibit sexual development of children
      • At puberty, melatonin decreases
    • Discovery
      • Aaron Lerner
        • Yale dermatology professor
      • Hoped pineal gland substance would help treat skin diseases
      • Called it melatonin
    • Melatonin
      • Tryptophan—Serotonin–Melatonin
      • Production $ by darkness
      • Inhibited by light
    • Photosensitive cells in retina
      • Detect amount of light
      • Signal SCN
    • Set 24-hr cycle
    • Duction $ by darkness
      • Movement of 1 eye
      • Retina
      • SCN signal PVN
      • Paraventricular nuclei to
      • Signal spinal cord then to
      • Superior cervical ganglia and then to
      • Pineal gland
    • Blood levels of melatonin
      • Undetectable during day
        • rise sharply when dark
      • Longer the night, more melatonin
      • Some effect on sleep
        • Not major regulator
      • If you take melatonin
        • Mild help to elderly insomniacs
      • Shift workers
        • Not as good as phototherapy
      • Jet lag
        • Taken close to target bedtime
        • Best effect when crossing many time zones
  • Sleep
    • Stages
      • Awake
      • REM
      • Stage 1
      • Stage 2
      • Stage 3
    • Mammals and birds
      • REM
      • NREM
      • N1
      • N2
      • N3 (delta) = slow wave sleep; deep sleep
    • Historically:
      • Alfred Loomis, 1937
        • EEG; five levels (A to E)
      • Dement & Kleitman, 1953
        • REM sleep plus 4 NREM
      • Now, 3 stages plus REM
        • combined stages 3 and 4
        • Stages based on EEG, eye movements, respiratory, cardiac, and movement events
    • Cycles
      • N1 → N2 → N3 → N2 → REM
      • proportion of REM sleep increases until just before natural awakening
    • In humans (adults)
      • Sleep cycle from 90 to 110 min.
      • 60 minutes for newborns
    • NREM
      • Relatively little dreaming in NREM
      • Stage N1
        • transition from alpha (awake)
          • 8-13 HZ alpha waves
        • To delta waves
          • 4–7 Hz delta waves
        • Somnolence or drowsy sleep
        • Twitches and jerks
        • Hallucinations
        • Lower awareness of external environment
      • Stage N2
        • Less movement, no awareness
        • About 50% of sleep time
        • K-complexes
          • Brief high-voltage peaks
            • roughly every minute
          • often followed by bursts of sleep spindles
          • Suppress cortical arousal
          • Expect to danger signals
          • Aides memory consolidation
        • Sleep Spindles
          • Also called “sigma bands” or “sigma waves“
          • Last half second
          • Sudden bursts
      • Stage N3
        • Deep or slow-wave sleep
          • minimum of 20% delta waves
        • Night terrors
        • Bed wetting
        • Sleepwalking
    • REM
      • Rapid eye movement sleep
      • 20–25% of total sleep time
        • rapid eye movements
        • rapid low-voltage EEG
      • Memorable dreaming
      • Paralysis
    • Sleep timing
      • Controlled by circadian clock
      • Timekeeping, temperature-fluctuating, enzyme-controlling device
      • Adenosine (neurotransmitter)
      • Inhibits wakefulness
      • Increases over the day
      • Sleepiness
      • Causes release of melatonin
      • Gradual decrease in body temp
    • Sleep duration
      • affected by the DEC2 gene
      • mutation of this gene; sleep two hours less than normal people
    • Optimal amount & timing
      • Be asleep
        • 6 hrs before lowest body temp
      • Max level of melatonin
      • Min core body temperature
    • Adequate = not sleepy in daytime
      • Varies with individual
      • Varies with age
      • Child to adult
    • Hours by age
      • Child need more sleep per day
      • Newborn = up to 18 hrs
        • 9 hours a day in REM sleep
        • 1-3 yr olds = 12-15
      • School age = 10 to 11 hrs
      • Adolescents = 9-10 hrs
      • Adults = 7-8
        • More if pregnant
        • Not less is elderly
    • Sleep debt
      • Not getting enough sleep
      • Impacts frontal lobes
      • Findings are mixed
    • Lack of sleep
      • Sign of cardiovascular disease?
    • Too much sleep
      • Sign of depression?
    • Sleep Problems
      • May have:
        • Depression, alcoholism, bipolar
        • 90% of depressed have sleep disorders?
    • Sleep Deprivation
      • Cognitive impairment
      • Memory loss
      • Moral judgment
      • ADHD symptoms
      • Motor impairment
      • Decreased reaction time
      • Less accurate
      • Tremors
      • Aches
      • Symptoms
      • Irritable
      • Yawning
      • Hallucinations
    • Impacts
      • Immune system impairment
      • Heart rate is more variable
      • Risk diabetes & heart attack
      • Decreased temp
    • Sleep Disorders
      • Jet Lag
        • Called desynchronosis
        • Alterations to circadian rhythms
        • Sleep disorder
        • May last several days
        • Figure 1 day per time zone
        • Out of synch w destination time
          • contrary to accustomed rhythms
          • times for eating, sleeping, hormone regulation and body temperature
        • How long to adjust
          • Varies greatly
          • Cross 1-2 time zones no prob.
          • Not linked to length of flight
            • 10 hr flight within time zone okay
              • Europe to southern Africa
              • trans-meridian distance (west–east)
            • 5 hr flight from LA to NY
              • International Date Line
          • Maximum possible disruption is 12 hours plus or minus
        • Symptoms vary
          • Headaches, irritability
          • Fatigue, mild depression
          • Sleep problems
          • Digestive problems (constipation-diarrhea)
        • To minimize effects
          • Before the flight
            • Ask doctor about meds
            • Partially adapt
              • get up an hour earlier
              • light box
          • During flight
            • Travel in smaller segments
            • Overnight midway
            • Set time to destination
              • Sleep-wake
          • After flight
            • Sunlight
            • Eat on schedule
        • Travel west to east is hardest
          • Most people have circadian period a little over 24 hours
          • Easier to stay up later
            • Harder to get up earlier
          • London to LA: 8 hr difference
            • Stay up all night, go bed at 6am
          • LA to London: 8 hr difference
            • Stay up all night, go bed at 2pm
          • Red-eye flight
          • West to east
            • body gets less rest to begin day
        • How fix
          • Gradually adjust start of sleep
            • Adjust over several days
          • Avoid afternoon naps
          • Eat on schedule, avoid carbs
          • Melatonin?
            • Hard to make timing precise
            • Need max level 6 hours into sleep
            • Light hits eyes, secretion stops
            • Impacts circadian
          • Light therapy
            • One day per time zone adjust
            • Start with light, avoid other times
            • Possible but untested
          • Fasting?
            • lack of food overrides light-controlled circadian body clock?
            • no food at all for 16 hours
            • eat nothing on plane; don’t eat until destination’s breakfast time
      • Sleep apnea
        • During sleep
          • Abnormal pauses in breathing (apnea)
          • Abnormal low breathing (hypopnea)
        • Each apnea can last
          • Seconds to minutes
        • 5-30 per hour
        • Sleep Study = polysomnogram
        • Most common in men
          • 2+ times for often
        • Can affect children too
          • excessive daytime sleepiness
          • slower reaction time
          • daytime fatigue
          • vision problems
        • Treatment
          • CPAP machine
            • Continuous Positive Airway Pressure
            • pumps air into throat
          • Turbinate surgery
            • Grind down turbinates in nose
          • Oral Appliance Therapy (OAT)
            • Dental appliance; custom-made mouthpiece to shift lower jaw
      • Narcolepsy
        • Symptoms
          • Excessive sleepiness
          • Fall asleep at inappropriate times
            • Work
            • Driving
          • Cataplexy
            • Sudden muscular weakness when emotional
            • Drop head, weak knees, collapse
            • Slurred speech but normal hearing
        • Often confused with insomnia
          • REM within 5 minutes
          • An hour before normal
        • Possible genetic cause
        • Treat with amphetamines
          • Provigil or Nuvigil
  • Dreams
    • Sequence of
      • Images, sensation, emotions
      • Occur involuntary
      • Most common in REM sleep
      • Most vivid in REM
    • Purpose = unknown
    • Duration of second to 20 min.
      • Get longer as night progresses
      • More REM as night progresses
    • 5-minute dream is about 5-minutes of story
      • Don’t compress a day into 5 min.
    • Remember if awakened in REM
    • 3-5 dreams per night
    • About 2 hrs per night
    • Feel out of your control
      • Except lucid self-aware dreams
    • Can provide creative thoughts, problem solutions or inspiration
    • REM has no release of:
      • Norepinephrine, serotonin & histamine
      • All mammals experience REM
        • dolphins experience minimum
        • humans are in the middle
        • opossum and the armadillo most
    • Theories
      • Ancient
        • Fates and gods talking to you
      • Unconscious Mind
        • Sigmund Freud
        • Unconscious wishes
      • Threat-simulation theory
        • Antti Revonsuo
        • Prepare you for real life
      • Activation Theory
        • Hobson & McCarley
        • Random neuron firings

 

Filed Under: BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Pineal Gland

Why do we spend 1/3 of our lives being unconcious?

Sleep is an automatic process we try to control but probably need to increase.

We get so focused on our tasks and activities, we try to limit the amount of sleep we get. But this mysterious process of sleep is not optional. It’s good for us.

  • light therapy
  • limbic system
  • lowest body temp
  • melatonin
  • memorable dreaming
  • memory consolidation
  • N1
  • N2
  • N3 (delta)
  • narcolepsy
  • NREM
  • oral appliance therapy (OAT)
  • paralysis
  • pineal body
  • pineal gland
  • pinealocytes
  • rapid eye movements
  • REM
  • serotonin
  • sigma bands or sigma waves
  • sleep apnea
  • sleep debt
  • sleep deprivation
  • sleep disorders
  • sleep duration
  • sleep spindles
  • sleep study = polysomnogram
  • somnolence
  • stages
  • sunlight
  • threat-simulation theory
  • total sleep time
  • transducer
  • transitions
  • trans-meridian distance (west–east)
  • tremors
  • turbinate surgery
  • turbinates
  • unconscious wishes
  • yawning

 

NOTES

  • Limbic System (con’t)
  • Pineal Gland
    • Also called
      • pineal body
      • epiphysis cerebri
      • epiphysis
      • third eye
    • Endocrine gland
    • Produces melatonin
      • Derivative of serotonin
      • Affects modulation of wake/sleep
    • Shape of pine cone
      • Size of grain of rice
      • Reddish-gray in color
    • Calcifies as get older
      • “Brain sand”
      • Tumors are rare
    • Composed of:
      • Pinealocytes
        • cell body with 4–6 processes
        • produce & secrete melatonin
      • Interstitial cells
        • between pinealocytes
    • Conjecture
      • Near death experience?
      • Psychedelic experiences?
      • Antidepressants (Prozac)?
      • Cocaine?
    • Transducer
      • Like adrenal medulla
      • Converts sympathetic nervous system to hormones
    • How it works
      • Hypothalamus to spinal cord
        • To superior cervical ganglia
          • To pineal gland
      • Mature by age 2 yrs.
      • Lots of melatonin may inhibit sexual development of children
      • At puberty, melatonin decreases
    • Discovery
      • Aaron Lerner
        • Yale dermatology professor
      • Hoped pineal gland substance would help treat skin diseases
      • Called it melatonin
    • Melatonin
      • Tryptophan—Serotonin–Melatonin
      • Production $ by darkness
      • Inhibited by light
    • Photosensitive cells in retina
      • Detect amount of light
      • Signal SCN
    • Set 24-hr cycle
    • Duction $ by darkness
      • Movement of 1 eye
      • Retina
      • SCN signal PVN
      • Paraventricular nuclei to
      • Signal spinal cord then to
      • Superior cervical ganglia and then to
      • Pineal gland
    • Blood levels of melatonin
      • Undetectable during day
        • rise sharply when dark
      • Longer the night, more melatonin
      • Some effect on sleep
        • Not major regulator
      • If you take melatonin
        • Mild help to elderly insomniacs
      • Shift workers
        • Not as good as phototherapy
      • Jet lag
        • Taken close to target bedtime
        • Best effect when crossing many time zones
  • Sleep
    • Stages
      • Awake
      • REM
      • Stage 1
      • Stage 2
      • Stage 3
    • Mammals and birds
      • REM
      • NREM
      • N1
      • N2
      • N3 (delta) = slow wave sleep; deep sleep
    • Historically:
      • Alfred Loomis, 1937
        • EEG; five levels (A to E)
      • Dement & Kleitman, 1953
        • REM sleep plus 4 NREM
      • Now, 3 stages plus REM
        • combined stages 3 and 4
        • Stages based on EEG, eye movements, respiratory, cardiac, and movement events
    • Cycles
      • N1 → N2 → N3 → N2 → REM
      • proportion of REM sleep increases until just before natural awakening
    • In humans (adults)
      • Sleep cycle from 90 to 110 min.
      • 60 minutes for newborns
    • NREM
      • Relatively little dreaming in NREM
      • Stage N1
        • transition from alpha (awake)
          • 8-13 HZ alpha waves
        • To delta waves
          • 4–7 Hz delta waves
        • Somnolence or drowsy sleep
        • Twitches and jerks
        • Hallucinations
        • Lower awareness of external environment
      • Stage N2
        • Less movement, no awareness
        • About 50% of sleep time
        • K-complexes
          • Brief high-voltage peaks
            • roughly every minute
          • often followed by bursts of sleep spindles
          • Suppress cortical arousal
          • Expect to danger signals
          • Aides memory consolidation
        • Sleep Spindles
          • Also called “sigma bands” or “sigma waves“
          • Last half second
          • Sudden bursts
      • Stage N3
        • Deep or slow-wave sleep
          • minimum of 20% delta waves
        • Night terrors
        • Bed wetting
        • Sleepwalking
    • REM
      • Rapid eye movement sleep
      • 20–25% of total sleep time
        • rapid eye movements
        • rapid low-voltage EEG
      • Memorable dreaming
      • Paralysis
    • Sleep timing
      • Controlled by circadian clock
      • Timekeeping, temperature-fluctuating, enzyme-controlling device
      • Adenosine (neurotransmitter)
      • Inhibits wakefulness
      • Increases over the day
      • Sleepiness
      • Causes release of melatonin
      • Gradual decrease in body temp
    • Sleep duration
      • affected by the DEC2 gene
      • mutation of this gene; sleep two hours less than normal people
    • Optimal amount & timing
      • Be asleep
        • 6 hrs before lowest body temp
      • Max level of melatonin
      • Min core body temperature
    • Adequate = not sleepy in daytime
      • Varies with individual
      • Varies with age
      • Child to adult
    • Hours by age
      • Child need more sleep per day
      • Newborn = up to 18 hrs
        • 9 hours a day in REM sleep
        • 1-3 yr olds = 12-15
      • School age = 10 to 11 hrs
      • Adolescents = 9-10 hrs
      • Adults = 7-8
        • More if pregnant
        • Not less is elderly
    • Sleep debt
      • Not getting enough sleep
      • Impacts frontal lobes
      • Findings are mixed
    • Lack of sleep
      • Sign of cardiovascular disease?
    • Too much sleep
      • Sign of depression?
    • Sleep Problems
      • May have:
        • Depression, alcoholism, bipolar
        • 90% of depressed have sleep disorders?
    • Sleep Deprivation
      • Cognitive impairment
      • Memory loss
      • Moral judgment
      • ADHD symptoms
      • Motor impairment
      • Decreased reaction time
      • Less accurate
      • Tremors
      • Aches
      • Symptoms
      • Irritable
      • Yawning
      • Hallucinations
    • Impacts
      • Immune system impairment
      • Heart rate is more variable
      • Risk diabetes & heart attack
      • Decreased temp
    • Sleep Disorders
      • Jet Lag
        • Called desynchronosis
        • Alterations to circadian rhythms
        • Sleep disorder
        • May last several days
        • Figure 1 day per time zone
        • Out of synch w destination time
          • contrary to accustomed rhythms
          • times for eating, sleeping, hormone regulation and body temperature
        • How long to adjust
          • Varies greatly
          • Cross 1-2 time zones no prob.
          • Not linked to length of flight
            • 10 hr flight within time zone okay
              • Europe to southern Africa
              • trans-meridian distance (west–east)
            • 5 hr flight from LA to NY
              • International Date Line
          • Maximum possible disruption is 12 hours plus or minus
        • Symptoms vary
          • Headaches, irritability
          • Fatigue, mild depression
          • Sleep problems
          • Digestive problems (constipation-diarrhea)
        • To minimize effects
          • Before the flight
            • Ask doctor about meds
            • Partially adapt
              • get up an hour earlier
              • light box
          • During flight
            • Travel in smaller segments
            • Overnight midway
            • Set time to destination
              • Sleep-wake
          • After flight
            • Sunlight
            • Eat on schedule
        • Travel west to east is hardest
          • Most people have circadian period a little over 24 hours
          • Easier to stay up later
            • Harder to get up earlier
          • London to LA: 8 hr difference
            • Stay up all night, go bed at 6am
          • LA to London: 8 hr difference
            • Stay up all night, go bed at 2pm
          • Red-eye flight
          • West to east
            • body gets less rest to begin day
        • How fix
          • Gradually adjust start of sleep
            • Adjust over several days
          • Avoid afternoon naps
          • Eat on schedule, avoid carbs
          • Melatonin?
            • Hard to make timing precise
            • Need max level 6 hours into sleep
            • Light hits eyes, secretion stops
            • Impacts circadian
          • Light therapy
            • One day per time zone adjust
            • Start with light, avoid other times
            • Possible but untested
          • Fasting?
            • lack of food overrides light-controlled circadian body clock?
            • no food at all for 16 hours
            • eat nothing on plane; don’t eat until destination’s breakfast time
      • Sleep apnea
        • During sleep
          • Abnormal pauses in breathing (apnea)
          • Abnormal low breathing (hypopnea)
        • Each apnea can last
          • Seconds to minutes
        • 5-30 per hour
        • Sleep Study = polysomnogram
        • Most common in men
          • 2+ times for often
        • Can affect children too
          • excessive daytime sleepiness
          • slower reaction time
          • daytime fatigue
          • vision problems
        • Treatment
          • CPAP machine
            • Continuous Positive Airway Pressure
            • pumps air into throat
          • Turbinate surgery
            • Grind down turbinates in nose
          • Oral Appliance Therapy (OAT)
            • Dental appliance; custom-made mouthpiece to shift lower jaw
      • Narcolepsy
        • Symptoms
          • Excessive sleepiness
          • Fall asleep at inappropriate times
            • Work
            • Driving
          • Cataplexy
            • Sudden muscular weakness when emotional
            • Drop head, weak knees, collapse
            • Slurred speech but normal hearing
        • Often confused with insomnia
          • REM within 5 minutes
          • An hour before normal
        • Possible genetic cause
        • Treat with amphetamines
          • Provigil or Nuvigil
  • Dreams
    • Sequence of
      • Images, sensation, emotions
      • Occur involuntary
      • Most common in REM sleep
      • Most vivid in REM
    • Purpose = unknown
    • Duration of second to 20 min.
      • Get longer as night progresses
      • More REM as night progresses
    • 5-minute dream is about 5-minutes of story
      • Don’t compress a day into 5 min.
    • Remember if awakened in REM
    • 3-5 dreams per night
    • About 2 hrs per night
    • Feel out of your control
      • Except lucid self-aware dreams
    • Can provide creative thoughts, problem solutions or inspiration
    • REM has no release of:
      • Norepinephrine, serotonin & histamine
      • All mammals experience REM
        • dolphins experience minimum
        • humans are in the middle
        • opossum and the armadillo most
    • Theories
      • Ancient
        • Fates and gods talking to you
      • Unconscious Mind
        • Sigmund Freud
        • Unconscious wishes
      • Threat-simulation theory
        • Antti Revonsuo
        • Prepare you for real life
      • Activation Theory
        • Hobson & McCarley
        • Random neuron firings

 

Filed Under: BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Ventromedial

Emotional Regulation

 

Frontal lobe

Prefrontal cortex

  1. dorsolateral cortex

Last to myelinate

Sleep deprivation

Executive functions

Working memory

Cognitive flexibility

Planning

  1. Orbitofrontal cortex

Controls

social adjustment

responsibility

mood

drive

gambling strategies

Alzheimer’s tangles

drug addiction

  1. Ventromedial cortex

Anatomically no difference between orbitofrontal and ventromedial

Only differ in connections

Processes risk & fear

Decision making

Inhibition of emotional responses

Rapidly develops during adolescence and young adulthood

Bilateral lesions

difficulty choosing between options with uncertain outcomes

severely impairs in personal and social decision making

choose immediate rewards; blind to future consequences

impairs learning from mistakes

make same decisions again & again

even if have negative consequences

retain intelligence

Connects with amygdala

Less associated with social functions

More with emotion regulation

Involved with

risk

ambiguity

Right hemisphere vmPFC

Detecting irony, sarcasm, and deception

If damaged:

Easily influenced by misleading advertising

“False tagging mechanism”

False Tagging Theory

All idea initially believed

Doubt occur when prefrontal cortex “tags” it as false

Provides doubt and skepticism

Suppresses emotional responses to negative emotional signals

social emotions

compassion, shame & guilt

anger & frustration tolerance

moral values

Regulates interaction of cognition and affect

Obitofrontal prefrontal cortex regulates pleasure responses

Ventromedial prefrontal cortex regulates preference judgement

PTSD

reactivating past emotional associations and events

Left vs Right

Right

intellectualization, emotional isolation

Left

projection, splitting, verbal denial, and fantasy

Gender Social Cues

gender stereotypes

categorize gender-specific names, attributes, and attitudes

Damage

consciously make hypothetical moral judgments without error

not in real life

make decisions inconsistent with professed moral values

Ventromedial includes

Anterior cingulate cortex

Wraps around corpus collosum

Left and Right Hemispheres

Each controls contralateral side

Except taste & smell

Uncrossed; own side of tongue

Left and Right hemispheres work together

Control trunk & facial muscles

Corpus Callosum

Connects L & R hemispheres; exchange information

Set of axons interconnect hemispheres

Wide, flat bundle of neural fibers

Located under cortex

Largest white matter structure

200–250 million axons

Fast transmission (myelinated)

Genu = anterior (knee)

Thin axons

Connect prefrontal cortexes

Larger in musicians

Truncus = middle (body)

Thick axons

Connect motor cortexes

M1, premotor & supp. motor

Splenium = posterior portion

Soatosensory info

Parietal lobes

Visual cortexes

Sexual Dimorphism

Different size in men & women? No

Larger in left-handed?    Yes, 11%

Dyslexic children have smaller CC

Childhood

Gradually thickens as grow

Slow growth til about age 10

Eventually develop adult patterns

Young children behavior similar to split-brain people

Fabric identification task

Three-year olds

90% more errors w/ two hands

Five-year olds

Equally well w/ one or two hand

Epilepsy

Seizures = excessively synched neural activity

Most treated with drugs (90%)

More severe, tissue ablation

Neural activity rebounds between

prolongs seizures

Extreme cases, severe CC

Called split-brain people

Split-Brain People

Present input of object to L field

Info goes to R hem (noses cross)

Independence

Draw circles, one with each hand, one hand going faster

Split-Brain people show independence

Present input of object to L field

Info goes to R hem (noses cross)

L hand controlled by R hem

Can point to it with L hand

Can’t do it with right hand

Present object input to R field

Info to L hem (noses cross)

Can name or describe what see

Language in L hem (95%; 80%)

Multitask

For a few weeks, feels like two people in one body

Competition vs Cooperation

Take item off grocery shelf with L

Return them with R

Normal

Cooperation

Flash different word to each visual field at same time

Report combined concept

Toad to left

Stool to right

Eventually lessens some

Brain uses smaller connection routes to avoid conflicts

CC not the only path, just the biggest

HM

Henry Molaison (1926-2008)

1 generalized seizure a week, began bilaterally

medial aspects of both temporal lobes

Removed both of H.M.’s medial temporal lobes (in 1953)

Included most of

hippocampus

amygdala

adjacent temporal cortex

Post-surgery symptoms

Major seizures almost completely eliminated

Minor seizures down to 1-2 day

IQ increased (104 to 118)

Normal short-term memory

Moderate retrograde amnesia (loss for events shortly before)

Amnesia

retrograde amnesia = before

anterograde amnesia = after

Severe anterograde amnesia

memory loss for events after

can’t transfer anything to LTM

everything is forgotten when attention shifts

impaired ability to form LTM

underestimate his own age by 10+ years

can’t form episodic memories

HM’s Implicit Memory

Mirror Drawing

First to show improvement in HM

Rotating Disc

Keep pen on target (rotating disk)

Improved over 7-day period

Each time saw task, claimed he had never seen it before

Hippocampus

if damaged, amnesia

not remember accident or around it

remember before & after accident

Consolidation memory

hippocampus must work to put into long term

Reproduces patterns during sleep

Encodes patterns

Sparse representations (non-overlapping)

allows quick learning

trains cortex, repeats pattern over time

Componential encoding

efficient; good for generalization

 

Gghh

 

Filed Under: BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Orbitofrontal

dice

  1. Dorsolateral

Last to myelinate

Sleep deprivation

  1. Orbitofrontal

Like dorsolateral, involved in:

Executive functions

Working memory

Cognitive flexibility

Planning

OFC is considered anatomically synonymous with ventromedial cortex

Named by location: above eye orbits

Characteristics

Least explored

Least understood

Sometimes considered part of limbic system

Vary by person

Considerable individuality

Research Difficulties

OFC is close to sinuses (air filled)

Hard to image (MRI, etc)

Orbitofrontal Functions

Cognitive processing

Decision making

Sensory integration

Affective value of reinforcers

Controls

Social adjustment

Responsibility

Mood

Drive

Extensive connections with other brain regions

Reciprocal connections

Ventral & dorsal visual streams

Auditory-spatial processing

phonetic processing (rostral stream)

auditory-spatial processing (caudal stream)

Phonetic processing

All sense modalities

Visual Processing

both ventral & dorsal streams

integration of spatial and object processing

Connect with hippocampus, cingulate and thalamus

Connect with amygdala (emotional center)

Compares expected with actual

Compare expected reward/punishment with actual reward/punishment

Intuitive judgments

Activated during intuitive coherence judgements

Stimulus-outcome associations

Evaluation of behavior

Encode new expectations about punishment and social reprisal

Conflict resolution

Suppressing negative emotions

Approach-avoidance situations

game of chicken

Damage

Inappropriate displays of anger

Inappropriate responses to anger

Defensive, present self in “angelic light“

Lesions – might feel no regret

Damage causes problems with

decision-making

emotion regulation

reward expectation

ADHD

dysfunction of reward circuitry

controlling motivation

reward

impulsivity

Obsessive-Compulsive

executive functioning

impulse control

Addictions

Dopaminergic activation of reward circuits

Compulsive behavior

Increased motivation take drug

Visual discrimination test

DON’T PRESS BUTTON

OFC damage: gotta press!

Reversal learning

Presented pictures A and B

Learn rewarded for picking A

When rule set, switch

Damage to OFC, stay with A

Disinhibited behavior

Excessive swearing

Hypersexuality

Drug, alcohol & tobacco use

Compulsive gambling

Iowa Gambling Task (Bechara & Damásio)

simulation of decision making

4 virtual decks of cards

goal of game is to earn as much money as possible

choose cards by gut reaction

start with $2000 (monopoly $)

don’t know how many cards in deck (it’s virtual)

deck A and B can win $100 reward but large penalty

deck C and D can win $50 reward but small penalty

Good deck = lose slower

Good deck = win some

After 10 cards

healthy show “stress” reaction

GSR if hover over bad deck

damage to amygdala

never develop GSR

After 40-50 cards

healthy stick to the good decks

OFC damage, stick with bad deck

even though know losing money

Probabilistic Learning

must pass up potential large immediate rewards for small longer-                                                       warning cues feel like excitement & pleasure?

Poor social interaction

Faux pas Test

1st used with autism

series of vignettes about social occasions

someone said but should not have said; awkward occurrence

Asked to:

Identify what awkward

Identify why awkward

Identify how would have felt

Identify factual control fact

OFC dysfunction

Understand the story

Can’t judge social awkward

Acquired brain injury have these symptoms:

disinhibited behavior

poor social interaction

excessive swearing

hypersexuality

compulsive gambling

drug, alcohol & tobacco use

low empathy

Alzheimer’s disease

Neurofibrer tangles in orbitofrontal area

Endoplasmic reticulum collapse

Tau protein

Tangles in cell bodies

Neuro-plaque

Brain proteins fold abnormally

Amyloid proteins clump together

Cause plaque between neurons

Causes cell loss

Progressive disease

Symptoms get worse with time

Symptoms

Inappropriate emotional R

Decline in intellect

Confused thinking

Memory loss

Repeated questioning

inappropriate emotional R

Violence

Procedural memory last longer than declarative

Can acquire new skills but not remember learning them

Age related

Likelihood increases with age

Strikes 50% of those over 85

Genetic components

Person with Down’s syndrome (3 copies of chromosome 21)

Always acquire Alzheimer’s in middle age

Early onset: chromosome 1 & 14

Late onset: chromosome 10 & 19

Environmental component

50% no relatives with disease

Yoruba people of Nigeria

high-risk genes

low incidence

Maybe due to diet?

low-calorie, low fat, low salt diet

Treatment to improve memory

Increase glucose & insulin

Acetylcholine activator drugs

Diet rich in antioxidants?

Block Aß42 production, inoculate with small amounts of Aß42

Addiction

involved in development of addictive behavior

dopaminergic activation

reward circuits

addicts show deficits in orbitofrontal, striatal, and thalamic regions

cocaine withdrawal shows increased OFC activity, proportional to drug craving

 

 

Filed Under: BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Dorsolateral

graduation day

 

 

I owe it all to my prefrontal cortex!

The prefrontal cortex of the frontal lobe is where a lot of thinking goes on. Some regions are better understood than others. The three major sections are dorsolateral, orbitofrontal and ventral-medial. They work together with other regions to make decisions, regulate behavior and anticipate rewards.

This area of the brain is the most likely to get damaged, since it is furthest forward in the head. But it isn’t clear what the actual results will be. You can have a metal rod through your head and have minor difficulties or show no outward damage and have major dysfunction.

NOTES

  • Pre-Frontal Cortex
    • Phineas Gage
      • First indication can survive major brain trauma
      • Lost 1+ frontal lobe
      • Working on a railroad in 1848
      • Tapered rod thru back of left eye
        • Out the top of his head
        • Rod landed 80 feet away
      • Retained
        • Normal memory
        • Speech & motor skills
      • Changed?
        • Mood, irritability, impatient
        • Personality
          • Impact exaggerated after his death
          • “American Crowbar Case”
      • Localization of functions
        • His case was used pro and con
      • Damage to frontal lobe
        • Can describe best course of action
        • But seek immediate gratification
  • Frontal lobes
    • 1. Primary Motor cortex
    • 2. Pre-motor cortex
    • 3. Pre-frontal cortex
      • Most anterior
      • Not short term storage
      • But if damaged, poor executive processes
  • 3. Prefrontal cortex
    • 10+ microscopically different cells
    • working memory for objects
    • working memory for spatial locations
    • 3 regions
      • a. dorsolateral
      • b. orbitofrontal
      • c. ventralmedial
  • A. Dorsolateral
    • last part of brain for myelination
    • still developing at 30 years old
    • interacts with other parts of brain
    • Connected to
      • Orbitofrontal prefrontal cortex
      • Thalamus & Basal Ganglia
      • Hippocampus
      • Plus more
    • Functions
      • Location of stimuli
      • Spatial info for sequence learning
      • High-level planning & regulation
      • Organizes movements
      • Regulates thoughts & actions
      • Integrates sensory & mnemonic info
    • Executive Processes
      • Not sole responsible
      • Collaborative effort
    • Damage causes problems with
      • Social judgment
      • Executive memory
      • Abstract thinking
      • Intentionality
      • Tumors produce symptoms similar to schizophrenia
      • Sleep deprivation inhibits activity here
    • Truth Telling
      • Involved in lying?
      • Inhibit of normal process
      • People usually tell the truth
      • Lucid dream states?
      • Hallucinations?
  • B. Orbitofrontal
    • Orbit – immediately above eye sockets
      • Least explored
      • Least understood
      • Sometimes considered part of limbic system
    • Controls
      • social adjustment
      • responsibility
      • mood
      • drive
    • Function
      • Cognitive processing
      • Decision making
      • Sensory integration
      • Affective value of reinforcers
      • Expectation of rewards-punish
      • Compare expected with actual
      • intuitive judgments
    • Connections
      • Extensive connections
      • Reciprocal connections
      • Ventral & dorsal visual streams
      • Auditory-spatial processing
      • Phonetic processing
      • All sense modalities
    • Damage
      • Alzheimer’s disease
        • neurofibrer tangles in this area
      • Lesions
        • feel no regret
      • Causes problems with
        • decision-making
        • emotion regulation
        • reward expectation
    • ADHD
      • dysfunction of reward circuitry
      • controlling motivation
      • reward
      • impulsivity
    • Obsessive-Compulsive
      • Executive functioning
      • Impulse control
    • Addictions
      • Dopaminergic activation of reward circuits
      • Compulsive behavior
      • Increased motivation take drug
      • Decision making
      • Reward system
    • During cocaine withdrawal
      • Increased metabolism in OFC
      • Proportional to drug craving
      • During protracted withdrawal
        • (up to 3-4 months) cocaine
        • reduced activity compared to healthy
    • Alcoholics
      • Less benzodiazepine receptors
      • During withdrawal
      • Decreased activity (compared to normals)
    • Visual discrimination test
      • Reversal learning
        • Presented pictures A and B
        • Learn rewarded for picking A
          • When rule set, switch
        • Damage to OFC, stay with A
      • Extinction
        • Rules don’t reversing
        • Punished for either A or B
        • DON’T PRESS BUTTON
          • OFC damage: gotta press!
    • Iowa Gambling Task
      • 4 virtual decks of cards
      • Each time choose a card win $$
      • Every so often, will lose $$
      • Win as much money as possible
      • Choose by gut reaction
      • Two decks are “bad decks”
        • net loss in long run
      • Two decks are “good decks”
        • net gain over time
      • Healthy Ss
        • Sample each deck
        • Stick to good after 40-50 cards
      • OFC damage
        • Stick with bad deck
        • Even if know it’s a bad deck
      • Galvanic Skin R of stress react
        • Hover over bad deck
        • Only 10 trials
        • OFC dysfunction
          • Never develop GSR reaction
    • Faux pas Test
      • Series of vignettes
      • Social occasion
      • Said but should not have said
      • Awkward occurrence
        • Identify what was said
        • Why it was awkward
        • How people would have felt
      • OFC dysfunction
        • Understand the story
        • Can’t judge social awkward
    • Disinhibited behavior
      • Excessive swearing
      • Hypersexuality
      • Poor social interaction
      • Compulsive gambling
      • Drug, alcohol & tobacco use
      • Little empathy
  • C. Ventralmedial
    • Includes
      • Anterior cingulate cortex
      • Hippocampus
  • 1. Anterior Cingulate Cortex
    • Collar around corpus collosum
    • Autonomic functions
      • Heart rate & blood pressure
      • Reward anticipation
      • Decision making
      • Empathy
    • Dorsal part connects with
      • Prefrontal cortex
      • Parietal cortex
      • M1
    • Dorsal part as Central Station
      • Processing top-down $
      • Processing bottom-up $
      • Assigning control to other areas
    • Ventral part connects with
      • Nucleus accumbens
      • Hypothalamus
      • Amygdala
    • Ventral part involved in
      • Assessing salience of emotion
      • Assessing motivational info
      • Problem solving
      • When effort needed for task
    • Activated by conflict
    • Potential of an error
      • Eriksen Flanker Task
        • Arrow pointing to left or right
        • Flanked by two distractor arrows
        • compatible (<<<<<)
        • incompatible (<<<>>)
      • Stroop Task
        • Don’t read word, name color
        • Top-Down Processing
        • Say the color you see:
        • RED
        • ORANGE
        • GREEN
        • BLUE
      • Counting-Stroop
        • Count neutral stimuli
          • ‘dog’ presented four times
        • Count interfering stimuli
          • ‘three’ presented four times
    • Functions
        • Error detection
        • Anticipation of tasks
        • Attention, motivation
        • Regulation of emotional R
      • Error detection
        • Respond to letter X after an A
        • Ignore all other letter combos
      • Monitoring conflict
        • Incompatible trials produce the most conflict
        • Conflict control system
      • Reinforcement learning ERN
        • Error-related negativity (ERN)
      • Electrophysiological marker
        • Making errors may cause changes in dopamine?
        • More avoid errors, larger ERNs
        • More learn from errors, less ERNs
        • Receives conflicting input
        • Assigns it to another area
      • Reward-based learning theory
        • detects and monitors errors
        • evaluates degree of error
        • suggests appropriate action
      • Largest activation in loss
      • Conscious experience corr
        • more emotionally-aware
        • recognition of emotional cues
        • Active even when Ss not aware of their error
      • Role in registering pain
        • Physical pain activates ACC
        • More intense pain, more active
    • Damage causes
      • Unclear what actually can’t do
      • Appears to impact:
      • Inability to detect errors
      • Severe difficulty in Stroop task
      • Emotional instability
      • Inattention
      • Maybe be seen in schizophrenia
      • Social anxiety
      • ADHD
      • OCD
    • Right Hemisphere
      • Better at spatial relationships
      • Better at perceiving patterns
      • Better at perceiving emotions
        • in gestures
        • In tone of voice
      • Damage
        • Speak with less inflection
        • Less expression in voice
    • Left Hemisphere
      • Better at details than patterns
      • Lateralization of Function
    • Best Practice
      • Use same hemisphere for repeat measurements
      • More accurate if smell two substances with same nostril

Filed Under: BioPsych

March 27, 2023 by ktangen

Prefrontal Cortex

Filed Under: BioPsych

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