H1 Development of Neuropsychology
1.1 The brain theory
● Longitudinal fissure: divides the two hemispheres
● Lateral fissure: divides the two hemispheres into
halves
● Corpus callosum: connects the two hemispheres
1. Frontal lobe: thinking, emotions, personality,
judgment, self-control, muscle control and
movements, memory storage
2. Temporal lobe: processing auditory information and
with the encoding of memory
3. Parietal lobe: management of taste, hearing, sight,
touch, and smell
4. Occipital lobe: visual perception, including color, form,
and motion
1.2 Perspectives on the brain and behavior
> Aristotle’s Mentalism
● Psyche is responsible for thoughts, perceptions, and emotions
● Psyche = mind
● A person’s mind is responsible for behavior
- Psyche is non-material
> Descartes’ Dualism
● Mind is material
● Mind responds mechanically and reflexively
● Mind and body are separate, but can interact = dualism
○ Mind-body problem: how can a non-material mind produce movement in a
material body?
- Animals do not have minds
- Mind develops with language in children
- Mental diseases impair the mind (> lost their minds)
> Darwin’s materialism
● Rational behavior can be explained by the workings of the nervous system
○ No need to refer to the nonmaterial mind
● The nervous systems of living animals are similar for they descend from the same first
nervous system
,1.3 Brain function: insights from brain injury
> Localization of function
= a different, specific brain area controls each kind of behavior
● Fundamentals discovered by Gall (in his research for phrenology)
● Phrenology: map of the mind
○ Gall and Spurzheim
○ Measuring bumps and depressions in the skull to determine a person's
behavioral traits (through a cranioscopy)
○ Unreliable
> Lateralization of the brain
= Certain functions are located on one side of the brain, some on both sides
● Jean Baptiste Bouillaud laid foundation around 1825
● Discovered by Paul Broca
● Broca’s area
○ Anterior speech region
○ Representations of speech movements are stored
○ Damage to the area leads to Broca’s aphasia
● Wernicke’s area
○ Auditory cortex in the temporal lobe
■ Behind Broca’s area
○ Sounds are processed intro auditory images or objects
and stored
○ Wernicke’s aphasia: person can technically speak, but
the words make no sense
- Broca’s aphasia patients have a movement problem, whereas
Wernicke’s aphasia patients have a problem of understanding
- To produce sounds, neural instructions are sent from Broca’s
area to muscles
> Disconnection
= when the fibers between the two speech areas are cut
● Conduction aphasia: speech sounds and movement are retained, but speech is impaired
○ Patients unable to repeat what they heard
● Regions are independent, but must interact in order to work
> Distributed function
● Flourens & Goltz
● Challenged the idea that brain functions are localized
● Created animal models of human clinical cases by removing regions of the cortex
- Discovered: even with the impaired brain, the animals recovered abilities
,> Hierarchical organization
= information is processed serially and organized as a functional hierarchy
● Understanding a function as walking requires understanding what each level of
organization contributes to that behavior
● Multiple memory systems: multiple systems work together for one product
○ Such as memory
○ Neural structures for learning motor skills and those for remembering that one
has those skills are separate
○ The binding problem: how does our brain make “memories” out of so many
sensory events?
> Conscious and unconscious neural streams
● Visual-form agnosia: normal visual acuity, but unable to recognize objects
○ Drawing objects from memory, but not recognizing the drawn object
○ Lesions in ventral stream: visual cortex to temporal lobe (object identification)
● Visual ataxia: normal ability to describe objects, but unable to reach for them
○ Lesions in dorsal stream: visual cortex to parietal lobe (guide action relative to
object)
1.4 The neuron theory
> more in H3
H2 Research on the Origins of the Human Brain and Behavior
2.1 Human origins and the origins of larger brains
> Evolution of the human brain and behavior
1. Australopithecus
a. 3,8 million years ago
2. Homo habilis
a. 2 million years ago
3. Homo erectus
a. 1,6 million years ago
4. Homo sapiens
a. 200.000 years ago
> Why the hominin brain enlarged
● Each new species appeared after a big climate change
○ New climate: different needs for hunting and living > bigger brain
● The bigger the social group, the bigger the brain
● Changes in physiology: more effective cooling in the brain > increase in brain size
● Neoteny: anatomical features link our adults to juvenile stages of other primates
2.2 Comparative research in neuropsychology
> Designing animal models of disorders to manipulate, understand and determine treatment
, > Describing evolutionary adaptations
= phylogeny
2.3 Genes, environment and behavior
> Mendelian genetics and the genetic code
● 23 chromosome pairs of two alleles
○ 22 autosomes and 1 pair of sex chromosomes (XY or XX)
● Homozygous (identical) and heterozygous (different)
● Dominant and recessive alleles
> Applying Mendel's principles
● Recessive inheritance pattern: inheriting two copies of a mutation gene
● Dominant inheritance pattern: inheriting one dominant defective gene leads to mutation
○ See Huntington disease
● Chromosome disorders that affect the brain: too many chromosomes in a pair (ea down)
> Genetic engineering
● Selective breeding
● Cloning
● Transgenic techniques: introducing or extracting genes from an embryo
● Gene modification
H3 Nervous System Organization
3.1 Neuroanatomy
> Describing location in the brain
1.1 The brain theory
● Longitudinal fissure: divides the two hemispheres
● Lateral fissure: divides the two hemispheres into
halves
● Corpus callosum: connects the two hemispheres
1. Frontal lobe: thinking, emotions, personality,
judgment, self-control, muscle control and
movements, memory storage
2. Temporal lobe: processing auditory information and
with the encoding of memory
3. Parietal lobe: management of taste, hearing, sight,
touch, and smell
4. Occipital lobe: visual perception, including color, form,
and motion
1.2 Perspectives on the brain and behavior
> Aristotle’s Mentalism
● Psyche is responsible for thoughts, perceptions, and emotions
● Psyche = mind
● A person’s mind is responsible for behavior
- Psyche is non-material
> Descartes’ Dualism
● Mind is material
● Mind responds mechanically and reflexively
● Mind and body are separate, but can interact = dualism
○ Mind-body problem: how can a non-material mind produce movement in a
material body?
- Animals do not have minds
- Mind develops with language in children
- Mental diseases impair the mind (> lost their minds)
> Darwin’s materialism
● Rational behavior can be explained by the workings of the nervous system
○ No need to refer to the nonmaterial mind
● The nervous systems of living animals are similar for they descend from the same first
nervous system
,1.3 Brain function: insights from brain injury
> Localization of function
= a different, specific brain area controls each kind of behavior
● Fundamentals discovered by Gall (in his research for phrenology)
● Phrenology: map of the mind
○ Gall and Spurzheim
○ Measuring bumps and depressions in the skull to determine a person's
behavioral traits (through a cranioscopy)
○ Unreliable
> Lateralization of the brain
= Certain functions are located on one side of the brain, some on both sides
● Jean Baptiste Bouillaud laid foundation around 1825
● Discovered by Paul Broca
● Broca’s area
○ Anterior speech region
○ Representations of speech movements are stored
○ Damage to the area leads to Broca’s aphasia
● Wernicke’s area
○ Auditory cortex in the temporal lobe
■ Behind Broca’s area
○ Sounds are processed intro auditory images or objects
and stored
○ Wernicke’s aphasia: person can technically speak, but
the words make no sense
- Broca’s aphasia patients have a movement problem, whereas
Wernicke’s aphasia patients have a problem of understanding
- To produce sounds, neural instructions are sent from Broca’s
area to muscles
> Disconnection
= when the fibers between the two speech areas are cut
● Conduction aphasia: speech sounds and movement are retained, but speech is impaired
○ Patients unable to repeat what they heard
● Regions are independent, but must interact in order to work
> Distributed function
● Flourens & Goltz
● Challenged the idea that brain functions are localized
● Created animal models of human clinical cases by removing regions of the cortex
- Discovered: even with the impaired brain, the animals recovered abilities
,> Hierarchical organization
= information is processed serially and organized as a functional hierarchy
● Understanding a function as walking requires understanding what each level of
organization contributes to that behavior
● Multiple memory systems: multiple systems work together for one product
○ Such as memory
○ Neural structures for learning motor skills and those for remembering that one
has those skills are separate
○ The binding problem: how does our brain make “memories” out of so many
sensory events?
> Conscious and unconscious neural streams
● Visual-form agnosia: normal visual acuity, but unable to recognize objects
○ Drawing objects from memory, but not recognizing the drawn object
○ Lesions in ventral stream: visual cortex to temporal lobe (object identification)
● Visual ataxia: normal ability to describe objects, but unable to reach for them
○ Lesions in dorsal stream: visual cortex to parietal lobe (guide action relative to
object)
1.4 The neuron theory
> more in H3
H2 Research on the Origins of the Human Brain and Behavior
2.1 Human origins and the origins of larger brains
> Evolution of the human brain and behavior
1. Australopithecus
a. 3,8 million years ago
2. Homo habilis
a. 2 million years ago
3. Homo erectus
a. 1,6 million years ago
4. Homo sapiens
a. 200.000 years ago
> Why the hominin brain enlarged
● Each new species appeared after a big climate change
○ New climate: different needs for hunting and living > bigger brain
● The bigger the social group, the bigger the brain
● Changes in physiology: more effective cooling in the brain > increase in brain size
● Neoteny: anatomical features link our adults to juvenile stages of other primates
2.2 Comparative research in neuropsychology
> Designing animal models of disorders to manipulate, understand and determine treatment
, > Describing evolutionary adaptations
= phylogeny
2.3 Genes, environment and behavior
> Mendelian genetics and the genetic code
● 23 chromosome pairs of two alleles
○ 22 autosomes and 1 pair of sex chromosomes (XY or XX)
● Homozygous (identical) and heterozygous (different)
● Dominant and recessive alleles
> Applying Mendel's principles
● Recessive inheritance pattern: inheriting two copies of a mutation gene
● Dominant inheritance pattern: inheriting one dominant defective gene leads to mutation
○ See Huntington disease
● Chromosome disorders that affect the brain: too many chromosomes in a pair (ea down)
> Genetic engineering
● Selective breeding
● Cloning
● Transgenic techniques: introducing or extracting genes from an embryo
● Gene modification
H3 Nervous System Organization
3.1 Neuroanatomy
> Describing location in the brain
