Please read chapter 13. After reading the chapter, please respond to the following questions:
Next you will be asked what three things from the chapter that you found interesting?
1a) What did you find interesting?
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
2a) What did you find interesting?
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
3a) What did you find interesting?
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
7b) Why?
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Thanks,
--Dr. M
1a) What did you find interesting?
The first thing I found interesting from Chapter 13 was the receptors for various channels and the attributes to them. The first attribute is the type of stimulation to which the receptor responds. Receptors respond to different stimulus events, such as pressure, vibration, or temperature changes. The second attribute is the size of the receptive field. Receptors are activated when stimulation is applied to a particular area of the body, which constitutes the receptors’ receptive field. The size of the receptive field is the extent of the body area that elicits a receptor response. The third attribution is the rate of adaptation. A fast-adapting receptor responds with bursts of action potentials, first when the stimulus is removed. It doesn’t respond during the steady state between stimulus onset and offset. In contrast, a slowly adapting receptor remains active throughout the period during which the stimulus is in contact with its receptive field. I thought this was interesting because I didn’t know there were such specific attributes for receptors.
2a) What did you find interesting?
I also found thermoreceptors to be interesting. Thermoreceptors are receptors that signals information about changes in skin temperature. Thermoreceptors are located in both the epidermal and dermal layers of the skin that inform us about changes in skin temperature. There are two distinct populations of thermoreceptors. Warmth fibers fire when the temperature of the skin surrounding the fibers rise. Cold fibers fire in response to decreases in skin temperatures. Our bodies are constantly working to regulate their internal temperature so under normal conditions the skin is kept between 30C and 36C, and neither cold nor warmth fibers respond much while skin temperature remains within this range. Theroreceptors also kick into gear when we make contact with an object that is warmer or colder than our skin. Objects in the environment are typically cooler than 30, so it is usually the cold fibers that tell us about the object. I thought this was interesting since in physics we always talked about heat transfer so in a way I thought this was interesting to compare to.
3a) What did you find interesting?
I also found noiciceptors to be interesting. Noiciceptors are sensory receptors that transmit information about noxious stimulation that causes damage or potential damage to the skin. Pain is the realm of touch that has the honor of becoming home to the sensation we like the least. We may find some visual stimuli revolting and some olfactory or gustatory stimuli disgusting, but of all the sensations, it is pain that we take the most drastic action to avoid. Pain begins with signals from the noiciptors, touch receptors that have bare nerve endings and that respond to various forms of tissue damage r to stimuli that have the potential to damage tissue. Noiceptors can divided into two types of their nerve fibers, for which no specialized endings have been found. A-delta fibers respond primarily to strong pressure or hear and are myelinated, so they can conduct signals very rapidly. C fibers are unmyelinated and respond to intense stimulation of various sorts including pressure, heat or cold, or noxious chemicals. Both types of pain fibers are smaller in diameter than those coming from non-nociceptive mechanoreceptors in the skin. The wider-diameter fibers known as type A-beta. Many painful events seem to occur in two stages, a quick sharp burst of pain followed by a throbbing sensation. I thought this was interesting because I didn’t know there were two different types of stages to pain.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
What I found least interesting was the section on somatosensory areas. From the thalamus, much of the touch information is carried up to the cortex into somatosensory area 1, located in the parietal lobe just behind the postcentral gyrus. Somatosensory area 1 is the primary receiving area for touch in the cortex. Neurons in S1 communicate with somatosensory area 2, which lies in the upper bank of the lateral sulcus, and with other cortical areas. The secondary receiving area for touch in the cortex. This lies in the upper bank of the lateral sulcus, and with other cortical areas. The motor areas of the cortex, which control movements of body parts, are located just in front of the central sulcus. The adjacency enhances communication between the somatosensory and motor control systems. I just didn’t find this interesting because it was hard for me to follow and understand.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
I think knowing the basics like kinesthesis will be useful. Kinesthesis is the perception of the position and movement of our limbs in space. Touch is used to refer to the sensations caused by mechanical displacements of the skin. Tactile refers to these mechanical interactions and expands the definition of touch to include perception and temperature changes. The sensation of pain occurs when our body tissues are damaged in some ways, itchiness; and the internal sensations that inform us of the positions and movements of our limbs in space. Collectively, these internal sensations are known as kinesthesis when they arise from muscles, tendons, and joints. I think it’s useful to know these terms to build on the rest of the chapter.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
This chapter builds on the rest of the chapters by talking about touch. The previous chapters were more about seeing and hearing. This chapter moves on to talking about touch. It’s a different subject now but expands the learning on sensation and perception. It still has to do with how we perceive and understand the world.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
I would like to learn more about thermoreceptors. Thermoreceptors are receptors that signals information about changes in skin temperature. Thermoreceptors are located in both the epidermal and dermal layers of the skin that inform us about changes in skin temperature. There are two distinct populations of thermoreceptors. Warmth fibers fire when the temperature of the skin surrounding the fibers rise. Cold fibers fire in response to decreases in skin temperatures. Our bodies are constantly working to regulate their internal temperature, and neither cold nor warmth fibers respond much while skin temperature remains within this range. Theroreceptors also kick into gear when we make contact with an object that is warmer or colder than our skin. I think this topic is interesting and I’d like to learn more about it.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
Since I took physics in high school I thought about heat transfer since some of this chapter mentioned how pain and heat works. I thought about how heat moves from the hotter object to the cooler object and how this chapter mentioned theroreceptors that is the sensation we feel when we touch heat. So I just generally put those concepts together. Otherwise I just generally thought about the interesting concepts in the chapter that describe touch and the perception of it.
Terms: Touch, channels, attributes, stimulation, receptor, stimulus, pressure, vibration, temperature, receptive field, elicits, rate, fast-adapting, onset, offset, adapting, active, thermoreceptors, epidermal, dermal layers, skin, warmth fibers, cold fibers, decrease, environment, noiciceptors, sensory receprots, transmit, noxious, damage, potential, pain, sensation, olfactory, gustatory, nerve endings, tissue, myelinate, hear, c-fibers, unmyelinated, intense, chemicals, wider-diameter fibers, type A-beta, throbbing, somatosensory area, thalamus, cortex, somatosensory area 1, parietal lobe, postcentral gyrus, somatosensory area 2, lateral sulcus, adjacency, motor control, kinesthesis, perception, mechanical interaction, tissue, itchiness, limbs, muscles, tendons, joints.
The section about thermoreceptors was the first topic I found interesting. The thermoreceptors signal information about changes in temperature. We have warm fibers and cold fibers that fire up when the temperature increases or decreases respectively. There a lot more of the cold fibers than the warm fibers. This aids in the bodies attempt to maintain our normal body temperature of 96 degrees. They also kick in when our skin touches something cold or warm, these things are normally less than the 96 degrees so it is normally the cold fibers that are at work. It was interesting to me because I had not considered exactly how the body attempts to maintain homeostasis in its entirety.
The second part I found interesting was the section that discussed phantom limb. This is the sensation perceived from a physically amputated limb of the body. I had heard of this before but I had never really understood how this happens. The homunculus is a kind of map representation of the regions of the body in the brain. When a limb for example is amputated the limb no longer sends those messages but the mapped area that controls those sensations may have sporadic activity causing the person to feel sensations. Some can feel very specific like the limb is in an awkward position and therefore it is very painful, sometimes it may just be a tingling feeling.
Finally the section about tactile agnosia was
interesting because it is different. The condition is caused by lesions on the parietal lobe. In these cases the condition makes identifying objects by touch impossible. It is interesting that because of how the brain operates a person could have this condition on one side and not the other. If an individual has lesions on the right side of the parietal lobe then the ability would be lost in the left hand. Although sufferers may not be able to identify an object they usually can tell the weight differences and roughness. I thought it was also interesting how they could also use previous experiences to make judgements when the sense of touch was lacking.
The section dealing with levels of pain and the anterior cingulate cortex which is the area of the brain associated with pain sensation would probably be my least favorite section. There were parts that were interesting but getting into t values and threshold levels gets a bit on the mundane. Although it is interesting how doctors are able to see which areas of the brain are affected and how these areas communicate.
The chapter is about touch, which is one of our five basic senses. Understanding how we process touch and how this aids with other senses helps to understand our perceptions about various things.
This chapter builds onto another of the senses, we have discussed sight, hearing and now touch just adds another element in how we physically perceive the world around us.
I would like to learn more about phantom pain. I think it is interesting how something no longer there can still have a sensation in the brain.
I really thought about how all of our senses work together. That when one sense is in deficit it really affects our ease of living.
Terms: thermoreceptors, warm fibers, cold fibers, phantom limb, sensation, perceived, homunculus, tactile agnosia, parietal lobe, anterior cingulate cortex, pain sensation
1a) From Skin to Brain
1b) I have always thought that the way that are brain senses touch is fascinating. The author explained that the initial touch messages that are felt in the muscles and skin of the feet need to travel a very long distance to get to the brain. To travel the distance faster, the spinal cord is used. There are two pathways that are used to carry information from the spinal cord. The first is the spinothalamic pathway. This is primarily used to carry information about skin temperature and pain. The second pathway is called the dorsal column-medial lemniscal pathway. This carries information from the spinal cord to the brain about skin, muscles, tendons, and joints.
2a) Analgesia
2b) Analgesia is the act of decreasing the sensation of pain while one is still in the conscious experience. From what I understood, examples of this can be things like minor pain killers like Advil or Tylenol. It can also be than anticipation that something will work which is very similar to the idea of the placebo effect. Religious beliefs, having dealt with it before, or excitement can also dampen the pain as well. I found this interesting because we can trick our brains to do a lot of different things, and it is always just really amazing to me that we have the power to alter our conscious experiences like that.
3a) Hyperalgesia
3b) The opposite of analgesia is hyperalgesia. This is a heightened awareness of pain in a specific spot. One would normally feel pain when presented with the stimulus, but this in this state, one is simply more aware of the pain inducing stimulus. The easiest way that I could describe it so that I understood it was the saying of “pouring salt into a wound.” You are aware of the wound that is there, but when some outside stimulus comes into the wound it makes you more aware of its presence.
4a) Touch physiology
4b) Learning about the different parts of touch and how it works was a little interesting but it was the least interesting thing to me in the chapter. I am not a huge fan of learning about different parts of the body and how things work. I am more interested into the information that comes after that learning process (the why?).
5) I think that most helpful thing in our study of sensation and perception from this chapter would have to be the parts about the touch receptors. Learning about all the different parts and how they work will help us understand touch better later on.
6) This is kind of a new topic in sensation and perception for us this semester. We have talked about sight and hearing but we have not really covered touch yet. The only thing that I can think of would be when we talked about thresholds.
7a) Analgesia
7b) This topic was really interesting to me and I would like to learn more about it.
8) When reading about hyperalgesia and analgesia I thought about the movie Major Payne. There is a scene at the very beginning of the movie where he is talking to one of the soldiers that has just been hurt. He asks him if he wants something to take his mind off the pain. The soldier is of course desperate and says yes to which Payne replies with the act of causing more pain to “take his mind” off the pain he was experiencing. Not quite the right idea, but close enough, I suppose.
9) Key terms: skin, brain, touch, touch messages, spinal cord, spinothalamic pathway, dorsal column-medial lemniscal pathway, analgesia, sensation, conscious experience, hyperalgesia, awareness, stimulus, touch physiology, touch receptors, thresholds
1) I found the part about Ian Waterman interesting. This part of the chapter was discussing the importance of the kinesthetic receptors. Ian’s cutaneous nerves that connect his kinesthetic and mechanoreceptors to his brain were destroyed by a viral infection. This leaves him unable to determine the position of his limbs in space unless he has a visual of them. This was interesting to me because you really don’t think about that sort of thing in every day life. We take for granted that those receptors are functioning, and that we don’t have to keep track of where our limbs are.
2) I also found the discussion of a-delta fibers and c-fibers interesting. The part I found most interesting was the part discussing how most people experience pain as a brief sharp sensation followed by a throbbing. This may be due to the onset of signals from the a-delta fibers (early/fast response) and then the c-fibers (delayed response). I thought this was important to understanding how and why we feel pain the way that we do.
3) Along with the discussion of pain fibers, I found the part about endogenous opiates interesting. This is the delay of the feeling of pain until the stress of a situation is eliminated. The endogenous opiates are chemicals that block the uptake and release of neurotransmitters that would transmit pain signals.
4) I didn’t totally understand the part about the spinothalamic and dorsal-column medial lemnical pathway, so they were the least interesting to me. I understood that these are two different pathways that information from the thermoreceptors and nocieptors.
5) I think knowing how we perceive things and that there are different kinds of receptors placed throughout the skin is important. I also thought haptic perception was important because it indicates how we explore and perceive things.
6) This chapter further elaborates how we are able to perceive the world around us. It also emphasizes the importance of vision along with touch. This indicates that our body uses all of its senses to make sense of the world, not just one. This also means our bodies are rather elastic when it comes to compensating for lost senses. With the kinesthetic loss in the patient from this chapter, his vision was able to replace the function of his fibers and so he was still able to walk and do activities.
7) I would like to know more about tactile agnosia, or pain moderation. Especially more about endogenous opiates. I want to learn more about these because I think it would be interesting to know what it’s like not to be able to identify things, or about how our bodies cope with stress.
8) When it was discussing endogenous opiates it reminded me of when I broke a disc my spine. I didn’t feel the pain for about two days! This chapter also made me think about clumsy people and if maybe some people have a worse sense of kinesthetic system than others, that creates their clumsy nature.
9) endogeneous opiates, tactile agnosia, pain moderation, vision, touch, kinesthetic receptors, cutaneous nerves, mechanoreceptors, a-delta fibers and c-fibers,
1a) The first thing that I found interesting was the section about the skin and its tactile receptors. When we sense vision, auditiory, olfaction, and gustation we are all using equipment in organs (eyes, ears, mouth) that are more or less dedicated to sensory processing. The touch that humans use is housed in the largest and heaviest of the sense organs the skin which is approximately 1.8 square meters and weighs about 4 kilograms. Touch receptors are embedded all over the body in both hair and hairless as well as within our mouth muscles tendons and joints. These tactile receptors are called epidermis which is the outer layer of skin and the dermis which is the inner layer of skin. These receptors form the basis for multiple “channels” specialized information-processing that contribute to the overall sense of touch.
1b) I found this section to be interesting more for the fact that I have never really thought about how touch is actually perceived from all parts of the body that is covered in skin. I guess i have thought about our hands being a big part to the touch receptors but never really thought about how we can feel things around us by what the rest of our body is touching at this very moment.
2a) The second section that I found interesting was the section about from the skin to brain. because the receptors for sight, sound, taste, and smells are all located in the skull the pathways that deliver the signals are fairly short. Touch messages on the other hand must travel as far as 2 meters to get to the brain. The information moves up through the spinal cord, the axons of various tactile receptors are combined into single nerve trunks. Once the information enters the spinal cord it is then processed into two major pathways. The spinothalamic pathway is the slower of the two and carries most of the information from thermoreceptors and nociceptors. The dorsal column-medial lemniscal pathway is wider-diameter axons and fewer synapses therefore conveys information more quickly to the brain. This section is used for planning and executing as it requires quick feedback.
2b) This section was interesting to be because I am always interested in how information is processed and how the brain is able to catch all of these signal. I also found it very interesting to learn that our touch receptors send information up through the spinal cord. I think that it is interesting and still often wonder how someone even thought to do research on this information. Like the very first person.
3a) The third section that I found interesting was the section about pain sensitization. Nociceptors provide a signal when there is impending or ongoing damage to the body’s tissue which is called nociceptive pain. Once there is damage the site can become more sensitive, triggering the feeling of pain more readily than before. This experience is called hyperalgesia which is the heightened response to a normally painful stimulus. The resulting pain is called inflammatory and the heightened pain sensitivity usually goes away once the tissue heals.
3b) This was particularly interesting to me because when I tore my meniscus in 8th grade I had experienced this. I was unaware of what was going on at the time I just realized that the sensitivity to the pain became worse and as my knee had more inflammation in it the more susceptible to pain I was.
4)The section of the chapter that I found to be less interesting to me was the section over tactile sensitivity and acuity. This section was just particularly boring for me to read and I didn’t find much interest with the information. I often found myself having to re-read the information more than one time and still was not comprehending what I was reading.
5) I think that the most important part of this chapter that will relate to sensation and perception will just be the basic definitions and understanding how the sense of touch really works in comparison to our bodies. As we look further into the sense I think that knowing the basic definitions as to how touch works will be one of the most important tools that we can have.
6) This chapter builds on from the previous chapters as it starts to introduce a new sense of touch. As we have went through sound, sight and now we started to be introduced to touch.
7) This week I would like to look further into disability/disorders that have to do with touch. I think that this would be particularly interesting because I work with someone who has a disorder that affects touch and would like to know more about the different disabilities that are out there that are associated with touch.
8)While reading this chapter I found myself stopping to think about the different things that I could feel my body touching. Like the socks on my feet, my pants on my legs, my bottom in the chair, my shirt on my back, and my arms resting on the book while reading. It was just interesting to stop and think about all the things that you are able to feel your body doing just by thinking about your different touch receptors.
9) Terms: tactile receptors, vision, auditory, olfaction, gustation, sensory processing, sense organ, touch receptors, epidermis, dermis, axons, single nerve, spinothalamic pathway, thermoreceptors, nociceptors, dorsal column-medial lemniscal pathway, pain sensitization, Nociceptors, nociceptive pain, hyperalgesia, inflammatory, sensitivity, acuity.
1. I found it interesting that the sense of touch can produce a number of different sensory experiences. Unlike sound or sight, which only elicit certain sensory experiences, tactile receptors are able to perceive and respond to vibration, pressure, temperature, and noxious stimulation. Furthermore, kinaesthetic system can also contribute to our sense of touch through sensing the limb position and the movement of our limbs in space. What I found the most interesting in regard of this introduction to touch is that emotional touch is another specialized sensory that we perceive. I found the wide variety of sensory experiences produced by touch along fascinating because I had never thought of the sense of tough that way – perhaps because this sense is often taken for granted due to the vast information that our tactile receptors receive on a daily basis.
2. I also found the differences of pressure-sensitive receptors between hairless skin and hary skin interesting. There are four classes of mechanoreptor for hairless skin: SA I, SA II, FA I, and FA II; these receptors are responsible for texture perception and patter detection, finger position and stable grasp, vibration detection in lower frequency and vibration detection in higher frequency, respectively. I found this interesting because the textbook compares these receptors with the rods, cones, and haircell. This makes things a lot easier to understand since I am familiar with the other sensory receptors, and by connecting similar terms and physiological functions together, it makes learning a lot more interesting. I also found this interesting because I thought touch was perceived by skin, and only skin. I though the skin was acting as a receptor itself and transfer information back to the brain without other little helpers.
3. Then, just as any other senses that I have learned in this textbook, I found disorders and inabilities to do something interesting because I believe it can aid my understanding of normal functioning sensory perception. Tactile agnosia is what I found interesting in this chapter. It is the inability to identify objects by touch, and it can be caused by lesions in the parietal lobe. This disorder is less crippling than the other ones we have learned about, because if you can’t tell by touch, you can always look at it (unless you are unfortunate enough to suffer from both tactile agnosia and visual agnosia, then that’s pretty bad).
4. This chapter is relatively friendlier to me than the other chapters. Although the first few sections about physiological the touch was confusing and unpleasant to read because I am not very smart when it comes to the anatomy of the human body (especially when it is so small that I cannot visualize it even with the help of diagrams), it was tolerable and I understood enough to get by.
5. I believe that the most important concept in this chapter is how tactile receptors send touch messages to the brain. Sight, sound, taste, and smell are relatively closer to the skull than touch. A touch message from the feet has to travel two meters in some cases before it gets to the brain. By understanding how the touch message is sent to the brain and how the brain process the message, we will be able to understand how we perceive touch as we know it.
6. This chapter is about touch and it is very different from the previous one, but it builds on the previous ones through discussions regarding sight and sound in comparison to touch, which is also the one factor that makes this chapter friendlier than the previous chapters.
7. I want to know more about the perception of pain and the different levels of pain. The textbook mentioned gate control theory which I found very interesting. I want to know how the trait that has aided humans’ survival in the mother-nature works, and how it shapes the world around us.
8. I thought about varies things regarding touch. The inability to perceive pain (congenital insensitivity to pain), how touch elicits certain emotional responses, and how the sense of touch shapes our daily lives. I have a friend who suffers from CIPA and she has to do a full body check up every four hours throughout her day just to make sure that nothing is broken and that she is not hurt or sick.
9. congenital insensitivity to pain, elicit, responses, touch, sight, sound, taste, smell, physiology, gate control theory, tactile receptors, tactile agnosia, visual receptors, mechanoreceptor, vibration, temperature, pressure, noxious stimulation.
1a) The first thing I found interesting was the skin and tactile receptors.
1b) There are three classifications of the traits of tactile receptors in both the epidermis (outer layer of skin) and the dermis (underlying layer of skin). Also referred to as mechanoreceptors, these receptors are grouped together based on what kind of stimulation the receptor responds to, how large the receptive field is, and the rate of adaptation in the receptor. I find this interesting because the fact that there are several ways to show how tactile receptors are classified, shows that touch is a complex method of sensation. There are many types of receptors, each made to sense a specific tactile event.
2a) The next thing I found interesting was nociceptors.
2b) Nociceptors are a type of sensory receptor that transmits information about damage and potential damage in the form of pain. These are touch receptors with bare nerve endings, and they are also where the process of feeling tactile pain begins. I am interested in this because I want to do my final paper on an object that is incredibly displeasing. This requires me to have knowledge of what makes things painful or displeasing. Therefore, nociceptors are a very useful topic to understand and learn about.
3a) The next thing I found interesting was the concept of phantom limb.
3b) Phantom limb occurs as a side effect of the strong association between body parts and their corresponding area of the Somatosensory Area 1 (S1) portion of the brain, according to Penfield’s somatotopic map. When a limb goes missing, there is still a portion of the brain devoted to that limb. Occasionally there will be sporadic brain activity, giving the impression of a limb, which is no longer there. I find this incredibly interesting because I have known about this phenomenon for as long as I can remember. However, I have never known exactly why it occurs. This information was incredibly fascinating because I no longer find the concept of feeling a non-existent limb completely mind-boggling.
4a) The one thing I did not find interesting was the two-point touch threshold.
4b) Two-point touch threshold is defined as the minimum distance between two stimuli where the stimuli are recognizable as separate stimuli. I did not find this interesting because it simply does not matter much to me. While I am sure this number is important to some, I cannot find a reason for myself to understand the significance of such a number.
5) I think the most useful part of this chapter in understanding sensation and perception was the operational definition of touch. Touch, at the most basic level, refers to the displacement of tissue by a mechanical force. This mechanical level of touch is called tactile touch. Touch in general, can also include sensation of temperature changes, itchiness, pain, and sensations forming internally that let us know how we are positioned in the world around us. This definition of touch is called kinesthesis. Knowing about kinesthesis gives us a base upon which to learn about the rest of the inner workings of the sense of touch.
6) This builds on previous chapters because it moves on to another one of our senses. In this chapter we learn about the basics of touch and why it is important to our survival as humans. We also learned about its connections to the vestibular system, which was discussed in the previous chapter. Both kinesthesis and touch combine to form proprioception.
7a) I would like to learn more about tactile agnosia.
7b) I would like to learn more about this because disorders or problems with our bodies interest me a great deal. Studying them has always helped me to better understand how a properly functioning system runs. I would like to know more about what enables us to identify objects by touch. Therefore, studying why we may not be able to do this will help me learn.
8) I thought a lot about how I cannot feel things after having touched them for a while. Being desensitized to stimuli because you are accustomed to them happens a great deal. I do not feel the booth I am sitting on until I think about it. I am mildly curious to learning about why this happens. I could not find anything about this in the book, and I think it would be interesting to learn more about this.
Terms: epidermis; dermis; tactile receptors; touch; sensation; receptive field; stimulation; rate of adaptation; mechanoreceptors; nociceptors. Phantom limb; somatosensory area; somatotopic map; two-point touch threshold; stimuli; kinesthesis; proprioception; vestibular; desensitized; tactile agnosia
1a) What did you find interesting?
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
The first thing I found to be interesting was the broad definition given in the term "touch" touch is used to refer to the sensation caused by mechanical displacements of the skin. I find this interesting because I know that the chapter is going to go more in depth on touch and that this is just the basic and beginning of the process. Touch is the sensation that often means the most to us, it is how we express emotion, how we show we love someone, how we make someone feel appreciated, and sometimes how we show anger in certain situations.
2a) What did you find interesting?
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
The next thing I found to be interesting in this chapter were thermoreceptors which are located in both the epidermal and dermal layers of the skin they inform us about changes in skin temperature. There were two different kinds of thermoreceptors discussed in chapter 13; warmth fibers fire when the temperature of the skin surrounding the fibers rises. And Cold fibers fire in response to decrease in skin temperature. I found this interesting because I know how important it is to keep our bodies at the correct temperature. This is necessary and vital for our bodies to function successfully.
3a) What did you find interesting?
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
The third thing I found interesting and probably the most interesting would be the levels of pain our body can experience. Pain sensations are triggered by the nociceptors. Neurons carrying nociceptive signals arrive at the spinal cord in an area called the substantia gelatinosa of the dorsal horn. Neurons there recieve information from the brain, and they form synapses with the neurons that are conveying sensory information from nociceptors to the brain. Bottom up pain signals from the nociceptors can be blocked via a feedback circut also located in the dorsal horn. I find this interesting because we all experience pain and most of us don't enjoy it. There were studies that supported that we can control how much pain we feel. Much of it is often in our minds and when we assume pain to be much worse than it actually it we actually feel the pain as worse than it is. This is something that could be a very powerful discovery if we learn how to use it correctly.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
I found Haptic Perception to be not as interesting as some of the other forms of touch explained. Haptic perception refers to perceptual processing of inputs from multiple sensory subsystems, including those in skin, muscles, tendons, and joints. I found this to be less interesting because it wasn't explained as well and I'm not entirely clear on what exactly this is.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
I think all of this chapter is vital in understanding sensation and perception. The idea of touch is arguably the most important sensation we can experience. Touch for me has always been a sensation that can make me feel an abundance of emotions and how you perceive each touch can interpret how you will feel from each touch you receive or place.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
The chapter builds on the previous chapters because it is moving on to the next important sense and how we experience it. Reminding us of each specific sense and how detailed and in depth they really are. We often don't realize all that being able to experience touch entails but after reading this we are more knowledgeable in the process of touch and how complex it truly is to experience the sensation.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
7b) Why?
Pleasant touch is something I would like to learn more about, we know of the traditional way of classifying different bodily sensations; is in terms of tactile, thermal, pain, and itch experiences.However, recently pleasant or emotional touch has been added to those forms of touch sensation. hey argue that the emotional properties of non painful bodily touch are mediated in large part by a class of unmyelinated peripheral C fibers known as C tactile afferents that are not related to either pain or itch. Pleasant touch tends to refer to mechanical stimulation in the form of slowly moving, lightly applied forces. Pleasant touch is processed in different parts of the brain than other touches. I find this interesting because pleasant touch is probably my along with everyone else's favorite form of touch. It is the touch that for me, holds the most emotion and sensation and I find that to be important.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I related parts of the reading to touch experiences I personal can recall that had a lot of meaning. I can remember hurtful touch from fighting with my sister when we were teenagers once, I can remember pleasureful touch from my boyfriend when he plays with my hair before I fall asleep. Touch is a sensation that can bring back memories for some and while reading this chapter I tried to recall specific touches that remain close to me and can force to me recall certain experiences in my lifetime.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Sensation, perception, touch, pain, painful touch, pleasure, pain moderation, vision, hearing, c-fibers, pain sensitization, thermorecptors, warm fibers, cold fibers, haptic perception.
1a) The first interesting thing I came across in this chapter was on spatial orientation which is the sense consisting of three interacting sensory modulators. These are the senses of linear motion, tilt, and angular motion.
1b) This was interesting because it is the result of vestibular organs working together to make our perception of gravity apparent otherwise we all would be stumbling around all the time. We also know that babies must develop this over time for it is not something that we are automatically born with; also like riding a bike it takes practice to get the balance down.
2a) The second thing in this chapter that I found interesting was on the otolith organs which are either of two mechanical structures in the vestibular system that sense linear acceleration and gravity. The two structures are utricle and saccule.
2b) It was interesting to me to find out this is what contributes to our head tilt. I never really thought about what cause this and makes us so we do not fall over. Also since I have ridden on a lot of airplanes and trains it made since to me to recall these experiences and relate them to what I was reading.
3a) A third thing that I found interesting in this chapter was a part on Hair cells which is any cell that has stereocillia for transducing mechanical movement in the inner ear into neural activity sent to the brain. Some of these hair cells also receive inputs from the brain.
3b) This was interesting to read about because a few chapters back I had done some research on the inner ear so I was already familiar with the areas in which the chapter was referring to.
4a) There really was not too much that was not interesting in this chapter, but if I had to choose it would have been the two pages dedicated to showing the different types of head tilt.
4b) This was not very interesting because I felt like I already had a good grasp on the concept so I felt as though all these images were kind of an overkill in this particular topic.
5) I believe the most useful piece of knowledge from this chapter that can help people understand sensation and perception would be in the area of tilt. This helps explain how we are able to balance ourselves on moving objects as well as being able to detect when something goes wrong with our stabilizing system.
6) As briefly mentioned above, there were a few sections that built on the previously learned inner ear portion that was from chapter nine in our book. They went more in depth on how messages are received and transport to the brain via the ear. We also had tough on spatial orientation in the last chapter and this chapter was able to build off that and explain how the different mechanisms work together.
7a) I would like to learn more about vertigo.
7b) I do not know much about this topic and I would like to know further as to what can cause it and if it can happen to anyone at any time.
8) While reading this chapter I thought a lot about my current spatial orientation and how I am currently sitting while I read and type. My body if slightly tilted while sitting on a couch, but because of my vestibular organs and spatial orientation I can still work without feeling nauseous or dizzy also sometimes referred to as vertigo. This tells me that my body is functioning properly.
9) Terms: Spatial orientation, tilt, vertigo, inner ear, hair cells, sensory modulators, linear motion, angular motion, vestibular organs, otolith organs, utricle, and saccule
1. The first concept from chapter 13 that I found interesting was the concept of phantom limbs. Phantom pain is pain that feels like it's coming from a body part that's no longer there. Doctors once believed this post-amputation phenomenon was a psychological problem, but experts now recognize that these real sensations originate in the spinal cord and brain. Although phantom pain occurs most often in people who've had an arm or leg removed, the disorder may also occur after surgeries to remove other body parts, such as the breast, penis, eye or tongue. I find this interesting because I have seen many shows/movies where this has been talked about. I also know a person who no longer has a limb and they say that sometimes it is like it is still there. I have always wanted to learn about this but I guess I never took the opportunity to.
2. The second concept from chapter 13 that I found to be interesting was the placebo effect. A placebo effect is a decreasing pain sensation when people think they’re taking an analgesic drug but actually are not. It could be a pill, a shot, or some other type of "fake" treatment. What all placebos have in common is that they do not contain an active substance meant to affect health. Researchers use placebos during studies to help them understand what effect a new drug or some other treatment might have on a particular condition. Researchers then compare the effects of the drug and the placebo on the people in the study. That way, they can determine the effectiveness of the new drug and check for side effects. Sometimes a person can have a response to a placebo. The response can be positive or negative. For instance, the person's symptoms may improve. Or the person may have what appears to be a side effect from the treatment. These responses are known as the "placebo effect." I have always found this concept to be extremely interesting. I have studied this in multiple psychology classes and every single time I have found more and more to be interested in.
3. The third concept that I found interesting was tactile agnosia. Tactile agnosia is the inability to identify objects by touch. Agnosia usually affects only a single information pathway in the brain. The weight and texture of an object may be perceived, but the person can neither describe it by name nor comprehend its significance or meaning. Tactile agnosia is caused by lesions in the brain’s parietal lobe. Although I did not find a lot of information on this, I still want to research it further and find out more about it. This is interesting to me because it would be interesting to talk to someone with this disorder and see what it is like and how they cope with this condition.
4. The section that I found the least interesting was the section at the beginning about touch physiology. This wasn’t very interesting to me because I did not fully understand all of the terms that related to this section. There were many terms talking about the body and the brain and I did not catch on as easily as I did the rest of the chapter. I also had to reread some of the information just to process it a little easier. I understand the other parts of the chapter better than this section.
5. Although I did not find this section interesting, I believe the most important part of this chapter that relates to understanding sensation and perception is the section on tactile receptors and how they send touch messages to the brain. I also think it is important to understand just the basic terms from this chapter because it all relates to sensation and perception in one way or another. By understanding how different messages are sent to the brain and how the brain then processes the information it is one step closer in understanding sensation and perception.
6. Chapter 13 builds on the other chapters in our textbook by talking about the concept of touch. In the previous chapters, we have discussed sensation and perception through vision and hearing and now we have added in the concept of touch. Although it is a different subject, it expands on our learning of sensation and perception and it still has to do with how we perceive the world.
7. I would like to learn more about the placebo effect. Although I have learned a lot about it already I want to read different experiments and research about it and learn more about the research behind it.
8. When reading about phantom limbs all I could think about was Grey’s Anatomy and the episode where Arizona goes through this state and believes that her leg is still there when it really had to be amputate a while back. Also, when I read about the placebo effect, I thought about the movie Side Effects and how one of the main characters was given this placebo and they found her to be lying.
9. Terms: Sensation, perception, phantom limb, placebo effect, tactile agnosia, receptor, touch physiology, touch messages, brain, analgesic drug, lesions, parietal lobe.
1A) Kinesthesis
1B) This was interesting to me because I have always heard of the work Kinesthesis and now I get to learn a little about it and what it is.
2A) Levels of pain
2B) I have always been interested in Pain and how we deal with it. especially how different people handle pain different and the levels they are able to handle.
3A) analgesia
3B) this interest me because it describes how pain decreases
4A) the location of different parts of the body.
4B) I wasn't as interested in all the fibers and different kinds of skin in the body. the actually biology of it all.
5) I think understanding how pain works is one of the most important parts. Due to pain has almsot everything to deal with sensation and preception.
6) this chapter relastes back to other chapters because if connects differnt parts and nurons to each other and how they comunicate and work when it comes to touch and pain.
7) I would really like to learn more about how differnt people react to pain
8) I thought about the tv show touch. and how differnt people react to touch in so many differnt ways.
FOR WEDNESDAY
For this week’s topical blog I am going to do research on congenital insensitivity to pain, or CIPA. This is relatable to class because it is an inability to perceive pain, and this week’s topic is on tactile receptors and touch. I am interested in this topic because I knew of a girl who suffered from this, and she had to check herself every couples of hours to make sure that she did not break a bone or cut herself open. I heard a story of her chewing on her fingers so hard that she was chewing on her bones when she was younger. She could not speak very clearly because she bit off her tongue as a toddler. She did not stay at my school for long before my school decided that it was too much liability having a special need child. I want to know more about the disorder because I want to know how CIPA affect the lives of the sufferers, and that I believe that abnormalities will aid my understanding of normalities.
CONGENITAL INSENSITIVITY TO PAIN (CIPA)
CIPA is a form of peripheral neuropathy as it affects the peripheral nervous system that connects the brain and spinal cord to muscles and cells that detect sensations like touch, smell, and pain. It is a condition hindering sufferer’s ability to perceive physical pain. People do not develop this disorder throughout life, as affected individuals are born with this disorder at birth. They cannot perceive any physical pain in any part of their body when injured, but they can perceive other tactile sensory experiences such as changes in temperatures and pressure. For example, they will not feel the burn on their tongue when they down a cup of hot coffee. This lack of pain awareness cause them many injuries and wounds. Young children may not be able to consciously stop chewing or biting on themselves because they do not perceive pain; burns may also be prevalent because they are not afraid of getting hurt by hot surface. Reduced life expectancy is often the result of these injuries. Some affected individuals also suffer from anosmia, as in a complete loss of the sense of smell.
There are different causes of this condition. An increased production of endorphins in the brain can bring on CIPA, so anything that can decrease the overproduction of endorphins can reduce this symptom. In the majority of the cases, affected individuals suffer from mutations and often times they also lack other neuropathies. Normally, the nervous system includes the brain, cranial nerves, spinal cord, spinal nerves, and more. The spine carries the messages to the brain. The peripheral nerves are the ones responsible to perceive pain, they reside in receptors that sense touch, pressure, and temperature, some reside in nociceptors. When the peripheral nerves fail to function normally, people fail to perceive painful stimulation and thus fail to learn danger. Parents of affected children often care for their children using goggles, helmets, and other means to cover their children up for protection. This disorder may also cause arthritis and growth defects. A branch of CIPA with anhidrosis is an even rare condition which is characterised by the absence of reactions to noxious stimuli, self-mutilating behaviours, inability to sweat, and mental retardation.
CIPA affected individuals often face many hardships in life. Since they are unable to perceive pain, they always have a hard time detecting injuries or internal abnormalities. Since they do not have a pain awareness, they are not able to learn to avoid certain actions that may cause them injuries. Other people may notice their injuries before they do. Internal injuries are tricky because they may not realize that until it was too late. There are many reported cases of CIPA where individuals are not able to protect themselves and have to rely on others and tools to keep themselves from danger. Younger children may also have a hard time knowing when they need to go to the bathroom, making it hard to potty train them. Fractures and broken bones often go unnoticed. Due to the accumulation of wounds and injuries, CIPA people are more likely to face reduced join functions, amputation or paralysis. Being daring and adventurous can be fun, but not so if they are not able to seek help when severely injured.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human-brain/cipa2.htmhttp://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human-brain/cipa.htm
http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/congenital-insensitivity-to-pain
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18713585
http://www.hindawi.com/journals/crinm/2014/141953/
http://www.omim.org/entry/256800
http://www.hkjpaed.org/pdf/2010;15;234-237.pdf
http://hmg.oxfordjournals.org/content/10/3/179.full
I found phantom pain interesting; it is pain that feels like it's coming from a body part that's no longer there. Doctors once believed this post-amputation phenomenon was a psychological problem, but experts now recognize that these real sensations originate in the spinal cord and brain. Although phantom pain occurs most often in people who've had an arm or leg removed, the disorder may also occur after surgeries to remove other body parts, such as the breast, penis, eye or tongue. I’ve heard about it on different shows and what not, so just thought it was interesting.
Spatial orientation is also interesting; it is the sense consisting of three interacting sensory modulators. It includes senses of linear motion, tilt, and angular motion. I liked it because it is the result of vestibular organs working together to make our perception of gravity apparent, didn’t think it had to be processes for us to feel it and understand it.
Receptors for various channels. Receptors respond to different stimulus events, like pressure, or temperature. Receptors are also activated when stimulation is applied to a part of the body. The size of the receptive field is the extent of the body area that elicits a receptor response. A fast-adapting receptor responds with action potential. I thought this was interesting because I didn’t know there were specific receptors, thought it just worked as one.
The one thing I did not find interesting was the two-point touch threshold. This was discussed in a previous chapter, nothing new.
Touch receptors are important to our understanding of sensation and perception. Learning about all the different parts and how they work will help us understand touch better later on.
The chapter builds on our next sense, touch. We’ve gone through sound and sight.
I would like to learn about tactile agnosia. Saw it on tv a lot, never went too much into it, I know what it is, but just knowing its background and why it happens and so on.
Terms: tactile receptors; touch; sensation; receptive field; stimulation; rate of adaptation; mechanoreceptors; nociceptors. Phantom limb; somatosensory area; two-point touch threshold; stimuli; proprioception; vestibular; desensitized; tactile agnosia
(1ab) I found interesting the subject of this chapter, somatosensation (the “body senses”). It was interesting to me because it provided a conglomeration of different sensory systems and their responsibilities. The body senses detect damage or potential damage to our bodily tissues (pain). They also can determine the position of our body parts and where our muscles are moving (kinesthesis). Sensing temperature changes is also a fundamental function. Along with feeling deformations, low and high frequency vibrations, and sustained pressure on our skin, the sensations commonly referred to by the generic word touch!
(2ab) The overall psychological study of touch was also very interesting to me. It was interesting because it provided usefulness in a number of different applications. For example, haptic virtual touch environments that transmit forces to the touch receptors can provide a basis for training people to perform remote operations like surgery. We can convey the illusion of touched objects over the internet which in turn will help us in the future to come.
(3ab) The topic of phantom limbs also was interesting to me. It is interesting to me because people who have had limbs amputated often “feel” sensations coming from the missing limbs, this phenomenon is known as “phantom limbs.” Its very interesting because these illusory sensations often include very real pain. The phantom limb may provide a feeling of stabbing or shooting pains, or the phantom limb could be perceived to be in an uncomfortable position.
(4ab) The two point threshold was not interesting to me. It was not interesting to me because the paperclip example didn’t impress me. The sensation of the paperclip having two ends on the thumb is known, but when you take the two ends on your wrist you can only feel one. This wasn’t interesting to me because it said if you can still feel two ends on your wrist pull it closer together. Well obviously when you pull those two points together it should act as one because they are so close together!
(5) My understanding of sensation and perception was further developed when the book described that touch is used to refer sensations caused by mechanical displacements of the skin.
(6) Previous chapters broke down the perceptual systems for vision and hearing. This chapter just goes on to break down and answer questions related to another sense, which in this chapter is touch.
(7ab) I would like to learn more about phantom limbs. The reason being is that I would like to further examine that if the patient or amputtee is experiencing phantom limbs, if he or she would get a positive benefit upon obtaining a prosthetic limb where the phantom limb is being experienced.
(8) While reading the chapter, the topic of phantom limbs really got me thinking and also got me emotional. The poor military members who have fought hard for our country have experienced sometimes certain hardships as a cost of war. On top of PTSD, family problems, a hard real life adjustment, and other post war or military service problems. Soldiers sometimes lose a limb or have to get a certain part of the body amputated. As if all their problems weren’t enough as it is, some go on to feel pain in the missing limb thanks to the phantom limb theory. It just painted another picture of how hard some military service members have had it and sometimes it just doesn’t get better.
(9) Terms: kinesthesis, somatosensation, touch, phantom limb, tow-point touch threshold, haptic virtual environment
The first thing I found interesting from Chapter 13 was the receptors for various channels and the attributes to them. The first attribute is the type of stimulation to which the receptor responds. Receptors respond to different stimulus events, such as pressure, vibration, or temperature changes. The second attribute is the size of the receptive field. Receptors are activated when stimulation is applied to a particular area of the body, which constitutes the receptors’ receptive field. The size of the receptive field is the extent of the body area that elicits a receptor response. The third attribution is the rate of adaptation. A fast-adapting receptor responds with bursts of action potentials, first when the stimulus is removed. It doesn’t respond during the steady state between stimulus onset and offset. In contrast, a slowly adapting receptor remains active throughout the period during which the stimulus is in contact with its receptive field. I thought this was interesting because I didn’t know there were such specific attributes for receptors.
The next thing I found interesting was the concept of phantom limb syndrome. Phantom limb occurs as a side effect of the strong association between body parts and their corresponding area of the Somatosensory Area 1 (S1) portion of the brain, according to Penfield’s somatotopic map. When a limb goes missing, there is still a portion of the brain devoted to that limb. Occasionally there will be sporadic brain activity, giving the impression of a limb, which is no longer there. This is interesting to me, because I have a friend who had his colon removed to save his life from ulcerative colitis. He experienced strong phantom pains from his missing colon. This was especially interesting, because we both thought it only happened when someone lost an external limb, and he had lost an organ that he had no control over or feeling in.
The third concept that I found interesting was tactile agnosia. Tactile agnosia is the inability to identify objects by touch. Agnosia usually affects only a single information pathway in the brain. The weight and texture of an object may be perceived, but the person can neither describe it by name nor comprehend its significance or meaning. Tactile agnosia is caused by lesions in the brain’s parietal lobe. There is something about the different forms of agnosia that have fascinated me as we have learned about them this semester. I think I am just unable to comprehend how one would experience the sensation of objects with this disorder.
The thing I found least interesting was the section on somatosensory areas. From the thalamus, much of the touch information is carried up to the cortex into somatosensory area 1, located in the parietal lobe just behind the postcentral gyrus. Somatosensory area 1 is the primary receiving area for touch in the cortex. Neurons in S1 communicate with somatosensory area 2, which lies in the upper bank of the lateral sulcus, and with other cortical areas. The secondary receiving area for touch in the cortex. This lies in the upper bank of the lateral sulcus, and with other cortical areas. The motor areas of the cortex, which control movements of body parts, are located just in front of the central sulcus. The adjacency enhances communication between the somatosensory and motor control systems. I just didn’t find this interesting because it was hard for me to follow and understand.
I think knowing the basics like kinesthesis will be useful. Kinesthesis is the perception of the position and movement of our limbs in space. Touch is used to refer to the sensations caused by mechanical displacements of the skin. Tactile refers to these mechanical interactions and expands the definition of touch to include perception and temperature changes. The sensation of pain occurs when our body tissues are damaged in some ways, itchiness; and the internal sensations that inform us of the positions and movements of our limbs in space. Collectively, these internal sensations are known as kinesthesis when they arise from muscles, tendons, and joints. I think it’s useful to know these terms to build on the rest of the chapter.
This chapter builds on others by going into another system of sensation and perception in the body similar to the hearing, seeing, etc. that has already been discussed in the book.
I would like to do more research on phantom limb, because I had always thought it only happened to people who lost external limbs until my friend experienced it. I would like to know if people often get phantom limb in cases like his, or if he was a special exception to the rule.
I spent most of the reading thinking about my friend's phantom limb and being pretty perplexed by how complex the body's touch receptor system is.
Terms: Stimulation, Receptors, Pressure, Vibration, Temperature, Receptive Field, Adaptation, Action Potentials, Phantom Limb, Somatosensory Area, Penfield's Somatotopic Map, Tactile Agnosia, Parietal Lobe, Thalamus, Cortex, Postcentral Gyrus, Lateral Sulcus, Central Sulcus, Kinesthesis, Pain
1a. The first topic from chapter thirteen that I found interesting was neural plasticity. It is the ability of neural circuits to experience changes in function or organization after experiencing a specific repeated activity. Typically the discussion of plasticity only applies to children because research indicates that plasticity occurs more frequently in children, but it still has the potential to occur in adults. The changes that result from neural plasticity are generally thought to be adaptable changes that aid in thriving and surviving.
b. I was extremely interested in this topic because I briefly learned about it in a Biopsychology class before this and found it to be a remarkable phenomena. It is amazing that the human brain is able to make significant changes after the critical period of development has occurred and after maturation. I also think it is worth noting that these changes only occur when a deficit has effected the body. This indicates that the plastic brain is adaptable to ensure that an individuals survive and also thrive in their environment even with a deficit.
2a. The second concept from chapter thirteen that I found interesting was touch physiology and specifically thermoreceptors. These receptors are located in both the epidermal and dermal layers of the skin and are responsible for alerting us when changes in the skin temperature occur. The two most distinct populations of thermoreceptors are the warmth fibers which fire when the temperature of the skin increases and cold receptors that fire in response to a decrease in skin temperature. Interestingly, cold fibers wildly outnumber warmth receptors.
b. I found this topic interesting because I never really thought about the physiology that allows our body to determine when the environment is cold or warm and how our body responds to these changes in temperature. I would assume that these temperature receptors allow the body to process the external temperature and then send messages to the brain that result in shivering or pursuit of warmth.
3a. The third concept from chapter thirteen that I found interesting was tactile agnosia. It is the inability to identify objects by touch that results from lesions to the parietal lobe. Patients that experience this deficit could still identify object properties such as weight but could not integrate perceived representations of objects and stored representations in memory.
b. I found this interesting because a deficit that results in an inability to recognize an object by touch has serious implications for human life. Touch is one of our most important senses and is required to make sense of what we encounter on a daily basis. I think it is fascinating that these individuals are able to sense certain aspects of objects but cannot consciously identify the entirety of the object in hand.
4ab. I did not find anything in this chapter to be boring but I did find the touch physiology section to be full of material that was hard to fully understand. Concepts such as Merkel cell neurite complex are difficult to read about in the textbook among other high level sensation and perception terms. I will have to review the terms of this section to have a full understanding of the physiology of the human body that synthesizes touch.
5. I think the most useful information I read about in this chapter was regarding the levels of pain processed in the anterior cingulate cortex of the brain. It is important to have an understanding of brain structures to fully comprehend sensation and perception. This specific brain structure is important for the perception of unpleasantness of pain sensation. An understanding of the brain allows me to be a more competent student.
6. This chapter covers a new topic related to sensation and perception so it does not directly relate to the previous chapters but it is an important part of sensation. However, it does follow the typical format of past chapters by giving he physiology of the sensation and then describing parts of the brain that are important for the function of the sense and perception.
7ab. I would like to learn more about brain plasticity because I think it is a very fascinating topic that could have great implications for neuroscience if it was further researched. It is incredible that the human brain is able to make neurological changes due to environmental and physiological factors.
8. I thought about brain deficits that could result in changes in the brain from plasticity and how the brain decides when to make these adaptive changes. I also thought about the possible research discussing the concept of plasticity.
Terms: neural plasticity, thermoreceptor, epidermal, dermal, warmth fibers, cold receptors, tactile agnosia, lesion, Merkel cell neurite complex, sensation, perception, anterior cingulate cortex,
1. A) I thought that analgesia was interesting.
B) I thought this was interesting because I think it's cool how a person can have decreasing pain and still be conscious in that specific situation.
2. A) I found hyoeralgesia to be interesting.
B) I thought this was interesting because of the high response to pain. It will be very painful or more sensitive than before. It's interesting that it will be more painful than it was in the first place or in the beginning.
3. A) Tactile agnosia was interesting to read about.
B) This was interesting because it made me curious as to why a person would be unable to figure out what an object is when they are touching it. I'm curious how a person copes with this.
4. A) I least liked A-delta fiber and C fiber.
B) I least liked this because I do not understand the difference between them. They both transmit pain and temperature signals. I do not understand why there are two different things or definitions if they do the same thing.
5. I think that knowing how we perceive touch and where those signals go into our brain will be most useful.
6. This chapter builds on with touch as another sense that we use to perceive the world. First it was seeing, then hearing,, and now being able to touch things to identify them.
7. A) I would like to learn more about tactile agnosia.
B) I would like to learn more about this because I want to know how this happens to a person. I would also like to know how a person can cope with this and if there are any treatments or cures.
8. While reading this chapter I was thinking about how I first identify things. By either seeing, hearing, or touching them. I also thought about how a person could cope if they could not identify objects when they touch them.
9. Terms: analgesia, hyperalgesia, A-delta fiber, C fiber, tactile agnosia, perceive, touch.
1. The first thing I found interesting was the distinction between touch and tactile. Touch is the sensations of mechanical displacement that happens to skin when the skin makes contact with the world. Tactile is the mechanical interactions the skin makes with world. This is usually felt through: thermal sensation, pain sensation, and internal sensation. Thermal Sensation is how the body detects changes in temperature. Pain sensation happens when the body tissues are damaged, or could be damaged. Itchiness is also a way the body feels pain sensation. The internal sensations are responsible for telling the body where are limbs are in space, specifically their position and movement. When all of these sensations are combined, the result is called kinesthetic cause they come from the joints, muscles, and tendons. Kinesthetic is a small part of a of a proprioception system. The proprioception system also includes the vestibular system. When the kinesthetic system and the proprioception system work together to send their messages is called somatosensation. It is interesting because I thought touch and tactile meant the same thing.
2. The second thing I found interesting is that all the types of tactical receptors have three basic attributes. The first attribute is “type of stimulation to which the receptor responds”. This means the response of the receptor is important in deciding on the ty of stimulation. There are different types of stimulation but the ones this chapter talked about were: pressure, vibration, and temperature changes. The second attribute is “size of the receptive field”. This means that the receptors are only activated after a sensation is experienced by receptive field, which depends on the size of the body area. The third attribute is “rate of adaption”. This basically means that some receptors are fast adapters, which are activated in short bursts at the start and end of a sensation. The other receptors are slow adapters, which are activated between the short bursts of the fast adapters, aka the period when the stimulus is in contact with the receptive field. I thought this was interesting because it talked about some physical laws the body’s receptors follow if they are to work properly.
3. The third thing I found interesting is how the thermosreceptors work. These receptors are located in the top of the three layers of skin: epidermis, dermis, and subcutis. Their job is to tell our body about thermal sensations. This works because there are two different types of thermoreceptors: warmth fibers and cold fibers. Warmth fibers fire (aka activate) when the temperature of the skin is lower than the outside temperature. Cold fibers fire when the skin is warmer than the outside temperature. There are 30 more warmth fibbers for every cold fiber and I thought this was interesting as cold seem to be more noticeable than warm. If a person’s internal temperature doesn’t stay somewhere between 86 degrees Celsius and 96 degree Celsius the thermoreceptors are activated as this is how the body cools and warms it.
4. I thought that the bit on the specie type of receptors and what those receptors responded was the most boring part of the chapter because it was too technical for my taste.
5. I think the bit on thermoceptors is the most important part that I can relate most to sensation and perception as it relates most to experiences I’ve had.
6. This chapter talks about the difference between touch and tactile.
7. I was reading about pain receptors and started to wonder if there are spots on the body that hurt more when they are injured. I would like to learn more about which parts are more painful /easy to hurt, like the funny bone for example.
8. I thought about how cold and warm can be relative, I mean different, for each individual. I wondered where that threshold came into play when talking about this topic.
9. Touch, tactile, mechanical displacement, skin, contact, mechanical interactions , thermal sensation, pain sensation, internal sensation, temperature, body tissues , damage, Itchiness, limbs , position, movement. Kinesthetic, joints, muscles, tendons, vestibular system, proprioception system, somatosensation, tactical receptors, attribute, Receptor, stimulation, pressure, vibration, temperature changes, receptive field, activated, Body area, fast adapters, bursts, slow adapters. Contact, layers of skin: epidermis, dermis, subcutis, thermoreceptors , warmth fibers , cold fibers, fire, Celsius.
1a &b) What did you find interesting? Why? The first item in this chapter I found interesting was thermoreceptors. Thermoreceptors is defined as sensory receptor that signals information about changes in skin temperature. I found this interesting because when I took Biopsychology, I was interested in knowing how our bodies maintain homeostasis. Every person has warm fibers and cold fibers that fire up when the temperature increases or decreases. There are more cold fibers than the warm fibers in our bodies. These fibers aid in the bodies attempt to maintain our normal body temperature of 96 degrees. These fibers also take control when our skin comes in contact with something cold or warm, these particular items are usually less than the 96 degrees, our cold fibers typically to do work when this happens.
2a &b) What did you find interesting? Why? The second item in this chapter I found interesting was the topic of the phantom limb. The phantom limb is defined as a sensation perceived from a physically amputated limb of the body. In other words, a person still feels that he/she has a tingle or an itch in a limb that is not there anymore. I found this interesting because I have heard of this term before, but not in a scientific way. According to Penfield’s somatopic map, the Phantom limb occurs as a side effect of the strong association between body parts and their corresponding area. I also found it interesting that is a person who has had an arm or leg removed, people that have had surgeries to remove other body parts (breast, eye, penis or tongue), have this sensation as well. When a limb goes missing, there is still a portion of the brain devoted to that limb. Occasionally there will be sporadic brain activity, giving the impression of a limb, which is no longer there.
3a &b) What did you find interesting? Why? The third item in this chapter I found interesting was tactile agnosia. Tactile agnosia is defined as the inability to identify objects by touch. Agnosia usually affects only a single information pathway in the brain. Although weight and texture of an object may be perceived, the person can neither describe it by name nor comprehend its significance or meaning. Tactile agnosia is caused by lesions in the brain’s parietal lobe. There is something about the different forms of agnosia that have fascinated me as we have learned about them this semester.
4a &b) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting? Why? The only part of this chapter I had the most difficulty reading was levels of pain and the anterior cingulate cortex. This is the area of the brain associated with pain sensation would probably be my least favorite section. There were parts that were interesting but getting into t-values and threshold levels got to be more complex than anticipated. Although it was interesting to see how doctors are able to see which areas of the brain are affected and how these areas communicate.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation/Perception? I think knowing how we have different perception levels and that there are different kinds of receptors placed throughout the skin is important. I also thought haptic perception was important because it indicates how we explore and perceive things.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters? I think this chapter further discovers how we are able to perceive and interpret the world around us. It also emphasizes the importance of our vision perception along with touch perception. This is excellent information that our body uses all of its senses to make sense of the world, not just one. This further reprimands our understanding of our bodies being quite elastic when it comes to compensating for lost senses.
7a &b) What topic would you like to learn more about? Why? I would like to learn more about the placebo effect. The book defines this as decreasing pain sensation when people think they are taking an analgesic drug but actually they are not. I would like to read different experiments and research about which “effects” have better outcomes.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter? While reading this chapter I found myself thinking about the different things that I could feel my body touching. The socks on my feet, my pants on my legs, my hat on my head, etc. It was just interesting to stop and think about all the things that you are able to feel your body doing just by thinking about your different touch receptors.
TERMS: thermoreceptors, warm fibers, cold fibers, Phantom limb, perception, sensation, Penfield’s somatopic map, tactile agnosia, agnosia, anterior cingulate cortex,
1)I enjoyed learning about tactile receptors. We have four types of tactile receptors, also known as mechanoreceptors because they operate based on physical stimulation or pressure. They are classified based on size of receptive field and the rate of adaptation. SAI fibers have a slow adaptation rate and small receptive field. They are assumed to end in the Merkel cell neurite complex. Their primary purpose is to detect surface texture and pattern. SAII fibers have a slow adaptation rate and a large receptive field. They end in Ruffini endings and are primarily responsible for detecting lateral skin stretch. For example, when something in your hand slips, it will cause vibrations across the surface of skin, which are detected by FAI fibers. The reaction is so immediate that we have time to correct our hand grip before item falls. When FAI fibers are stimulated, the feeling we experience is a wobble or flutter motion, and they are thought to end Meissner corpuscles. FAII fibers have a fast adaptation rate and large receptive field. They are best stimulated by high-frequency vibrations and occur whenever an object contacts the skin or when an object in your hand collides with another. These fibers have been associated with Pacinian corpuscles, associated with a buzz feeling
These were interesting to me because they really are automatic reflexes we never contemplate. Over the course of the semester, we have learned many mechanisms that operate on an unconscious level. Almost all of these produce a conscious experience we are aware of.
2)I really enjoyed reading about phantom limbs because of how it relates to everyone. We all have a mental map of the regions of the body, known as the homunculus, which allows us map sensation to various areas of the body. When a limb is physically amputated, there is some possibility the area of the homunculus associated with that limb to be stimulated, even though it is no longer there. When this happens, we may experience the conscious feeling of the amputated limb despite reality. This was interesting to read about because I had always wondered if this phenomenon is more of a myth science. However, I was excited to learn the science behind it.
3)Reading through the chapter, I realized our senses work together all the time so that we can efficiently perceive the world around us and make many important split-second reflexive decisions. We are able to do this because we can synthesize all of the information available to us. Although we utilize many types of sensory input, these can cover and compensate for senses that may be lacking part of their normal functionality. This is interesting to me because it means that individuals with some kind of vision problem, or a deficiency of any other sense, may be able to compensate for it fairly easily.
4)I was less interested in the section about pain receptors and the mechanisms at work behind pain perception. As research progresses, we can learn more about the body’s pain receptors, which will be helpful in the medical industry, but I wasn’t much interested in the material because it is incredibly detailed and kind of hard to follow.
5)In general, various types of receptors in the skin are good to know about. I’m sure these will come back in the next chapter.
6)Although this is our first chapter covering touch, it relates to previous chapters by describing how especially sight, hearing, and touch interact to produce our sensory experience.
7)I would like to learn more about the processing of skin receptor input. After reading about the various types of receptors that we have, I kind of thought about different feelings, and how they don’t seem to be covered in one of the receptors. Are there others that the book did not cover? Is the majority of our touch experience a combination receptor stimulus response?
8)While reading the chapter, I thought about the other chapters and how our senses might interact to learn about our environment and produce our ultimate perceptive experience.
9)Terms: Tactile Receptors, mecahnoreceptors, receptive field, adaptation rate, Merkel cell neurite complex, SAI fiber, SAII fiber, Ruffini ending, FAI fibers, FAII fibers, Meissner corpuscles, Pacinian corpuscles, homunculus, pain perception
1a) What did you find interesting?
reading this chapter was great, they went in well details on what "touch" means to humans and how it associates with everything else in our lives. my first pick on this chapter would be Mechanoreceptor, which is a sensory receptor that responds to mechanical stimulation like pressure, vibration or movement.
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
i found this very interesting because i want to understand how people could get use to touch of someone or something, or how people could get use to someone movement or just knowing the vibration of you phone or something that you're consistently hearing the touch or feeling the touch of it and how you could get use to that.
2a) What did you find interesting?
the second one that i thought was really interesting as well was Meissner corpuscle which is an specialized nerve ending associated with the fast adapting fibers that have small receptors.
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
i thought this was interesting because i want to know about the small pain people feel when they hit a certain part of their body, whether or not this is the nerve for it, i want to know, an example of this is why does your small toe hurts so badly when you hit something with it even if it's the slightest hit on it. i want to know if this has anything to do with it.
3a) What did you find interesting?
Thermoreceptor is the third thing that i found interesting in this chapter, which is the sensory receptor that signals information about changes in skin temperature.
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
i thought this was very interesting to me because i am one of those individuals who's always cold, but my outside temperature is warm, when people are warm i feel cold, when people are cold, i'm freezing, i dont understand why, by now, my body should get use to the midwest temperature especially during the winter, i am interested because i want to understand my own body temperature.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
the section i didn't find as interesting was the perceiving objects and their properties.
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
i thought everything in this chapter is pretty informative and useful but i didn't understand this section of the chapter because it was a bit confusing to me, i didn't really understand what it was explaining, i think that they should given more complex examples maybe that would help people understand more of what's going on in that section of the chapter, otherwise everything else was pretty understanding.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
before reading this chapter, i didn't realized that you actually don't use your visual system as much, that the touch is actually as accurate or as helpful as visual. then i thought about how when you close your eyes, you still could imagine images that you've saw before or you've touched before and they are as vivid as seeing them visually. i also think that it's very useful to get in touch with your touch because if you were to come in a situation where you can't see or it's completely dark, then you can easily help yourself by touching things and feeling their sensation, i think that it would be skillful as teaching people who are deaf the sign language, people who have perfect visual system should be taught how to read in blind words by touch, i think that'd be something that alot of people could benefit from.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
the previous chapter mainly focused on the sense of organs location, it also focused on their movements and what each of those organs are capable of, it builds on to this chapter in putting those organs in use, i think that to touch and to feel something with your whole being takes alot of sensory motions and it takes little parts of your fibers to collect those data just so they come in together to make sense and recognize the sensational touch of the property. this chapter focus mainly on the four important "organs" or the collective of the sensory fibers.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
this chapter was great, i had a good time knowing and looking at these terms and their meaning but the one thing that i could go on and learn more about would have to be tactile agnosia
7b) Why? Tactile Agnosia is the inability to identify objects by touch.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
while i was reading this, i found myself pausing and thinking back on a time where i understood something by touching it. like for example, when my phone vibrates i feel the vibration in the closer areas in my body that close to that phone, eventually it makes its way to my whole body feeling that vibration. another thing that i thought was cool was that when it's dark and you've lived somewhere for a long time, by touching objects without visual, you actually recognize them with no problem and i thought that was pretty amazing.
9) TERMS: Visual receptors, Visual system, Tactile Agnosia,Mechano receptors,Fibers, Mechanoreceptor, Meissner corpuscle, thermorecetor.