Chapter 3: Biological Psychology

Chapter 3 really went into depth about the brain, Central Nervous System, Neurons, Neurotransmitters, etc.  I learned what a neuron is - a nerve cell specialized for communication - and how it works and why it is important to our brain. The neurons communicate with each other to help us think and recieve senses. The neuron is made up of multiple parts; the soma, dendrites, axons, synaptic vesicles, neurotransmitters, synapse, and synaptic cleft. What I didn't understand is what is the difference between resting potential and action potential? I think it just means the resting potential of the neuron is when it is not active, and the action potenital is when it is moving. Does the "all or none law" mean that all neurons will trigger at once, or none will? One thing I didn't realize in this chapter was that there are MANY different imaging and scanning techniques for your brain; many I have never even heard of like the PET (Position emission tomography) or the EEG (electroencephalograph). I wonder which one is the best to use? Another thing I learned was that the colorful pictures we see of the brain are not pictures of the brain in action, they are really pictures of the control task minus the experimental task. This is a misconception by many people, not just me! There were three misconceptions about heritability - percentage of the variability in a trait across individuals that is due to genes. I think we all should be aware of the misconceptions because they are ones that many of us fall prey to everyday. 1 - heritability applies to a single individual rather than to differences among individuals. 2 - heritabilty tells us whether a trait can be changed. 3 - heritabilty is a fixed number.  Heritability is important because it allows us to examine the influence of nature and nurture.