PSYC 110 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Motor Learning, Smart People, Occipital Lobe
27 Jun 2018
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Department
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Professor
Frontal Lobe - "doing" something - moving muscles, executive functions, cognition
Parietal Lobe - facial movements, "sensing" things
Occipital Lobe - vision, seeing, bumping head and seeing stars - brain hitting the skull - activating the
occipital lobe
Temporal Lobe - hearing, memory, making sense of the world, "meaning to your life, understand,
speech"
Cerebellum - balance, motor coordination, "optimization" - optimizing motor movements, language,
react emotionally
Somatosensory Cortex:
Lots of sensory receptors on the fingertips - high density
Forearm - lower density of sensory receptors - two points of contacts but only respond to one sensory
receptor
Back - very low density of sensory receptors
Homunculus - your sensory systems "view" of your own body - evolutionary standpoint explains that
only a few points on your body are dense because only a few parts of the body can optimize on the
neuro resources for feelings things rather than having it spread across the body where it wont be used
optimally.
The most sensitive parts of the body have the most motor control over movements.
Dominant hand: Writing a signature - only using fingers
Writing all across the page - wrist movements - different muscle group
Nondominant hand: Writing a signature - only fingers but very weak movement
Using the same part of the brain for one side even if you have to use different muscle groups, you are
still able to work around with it.
However, use the different hand - make use of the different brain - very difficult because the muscles
seem unrecognized.
Writing the signature using your toes - with right it will still be more similar than with the left - same side
of the brain
Cerebellum: the little brain
Why is it more easier to do everything with your dominant side than it is with the non dominant side?
Damage to cerebellum - affects motor movements a lot. Eg: Wouldn't be able to touch a point right
away - a lot of uncoordinated movement will be involved to touch the point - have to use the eyes to
correct and make up for the cerebellums orders
Cerebellum - enables the optimization of complex motor movements via the Motor Cortex. These
longer-lasting improvements require practice. Has the fastest response time than any other part of the
brain. Allows for super complicated athletic movements.
Functions:
Combines Sensory Input with Action
o"Does what I am sensing line up with what I am doing?"
oAdjust the timing so that it does.
Unconscious information processing
oLanguage
oSensation
oEmotion: Finding something rewarding - Yay. Don't have to think about it much, it just
comes unconsciously to the brain
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Frontal lobe - "doing" something - moving muscles, executive functions, cognition. Occipital lobe - vision, seeing, bumping head and seeing stars - brain hitting the skull - activating the occipital lobe. Temporal lobe - hearing, memory, making sense of the world, "meaning to your life, understand, speech" Cerebellum - balance, motor coordination, "optimization" - optimizing motor movements, language, react emotionally. Lots of sensory receptors on the fingertips - high density. Forearm - lower density of sensory receptors - two points of contacts but only respond to one sensory receptor. Back - very low density of sensory receptors. The most sensitive parts of the body have the most motor control over movements. Dominant hand: writing a signature - only using fingers. Writing all across the page - wrist movements - different muscle group. Nondominant hand: writing a signature - only fingers but very weak movement.
