What is stress?
Physiological reaction caused by the perception of aversive or threatening situations
What is stress response?
Physiological reaction caused by the perception of aversive or threatening situations
What is the fight-or-flight response?
1. Species typical response preparatory to fighting or fleeing.
2. Responsible for some of the deleterious effects of stressful situations on health.
What are some of the physiology of the stress response?
1. Sympathetic branch of autonomic nervous system is active.
2. Adrenal glands secrete epinephrine, norepinephrine, and steroid stress hormones.
3. Epinephrine affects glucose metabolism, causing nutrients stored in muscles to become available to provide
What is glucocorticoid?
1. One group of hormones of adrenal cortex that are important in protein and carbohydrate metabolism.
2. Secreted especially in times of stress.
What is corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH)?
1. Hypothalamic hormone that stimulates anterior pituitary gland to secrete ACTH (adrenocorticotropic hormone).
What is adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH)?
1. Hormone relased byanterior pituitary gland in response ot CRH (corticotropin-releasing hormone).
2. Stimulates adrenal corte to produce glucocorticoids.
3. ACTH enters general circulation and stimulates adrenal cortex to secrete glucocorticoids.
What is the physiology of the stress response for CRH or CRF (corticotropic-releasing factor)?
1. Secreted within the brain
2. Neuromodulator/ neurotransmitter, in regions of the limbic system that are involved in emotional response.
3. Behavioral effects similar to those produced by aversive situations.
What is the harmful long-term effect of stress?
1. Harmful effects of stress produced by prolonged secretion of glucocorticoids.
2. These effects include high blood pressure, damage to muscle tissue, steroid diabetes, infertility, inhibition of growth, inhibition of inflammatory responses, and suppress
What is the effects of stress on the brain? How?
1. Long-term exposure to glucocorticoids destroys neurons located in field CA1 of hippocampal formation (memory).
2. Hormone appears to destroy the neurons by decreasing the entry of glucose and decreasing the reuptake of glutamate.
What is the effect of prenatal stress?
1. Can cause long-lasting malfunctions in learning and memory by interfering with normal development of the hippocampus.
What does acute stress do to the rats?
1. The ability to learn a spatial task was impaired
2. Primed-burst potentiation (a form of long term potentiation) was impaired in the hippocampal area.
What is the effect of exposure to early life stress?
Reduces the volume of the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
What is psychoneuroimmunology?
Branch of neuroscience involved with interactions between environmental stimuli, nervous system, and immune system.
What is an antigen?
Protein present on microorganism that permits immune system to recognize microorganism as invader.
What is an antibody?
Protein produced by cell of immune system that recognizes antigens present on invading microorganisms.
What is B-lymphocyte?
1. White blood cell that originates in the bone marrow
2. Antibodies, called immunoglobulins, are chains of protein
What is immunoglobulin?
1. Antibody released by B-lymphocytes
2. Binds with antigens and helps to destroy invading microorganisms.
What is T-lymphocyte?
White blood cell that originates in thymus gland.
What is cytokine?
1. Released by certain white blood cells when they detect presence of invading microorganism.
2. Causes other white blood cells to proliferate and mount attack against invader.
How does glucocorticoid affect the immune system?
1. Gucocorticoids suppress specific immune responses by interfering with messages conveyed by cytokines.
What is the relationship between stress and immune system?
1. Caregivers of family members with Alzheimer's disease, who certainly underwent considerable stress, showed weaker immune systems.
2. One measure of the quality of a person's immune response is measurement of antibodies produced in response to a vaccina
What is the relationship between stress and infectious disease?
1. A wide variety of stress-producing events in a person's life can increase the susceptibility to illness.
2. Ex: Medical students were more likely to contract acute infections and to show evidence of suppression of the immune system during the time that
What is the difference between B and T - lymphocyes?
1. B-lymphocytes detects an antigen on a bacterium and releases a specific immunoglobulin.
2. T-lymphocytes detects an antigen on a bacterium and kills it directly or releases a chemical that attracts other white blood cells.
What is posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)?
1. Development of characteristic symptoms following exposure to on or more traumatic events.
2. Likelihood of developing PTSD increased if traumatic event involved danger or violence from other people.
3. Although men are exposed to traumatic events more
What are the symptoms of PTSD?
1. Recurrent dreams or recollections of the traumatic event
2. Intense psychological stress
What are some of the hereditability factors that influence PTSD?
1.Both genes and environment
2. Overlap with anxiety disorders
3. Dopamine (D2 receptors and transporters), 5-HTT
How does the amygdala play a role in PTSD?
1. Emotional reactions
2. Influence of the Prefrontal cortex.
PFC plays role in these reactions in people without PTSD by inhibiting activity of amygdala.
How is the hippocampus involved in PTSD?
1. Reduced volume (may be the cause or the consequence)
What are the most common treatments for PTSD?
1. Cognitive behavior therapy
2. Group therapy
3. Anti-depressants
What is the effect of transcranial magnetic stimulation on PTSD experiment?
1. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
2. Found that ten session of stimulation of the left or right dlPFC significanly reduced the symptoms of PTSD,and that the beneficial effects was still seen three months late
What is anxiety disorder?
Tension, overactivity of the autonomic nervous system, expectation of impending disaster, and continuous vigilance for danger
What is panic disorder?
Episodic periods of symptoms such as shortness of breath, irregularities in heartbeat, and other autonomic symptoms, accompanied by intense fear.
What is anticipatory anxiety?
Fear of having a panic attack; may lead to development of agoraphobia.
What is agoraphobic?
Fear of being away from home or other protected places
What is generalized anxiety disorder?
Excessive anxiety and worry serious enough to cause disruption of their lives.
What is social anxiety disorder?
Excessive fear of being exposed to scrutiny of other people that leads to avoidance of social situations in which person is called on to perform.
What is the hereditability factor may lead to anxiety disorders?
1. Panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and social anxiety disorder
2. BDNF gene variations
What is BDNF?
1. BDNF regulates neuronal survival and differentiation during development.
2. Plays a role in long-term potentiation and memory, and is associated with anxiety and depression.
3. A particular allele of BDNF gene impairs extinction of conditioned fear mem
Which regions of the brain is affected by anxiety disorders?
1. Amygdala
2. Cingulate
3. Prefrontal cortex
4. Insular cortex
What are some of the symptoms of panic disorder?
1. Panic attacks, consisting of physiological symptoms, intense discomfort, and intense fear with a rapid onset within a few minutes.
2. Persistent worry about the occurrence of panic attacks
3. Changes in behavior such as avoiding places in which panic a
What are some of the symptoms for agoraphobia?
1. Fear or anxiety related situations, such as being in a crowd or a place from which escape is difficult, or being outside of a safe place and alone.
2. Fear of the situation is disproportionate to the actual context
3. Avoidance of the situations that c
What are the symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder?
1. Excessive anxiety and worry across many different situations and contexts.
2. Worry that is difficult to control
3. Restlessness, fatigue, problems with memory or concentration, tension, and insomnia.
What are the symptoms for social anxiety disorder?
1. Fear or anxiety in situations that can include evaluation by others.
2. Social situations are avoided
3. Intense fear in social situations that cannot be avoided.
What medication is used to treat anxiety disorders?
Benzodiazepines
What is Benzodiazapines?
1. Often used for emergency medical treatment for anxiety disorders because the therapeutic effects of these drugs have rapid onset.
2. Benzodiazepines exert their effects by interacting/binding with GABAA receptors (binding site)
What are the binding sites?
1. GABA site
2. Steroid site
3. Benzodiazepine site
4. Picrotoxin site
5. Babiturate and alcohol site.
What does the neurosteroid binding site do to GABAA receptor? What happens during anxiety attacks?
1. Enhance activity of GABAA receptor
2. During anxiety attacks, synthesis of neurosteroids, and activity of GABAA receptor is suppressed.
What are some of the treatments for anxiety disorders?
1. Serotonin - plays a role in anxiety disorders
2. Fluvoamine - an SSRI
3. GABA receptors
4. Benzodiazepines
What is obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)?
Mental disorder characterized by obsessions and compulsions.
What is obsession?
Unwanted thought or idea with which person is preoccupied.
What is compulsion?
Feeling that one is obliged to perform behavior, even if one prefers not to do so.
What are some of the hereditability factor that plays in obsessive-compulsive disorder?
1. Associated with Tourette's syndrome
2. Sometimes occurs with brain damage.
3. Group A beta-hemolytic streptococcal infection.
4. Damage to basal ganglia.
What is Tourette's syndrome?
Characterized by muscular and vocal tics: facial grimaces, squatting, pacing, twirling, barking, sniffing, coughing, grunting, or repeated specific words.
What can cause tic disorders?
Tic disorders can be caused by group A beta-hemolytic streptococcal infection.
Infection can trigger several autoimmune disease, in which patient's immune system attacks and damages certain tissues on body.
What are the 3 drugs that are regularly used to treat the symptoms of OCD? What do they do?
1. Clomipramine
2. Fluoxetine
3. Fluvoxamine
These drugs are specific blocks of 5-HT reuptake; thus, they are serotonergic agonists.
Brain regions that have been implicated in OCD, including the orbitofrontal cortex and the basal ganglia, receive input fr
What is autism spectrum disorder?
1. Chronic disorder
2. Failure to develop normal social relations with other people
3. Impaired development of communicative ability
4. Repetitive, stereotyped movements
What is Rett's disorder?
1. Genetic neurological syndrome seen in girls that accompanies an arrest of normal brain development during infancy.
What is the hereditability factor that plays in autism spectrum disorder?
1. Concordance rate of monozygotic twins is 70-90%.
2. Wide variety of rate mutations
3. 10% of definable biological causes (prenatal exposure to rubella).
What is the significant developmental abnormalities in autism spectrum disorder?
1. Abnormally rapid growth until 2-3 years of age.
2. Then slower growth than brains of unaffected children.
3. Regions of the brain involved in higher-order processes such as communicative functions and interpretation of social stimuli develop more quick
What is the theory of mind regarding intentions?
1. People with ASD were able to accurately describe the goal-directed interactions of the triangles, but they had difficulty accurately describing the "intentions" of a triangle trying to trick or coax the other.
2. They had difficulty forming a theory of
How does ASD affect the response to human face?
1. Lack of interest in or understanding of other people reflected in response to human face.
What is FFA (Fusiform face area)?
Located on region of visual association cortex on base of brain, is involved in recognition of individual faces.
What are some of the brain changes caused by ASD regarding the caudate nucleus?
1. Increased volume of the caudate nucleus in autism
2. Volume of the right caudate nucleus was positively correlated with ratings of repetitive behavior in patients with ASD.
What are some of the brain changes caused by ASD regarding the mirror motor neuron system?
1. Deficient activation in the mirror motor neuron system of children with ASD
2. Found that cerebral cortex in the mirror neuron system was thinner in people with ASD.
What did Baron-Cohen stated regarding "extreme male brain"?
1. Noted that an average, females are better than males at inferring the thoughts or intentions of others, are more sensitive to facial expression, are more likely to response empathetically to the distress of others, and are more likely to share with oth
What are the symptoms of attention-deficit/hyeractivity disorder (ADHD)?
1. Characterized by uninhibited responses, lack of sustained attention, and hyperactivity
2. Boys are about 10x more likely than girls to receive a diagnosis of ADHD, but in adulthood the ratio is approximately 2 to 1, which suggests that many girls with
What are the hereditability factors that affect ADHA?
1. Strong evidence for hereditary factors and likelihood of developing ADHD
2. Dopaminergic transmission deficiencies in the prefrontal cortex increase the steepness of their delay of reinforcement gradient, which means that immediate reinforcement is eve
What is COMT (Catechol-o-methyltransferase)
1. An enzyme that breaks down catecholamines (dopamine and norepinephrin) in the extracellular fluid.
What is the effect of giving amphetamine to people with val-val or met-met variant?
1. People with the val-val variant (lower brain levels of catecholamines) performed better when they were given low doses of amphetamine.
2. Adminstration of amphetamine to people with met-met variant, who have higher brain levels of catecholamines, actua