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Pre-final Reviewer in BioPsych

Chapter 8: Internal Regulations

I. Temperature
II. Thirst
III. Hunger

I. Temperature Regulation
Homeostasis
- latin term for 'same state'
- tendency of human body to seek balance, equilibrium, and stability
- refers to a set of internal processes that keeps the body operating w/in a fixed ranged on a # of diff.
variables:
● Body temperature

● Set point
○ single value that the body works to maintain under normal circumstances (ex. weight, levels of water,
oxygen, etc)

Allostasis
- refers to the adaptive way in which the body changes its set point in response to changes in life or the
environment
- "achieving stability through change"
● increase heart rate

● Basal metabolism
○ energy used to maintain a constant body temperature while at rest

● Poikilothermic
○ body temp. matches the environment (ex. amphibians, reptiles, and most fish)
● Homeothermic
○ the body expends energy to maintain a constant temp.
○ it refers to the use of internal physiological mechanisms to maintain an almost constant body temp. (ex.
mammals and birds)

Preoptic area/ Anterior hypothalamus (POA/AH)

- body temp. regulation is predominantly dependent upon this area
- it partially monitors the body's temp. and sends signals to the rest of the body to make homeostatic
adjustments.
● Heating the POA/AH leads to panting or shivering; cooling leads to shivering.
● Cells of POA/AH also receive input from temp. sensitive receptors in the skin.

Fever
● temporary rise in body temp.
● it is one part of an overall response from the body's immune system
● usually caused by an infection
● Immune cells
○ release prostaglandins (hormone) into the blood, which stimulate the anterior hypothalamus to
increase body temp.

Anhidrosis
- inability to sweat in response to increasing body temp.
- signs and symptoms of anhidrosis include:

● Little or no sweat
● dizziness
● flushing
● muscle cramps
● overall weakness
● feeling hot and not able to cool off

II. Thirst
● subjective perception that provides the urge for humans and animals to drink fluids
● component of the regulatory mechanisms that maintain body fluid homeostasis and ultimately is essential
for survival
● 2 Kinds Of Thirst:
a. Osmotic thirst/ intracellular dehydration
■ water deficit
■ refers to thirst that results from an increase in the concentration of solutes in the
body
■ this is your everyday eat a bag of chips get thirsty, kind of thirst
■ Mechanism of thirst
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● when osmotic thirst is triggered ,watered that you drink has to be absorbed
through the digestive system
● to inhibit thirst, the body monitors swallowing and detects the water contents
of the stomach and intestines

b. Hypovolemic thirst
■ low vol. of fluids
■ occurs when the vol. of your blood is reduced due to fluid loss from sweating
■ this is thirst due to loss of blood vol. from injury or illness
■ when you are thirsty ,your body conserves water in several ways: no sweat, no urine,
increase blood pressure
● result from release of hormone vasopressin
■ Mechanism of thirst
● triggered by the release of the hormones vasopressin and angiotensin II
■ which constricts blood vessels to compensate for a
drop in blood pressure

Types of Stimulus Best Relieved by Receptor Location Hormones

Thirst Drinking Influences

Osmotic high solute concentration water OVLT

outside cells causes loss - a brain area adjoining
of water from cells the 3rd ventricle

Hypovolemic low blood vol. water containing 1. Receptors accompanied by

solutes - measuring blood vasopressin
pressure in the veins secretion to
conserve water
2. Subfornical organ increased by
- a brain areas adjoining angiotensin II
the 3rd ventricle

III. Hunger
Biological constraints on what we eat
● dairy & lactose intolerance
● teeth
● herbivores, carnivores, omnivores
● taste & experience
○ sweet vs. bitter
○ conditioned aversions

● Animals vary in their strategies of eating but humans tend to eat more than they need at the given moment
● A combination of learned and unlearned factors contribute to hunger
● The function of the digestive system is to break down food into smaller molecules that the cells can use

● Digestion
○ begins in the mouth where enzymes in the saliva break down carbohydrates
● Hydrochloric acid and enzymes in the stomach
○ digest proteins
● Small intestines
○ have enzymes that digest proteins, fats, and carbohydrates and absorb digested food into the bloodstream.
● Large intestines
○ absorbs water and minerals and lubricates the remaining materials to pass as feces

● Why Do We Feel Sleepy After Eating?

○ "oftentimes, when you are eating a meal rich in carbohydrates and protein, you may feel sleepier because
you have an uptake of tryptophan from the protein and then an increase of serotonin"
○ eating also causes your blood sugar levels to rise, which can lead to a decrease in energy
● What Makes Us Feel Full?
○ We require both the early digestive processes (chewing and swallowing) and the filling of the stomach
to feel satisfied.

● The brain regulates eating through messages from the mouth, stomach, intestines, fat cells, and elsewhere.
● The main signal to stop eating is the distention of the stomach
○ Vagus nerve
■ conveys information about the stretching of the stomach walls to the brain
○ Splanchnic nerves
■ conveys info about the nutrient contents of the stomach
● Glucose, insulin, and glucagon levels
○ also influence feelings of hunger
● Insulin
○ is a pancreatic hormone that enables glucose to enter the cell
● Glucagon
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○ is a hormone released by the pancreas when glucose levels fall

● In people w/ diabetes, insulin levels remain constantly low but blood

glucose levels are high
○ People eat more food than normal, but excrete the
glucose unused and lose weight

● Long-term hunger regulation

○ is accomplished via the monitoring
of fat supplies by the body
● The body's fat cells produce the peptide called leptin
■ which signals the brain to increase or
decrease eating
○ Low levels of leptin increase hunger
○ while high leptin do not necessarily decrease hunger
■ most people are obese because they are less
sensitive to leptin
■ some are obese because of a genetic inability to produce leptin

Lateral Hypothalamus
- contribute to feeding by:
1. detecting hunger and sending messages to make food taste better
2. arousing the cerebral cortex to facilitate ingestion, swallowing and to increase responsiveness to taste,
smell ,and sight of food

● Damage to the ventromedial hypothalamus that extends to areas outside can lead to overeating and weight gain.

Some Eating disorders

I. Prader-willi Syndrome
○ genetic condition marked by mental retardation ,short stature, and obesity
○ constant sense of hunger that usually begins about 2 yrs of age
○ Treatment:
■ artificial version of the human growth hormone (HGH)
● it increases muscle size while lowering the amount of body fat
II. Obesity
○ overweight
○ defined as abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that presents a risk to health
○ BMI over 25 is considered overweight and over 30 is obese
○ Treatment:
■ dietary changes
■ increased activity
■ behavioral therapies
■ medication
■ weight loss surgery
III. Anorexia Nervosa
○ eating disorder associated w/ an unwillingness to eat as much as needed
○ common in women, upper socio-economic & caucasian women
○ overproduction of serotonin
■ which can cause a continual state of acute stress and anxiety
■ as people continue to extreme calorie control, the brain increases the # of serotonin receptors to
help increase efficiency of the final serotonin
IV. Bulimia Nervosa
○ eating disorder in which people alternate bet. extreme dieting and binges of overeating
○ some force vomiting after eating
○ low levels of serotonin are seen w/ patients who are diagnosed w/ this disorder

Consequences of Eating Disorders

1. Death
2. Osteoporosis
3. Heart and other cardiovascular problems including stroke
4. Damage to the esophagus, stomach, mouth, and teeth
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Chapter 9: Reproductive Behavior

Sexuality
Gender Identity
- how we identify sexually and what we call ourselves
- learned and more a product of rearing and experience
- biological factors, especially prenatal hormones, play a large role in gender identity
Sex Differences
- biological differences bet. males and females
Gender Role
- refers to the activities and dispositions that a particular society encourages for one sex or the other

Variation in Sexual Development

True Hermaphrodite
- someone who has both testicular and ovarian tissue (rare)
Hermaphrodites
- individuals whose genitals do not match the normal development for their genetic sex
Intersex people
- intermediate bet. being male or female ( pseudohermaphrodite)

Sex and Hormones

Sex hormone
- a chemical that is secreted by a gland, conveyed by the blood, and affect other organs

2 Types of Sex Hormones

● Androgens
- group of male sex hormones that include testosterone
- male hormones
● Estrogens
- include estradiol
- female hormones
● Progesterone
- type of hormone that prepares the uterus for the implantation of a fertilized ovum and
promotes the maintenance of pregnancy
(Both sexes have both hormones)

Endocrine glands
- glands that produces hormones

Sexual Differentiation
- it begins w/ chromosomes

● Female: XX chromosomes; Male: XY chromosomes

Gonads
○ are the reproductive organs
○ in mammals, the gonads of males and females are identical early in prenatal development
○ at 6 weeks of development
■ both sexes have primitive gonads as well as;
● Mullerian ducts
○ precursors to female reproductive organs
● Wolffian ducts
○ precursors to male reproductive organs

Sex and Hormone

● Sensitive periods are early periods when hormones have long-lasting effects
● Sexual differentiation depends mostly on the level of testosterone during a sensitive period
● The human sensitive period for genital formation is about the third and fourth month of pregnancy
● Sex hormones can have the following effects:
○ Organizing effects
- occur mostly at sensitive stages of development
- determine whether the brain and body will develop male or female characteristics
○ Activating effects
- occur at any time of life and temporarily activate a particular response

Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH)

- XX female's cortisol production leads to overstimulation of the adrenal gland leads to extra
testosterone production
- The female fetus becomes partly masculinized
- CAH girls show a greater preference for boy-typical toys than do other girls
- during adolescence and early adulthood, they also show partly masculinized interests
- sexual interest and activity also differs for CAH girls as well

Androgen Insensitivity or Testicular Feminization

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- XY male has the genital appearance of a female

- production of androgens remains normal but they lack the androgen receptor that enables it to activate
genes in a cell's nucleus
- condition occurs in various degrees from a smaller than average penis to genitals that develop a
female appearance

5 Alpha-Reductase 2 Deficiency (5αR2D)

● XY males fail to produce an enzyme that converts testosterone to dihydrotestosterone
● most look female at birth but a penis develops during adolescence and puberty
● most of them accept a male gender identity
● Brain is exposed to testosterone during early development

Biological Bases of Sexual Orientation

● Organizing effects of sex hormones
Sexually dimorphic nucleus (SDN)
- an area in the anterior hypothalamus that is larger in the male and contributes control of male
sexual behavior
- study of homosexual male brains found that their SDN was similar to those found in females
● Sexual orientation may be influenced by testosterone levels during sensitive periods of brain development
● Male animals deprived of testosterone early in life show sexual interest in other males as adults
● Female animals exposed to testosterone during early development show an increased likelihood of mounting
behavior

Sex Differences in Non-reproductive Behavior

● if female fetuses are exposed to androgens, they tend to toward masculine behavior
● male and female brains differ in regions unrelated to sexual behavior
○ language areas of the left lobe & corpus callosum differ

● Lab. research has also shown that prenatal stress can alter sexual development
● male subjects subjected to either prenatal stress or alcohol developed male sexual behavior in addition to female
sexual behaviors
● male subjects exposed to both stress and alcohol during prenatal development had decreased sexual behavior

● The probability of homosexual orientation higher among men w/ older brothers

● Research suggests that a mother's immune system may react against a protein in a son and attacks subsequent
sons to alter development

Sexual Behavior in Humans

● Effects on Men
○ Sexual excitement
■ is highest when testosterone levels are highest
○ decrease in testosterone levels generally decrease sexual activity
○ Sexual pleasure during orgasm
■ is due to the secretion of large amounts of oxytocin

Impotence
- inability to have or maintain an erection
- usually not caused by low levels of testosterone
- treated by increasing blood circulation in the penis & hypothalamus
- decreasing testosterone activity is a method to treat sex offenders

● Effects on Women
○ Menstrual Cycle
■ periodic variation in hormones & fertility over the course about 1 month
■ at the end of period, the anterior pituitary release Follicle-Stimulating Hormone (FSH) that
promotes the growth of a follicle in the ovary
■ toward the middle of cycle the follicle produces increasing amounts if estradiol leading to
increase in release of FSH & LH from the anterior pituitary
■ at the end of cycle, levels of LH, estradiol and progesterone decline
■ Preovulatory period
● the midpoint of the menstrual cycle when sexual interest increase
■ Premenstrual syndrome (PMS)
● characterized by anxiety, irritability, sudden loneliness during days before menstruation
■ Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD)
● defined as depressive disorder
● not specified in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical
Manual of Mental Disorders
● it is characterized by mood, appetite, energy, and cognitive changes that occur during
the late luteal (premenstrual) phase of the menstrual cycle and remit shortly after the
onset of menses
● Symptoms are severe enough to interfere w/ functioning at home ,school, or work
● It occurs in an estimated 5% of women, and if left untreated, may become more severe
and extend in duration over time