Biological foundations of

behavior

By
Laila T. Sabei
Biological foundations of behavior

These are the several aspects of human biology

directly relevant to understanding behavior:
• The nervous system.
• Endocrine glands.
• Genetic mechanism.

The brain is the most important biological

organ to psychology
 Nervous system
biological control center

• Billions of neurons in nervous system transmit

messages to one another in complex ways
that make the nervous system both the
“computer” and the communication network
of the body.
 The neurons
primary units of the nervous system

• It is the building
blocks of the NS.
• It consists of : cell
body, dendrites and
axons.
• Axons are encased
in a white fatty
coating called the
myelin sheath.
 Types of message transmission in NS

• Neural transmission ( from one

end of the neuron to the other
end): by action potential.

• Synaptic transmission ( from one neuron to

the next neuron): by
neurotransmitters.
 Neurotransmitters and Synaptic
Transmission
Chemicals in brain
– Acetylcholine
– Dopamine
– Serotonin
– Norepinephrine
– Glutamate
– Neuropeptides
 Acetylcholine

• A neurotransmitter used by
somatic neurons that
contract the large muscles.
• It plays a role in memory and
dreaming.
• Alzheimer’s disease is
related to low level of
acetylcholine.
 Dopamine
• Neurotransmitter substance used by neurons in
the brain that control large muscle movements.
• Depletion of dopamine → uncontrolled muscle
tremors (Parkinson’s disease).
• Dopamine plays a central role
in pleasure and reward system
in the brain and involved in
schizophrenia and attention
deficit hyperactivity disorder
(ADHD). Muhammad Ali
 Serotonin

• It regulates sleep cycles and dreaming, appetite,

anxiety, and the inhibition of violence.
• Lower serotonin levels in the brain →
↑antisocial behaviors
• Serotonin depletion → depression
Underlying physiology of trait theory
 Norepinephrine

• Play a role in attention to important events as

presence of danger in the environment.
• It involved in anxiety and depression.
 Glutamate

• Plays a key role in the regulation of cognition

and emotion
• Glutamate depletion → schizophrenia
 Divisions of the nervous system

• Central NS : brain & spinal cord.

• Peripheral NS; the nerves that branch from

the brain and the spinal cord to the body.
 Divisions of the peripheral NS
• Somatic nervous system: carry messages from
the central NS to the skeletal muscles.

• Autonomic nervous system: carry messages to

the glands and visceral organs (heart, stomach
and intestines)

Autonomic NS: not consciously controlled and

not require our awareness or intentional control
 Functions of the autonomic NS
• Essential body function: it regulates; heartbeat,
breathing, digestion, sweating & sexual
arousal.

• Emotion
 Functions of the autonomic NS
Emotion
• Sometimes a person gets a stomachache, diarrhea,
a pounding heart, or a headache when he feels
anxious.

• This is because the autonomic nervous system is

activated during emotional states.

• Prolonged emotional stimulation can adversely

affect the health of the organs controlled by
autonomic nervous system
 ‫‪Autonomic NS: not consciously‬‬
‫‪controlled‬‬

‫ال ياودي عالش ترعشي في روحك و تزيدي في ظغطك على‬

‫حاجة بسيطة زي هكي ال ال كوني في روحك‬
 Divisions of the autonomic NS
• The sympathetic NS that prepare the body to
respond to psychological or physical stress.

• The parasympathetic NS that promotes bodily

maintenance and energy conservation and
storage under non stressful conditions.
 Autonomic NS
sympathetic
• Dilate pupils.
• ↓ salivation.
• ↑ heart rate.
• Dilate the bronchi.
• Inhibit digestive tract.
• Release sugar.
• ↑ epinephrine secretion
• Inhibit contraction of urinary
bladder.
• ↑ blood flow & muscle
tension in large muscles
parasympathetic
• Constricts the pupils.
• ↑ salivation
• ↓ heart rate
• Constricts the bronchi
• Activate the digestive tract.
• Release bile from liver.
• ↓ epinephrine secretion
• Contracts the urinary bladder
• ↓ blood flow & muscle
tension in large muscles
Structures & functions of the brain

• The brain is the fundamental basis for

psychological life.

• All mental functions require the integrated

functioning of multiple parts of the brain.

• No function of the brain is carried out solely by

one part
 The brain is the most important
biological organ to psychology
• A classic experiment conducted by Canadian brain
surgeon wider penfield in the 1930s dramatically
illustrated this fact.
• Dr. penfield was conducting surgery on the
cerebral cortex while the patient was awake
under local anesthesia, when penfield placed a
small rod that carried a mild electric current
against the brain, his patient experienced being in
her kitchen, in the background, she could hear the
voice of her little boy playing in the garden and
cars passing in the street
Structure of the brain
 Hindbrain and midbrain
The hindbrain has 3 principal parts:
• Medulla: responsible for
controlling breathing & variety of
reflexes.
• Pons: involved in balance, hearing
& some parasympathetic
functions.
• Cerebellum: involved in
coordination of muscle
movement, learning and memory.
 Hindbrain and midbrain

• The reticular formation: it is a set of neurons

that spans ‫إمتداد‬the medulla and pons, it
influence our wakefulness, arousal and
attention. ‫ اإلثارة واالهتمام‬،‫اليقظة‬
 Hindbrain and midbrain

• The midbrain: transmitting information

necessary for vision and hearing.
• It also plays an important role in motor
movement, pain, and the sleep/wake cycle.
 Forebrain
Cognition, Motivation, Emotion and Action

• The most interesting part of the brain to

psychologists is the forebrain.
• It consists of 2 areas:
 One area which contains: the thalamus, the
hypothalamus and most of the limbic system.
Other area is the cerebral cortex.
 Forebrain
• Thalamus: it routes sensory messages to
appropriate parts of the brain and works with
other parts of the brain to process sensory
information.
• Hypothalamus: involved with motives, emotions
and regulate body temperature, sleep, endocrine
gland activity, controlling glandular secretions of
the stomach & intestine; and maintaining the
normal pace & rhythm of blood pressure and
heart rate.
So hypothalamus is most directly linked to the
function of autonomic NS.
 Forebrain
Limbic system
Limbic system: composed of 3 important parts: the
amygdala, the hippocampus, the cingulate cortex.

• The amygdala which play a key role in emotion

and aggression also in formation of memories
about emotionally charged events.
 Forebrain
Limbic system
• The hippocampus:
 brings important cognitive elements to the
processing of emotion-related information.
 plays a major role in the formation of new memories.
 It “ties together” the sights, sounds and meaning of
memories stored in various parts of the cerebral
cortex.
Story of taxi drivers in London

The memory loss experienced by patients suffering

from Alzheimer`s disease results in part from damage
to the hippocampus.
 Forebrain
Limbic system

• The cingulate cortex: works with the hippocampus

to process cognitive information related to
emotion.

• Both hippocampus and cingulate cortex play a role

in comparing current emotion-related information
to information stored in memory.
The limbic system

Long-term memory
 The limbic system

Emotions (fear),
memory
 Forebrain
Cerebral cortex
• It is the largest structure in the forebrain.
• It formed of a densely packed mass of billions of
cell bodies (gray matter of the brain)
• The part of cerebrum beneath the cortex is
composed primarily of axons (white matter of
the brain) matter)
• It is involved in conscious experience, voluntary
actions, language and intelligence.
………. Many of the things that make us human…….
 Lobes of the cerebral cortex
• It has 4 sections(lobes): frontal, parietal,
occipital and temporal lobes.
 Frontal lobes
• They play key roles in thinking, remembering,
making decisions, speaking, predicting the future
consequences of actions, controlling movement &
regulating emotions.
• Left cerebral hemisphere also contains Broca`s
area which is involved in our ability to speak
language.
• Strokes which affects Broca`s area make patients
understand what is said to them but have
difficulty speaking (expressive aphasia)
 Frontal lobes

• Frontal lobes also play a role in the regulation of

emotion and socially inappropriate behavior.

Story
Post thrombotic CVA 63 Libyan man who was
known as a polite and hardworking man…………..
 Parietal lobes
• It contains the somatosensory area.
• It is important to the sense of touch and other
body sense that tell us, among other things,
where our hands and feet are and what they
are doing
 Temporal lobes
• It contains the auditory areas which involved in
the sense of hearing.
• Wernicke`s area is located behind the auditory
area in the left hemisphere.
• Wernicke`s area plays a role in understanding
spoken language
• Wernicke`s area further processes the messages
arriving from the ears, which are first processed in
the auditory area.
 Temporal lobes
Wernicke`s aphasia

• Damage from strokes or injuries in Wernicke`s

area result in Wernicke`s aphasia.
• Where patients cannot make sense out of
language that is spoken to them by others
• Although they can make normal speech
sounds, what they say typically makes little
sense.
 Occipital lobes
• Visual area is the major part of occipital lobes
• The visual area plays an essential role in the
processing of sensory information from the
eyes.
• Damage to the visual area of the occipital
lobes can result in partial or complete
blindness, even though the eyes are able to
function normally.
Positron emission tomography PET images of the brain at
work in four tasks
5 minutes rest
 Images of the brain at work
• During the past 40 years, a number of exciting
scientific tools have made the study of brain
functions much easier.
• These techniques create images of the activities
of the living brain by using computer to compile
and interpret huge amounts of information from:
Electrical activity.
Magnetic waves.
other forms of radiation
 Images of the brain at work
• Electroencephalogram (EEG): recode the electrical
activity from the brain.
• Positron emission tomography (PET): the images
created by computer interpretation of the activity of
the brain obtained by PET.
• Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI): this technique
detects magnetic activity from the nuclei of atoms in
living cells and creates visual images of the anatomy
of the brain.
• Functional MRI: measures the activity of specific
parts of the brain by measuring the changes in the
use of oxygen in neurons that reflect their level of
activity.
• EEG
• PET images
• MRI
 Functioning MRI: Oxygenated and deoxygenated
hemoglobin have different magnetic susceptibility.
 Functional difference between left and right
cerebral hemispheres
• The left & right cerebral hemispheres play
different but complementary roles in processing
information.
• In 90% of the population, the areas of greatest
control over language are located in the left
cerebral hemisphere.
• So, left hemisphere plays the major role in
analyzing the logical content of language.
• The right hemisphere play a greater role in
processing information about the shapes and
location of things in space.
 Function of the left and right cerebral
hemispheres
• For example: when you study a list of
verbal items such as memorizing the
names of the different parts femur
bone , there will be more activity in
your left frontal lobe.

• However, if you study a drawing to

memorize the shape location of the
parts of femur, there will be more
activity in your right frontal lobe.
 Function of the left and right cerebral
hemispheres

In general: the left side of the cerebral cortex tends

to handle verbal information and the right side
tends to handle visual information.
• So there are differences in the cognitive functions
of the two cerebral hemispheres.

That is very important in learning

 Hemispheres of the cerebral cortex
and emotion
• The two hemispheres also play different roles
in processing emotions.
• The right hemisphere plays a greater role in
the expression and perception of negative
emotion (fear, sadness & anger).
• Left hemisphere plays a greater role in the
perception and expression of positive emotion
 Hemispheres of the cerebral cortex
and emotion
• So, patients who had suffered strokes were more
likely to become depressed if the stroke was in
the left hemisphere.

• Indeed, some patients with right hemisphere

damage are cheerful, happy and not at all
depressed by their disability

The story of Libyan women with right hemisphere

tumor (SOL)
 Human Diversity: Sex Differences in
the Cerebral Cortex
• Female brain – average size smaller than that
of male brain
– More folds and complex
– Greater surface area
– More accurate in verbal task performance
– More activation in left cerebral hemisphere
• Male brain
– More activation in right
cerebral hemisphere
Is the brain a changeable structure or
not?
 Yes
Brain is a developing system
 Brain is a developing system

The brain continues to change in structure

throughout our lives by:
• Developmental changes in white and gray
matter.
• Neurogenesis.
 Developmental changes in white and gray
matter.
• The total weight of the brain does not change much
after early childhood.
• But from childhood through middle age, the ↑white
matter increases and ↓gray matter decreases in the
cerebral cortex by eliminating unnecessary neural
cells (neural pruning) to improve the efficiency of
neural system.
• After the 5th decade of life the volumes of both gray
and white matter begin to decrease leading to
reduction in the working memory and cognitive
speed.
 Neurogenesis
• The brain is also a developing system in the sense
that new neurons grow (neurogenesis) in many
key areas of the brain well into adulthood.
• The growth of new neurons through neurogenesis
plays an important role in learning and the storing
of new memories.
• For example: it has been shown that learning a
new skill causes an average increase of 3% in the
number of neural cell bodies (gray matter) in
areas of cortex related to visual attention.
Endocrine system
 Endocrine system: chemical messengers of the body

• This system plays an important role in

communication and the regulation of body
processes.
• It consists of a number of glands that secrets two
kinds of chemical messengers:
 Neuropeptides; some neuropeptides reach the brain
& influence the neural system, in this way they play
important role in stress regulation, social bonding,
emotion & memory.
 Hormones: secreted into the blood carried
throughout the body and influence many organs
including the brain.
 Endocrine system: chemical messengers of the body

• The release of neuropeptides & hormones by endocrine

glands is regulated by the brain through the hypothalamus.
• Thus the endocrine glands gives the brain additional ways
to control the body`s organs.
• Hormones are powerful tools of the brain, but they
influence the body in diffuse rather than precise ways.
• This particularly true during physical stress or emotional
arousal.
• At these times, neuropeptides and hormones influence
such things as metabolism, blood pressure, blood sugar
level and sexual functioning.
 We have 7 endocrine glands
• Pituitary gland: it is the body master gland, it is
regulating the body`s reaction to stress and
resistance to disease, controls; blood pressure,
thirst &body growth.
• Adrenal glands: they play an important role in
emotional arousal, they secrets; epinephrine,
norepinephrine and cortisol the three hormones
are important in stress reaction.
 The stress of giving a public speech affects
hormones secreted by adrenal glands
60 200
180
50
160
40 day not
140
Day not giving giving
30 120 speech
speech
20 100
immediately 80 imediately
10 after
after giving 60
speecch giving
0
40 speech
20
0
cortisol
 The stress of giving a public speech increases
the heart rate & BP
86 120
84
100
82
day not
80 80
day not giving
78 giving speech
76 speech 60
immeditely immediatel
74
after giving 40 y after
72 speech giving
70 20 speech

68
Diastolic blood 0
pressure heart rate
 Autonomic NS and the internal organs
The autonomic nervous system has two ways of
activating the internal organs:
• By directly affecting the organs.
• By stimulating the adrenals & other endocrine
glands that then influence the organs with their
hormones.

One reason it takes so long to feel calm after a

stressful event has passed is because it takes quite
a while for hormones to leave the blood stream.
 We have 7 endocrine glands
• Islets of langerhans: secrets glucagon and insulin
to control blood sugar level which is important
psychologically, because it`s one of the factors in
the hunger motive.

• Gonads: ovaries and testes secret estrogen and

testosterone: there is emerging evidence that sex
hormones play a role in guiding the development
of the brain and changes in social behavior during
adolescence.
 We have 7 endocrine glands
• Thyroid gland: in children, proper functioning of
the thyroid is necessary for proper mental
development.
A serious thyroid deficiency in
childhood produces sluggishness,
poor muscle tone, and a rare type
of mental retardation called cretinism.

In adults, people with hypothyroidism tend to be

inactive and overweight.
 We have 7 endocrine glands
• Parathyroid glands: it is important in the
functioning of the nervous system.
 too much ↑PTH inhibits nervous activity
leading to lethargy.
 too little ↓PTH leads to excessive nervous
activity & tension.
 We have 7 endocrine glands
• Pineal gland: secreting melatonin which
regulates the biological rhythm, including:
 Menstrual cycle.
Sleep & wakefulness.
Mood regulation (Seasonal affective disorder;
a type of depression).
Application of psychology
Schizophrenia and the brain
Alzheimer and the brain
 MCQ
• The small but vitally important part of the
forebrain that plays a key role in the control of
emotion, endocrine gland activity, blood
pressure, and heart beat (because it is the
brain center most linked to the autonomic NS)
is the:
a) Cerebrum b) Cerebellum
c) Hypothalamus d) Thalamus
 MCQ
• The small but vitally important part of the
forebrain that plays a key role in the control of
emotion, endocrine gland activity, blood
pressure, and heart beat (because it is the
brain center most linked to the autonomic NS)
is the:
a) Cerebrum b) Cerebellum
c) Hypothalamus d) Thalamus
 MCQ
• When you are in danger, which part of the
nervous system is responsible for your heart
rate increasing?
a) The central nervous system
b) The somatic nervous system
c) The sympathetic nervous system
d) The parasympathetic nervous system
e) The spinal cord
 MCQ
• When you are in danger, which part of the
nervous system is responsible for your heart
rate increasing?
a) The central nervous system
b) The somatic nervous system
c) The sympathetic nervous system
d) The parasympathetic nervous system
e) The spinal cord
 MCQ
• Broca's area plays an important role in _____, while
Wernicke's area plays an important role in _____.
a) Motor function & sensation, respectively.
b) Sensation & motor function, respectively.
c) Speech production & speech understanding,
respectively.
d) Speech comprehension & speech production,
respectively.
e) Both in speech understanding.
 MCQ
• Broca's area plays an important role in _____, while
Wernicke's area plays an important role in _____.
a) Motor function & sensation, respectively.
b) Sensation & motor function, respectively.
c) Speech production & speech understanding,
respectively.
d) Speech comprehension & speech production,
respectively.
e) Both in speech understanding.