Neural Integration I: Sensory Pathways and the Somatic Nervous System
The primary sensory cortex of the cerebral hemispheres or areas of the cerebellar hemispheres receive:
somatic sensory information
Visceral sensory information is distributed primarily to reflex centers in the:
brain stem and diencephalon
The efferent division of the nervous system that includes nuclei, motor tracts, and motor neurons controls:
peripheral effectors
The motor neurons and pathways that control skeletal muscles form the:
somatic nervous system
Judith is receiving messages in her brain from baroreceptors in the stomach, chemoreceptors detecting Po2 levels in the blood, and tactile receptors in the skin. All this information must be transmitted in what type of format to be detected by the CNS?
action potentials
Free nerve endings can be stimulated by many different stimuli because they exhibit little:
receptor specificity
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a degenerative disorder that affects:
motor neurons and their associated skeletal muscles
Nociceptors, common in the skin, in joint capsules, and around the walls of blood vessels, are sensory receptors for:
pain
Which of the following receptors are stimulated when a stiff breeze blows across the skin of your arm and moves some of the hairs?
root hair plexuses
Thermoreceptors are phasic receptors because they are:
very active when the temperature is changing
Tactile receptors provide sensations of:
touch, pressure, and vibration
Which type of receptor detects volumes of digestive materials in the colon?
Answer:
baroreceptors
Chemoreceptors in the medulla oblongata would be sensitive to changes in pH and Pco2 in:
cerebrospinal fluid
The three major somatic sensory pathways are the:
posterior column, anterolateral, and spinocerebellar
The axons of the posterior column ascend within the:
fasciculus gracilis and fasciculus cuneatus
The reason the sensory homunculus appears distorted in the face and hands is:
Answer:
it is a representation of the number of sensory neurons in the given body areas
Ruffini corpuscles and Golgi tendon organs are similar in their:
ability to detect tension and distortion
The integrative activities performed by neurons in the cerebellar cortex and cerebellar nuclei are essential to the:
precise control of voluntary and involuntary movements
A sensory first-order neuron traveling along the posterior column pathway from the arm would synapse in the:
nucleus cuneatus
The upper motor neuron of a somatic motor pathway has a cell body that lies in:
a CNS processing center
The three integrated pathways controlling conscious and subconscious motor commands in skeletal muscle are the:
corticospinal, medial, and lateral
The motor tracts in the spinal cord controlling subconscious regulation of balance and muscle tone are the:
vestibulospinal tracts
The background patterns of movement involved in voluntary motor activities are controlled by:
basal nuclei
The center of somatic motor control that plans and initiates voluntary motor activity is the:
cerebral cortex
The center of somatic motor control that coordinates complex motor patterns is the:
cerebellum
The center of somatic motor control that controls basic respiratory reflexes is the:
medulla oblongata
If a tract name begins with spino-, it must start in the:
spinal cord and end in the brain, carrying sensory information
If the name of a tract ends in -spinal, its axons must:
start in the higher centers and end in the spinal cord, bearing motor commands
The posterior column pathway receives sensations associated with:
highly localized fine touch, pressure, vibration, and position
In the thalamus, data arriving over the posterior column pathway are integrated, sorted, and projected to the
primary sensory cortex
If a sensation arrives at the wrong part of the sensory cortex, you will:
reach an improper conclusion about the source of the stimulus
If the central cortex were damaged or the projection fibers cut, a person would be able to detect light touch but would be unable to determine:
the source of the stimulus
The spinothalamic pathway relays impulses associated with:
"crude" sensations of touch, pressure, pain, and temperature
The spinocerebellar pathway includes:
anterior and posterior tracts
The spinocerebellar pathway carries information concerning the:
position of muscles, tendons, and joints to the cerebellum
Somatic motor pathways always involve a(n):
upper and lower motor neuron
Voluntary and involuntary somatic motor commands issued by the brain reach peripheral targets by traveling over the:
pyramidal and extrapyramidal systems
The primary goal of the vestibular nuclei is:
maintaining posture and balance
The reticulospinal tract is involved with regulation of:
involuntary reflex activity and autonomic functions
An individual whose primary motor cortex has been destroyed retains the ability to walk and maintain balance but the movements:
lack precision and are awkward and poorly controlled
The basal nuclei contain two populations of neurons, one releasing ACh and the other releasing GABA. ACh would have a(n) ____ effect on the neurons they synapse with, while GABA would have a(n) ______ effect.
excitatory,inhibitory
When someone touches a hot stove, the rapid, automatic, preprogrammed response that preserves homeostasis is provided by the:
spinal reflex
Which part of the brain is responsible for the highest level of motor command in terms of complexity and voluntary motion?
primary motor cortex
"Itch spots" can be found in all but which of the following areas of the body?
trachea
An individual who can understand language and knows how to respond but lacks the motor control necessary to produce the right combinations of sounds has:
major motor aphasia
If connections between the prefrontal cortex and other brain regions are severed:
tensions, frustrations, and anxieties are removed
A person demonstrating anesthesia in a given area would lose:
a. sensation of pressure
b. sensation of touch
c. sensitivity to pain and temperature
All three are correct.
An individual would lose two-point discrimination at 3–5 mm on which region(s) of the body?
backs of hands and feet
Which of the following correctly defines referred pain?
pain felt in an uninjured body area when it actually occurs in another location
The walls of the diencephalon form the paired right and left ____ and the floor is called the hypothalamus.
thalamus