INTRODUCTION TO

PHYSIOLOGICAL
PSYCHOLOGY
Major Issues

Physiological Psychology provides

an introduction into the biological
basis of behavior. This course
explores the structure and function
of the nervous system and its
relationship to behavior, emotion,
and cognition.
Key Terms

Biology
- is the science of life.

- is the natural science that studies

life and living organisms, including
their physical structure, chemical
processes, molecular interactions,
physiological mechanisms,
development and evolution.
WHAT IT IS?

• Physiology
– from the Greek word “Physis” meaning nature
or origin and “Logia” which means Study of
- A branch of biology that deals with the workings
of the human body.
-is the study of normal function within living creatures. It is a
sub-section of biology, covering a range of topics that include
organs, anatomy, cells, biological compounds, and how they
all interact to make life possible.
WHAT IT IS?

• Psychology
- from the Greek word “Psyche” which mean
mind and “logia” which means study of.
- it refers to the branch of science that studies the
working of the human mind more specifically the
ones that deal with behavior.
WHAT IT IS?

• Biological Psychology

is the study of the physiological, evolutionary,

and developmental mechanisms of behavior
and experience.
WHAT IT IS?

• Physiological Psychology
-is branch of biological psychology that deals
with the workings mind and body.
-studies how the different workings of the body as
in direct link to the brain.

-it is devoted to studying brain functioning.

 WHY IS IT IMPORTANT IN
PSYCHOLOGY?
• Psychology studies the behavior of an individual.
• The behavior of an individual is govern by the changes in the
body.
• The changes in the body is profoundly affected by the main
provider of information throughout the body which is the brain.
• The subject is important to be able to understand how small
changes in the brain relates to the differences in the actions of
an individual more precisely in the person’s behavior.
 Way of Thinking of Biological
Psychologists
Biological psychologists try to answer four types of question
about any given behavior.
 How does it relate to the physiology of the brain and other
organs?
 How does it develop within the individual?
 How did the capacity for the behavior evolve?
 Why did the capacity for this behavior evolve?
 Biological Explanations of
Behavior
Explaining behavior in biological perspective falls into four
categories:
 Physiological - relates a behavior to the activity of the brain
and other organs; it deals with the machinery of the body.
 Ontogenetic - describes the development of structure or a
behavior; it traces the influences of genes, nutrition,
experiences, and the interactions among these influences
in producing behavioral tendencies.
 Evolutionary - examines a structure or a behavior in terms of
evolutionary history; suggests that behavior evolved in our
distant ancestors.
 Functional - describes why a structure or behavior evolved
as it did.
 MAJOR ISSUES

 MIND-BRAIN RELATIONSHIP
 THE GENETICS OF BEHAVIOR
 THE USE OF ANIMALS IN RESEARCH
 Mind-Brain Relationship
Philosophers and scientists continue to address the mind-
brain or mind-body relationship.

 Dualism - the belief that mind and body are different kinds of substance
(thought substance and physical substance) that exist independently but
somehow interact.
- Rene Descartes proposed that mind and brain interact at a single point in space,
which he suggested was the pineal gland, the smallest unpaired structure he
could find the brain.
 Monoism - the belief that the universe consists of only one kind of existence.
- versions of monoism are as follows:
 Materialism - the view that everything that exists is material, or physical; mental events
don’t exist at all; mind is the figment of imagination; psychological experiences can
eventually be explained in purely physical forms.
 Mentalism - the view that only the mind really exists and that the physical world exists
only because we think about it.
 Identity Position - the view that mental processes are the same thing as certain kinds
of brain processes; every experience is a brain activity, even though descriptions of
our thoughts sound very different from descriptions of brain activities.
 Genetics of Behavior

Everything in a human person depends on both

genes and environment. Without genes or without
an adequate environment, a person would not
exist.
Genes affect behavior by controlling the
production and distribution of neurotransmitters
 Mendelian Genetics
Mendel demonstrated that inheritance occurs through genes.

Principles:
1. Hereditary factors (genes) must exist.
 Genes dictate the heredity and variations of individuals.
In a simpler form, Genes are the information placed in
the DNA and RNA that make a person “YOU”.
 In every specie, genes play a very vital role for a
biological mechanisms.

2. Two factors exist for each characteristic.

 There must be two factors for each characteristic: one
from your mother and one from your father.
 Mendelian Genetics
Mendel demonstrated that inheritance occurs through genes.

Principles:
3. At the time of sex-cell formation, the hereditary factors of a
pair separate equally into the sex cells (Law of
Segregation).
 The sex cells are the only cells of the body to undergo meiotic
division. During that time, the sex cells will separate, from 46
chromosomes to 23 chromosomes for each sex cell.

4. Each sex cells only bear one characteristic .

 Not all sex cells have the same characteristics
 Mendelian Genetics
Mendel demonstrated that inheritance occurs through genes.

Principles:
5. Hereditary factors for different sort independently of one
another at sex cell formation (Law of Independent
Assortment).
 The variants that a cell receives for one gene (during gamete
formation) does not influence the variants received for another gene.
This is the reason why there are different characteristics each cell.

6. Cells join randomly, regardless of the factors that they

carry - characteristic that appeared in an organism
seemed to dominate over the one that was recessive.
(Law of Dominance).
 Heritability
Heritability is an estimate of the amount of variation that is
due to genetic variation as opposed to environmental
variation.
Researchers estimates heritability through: twin studies and
adopted studies, among others.
However results often overestimate human heritability for
several reasons:
 The environmental quality varies little for most adopted
children.
 Most of the results do not distinguish between the effects
of genes and those of prenatal environment.
 After genes produce an early increase in some behavioral
tendency, that behavior may lead to change in the
environment that magnifies the tendency, thus leading to
what appears to be a huge effect of heredity.
 Evolution
Evolution is the change of frequencies of various genes over period of time.
Frequencies of gene variants (alleles) change in populations by these
forces:
 Nonrandom Mating - occurs when certain individuals contribute more to
the next generation than others; it increases the incidence of certain
recessive disorders.
 Migration - is the movement of populations, groups or individuals.
 Genetic Drift - is change in allele frequencies in a population from
generation to generation that occurs due to chance events.
 Natural Selection - the process in nature by which, according to
Darwin's theory of evolution, only the organisms best adapted to their
environment tend to survive and transmit their genetic characters in
increasing numbers to succeeding generations while those less
adapted tend to be eliminated.
 The Use of Animals in Biological
Research

Most of what we know about the functioning of the nervous system

stems from research done on nonhuman animals.
Here are the reasons for animal research:
1. The underlying mechanisms of behavior are similar across
species and sometimes are easier to study in a nonhuman
species.
2. We are interested in animals for the sake of understanding.
3. What we learn about animals sheds light on human evolution.
4. Certain experiments cannot use human subjects because of
legal or ethical restrictions.
However, animal research today is conducted under legal and
ethical controls that attempt to minimize animal distress.
 Prospects for Further Study
There are careers related to biological psychology.
A research career ordinarily requires a PhD in psychology, biology,
neuroscience, or other related field.

Researchers of this field can be identified as follows:

 Behavioral Neuroscientist - investigates how functioning of the brain and other organs
influences behavior.
 Neuroscientist - studies the anatomy, biochemistry, and physiology of the NS.
 Neuropsychologist - conducts behavioral tests to determine what various brain
damaged people can and cannot do and how their condition changes over time.
 Psychophysiologist - measures heart rate, breathing rate, brain waves, and other body
processes that change as a function of people’s activities and information processing.
 Neurochemist - investigates chemical reactions in the brain and their consequences.
 Comparative Psychologist - compares the behaviors of different species and tries to
relate them to evolutionary histories and ways of life.
 Sociobiologist - relates behaviors, especially social behaviors, including those of
humans, to the functions they have served and therefore the presumed selective
pressures that caused them to evolve.
The related medical specialties are:
Neurologist - treats people with brain
damage or diseases of the brain.
Neurosurgeon - performs brain surgery.
Psychiatrist - helps people with emotional
distress or troublesome behaviors,
sometimes using drugs or other medical
procedures.