Human Movement: Basics, Complexities, and Disorders
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Presentation Transcript
Chapter 7 Movements
Outline • Movement basics • Complex movement • Adaptive movement • Movement disorders • Language from movement
Movement basics • Motor homonculus in motor cortex • Which areas are given the most real estate?
Movement basics • Corticospinal tracts • Lateral corticospinal tract • Anterior corticospinal tract • The spinal cord • Transit system for motor neural signals • Reflex responses
Complex Movement • Movement requires memory, strength, sensory feedback, and coordination across brain regions
Complex Movement Super advanced robot vs. a child
Complex Movement: Basal ganglia • Interconnected nuclei that surround the thalamus • Involved in: • Movement • Habit formation • Attention • Communicates as needed with cerebral cortex
Complex Movement: Cerebellum • Movement coordination, balance, and muscle tone • 10% of the brain’s total volume • 4x more neurons than the cortex
Adaptive movement • Optimal actions minimize cost and maximize reward. • Predict how much effort is needed before lifting a box
Adaptive movement • Many species can do complex movements • What are some possible functions for complex movements?
Adaptive movement: Athletics • Novice and expert golfers exhibit different patterns of brain activity when preparing to make a shot. • Becoming an expert usually means automating behavior (less prefrontal cortex)
Adaptive movement: Athletics • What happens when athletes “overthink” automatic behaviors? • Is “icing the kicker” effective?
Adaptive movement: Exercise • Exercise may help your brain stave off effects of again • Why might exercise be more important now than a few hundred (or thousand) years ago?
Movement Disorders Add Title here • Parkinson’s disease • Spinal cord injury
Movement Disorders: Spinal cord injury • 2.5 million worldwide • Severe impact on quality of life • CNS neurons don’t regrow
Movement Disorders: Spinal cord injury Animal models of spinal cord injury are used to develop therapies that may hold promise for human spinal cord injuries.
Language as movement • Protosigns and protolanguage • Similar gestures across some primates
Language as movement • Mirror theory of speech • Motor theory of speech • Genetics also play a role (genes implicated in dyslexis)
Language as movement • Where did we get the sounds used in our language from? • From nature?
Language as movement: Cortex Large language network. Much early knowledge about language in the brain came from patients with lesions in particular areas
Language as movement: Cortex • Language is primarily left-lateralized • Individuals with damage to left hemisphere show some plasticity • Better plasticity for younger people