Twin Studies, Adoption Studies, MISTRA

          Twin study is for examing the influence of genetic and environment on behavial and medical traits. The researchers observed both the identical and fraternal twins and found that identical twins are more similar than fraternal twins because they are closer in the genetic parts than fraternal twins. Also, the researchers found that the genetic effect, environment and unique environments do important roles to shape people. Adaoption study is based on the record of individuals who are adopted. The advantage of adoption study is that it can help people to know the impact of environment and genetic influence in various situation. Also, people can compare them easily with others in the family. However, the disadvantage is that people cannot eaily find the difference. MISTRA (Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart) is that the study about twins who are seperated when they are born, and raised in the different families. The result of this study is that the twins have many similar things such as personality, interest and attitudes. This found makes people to think that these similarities are because of genetics, not environment and the difference is because of environmental effects. The one of example of this study is 'jim twins'. They have a lot of similarities such as the name of son and the number they married.

Stroke: An Assault on the brain

1. Explain what happens to the brain when a stroke occurs.

          The cells in the brain die when a stroke occurs and because of this, the ablilities which the part that the dead cells responseare lost. The part of movement, speech and memory can be affected.

2. Briefly explain the differences between the three different types of strokes.

          First type is ischemic stoke. 83% of stroke is ischemic stoke that blood clots in the artheries which suply blood to the head. This means that oxygen cannot go that part of brain. Ischemic stoke is divided two parts; embolic and thrombotic. Embloic is that blood clots in the body and it breaks off and block brain's blood vessel. It makes the blood vessel too narrow, so blood cannot pass it. Another type is hemorragic stroke. The blood vessel ruptures and and bleed in the brain. It is more common and it can be occured in the brain. Third type is subarachnoid hemorrhage which blood spills and it goes into the spinal fluid.

3. Identify some of the most common risk factors - in other words, who is most likely to have a stroke?

          To people who have a high blood, the stoke can be occured, especially hemorragic storke can be easily occured.

4. What disabilities can result from a stroke?

          No matter what kind of stoke is occured, lifetime disablitiy and death can be result of the storke, so people need the medical treatment.

5. What is brain plasticity and what does it mean in terms of recovering from a stroke?
          Brain plasticity, or neuroplasticiy is the ability of the brain to change with learning. It allows to rebuild of neurological connection, which is needed to recover stroke. It is because neurological connection is damaged because of stoke.  

The Split Brain Theory

Mi Kyung Kim

IB Psychology Year 1

1. What does it mean for a person's brain to be "split"?
- It means that the brain is divided two hemisphere, and it is connected by the corpus callosum that transmits information between two hemisphere. 

2. What was the reason why this procedure was performed on patients?
- It is because the patients did surgery which was removing a corpus callosum that connects two hemisphere. So, the brain cannot transmit information to each other. It means the brain cannot work together. It is good for this experience, because they want to know what each hemisphere does special function and two hemisphere do not work together, so researchers was able to know easily what each hemisphere does.

3. Explain one of the tests Sperry and Gazzaniga performed on these split brain patients.
- Sperry and Gazzaniga used a visual paradigm. They made that patients looked the middle point of screen, and only presented the stimulus very briefly. It was to remove participants making eye movement to left or right side of the stimuli. Second, they blindfolded patients. Then, they had patients identify objects placed in their left or right hand, and did similar things to animal. 

5. What is the reason that these results occurred?
- This is because each brain parts do different works. The left brain do work related with mathematics or vocal expression. The right brain do work related with visual things such as drawing or making. 

6. What is the corpus callosum and what role does it serve in your brain?
- The corpus callosum is the thick band of nerve fiebers between left hemisphere and right hemisphere. It connects both hemisphere; left and right and it allows both hemisphere to communicate to each other. 

The Dutch Hunger Winter

The Dutch Hunger Winter lasted from the start of November 1944 to the late spring of 1945. It was very cold winter in Western Europe and also it was very hard because of the war. The worst place was western Netherlands which was still under German control. The populations in western Netherlands were dropped rapidly because the German blocked foods. So, people in the western Netherlands were suffered from starving. Sometimes, they tried to survive with only 30 percent of daily calorie intake, and people ate grass and tulip bulbs. More than 20,000 people died because of food supplies.

From survivors, people found something interest. The Dutch survivors were a group of individuals who just suffered from one period of malnutrition and all of them suffered at exactly same time. Because of well health-care infrastructure in Netherlands, epidemiologists who study about epidemic diseases could follow the long-term effect of famine. Famine is scarcity of food. First of all was the weight of children who had been in the womb during the winter. Because of starvation, people got malnutrition, which is the condition when the body does not get enough nutrition from foods. If mother was well fed in the beginning of pregnancy and malnourished only in the roughly last 3 months of pregnancy, the babies were usually born smaller than normal babies. On the other hand, if mother was not well fed in the beginning of conception some a few months and well fed end of pregnancy, the baby’s weight was usually normal. It showed that the fetuses grow most in the end of pregnancy. So, there was difference between babies whose mother were well fed in the beginning and last a few months.

Second, however, biologist studied these babies who born in winter after 10 years later and they noticed that the baby who was born small lived with lower obesity rate. Also, after decays, baby from mother who ate well in the end of pregnancy has higher obesity rate and easily get other diseases. On the other hand babies whose mother well fed in the beginning was good health. These showed that some function which is related with person’s health was become when the beginning of the conception.

           More interesting is some of these effects are showed in present from children. The grandchildren of the women who suffered from malnutrition during the first three month of conception have higher obesity rate and get some diseases easily than other normal children. These noticed that one pregnant population can affect to grandchildren. 

Theory of Evolution

1.  Explain the theory of evolution.

     - Theory of evolution is proposed by Charles Darwin. The theory requires three condition; variation, selection and retention. Variation is that there are many species. Selection is that individual has different inheritance. Last, they have to have a retention of the selected traits from ancestors.

2.  Explain the “nature vs nurture” debate.

    - It is that although both of heredity and environment can affect on the human's mind,   the question is which one is more effective. As a result, they are viewed as competition.

3.  What is wrong with the concept of “nature vs. nurture”?

     - It is not a matter of nature and nurture. The competitive frameworks misread the way how the human traits come to be.

4.  What is meant by “social Darwinism”?

    - It is that competition and natural selection are basic power of social evolution. They rejected that it is from biology.

5.  Explain eugenics.

     - It is a effort to produce super human through selective breeding. It formalized the idea that we develop super dogs and roses.

6.  What is the problem with the concept of eugenics?

     - People misunderstand the concept of evolution. The problem is that the traits that people think it is good could combine with less-valued traits. Also, everyone is top of an equally long series of successful reproduction.

7. What does the term “fitness” mean in relation to evolution?

   - It is a basic mechanism of evolution. The greatest fit is remained and passed to next generation to survive, and less fit is disappeared.

8.  What is meant by “genetic determination”?

    - It is one of the persistent objection in psychology, and in biology, generally, it means if something found to be genetic, it cannot be changed. So, investigating genetic basis is dangerous.

9.  What is “fixation”?

     - The species are committed to it, so it is only changed by mutation. 

10.  What is “canalization”?

     - It is a phenomenon that the trait controlled by family of gene that produce same result.

11.  What is “punctuated equilibrium”?

    - It is the period of rapid evolution were colorfully terms. During the equilibrium, usually, the natural selection does not crease.

12.  How does evolution relate to psychology?

    - Evolution explains some psychological traits such as memories, perception, and adaptation.

13. Examine one evolutionary explanation of behavior.

    - The aggression helps animal to get food and access to the mates. Sometimes, they are aggressive to get territory and defend it. Also, human aggression may exist because of reproductive results from ancestors' aggressive behavior.