Sensory System

INSTRUCTIONS 

  1. Pick any topic that interests you that is related to the biopsychology ofSENSORY, ATTENTION OR MOTORSYSTEMS (or combinations of these). Read about your topic of interest from at least two reliable sources (see more about the sources below). Your essay must somehow address the neuroscientific/biopsychology aspects of your topic. One of your sources can be our textbook. Many chapters in the book discuss relevant topics, but the most relevant chapters for this assignment are chapters 6, 7 and 8. Note, however, that you must also have at least one other source. Many topics you could select are discussed a little bit in the book and that could be your starting point, but you’d want to find more information elsewhere.
  2. Report to others what you discovered by writing a summary of your findings and posting it in this Canvas discussion board below. You also need to post your summary in the Vericite plagiarism check which is right underneath this discussion in the Canvas module. The minimum length of your summary is 3 pages (when double-spaced). There is no maximum length.
  3. As mentioned above, one of your sources can be our textbook (but does not have to be). Your sources should be RELIABLE ACADEMIC SOURCES that discuss peer-reviewed research findings. The best way to accomplish this is to locate an actual PEER-REVIEWED JOURNAL ARTICLE  (using the library website). It is also acceptable to use a book that discusses research data, or a reliable academic website that cites peer-reviewed research data. However, the website needs to list their peer-reviewed sources so that you can determine where the information came from. WIKIPEDIA IS NOT ACCEPTED AS A RELIABLE SOURCE for this assignment.
  4. You also need to read other students’ summaries, and reply to TWO of them by the due date above. You can ask questions, comment on their information, tell about your knowledge related to their topic, etc.

 

Here are some ideas for what you could research and report about:

You could research a condition in which the sensory, attention and/or motor functions are somehow affected/impaired, often because of brain damage and/or a developmental process. Discuss symptoms, brain regions/neural organization, case studies if applicable, and any other information you find interesting about the condition. Remember that your essay must address the neuroscientific/biopsychology aspects of your topic. You can pick a condition mentioned in our textbook, or find a condition that is not mentioned in the book but is relevant to this question. Some example conditions you could examine:

  • Scotoma
  • Blindsight 
  • Apperceptive agnosia
  • Associative agnosia
  • Prosopagnosia 
  • Achromatopsia
  • Red-green color blindness
  • Synesthesia
  • Akinetopsia 
  • Auditory cortex damage
  • Hearing loss/Deafness
  • Tinnitus (ringing of the ears)
  • Astereognosia (inability to recognize objects by touch)
  • Asomatognosia (failure to recognize parts of own body)
  • Unilateral/contralateral neglect
  • Rubber-hand illusion (feeling that an object is part of one’s body)
  • Congenital insensitivity to pain
  • Neuropathic pain
  • Anosmia (inability to smell)
  • Ageusia (inability to taste)
  • ADHD
  • Simultanagnosia (inability to perceive more than one stimulus at a time)
  • Optic ataxia (inability to reach and grab objects)
  • Apraxia (generally: inability to make certain movements; many different kinds of apraxias)

Alternatively, you could investigate the general neural organization and function of a specific sensory, motor or attention system. Your focus could be on describing the details of the system, or you could pick a specific topic related to the system, briefly describe the general organization and then focus on that specific topic (e.g. describe the primary motor cortex organization and function, and then discuss controlling robotic arms with it; or describe mirror neurons, and then discuss the research in relation to autism and mirror neurons).

Tell us about your key findings in your summary.  Again, remember that you must specifically address the neural processes related to your topic. Relevant topics include:

  • The auditory system
  • The visual system
  • The gustatory (taste) system
  • The olfactory (smell) system
  • The somatosensory system
  • Pain perception in the nervous system 
  • Neural mechanisms of attention
  • The sensorimotor system
  • Mirror neurons

 

Feel free to pick any of these topics, or come up with your own, as long as it somehow relates to the biopsychology of the sensory systems, motor systems and/or attention.

Note: the focus of this assignment is to learn about the sensory, motor and attention systems of the body. It would be acceptable to select a neurodegenerative disorder that has motor/sensory symptoms (e.g. Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease) BUT if you do so, you must still also describe one of the sensory/motor systems of the body.

 

FORMAT AND GRADING INFORMATION 

  1. Copy and paste (or directly type) your summary as a discussion post in the REPLY box below instead of including an attachment, because it’s easier/quicker for others to read it.
  2. You need to use APA format in-textcitationsand an APA format reference list in these assignments (instructions below and in the other documents in this module).
  3. As discussed above, you need refer to at least TWO SOURCES in your post. You can use academic peer-reviewed journal articles, books, reliable newspaper articles that discuss research, films that discuss research, academic websites (WIKIPEDIA DOES NOT COUNT FOR THIS ASSIGNMENT). The most credible websites are based on research findings and often end in .edu or .org. The best method for you for finding peer-reviewed journal articles is to use the library search tools such as Academic Search Complete. If you search for a particular key term (e.g. prosopagnosia), you will usually get a list of journal article abstracts, often with direct links to the actual articles. Peer-reviewed articles typically contain subsections such as an abstract, introduction, methods, results and discussion. Sometimes they are “review articles” that review many studies (rather than report the results of an original experiment) and may not include all of these subsections, but you can still recognize them in the library search since they are labeled as an “Academic journal” (rather than “Periodical” which are not peer-reviewed).

It can be challenging to read scientific journal articles that sometimes contain many technical details. You don’t have to understand everything about the articles; what is important is that you try to understand what kind of research the scientific community is conducting to explore your topic, and what kinds of conclusions the authors make about the research findings as well as what you think of the findings yourself. Explain what your thoughts are: why is it interesting? Why is it important?

 

GRADING

I will look for the following things when I grade your assignment:

  1. a) Clarity/quality of writing/following instructions (up to 10 points):The student has chosen a topic that is relevant to the assignment, and the student is referring to at least two reliable sources that are relevant to the topic. The post is written in formal language. The student has written the assignment using mostly or completely their own words and has paraphrased their sources. There are no or very few direct quotes, and if there are some, they are accurately cited as a direct quoteinstead of a paraphrase.

Needs improvement – 1-3 pts

Satisfactory – 4-7 pts 

Excellent – 8-10 pts

  1. b) Critical Thinking (up to 10 points):The student is able to accurately identify, discuss and critically evaluate the relevant biopsychology concepts. The student makes connections to our class material and/or other reliable research-based material they discovered, uses accurate terminology, and presents their own ideas in an educated fashion.

Needs improvement – 1-3 pts

Satisfactory – 4-7 pts 

Excellent – 8-10 pts

  1. c) Format/citations (up to 10 points):The student uses APA (American Psychological Association) format in-text citationsand an APA format reference list (the rest of the formatting does NOT need to follow the APA guidelines [spacing, abstract etc.]).

APA format in-text citations and reference list not attempted – 0 pts

Student has APA format in-text citations in every section of the text in which information is obtained from a source:

  • Includes author last names or article title if there is no author:  2 pts
  • Includes year of publication or n.d. (no date): 2 pts
  • Student has made no other mistakes: 1 pt (other mistakes include for example not using parenthesis or not using et al. when appropriate, or including information that should not be there, e.g. first names, journal names, etc.)  

APA format reference list:

  • Correct order of the items in the reference list entry (see the APA guide): 2 pts
  • All the required items are included in the reference list entry for the type of source in question (e.g. article, book, film, website): 3 pts

 

  1. d) 2 comments in response to 2 different student posts (up to 10 points):There is no specific length requirement for the comments, but the student needs to address the content of the other student’s post, showing that they read it and thought about it. Student receives 5 points for each comment that follows the instructions.

Post your summary in the REPLY box below, and then respond to two students by selecting “Reply” underneath their post.

 

ABOUT PARAPHRASING

Remember that your posts need to be written by you, not copied from someone else! When you cite sources, you take ideas from others and give them credit for it, but you need to paraphrase the information. Paraphrasing means that you form the sentences in your own words, and do not directly copy the sentence structure of the original source. DO NOT USE COPY AND PASTE AT ALL. These posts are meant for you to express your ideas and present your knowledge. You’ll need sources to gather knowledge, and you need to always credit them in your posts, but the words you use must come from you. See also the information about plagiarism and paraphrasing in the other APA format documents in Canvas.

APA STYLE IN-TEXT CITATIONS: 

When you cite a source in the text of your post, use the last name of the author(s) and publication year in parentheses.

For our textbook, APA format in-text citations look like this:

(Pinel & Barnes, 2018)

Or you could say something like this:

According to Pinel and Barnes (2018), …

That’s it, no other information needed in the text; no first names, no book name, etc. By the way, the textbook itself uses APA format in-text citations, so a good way to learn the format is to just look at how they cite in the text.

 

If for example the author of the source is Nicholson, and the publication year is 2011, cite like this in the text of your post every time you take any information from this source:

(Nicholson, 2011).

Or with two authors: (Nicholson & Pham, 2011)

If there are 3-5 authors, give their last names the first time you mention the source in the text:

(Nicholson, Pham, Pinel & Karp, 2007).

For subsequent references use the first author and “et al.” (it means “and others” in Latin)

(Nicholson et al., 2007)

With more than 6 authors, you can always use the first author and “et al.” in the text.

 

More examples in sentences:

Cocaine is a strong central nervous system stimulant (Smith, 2010). Alcohol, on the other hand, is a strong depressant (Zhang & Jones, 2001).

Or:

According to Smith (2010), cocaine is a strong central nervous system stimulant. In contrast, Zhang & Jones (2001) discuss the effects of a strong depressant, alcohol, on the central nervous system.

 

NO AUTHOR OR DATE

If there is no author (which may sometimes happen with websites), use the website article title in place of the author (or the first few words of it if it’s long). Use double quotation marks. If there is no publication date, use n.d. (no date).

For example, if the website title is NARCOLEPSY, and there is no author and no date of publication listed on the website, cite like this in your post every time you refer to information on that website:

(“Narcolepsy”, n.d.)

 

DIRECT QUOTES (USE THESE VERY RARELY OR NOT AT ALL)

If you ever quote the direct words from a source (which I don’t want to see much of, so do it sparingly if at all), you need to put the quoted sentence in quotation marks, followed by the author last names, year and page number (if available). This shows that you did not form that sentence yourself. 

The best way to practice writing scientific text is to form the sentences yourself and just paraphrase from your sources (with in-text citations). However, occasionally it might be justified to add a direct quote (e.g. famous words, or a very complicated sentence that you think should be preserved in the original form). As long as you have quotation marks and an accurate in-text citation, this is fine. But as stated before, most of each post must be written by you, not directly quoted.

Note that in APA format, paraphrases do not require the page number but always require the author last names (or website article title with no author) and year (or n.d.).

 

REFERENCE LIST IN APA FORMAT:

List the sources you referred to in your post at the end of the post in APA format (in alphabetical order by first author last name). There are APA guides in the APA format module. You need to find the type of source you are using in the guide (e.g. journal article, book, film), and list the source at the end of your post in the manner shown in the APA guide.

 

This is our textbook reference list entry: 

Pinel, P.J., & Barnes, S.J. (2018). Biopsychology (10th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Pearson Higher Education. (or just Pearson is fine, and using this format is fine for the eBook as well).

 

OTHER EXAMPLES FROM THE APA GUIDE:

This is how you list an article reference entry:

Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of article. Periodical name, volume, and page numbers. DOI (digital object identifier, if present)

Specific examples:

Kaplan, K. A., & Harvey, A. G. (2013). Behavioral treatment of insomnia in bipolar disorder. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 170, 716-720. Retrieved from http://www. ajp.psychiatryonline.org

Skiba, D. J. (2009). Digital object identifiers: Are they important to me? Nursing Education Perspectives, 30, 394-395. doi:10.1016/j.lookout.2008.06.012

Magazine article:

Kluger, J. (2008, January 28). Why we love. Time, 171(4), 54-60.

 

Website reference list entries:

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of document. Retrieved from http://Web address

Examples (these websites have no specific author name given; if there is an author name, start your reference list entry with that name as shown for the articles above):

National Renewable Energy Laboratory. (2008). Biofuels basics. Retrieved from http://www.nrel.gov/learning/re_biofuels.html

American Psychological Association. (2010, June 1). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/ethics/code.html (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.

Note that your list of references at the end of the paper and your in-text citations MUST MATCH! In other words, if you mention Smith (2010) in text, the source by Smith must be listed in the reference list, and your reference list cannot include sources that you are not mentioning in the text.

Note that you don’t have to worry about indentations and other spacing for the APA format; spacing can get messed up anyway when you post in the discussions!

If you need help with the citations besides reading the resources in Canvas, please contact me, or use the resources such as the library and the Writing center.

The best method to find articles is to use the library search tools such as Academic Search Complete.

This is how you find articles at the library website:

 

http://www.bellevuecollege.edu/lmc/ (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.

Then click “Databases” on the left, and then “Academic Search Complete”, and then you can perform searches for your topic with keywords. Sources that say “Academic Journal” are peer-reviewed (“Periodicals” are not).

If you search for a particular key term, you will usually get a list of journal article abstracts, often with direct links to the actual articles. Peer-reviewed articles typically contain subsections such as an abstract, introduction, methods, results and discussion. Sometimes they are “review articles” that review many studies (rather than report the results of an original experiment) and may not include all of these subsections, but you can still recognize them in the library search since they are labeled as an “Academic journal”.

I don’t absolutely require peer-reviewed articles for this class, but I encourage searching for them and reading them. However, you can use for example Scientific American, Psychology Today, The New Yorker, etc. which are not peer-reviewed but have good scientific articles meant for the general public.

 

DON’T FORGET TO COPY AND PASTE YOUR SUMMARY IN THE PLAGIARISM CHECK IN THIS MODULE (SEE THE INSTRUCTIONS THERE)