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Readings:

The Textbook for this course is Biological Psychology, 5th Edition by S.M. Breedlove, M.R. Rosenzweig, N.V. Watson (2007), Sinauer Associates

All Textbook readings are indicated by BRW, Chapter #. All other articles are available through the Blackboard interface. It is preferable for you to complete readings prior to date listed, unless otherwise indicated in class.

 

Date

Reading Assignment

1/22

BRW, Chapter 1, pp. 3-20

1/24

Dodds, D. Fact or Phrenology? Scientific American, 2005.


BRW, Ch. 2, pp. 51-55.

Sacks, O. "The Last Hippie", in An Anthropologist on Mars.


1/29

Chalmers, D. The New Puzzle of Consciousness, Scientific American, 2002.

Gazzaniga, M., and Steven, M. Neuroscience and the Law

Pinker, S. Standard Equipment (Chapter 1 from How the Mind Works, Norton & Co.) 1997

1/31, 2/5

Buss, D. Evolutionary Psychology: A new Paradigm for Psychological Science.  Psychological Inquiry, 1995.Vol. 6 pp. 1-30 (focus on the first 15 pages or so).

BRW, Ch. 6

2/7, 2/12

Gawande, A. Crimson Tide. The New Yorker, Feb 12 2001: 50-57

Stein, R.B., and Mushahwar, V. 2005. Reanimating limbs after injury or disease. Trends in Neurosciences, 28, pp. 518-524.

Linge, F., What does it feel like to be brain damaged? Injury: 18, 1987, 322-326.

2/14, 2/19, 2/21, 2/26

Krebs, C., Huttmann, K., Steinhauser, C. The forgotten brain emerges, Scientific American: 2004, pp. 40-44.

Parri, R., and Crunelli, V.  An astrocyte bridge from synapse to blood flow.  Nature Neurosceince, 2003, Vol. 6 pp. 5-6

BRW, Chapter 2, pp. 22-34

BRW Chapter 3


2/28

BRW, Chapter 4 until p. 111

Llinas, R. Calcium in synaptic transmission. Scientific American 1982, 247, pp. 56-65.

Julien, R., Principles of Drug Action (Chapter 1 from A Primer of Drug Action, 8th Ed.,Wm Freeman & Co. 1998).

3/6

BRW, Chapter 4, pp.111-116

Taking Sides, Clashing views in psychological issues, 14th Ed. Brent Slife Ed, Issue 13: Is drug addiction a choice? pp. 235-251

3/18

(development: neurulation to neurogenesis)

BRW, Ch. 7 (until p. 186)

Sabbagh, L. (2006).  The teen brain: hard at work.  Scientific American Mind, v.17 pp 20-26.

Erikkson, PS., Perfilieva, E., Bjork-Erikkson, T., Alborn, A-M., Nordborg, C., Peterson, DA., Gage, FH.  (1998) Neurogenesis in the adult human hippocampus. Nature Medicine, 4, 1313-1317

Supplementary commentary (read this if you're having trouble getting through the Erikkson paper: Gibbs, 1998, Dogma Overturned, Scientific American, pp19-20

3/20

(development: migration to apoptosis)

Classic 1: Rakic, P. (1974) Neurons in rhesus monkey visual cortex: systematic relation between time of origin and eventual disposition.  Science, 183, 425-427.

BRW, Ch. 7 (until p. 194)

3/25

(development: synaptic-rearrangement, learning)

Classic 2: Wiesel, TN., Hubel, DH. (1965).  Comparison of the effects of unilateral and bilateral eye closure on cortical unit responses in kittens. Journal of Neurophysiology, 28, 1029-1040.

BRW, Chapter 7, pp.202-206

3/27

(development: aging)

BRW, Chapter 7, pp. 210-214

4/1

BRW, Ch 5

Becker & Breedlove, Introduction to Behavioral Endocrinology, pp. 22-34 (excerpt from Behavioral Endocrinology (1992), Becker, Breedlove, Crews (Eds).)

4/3, 4/8
BRW, Chapter 13, p. 401-415; Gawande, The Man Who Couldn't Stop Eating.  The New Yorker
4/10

Cacioppo, JT, Bernston, GG., Sheridan, JF, McClintock, MK.  (2002).  Multilevel integrative analysis of human behavior: social neuroscience and the complementing nature of social and biological approaches.  In Foundations in Social Neuroscience MIT Press 2002

Kinsley, CH., Lambert, KG. The maternal brain.  Scientific American (2005)

4/15

Fisher, H., Aron, A., Brown, L. Romatic Love: An fMRI study of neural mechanism for mate choice (2005). Journal of Comparative Neurology, 493 58-62.

de Vignemont F., & Singer, T. (2006).  The empathic brain: How, when and why? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 10, 435-441.

Langford, DJ., Crager, SE., Shehzad, Z., Smith, SB., Levenstadt, JS., Chandra, ML., Levitin, DJ., Mogil, JS. (2006).  Social modulation of pain as evidence for empathy in mice. Science, 312, 1967-1970.

4/20

Sapolsky, RM. Neuroendocrinology of the stress response pp. 287-303 (excerpt from Behavioral Endocrinology (1992), Becker, Breedlove, Crews (Eds.))

Gould, E. Social isolation delays the positive effects of running on adult neurogenesis.  Nature Neuroscience, 2006.