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Gender, age, and experience influence our
Figure 1.6-25 Processes ability to identify and remember scents. Women
CONNECT 1.6-14 Taste, smell, and memory taste tend to have a better sense of smell, but for all of
Information from the taste buds us, the sense of smell peaks in early adulthood
As a connection to neuroscience, travels to an area between the and gradually declines thereafter ( Doty, 2001 ;
brain’s frontal and temporal lobes
inform students that smell is the only (yellow area). It registers in an Wickelgren, 2009 ; Wysocki & Gilbert, 1989 ). Phys-
area not far from where the brain
sense where the signals do not go receives information from our ical condition also matters: Smokers and people
with Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, or
directly to the thalamus before being sense of smell (red area), which alcohol use disorder typically have a diminished
interacts with taste. The brain’s
processed. In fact, smell is processed circuitry for smell also connects sense of smell ( Doty, 2001 ). Moreover, the smells
with areas involved in memory
near the prefrontal cortex before it is storage, which helps explain why Processes smell we detect and the ways we experience them dif-
fer, thanks to our individual genes ( Trimmer et al.,
a smell can trigger a memory.
(near memory area)
sent along. This may help explain why 2019 ). The scent of a flower may be different for
smell can trigger powerful memories, you than for a friend.
because that part of the brain works Body Position and Movement
with the limbic system to process
How do we sense our body’s position and movement?
1.6-15
emotional memories. 1.6-15 How do we sense our body’s position and movement?
If you did not sense your body’s position and movement, you could not put food in
your mouth, stand up, or reach out and touch someone. Nor could you perform the
TEACH 1.6-15 “simple” act of taking one step forward. That act requires feedback from, and instruc-
tions to, some 200 muscles, and it engages brain power that exceeds the mental activity
Enrichment involved in reasoning. Millions of position and motion sensors in muscles, tendons, and
joints all over your body, called proprioceptors, provide constant feedback to your brain.
Copyright © Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
People who lose their kinesthetic This enables your sense of kinesthesis which keeps you aware of your body parts’ posi-
,
sense, also called proprioception, lose tion and movement. Twist your wrist one degree and your brain receives an immediate
the ability to move unless they can see update.
If you are able to experience sight and sound, you can momentarily imagine being
themselves move. When they see their blind and deaf by closing your eyes and plugging your ears to experience the dark silence.
bodies, their brains are able to pro- But what would it be like to live without touch or kinesthesis — without being able to sense
cess what needs to be done to move. the positions of your limbs when you wake during the night? Ian Waterman of Hampshire,
England, knows. At age 19, Waterman contracted a rare viral infection that destroyed the
In the dark, such individuals become nerves enabling his senses of light touch and of body position and movement. People with
limp and collapse. this condition report feeling disembodied, as though their body is dead, not real, not theirs
( Sacks, 1985 ). With prolonged practice, Waterman learned to walk and eat — by visually
focusing on his limbs and directing them accordingly. But if the lights went out, he would
crumple to the floor ( Azar, 1998 ).
Vision interacts with kinesthesis for you, too. If you are able, stand with your right heel
in front of your left toes. Easy. Now close your eyes and try again. Did you wobble?
A companion vestibular sense monitors your head’s (and thus your body’s) position
and movement. The biological gyroscopes for this sense of equilibrium are two structures in
TEACH 1.6-15 Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Not for redistribution.
your inner ear. The first, your fluid-filled semicircular canals, look like a three-dimensional
kinesthesis [kin-ehs-THEE-
Teaching Tip sis] our movement sense; our pretzel ( Figure 1.6-18a ). The second structure is the pair of calcium-crystal–filled vestibular
system for sensing the position
sacs. When your head rotates or tilts, the movement of these organs stimulates hair-like
and movement of individual
To illustrate vestibular sense, invite a body parts. receptors, which send nerve signals to your cerebellum at the back of your brain, enabling
local dance or figure skating instruc- vestibular sense our balance you to sense your body position and maintain your balance.
If you twirl around and then come to an abrupt halt, neither the fluid in your semicir-
tor to come to class to discuss how sense; our sense of body cular canals nor your kinesthetic receptors will immediately return to their neutral state.
movement and position that
dancers and figure skaters maintain enables our sense of balance. The dizzy aftereffect fools your brain with the sensation that you’re still spinning. This
their balance when completing those illustrates a principle that underlies perceptual illusions: Mechanisms that normally give
amazing spins and turns.
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