Course teached as: B016481 - PSICOFISIOLOGIA DELLA PERCEZIONE 3-years First Cycle Degree (DM 270/04) in PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCES AND TECHNIQUES Curriculum Scienze e Tecniche di Psicologia dei Processi Cognitivi
Teaching Language
Italian
Course Content
The course will take into account the neurophysiological and psychophysical properties of all sensory systems humans are provided with. The description of the functional properties will be provided in light of the physiological characteristics of the neural mechanisms involved. Then, to achieve a comprehension of the sensory system from an evolutionary point of view, sensory processing in humans will be compared to other classes of animals to highlight similarities and difference across species.
This course does not depend on a specific textbook. Essential material for the exams will be covered through lectures and notes. All teaching material as well as audio-video podcast of the lessons will be made available via the Moodle platform.
Learning Objectives
The course aims at achieving several learning goals. First, it will provide students with an extensive knowledge of both, the functional and neurophysiological organization of all humans sensory systems: sight, audition, somatosensation, smell and taste. Regarding the neurophysiological properties of the sensory mechanisms, the course is highly complimentary with two different courses students will have previously been presented with: a) Anatomical And Physiological Fundamentals Of Psychic Processes, b) Physiological Psychology. During the course it will be provided an explanation of the functionality of each sensory system within a given domain (such as vision, audition and so forth) together with a presentation of how different sensory system interact to each other to provide the unique representation of the world each of us is familiar with. An additional goal of the course is to make students familiar with the synergetic interactions amongst the sensory/perceptual mechanisms and higher level (cognitive) processes such as attention and consciousness to intimately integrate the perception module with the second module of the course, namely, Psychology of Attention.
Applying knowledge and understanding
Once the students will have gone throughout all the lessons of the course, the are expected to know and understand the fundamentals of the functional and physiological basis of perception, to read and understand the results of scientific papers in perceptual neuroscience and to be able to tackle a critical discussion of the reported results, and the good of fitness of the data in terms of the proposed (if any) theoretical framework.
Finally, the course aims to help students in developing effective learning skills, both for continuing the studies during the academic years but also and for keeping themself up to date about the state of the art in perceptual neuroscience
Prerequisites
None
Teaching Methods
Different teaching techiques will be exploited to achieve the following learning goals.
Knowledge and understanding
Teacher up front lessons on the neurophysiologicmechanisms underlaying all sensory modalities.
Applying knowledge and understanding
Practical tests during classes: 6 hours will be dedicated to students presentations (to be done in small groups) about a topic in percpetual neuroscience they have chhosen to make a brief report about. 2 hours for question time and review of the main topics of the course. 2 hours for comprehension assessement
Students communication skills will be strengthened by means of class discussions and practical tests. In particular at the end of the course students will be required to choose a topic about human perception, make a short but exhaustive bibliography research about it and then to summarize the most important results in a presentation they will provide to the other students in class.
Further information
None
Type of Assessment
The amount of acquired knowledge will be evaluated by mean of a wtitten and oral exam. The former consists of 30 questions the students have to answer to with by searching the correct response in a list of 4 different alternatives with just one of them being right. The test is followed by a compulsory oral exam in which the correctness and completeness of students responses are evaluated.
Course program
Visual perception: Geometrical optics, Anatomo-physiological organization of the visual system. The first steps in visual perception: the role of the retina in visual transduction. Spatial vision: retinal ganglion cells (Opposed center and surround responses), the lateral geniculate nucleus, V1. The perception and recognition of objects: Figure/Background segregation, the Gestalt principles. The special role of faces in vision. Color perception: the principles of color perception, beyond the tricromaticity: cells with chromatic opposite organization. The perception of space and binocular vision: accommodation and convergence, the functional principles of binocular rivalry. The perception of motion: the Aperture problem, neurons for the detection of motion in MT (V5).
Acoustic Perception: The Physics of Sounds. Functional anatomical organization of the acoustic system. Role of the ossicles of the middle ear in the transmission and amplification of sounds. Organization of the cochlea, organ of Corti, tonotopic processing of sounds. The spatial and temporal code for the coding of sounds. Cochlear nuclei. From the Cochlea to the brain. Organization of the acoustic cortex: CORE, belt, parabelt. The perceptual mechasnisms for sounds spatial localization. Sounds in the real world, complex sounds, music and language.
Somatosensory system: A system and many senses: touch, proprioception, thermoception and nociception. The skin, the sense organ for touch. Properties of the mechanoreceptors. Psychophysical thresholds for the haptic perception. The mechanisms of proprioception, the perception of pain (gate theory) and thermoception. The ascending pathways for somatosensory information. Role of primary, secondary somatosensory cortex and posterior parietal cortex (PPC). The nociceptive network: insular cortex (CI) and the anterior cingulate cortex (CCA).
Smell: Chemical properties of odorants. Physiological organization of the mechanisms for odors transduction. Theory proposed for olfactory coding: patterns of activation vs theory of vibrations. Olfactory synthesis and analysis. Detection, discrimination and identification of odors. Interactions between smell and language. The role of the hedonistic dimension in smell. The interactions between the hedonistic dimension and odors intensity.
Taste: Difference between taste and flavour. Interactions between taste and smell. Retronasal sensations. Organizations of taste buds. The 4 universal tastes. The strange case of t Umami. Theories proposed for taste: marked lines vs pattern of activation. Psychophysical thresholds for taste sensations. The role of the cultural context in defining tastes.