Development of the human nervous system

PSY 511.003

2024-02-29

Prelude

(Spacenukes, 2012)

Announcements

• Exercise 06 write-up due yesterday.
• Final project/paper proposal due today

Last time…

• Evolution of nervous systems

Humans reached our current biological form about 200,000 years ago. What have been the main drivers of psychological change since then?

How do psychological changes over evolutionary time spans influence biological functions within individual lifespans?

The basic vertebrate brain plan is hundreds of millions of years old. What are some implications of this for understanding brain/behavior relations in humans today?

Exercise 07

• exercises/ex07-evo-devo

Today’s topics

• Human brain development

Thinking developmentally

• What causes/influences what?
• Correlation is not causation, but…
  • Causes must (logically) temporally precede effects
  • Correlation necessary but not sufficient
• What are the developmental functions?
  • \(x_{t+1}=F_1(x_t)\) or within domain/measure
  • \(y_{t+1}=F_2(x_t)\) or across domains/measures
• What is the story?
• resources/development

Main points

• CNS among earliest-developing, last to “finish” organ systems
• Development clarifies (aspects of) anatomy
• Prenatal vs. postnatal
  • Altricial vs. precocial
• Changing structures changing functions
• Progress through regress (e.g. apoptosis, synaptic pruning, cortical thinning)

Exercise 08

• exercises/ex08-devo

Next time…

• Perception

Resources

References

Spacenukes. (2012, December). In the beginning – children of eden. Youtube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1kSUkMtNWk