Neurotransmitters Are Very Important - Essay Example

Throughout the development of an organism, connections with some regions of the central nervous system are established.

Neurotransmitters vary in terms of their functions. Some of the chemical markers serve regulative, stimulatory, motive, and inhibitory roles. For instance, neurotransmitters are important in the regulatory processes of emotion and sensation. Therefore, their role in determining an individual’s behavior is expansive. Dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin are the most commonly cited neurotransmitters. Dopamine is typically discharged by naturally rewarding factors like sex and food. Along with stimulating effects, dopamine serves many additional roles, such as in behavior, learning, motivation, pleasure, sleep, sexual arousal, mood, movement, and attention.  Likewise, the neurotransmitter serotonin regulates behavior and mood. Some facets of behavior that serotonin affects include appetite, learning, sleep, and memory. With optimal levels, norepinephrine fosters a sense of well-being and a feeling of euphoria during stressful conditions. With excessive levels of norepinephrine, individuals can suffer physiological symptoms of fear and anxiety. From these three cases, one can see that neurotransmitters greatly affect individual behaviors. For instance, dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine are each commonly correlated with symptoms of depression.

If an organism’s body is an aircraft, the brain is analogous to the pilot. Besides serving as the root of consciousness and rationality, the brain is reducible to being the root of behavior. Like the control room of a power plant, the brain contains several areas for monitoring and regulating different behaviors. These brain regions include the cerebellum, the diencephalon, the brainstem, and the cerebrum.

The cerebellum controls the body’s sense of balance and equilibrium. The frontal lobe of the cerebellum controls a large portion of an individual’s behaviors. Because this region conditions emotions, it plays a central role in the daily experiences of human beings. Likewise, the limbic system, which refers to brain structures such as the hippocampus, hypothalamus, and amygdala, also retains an important role in the regulation of motivation and emotion. The hypothalamus affects basic life functions. For instance, sleep, sexual drive, appetite, and stress reactions are all factors conditioned by the hypothalamus. The amygdala is located in the posterior lobes of the forebrain and causes emotional aggression as manifested by anger, fear, or disgust. Additionally, it is responsible for the effects of pheromones on sexuality and reproduction. The orbitofrontal cortex, which is also a part of the frontal lobes of the brain, also affects many of those emotional reactions initiated in the amygdala. Disturbances in the limbic system will greatly affect an individual’s behavior and mood.

Ultimately, the brainstem is the information center where all sensory input is filtered. The diencephalon contributes to this filtering of sensory information during the process of regulating pain sensation, thirst, hunger, and temperature sensitivity. The cerebrum is the largest region of the brain and retains an important role in transferring information between the two sides of the brain, in addition to regulating inhibitions, impulses, and judgments.

Sensory processing is a multifaceted process that enables the brain to comprehend both its internal (inside of the body) and external (outside of the body) environments. In the baseball case of the crack of the bat, the sighting of the ball, and the catching of the ball, several discrete processes occur that end in the ball being caught in the player’s mitt. The first sensory input in this process is the intake of sound from the swing, which tells the player that the ball has made contact with the bat. Neurons in the player’s ears communicate with the brain using neurotransmitters. By triggering the limbic system, memory of what to do in this situation will trigger the player to move and the emotional rewards of that movement will serve as motivation. At this point, the player must use his sight as a sensory input for locating the position and movement of the ball so that he can get into position to catch it. Now that the player’s fight-or-flight reflex has been activated, he is concentrated and uses the nerves in his eyes, differentiating the texture and color of the ball from the surrounding environment.

Once he locates the ball in his sight, his brain will communicate with the rest of his body to move into the position that his frontal cortex believes will give him the best shot of successfully catching the ball. Once he is in that position, he moves his arm through an unconscious effort to catch the ball. The more times he repeats this procedure, the more it will be ingrained into his memory and his limbic system. Additionally, the greater reward he receives for completing this procedure successfully, the more it will be ingrained into his emotional motivations as produced by the amygdala and other related brain structures.