7th Grade Reviewer for Unit 7C

The prefrontal cortex lies within the frontal lobe. This section of the brain is responsible for 

• Generating emotions

• Regulating behavior

After calculating the average brain development, Blakemore explains how she, Kate Mills, and Ann-Lise Goddings further investigated their results (paragraph 15): “We then carried out a different analysis in which, instead of calculating averages from all the participants' MRI data, we looked at each individual's brain development separately.”

What would be the importance of analyzing each individual’s data in addition to the average of all the data?

• The two sets of data should give researchers the same information about brain development.

• The average of the data will show researchers the overall trend, and the individual data will show the difference in brain development between individuals.

• The individual data will show researchers who has abnormal brain development, and the average will show who has normal brain development.

The limbic system is another section of the brain. This section of the brain is responsible for 

• Generating emotions

• Regulating behavior

"Ron Dahl, from the University of California in Berkeley, has referred to this as the ‘paradox of adolescence’: in the period of life during which people are at their healthiest and fittest, there is still mortality, caused mostly by accidents that are, in principle, largely preventable."(2)

What is the "paradox of adolescence"?

• Adolescents are very healthy but die from preventable behaviors.

• It is widely believed that adolescents take risks but this is not actually true.

• Parents try to prevent their kids from taking risks but it doesn't often work.

• Scientists can't exactly determine why adolescents take risks.

Which TWO details provide the best evidence for the Localizers’ theory that specific “‘organs’ inside the brain control specific functions” (20)?

Choose two details below.

• “On the other side, Dr. Harlow is a Localizer, or at least he is a friend of some leading Localizers/ Phrenologists.”

• “The tamping iron has not killed him because the damage is limited to specific organs that are not critical to life.”

• “Dr. Sizer is a big man in phrenology and lectures on it all over New England.”

• “Dr. Harlow leaks the information to Dr. Sizer that the “completely recovered” Phineas is not the old Phineas.”

"The theory suggests that this results in a ‘developmental mismatch’ between the maturity and functioning of these two brain systems, and this in turn explains why adolescents get a kick out of taking risks (a function of the limbic system) and aren’t always able to stop themselves doing so in the heat of the moment (a skill that relies on the prefrontal cortex)."(8)

“adolescents get a kick out of taking risks”, means that these risks result in __________.

• a serious punishment

• a physical pain

• a positive emotion

• a financial boost

“If Phineas survived with a large piece of his cortex destroyed, then what does the cortex do? Across America and Europe, doctors are fiercely divided over this very question. There are two rival schools.”

Which word provides the strongest context clue for the meaning of “rival”?

• Doctors

• Fiercely

• Divided

• Schools

T or F: The tamping iron entered just below his left cheekbone, passed behind his left eyeball, and continued on upward through his frontal lobe.

• True
• False

Which sentence from the text provides the BEST evidence that Phineas’s behavior changed after his accident?

• “Yet here is Phineas alive in Boston, walking, talking, and taking care of himself.” (23)

• “Yet the Localizers/Phrenologists don’t have all the facts.” (24)

• “Dr. Harlow leaks the information to Dr. Sizer that the ‘completely recovered’ Phineas is not the old Phineas.” (24)

• “’We have been informed by the best authority that after the man recovered, and while recovering, he was grossly profane, coarse, and vulgar, to such a degree that his society was intolerable to decent people.’” (24)

How did Phineas react right after the accident?

• He panicked

• He was scared

• He was calm

• He did not care