Brain Mechanisms of Behaviour in Lower Vertebrates

About this book

First published in 1981, this book is about how the brain controls the behaviour of lower vertebrates. It concentrates on teleosts and amphibians as these are the classes about which most is known. The literature dealing with mammalian brain mechanisms of behaviour is extensive and this book starts to fill the gaps in our knowledge of vertebrate brain behaviour so that the multidisciplinary, comparative approach will be better understood. The text deals with selected topics from five major areas of interest, commencing with the evolution of lower vertebrate brain structure in relation to function. Subsequent sections look at the way sensory information is processed, how sleep, arousal and wakefulness and the level of attention and appetite in lower vertebrates are studies and, finally, how experience may modify the behaviour of these animals. The book combines an introduction to comparative neurothology with specialised topics in which advances have been made. The book will interest students and research workers in neurobiology and animal behaviour.

Contents

Contributors; Preface; Introduction P. R. Laming; Part I. Evolutionary Perspectives in Vertebrate Neuroethology: 1. An introduction to the functional anatomy of the brains of fish and amphibians (with comments on the reptiles) P. R. Laming; 2. Evolution of telencephalic function in lower vertebrates L. R. Aronson; 3. Interspecific variability in brain organisation and its possible relation to evolutionary mechanisms S. O. E. Ebbesson; Part II. Sensory Mechanisms and Behaviour: 4. The properties of the visual pathway of a common freshwater fish in relation to its visual behaviour D. M. Guthrie; 5. The telstean optic tectum: neuronal substrates for behavioural mechanisms H. Vanegas; 6. Behavioural and electrophysiological studies of chemosensory reactions in fish T. J. Hara; 7. Neural coding of 'worms' and 'antiworms' in the brain of toads: the question of hardwired and softwired systems J. P. Ewert; Part III. Sleep, Wakefulness and Arousal: 8. Sleep ontogeny in fish C. M. Shapiro, C. J. Woolf and D. Borsook; 9. An electrophysiological study of wakefulness and sleep-like states in fish and amphibians I. G. Karmanova, A. I. Belich and S. G. Lazarev; 10. The physiological basis of alert behaviour in fish P. R. Laming; Part IV. Neuronal Substrates of Appetitive Behaviour: 11. Hypothalamic mechanisms of feeding fishes L. S. Demski; 12. The telencephalon and reproductive behaviour in the teleost Macropodus opercularis: effects of lesions on the incidence of spawning and egg cannibalism R. E. Davis, J. Kassel and M. Martinez; Part V. Learning and Memory Mechanisms: 13. Learning in teleost fish: role of the telencephalon N. Bohac Flood and J. B. Overmier; 14. Electrical stimulation of the telencephalon and learning in a teleost fish G. E. Savage and D. E. Wright; 15. Pituitary peptides and memory in fish D. Borsook, C. J. Woolf, D. Vellet, I. S. Abramson and C. M. Shapiro; Index.

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