Chapter 38.3, Problem 1Q

Summary Introduction

To determine:

The reason why skin areas that are especially sensitive to touch differ from the less sensitive area.

Introduction:

The senses provide information to the brain “about nature and intensity” received from the environmental stimuli. The special senses: taste, vision, hearing, smell, and touch carry stimuli from the sensory receptors and transmit these impulses towards brain for interpretation. A small receptor potential may generate few action potentials, while larger receptor potential can generate a high frequency of action potentials. Thus, “intensity of stimulus” is encoded by the frequency of action potentials that is achieved by the brain.