Special and General Senses

SensesGeneral Senses• Temperature• Pain• Touch pressure• Vibration• proprioception

Special Senses• Smell• Taste• Balance• Hearing• vision

General Senses• Pain–Nociceptors – in skin, joints and periostea of

bones, blood vessel walls, and few in visceral organs. – Fast pain – myelinated fibers carry sense.

May be localized or deep– Slow pain – unmyelinated fibers – may be

burning or aching pain – very general area.–Referred Pain- may not be where you think it

is – see page 251 black book.

General senses, con’t• Temperature- • thermoreceptors: free nerve endings just beneath the

skin, also in muscles, liver, and hypothalamus• Cold receptors 3-4 times more numerous than warm

receptors

General Senses• Touch, Pressure and Position– Mechanoreceptors – general category• Tactile receptors – touch, pressure, and vibration• Proprioceptors – monitors position of joints, tendons

and ligaments and the state of muscular contraction – watch out adolescent!

Sense of Smell- olfactory organs

Sense of Taste – Gustatory Sense

Vision

Optic Nerve

Visual Pathway

Near Sighted and Far Sighted

Rods and Cones of RetinaCones are for color

vision, Rods for night vision

Color vision testA subject with normal color vision can read the number 26 in the above plate, but a person with colorblindness will see only a field of gray dots.

Sense of Hearing

Tympanic membrane

• Cool sound waves

Hearing Pathway

Balance – Vestibular Complex

Cochlear Implant?