Reflex Lab Reflection

1. In this here lab, we tested our reflexes in different way such as throwing cotton balls at eachothers faces to see if we blink, and catching yard sticks in our hands to test reaction time and then even tickling the bottom of a foot to see if it cringes and curls up. Reflexes are rapid, predictable, and involuntary responses to stimuli.

2. The knee jerk reflex- a 2 neuron reflec arc (sensory neuron-->spinalcord-->motor neuron-->knee). When my partner hit me right below the knee, my leg kicked up. My leg kicked up because i was hit in a sensory neuron causing that to react.

Photopupillary reflex- This reflex is when the intensity of light entering the eyes increase, the photopupillary reflex is triggered and the cilliary body of the iris is stimulated to contract. As a result the pupil size decreases and less light enters the eye. When my partner shined the flashlight in my eye my partner said my pupil got smaller and when he took the flash light away it got bigger.

Blink Reflex- This reflex is the eye blinking and protecting the eye from light, dust, particles, and just to keep the eye not dry. When my partner threw a cotton ball at my face, my eyes blinked. I blinked because this is an example of a natural human reaction. When something is headed towards your face we blink to protect the eye.

Plantar Reflex- This reflex is when you drag something along the bottom of your foot and the foot tenses up curling the toes inward. I experienced this when my partner dragged the pen along my foot, and this happens because it stimulated a neuron and then made my toes curl up. How ever if there is nerve damage, then one might show Babinski's sign where the toes spread apart and upward.

How Fast are You Reflex- In this part of the lab, we tested our reaction times by catching a yard stick in between a 5 second interval and having to catch the stick as fast a we can. We then did this while texting to show us our slower our reflexes get. This activity proved that texting and driving slowers reflexes by a lot and is extremely dangerous to text and drive. This is the somatic reflex being used and it is the fight or flgith response. Without texting and driving my average response to catching a yard stick was 0.168 seconds. But while texting my average response was 0.25 seconds. As you can see here it increased almost .1 seconds which in driving is huge because in drivers education we learned that it is at least a 2 second buffer between you and the car and this is really the difference between life and death.  <--(Watch the video if you have time)