Assignment #1

IntroductionThe Parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems are essentials in emotion regulation. The sympathetic system helps stimulate the fight or flight response in people. On the contrary the parasympathetic system helps with calming one down. These nervous systems are what allow people to act properly under different conditions. For example they are especially used during different social situations. However, with patients suffering from Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) their parasympathetic and sympathetic systems are damaged. This can cause them to have trouble with adapting to social situations. One of the most common examples of this would be frustrations. It is easily noted that many Traumatic Brain Injury patients are shown to easily be frustrated.PurposeWhile it known that Traumatic Brain Injury patients are devoid from a fully functional sympathetic and parasympathetic system, the true mechanisms of the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems are not fully understood. The purpose of this study is to have a better understanding of these mechanisms in Traumatic Brain Injury patients.

MethodsFor this study about 30 subjects will be used. These subjects will all have mild to moderate TBI. The severity of their Traumatic Brain Injury will be measured using the Glasgov Coma Scale (GCS). The subjects will all be over the age of 65(seniors). Other exclusion criterias will also be in use. For example none of the subjects can have scars on their forehead. However, this is because the subjects of this study will all be part of one larger study and it will have little bearing on this part of the study.

Prior studies have shown that the best method to elicit emotional responses is for the subject to watch film clips. For the sake of comparison with C.Uy et al, 2013 the same video clips will be used. These video clips will be between one to five minutes long. The clips will be used to target multiple emotions, including, amusement, sadness, sexual amusement, fear and disgust. There will also be a clips that shall target no emotion. While the subjects are watching the clips electrocardiograph and repertory signals will be looked. This data is what will be than looked at and analyzed.