The learning curve that describes the unlearning of previously learned knowledge and its subsequent re-learning. For example, in the acquisition of the English past tense, children often produce incorrect inflections of irregular verbs (e.g., ‘comed’) after previously having produced the correct ‘came’. In the end, they learn to produce the correct form again. See Qualitative …
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Tyrosine kinase receptor/pathway
The proteins downstream of the active receptor that are involved in transducing the signal into a biologically relevant response. See Developmental genetics, Boss (or bride of seven less, Boss (or bride of seven less), Developmental genetics, Fibroblast growth factor (FGF), Growth factors, Protein, Protein tyrosine kinase, Ras, R7 and R8 photoreceptors, Sevenless
Type 2 muscle fibers
Glycolytic fibers, with few mitochondria and rich in glycogen but low in myoglobin (the reason they are whitish in colour), that undergo fast, short-lived contractions. Typical of muscles involved in sprinting etc. as they are activated by large diameter, and therefore fast, conduction, motoneurons. There are two sorts of fast-twitch fibers: Type 2a muscle fibers that …
Typological thinking
Having it roots in Plato’s idealistic philosophy, it is a view that there are a limited number of fixed types in nature and thus that any variation is an illusion. A focus on central tendencies such as means to the neglect of standard deviations represents a modern form of typological thinking, as do racism and sexism. …
Type 1 muscle fibers
Oxidative fibers, loaded with mitochondria and rich in myglobin (the reason why they are red in colour), that undergo slow, but long-lasting, contractions typical of tonically active postural muscles. Thus, they are resistant to fatigue. The main reason these slow-twitch fibers are slow to fatigue is that they contain more mitochondria than fast-twitch fibers (Type …
Type 1 error
The error (denoted by ( and hence also referred to as alpha error) in statistical testing of rejecting the null hypothesis (i.e., there is no change, difference or relationship) when it is true and accepting the alternative hypothesis (i.e., there is change, difference or relationship). As such, it can be considered to be a rate …
Two visual systems hypothesis
The hypothesis that there are two streams of visual information appears to have arisen from studies carried out in the late 1960s. One set of studies, carried out by Gerald E. Schneider, and published in 1967 and 1969, was based on research with hamsters in which removal of the visual cortex (areas 17 and 18) …
Tympanic membrane
No definition See Otitis media with effusion (OME)
Two physical characteristics of Marfan syndrome
spidery fingers (a) and lax joints (b). See Autosomal dominant condition/disease
Turing test
A proposal for a test of a machine’s capability to perform human-like conversation. Described by Alan Turing in the 1950 paper “Computing machinery and intelligence”, it proceeds as follows. A human judge engages in a natural language conversation with two other parties, one a human and the other a machine, and both hidden by a …