Teaching Fruit Flies

After watching the video I found it very interesting that flies are capable of learning. I never even thought that we could do such a thing. There is a lot of information in how humans can teach and train animals. But never have I heard of teaching flies. This goes to show the power and knowledge humans have. In the video, David conducted research on teaching fruit flies to avoid odors by pairing an odor with a shock. This reminds me of the use of classical conditioning of John B. Watson, Ivan Pavlov, and many other behavioral psychologists who used this learning process to elicit responses. I agree with David in that psychiatric drugs are not one hundred percent effective. As he and other researchers are conducting research, I believe that further knowledge will be gained. While gaining more knowledge they will soon be able to find targeted forms of treatment for psychiatric disorders. I do not think the cause of psychiatric disorders are solely due to chemical imbalances. Although a chemical imbalance may play a major factor, other factors may play a cause for the psychiatric disorder. Like the environment and …show more content…
In doing this, they are able to learn about the different behaviors that may or may not occur. They are also able to study the neurons and how it affects behavior. From previous courses, I have learned that there is a large number of people who do not benefit from their prescribed medications. For example, those whose diagnosed with depression are usually prescribed with antidepressants. The antidepressants may not work effectively or they may have several negative side effects. David mentioned when it comes to mental health, there is not much scientific approach to addressing disorders, as opposed to cancer and diseases. There is so much that we can learn from the mental health field, but we just have to take the time to study