The professor knocks over her chair during the exam startlin

The professor knocks over her chair during the exam, startling you. You look up and realize what happened, but it takes a little while before you can fully return to focusing on the exam after the scare. Explain what happened in you body immediately, and why it took you a while to calm down.

Solution

When the professor knocks over her chair, we become startled.This is a fear and flight response.In response to the knocking , our sympathetic nervous system becomes activated that causes norepinephrine to be released.This brings physiological changes in our body such as increase in heart beat,upregulation of emotional reactivity etc.making us scare.After the scare,it takes a while to calm down as the parasympathetic nervous system acts to bring our body to normal physiological conditions by releasing acetylcholine.