Question

When you get home, you smell cookies baking. You respond by walking toward the kitchen. Many signals move through your nervous system in this process. Which component is involved first? (1 point)

axons in your sensory neurons

dendrites in your sensory neurons

dendrites in your motor neurons

axons in your motor neurons

Answer 1

dendrites in your sensory neurons

Reason: odor molecules first activate receptors on the sensory (olfactory) neuron's dendrites, producing receptor potentials. Only after that do action potentials travel down sensory axons to the CNS and then motor pathways are engaged.