• Question: Why when i fall down the stairs and hit my head badly does it hurt?

    Asked by britishmcawesome to Antonia, Douglas, Hugh, Matt, Tom on 15 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Antonia Hamilton

      Antonia Hamilton answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      so that you learn not to fall down again. If when you hit your head, it didn’t hurt, you would never learn to avoid falling. And then one day you’d fall so badly you’d be dead.

    • Photo: Matthew Hurley

      Matthew Hurley answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      It does. You can bruise your brain and this is bad. Larger blood vessels can also bleed and this is very very bad. Anything that stops your brain working (unconsciousness) is usually not very good for you. So it hurts to protect you from doing it again.

    • Photo: Tom Hardy

      Tom Hardy answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Pain is a function of the body’s peripheral nervous system. We all have receptors on our skin, many thousands of them all over the body, including our head. When you bang your head you activate these receptors which through a complex series of reactions send an electrochemical message to the brain which interprets the signal as pain. It’s your body’s way of telling you not to do it again!

    • Photo: Hugh Roderick

      Hugh Roderick answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      Because our bodies are aim is to keep us away from danger so doing things that put us in danger will generally cause pain as a warning that we shouldn’t do it. The exact biology of why it hurts is down to nerves that send signals from the part of your head that was hit to the brain. The impact will cause pain and swelling afterwards will cause pain. But it’s a bit away from my area!

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