Sensation and Perceptions

Sensation

The process by which our sensory and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment

Vision

Light wave striking the eye

Hearing

Sound waves striking the outer ear

Touch

Pressure, warmth / cold

Taste

Chemical molecule in mouth

Smell

Chemicals breath in though nose

Kinesthesia

Change in position of a body part - joint, tendons, and muscles

Vestibular Sense

Balance and movement - vestibular sac

Subliminal Stimulation

Stimulation that is too weak to be consciously

Sensory Adaptation

When you stop noticing something because it never changes

Sensory interaction

Smell/Taste, Vision/Hearing, Other senses..

Perception

When the brain organizes and intercept’s sensory information, into meaning object / events

Perceptual Set.

Mental tendencies and assumptions that set us to perceive one thing and not another

Learning

Getting new expectances / new information = new behavior

Assumptions of behaviorism

Gene doesn’t influence behavior

Classical Conditioning

• Acquiring emotional / physiological reactions to previously insignificant stimuli

• Responses are involuntary

• first studied by Ivan Pavlov

Conditioned Stimulus

• an originally irrelevant stimulus that after conditioning, comes to trigger a condition response.

Generalization

The tendency, after conditioning, to respond similarly to stimuli that resemble the condition

Behavior Techniques

learning that affects the probability of engaging in a particular action in the future

Basic Principle 

Behavior is influenced by it’s consequence

• Responses are voluntary

• Studied by B.F Skinner

Reinforcer

Any event that strengthens the behavior it follows

Shaping

A procedure in which reinforcers guide action closer and toward a desired behavior

Positive Reinforcement

Increases behavior by presenting desirable stimuli

Negative Reinforcement 

Increase behavior by elimination ( or diminish ) undesirable stimuli 

Immediate and delayed reinforcement

Immediate reinforcement is more powerful

Continuous reinforcement

• Reinforcing a desired response every time it occurs

• Leads to rapid learning of new behavior 

Partial Reinforcement

• Reinforcing a response only part of the time

• New behavior are learned slowly

Punishment

Decreases behavior by presenting undesirable stimuli or eliminating desirable stimuli

Mirror Neurons 

a messages that sends when we perform certain actions / when we observe others perform the same task