PSY 1100 - Columbus State Community College - Chapter 3

Sensatin

the process of receiving stimulus energies from the external environment and transforming those energies into neural energy

Perception

process of organizing sensory information so that it makes sense

Bottom-Up Processing

sensory receptors register information about the external environment and sent it up to the brain for interpretation

Top-Down Processing

starts with cognitive processing in the brain; we begin with some sense of what is happening and apply that framework to incoming information from the world

Sensory Receptors

specialized cells that detect stimulus information and transmit it to sensory (afferent) nerves and the brain

Photoreception

detection of light, perceived as sight

Mechanoreception

detection of pressure, vibration, and movement, perceived as touch, hearing, and equilibrium

Chemoreception

detection of chemical stimuli, perceived as smell and taste

Synaesthesia

an experience in which one sense induces an experience in another sense; ex: seeing music, or tasting a color

Absolute Threshold

minimum amount of stimulus energy that a person can detect

Noise

the term give to irrelevant and competing stimuli-not just sounds but any distracting stimuli for our senses

Difference Threshold

just noticeable differences

Weber's Law

the principle that two stimuli must differ by a constant proportion to be perceived as different

Subliminal Perception

the detection of information below the level of conscious awareness

Selective Attention

involves focusing on a specific aspect of experience while ignoring others

Novel Stimuli

new , different or unusual; often attract our attention

Inattentional Blindness

the failure to detect unexpected events when attention is engaged by a task

Sustained Attention

focused and extended engagement with an object, task, event, or other aspect of the environment

Executive Attention

involved action planning, allocation attention to goals, error detection and compensation, monitoring process on tasks, and dealing with novel or difficult circumstances

Perceptual Set

act as "psychological" filters in processing information about the environment

Sensory Adaptation

a change in the responsiveness of the sensory system based on the average of surrounding stimulation

Light

a form of electromagnetic energy that can be described in terms of wavelength

Amplitude

determines the brightness of the stimulus

Purity

determines the perceived saturation, or richness, of a visual stimulus

Sclera

the white outer part of the eye that helps to maintain the shape of the eye and to protect it from injury

Iris

the colored part of the eye; contains muscles that control the size of the pupil, and hence regulates the amount of light that enters the eye

Pupil

appears black; the opening in the center of the iris

Cornea

a clear membrane just in front of the eye; function is to ben the light falling on the surface of the eye enough to focus it at the back

Lens

a transparent and somewhat flexible, dislike structure filled with gelatin-like material; function is to ben the light falling on the surface of the eye enough to focus it at the back

Retina

the light-sensitive surface that records electromagnetic energy and converts it to neural impulses for processing in the brain

Rod

the receptors in the retina that are sensitive to light, but they are not very useful for color vision

Cones

the receptors that we use for color perception

Optic Nerve

carries the visual information to the brain for further processing

Visual Cortex

located in the occipital lobe at the back of the brain; the part of the cerebral cortex involved in vision

Feature Detectors

neurons in the brains visual system that respond to particular features of a stimulus

Parallel Processing

the stimultaneous distribution of information across different neural pathways

Binding

the bringing together and integration of what is processed by different neural pathways or cells

Trichromatic Theory

the color perception is produced by three types of cone receptors the retina that are particularly sensitive to different but overlapping ranges of wavelengths

Figure-Ground Relationship

the principle which we organize the perceptual field into stimuli that stand out and those that are left over

Gestalt Psychology

a school of thought that probes how people naturally organize their perceptions according to certain patterns

Gestalt Principles of Closure, Proximity, and Similarity

Closure

when we see disconnected or incomplete figures, we fill in the spaces and see them as completed figures

Proximity

when we see objects that are near each other, they ten to be seen as a unit; you are likely to perceive the grouping as four columns of four squares, not one set of 16 squares

Similarity

when we see objects that are similar to each other, they tend to be seen as a unit

Depth Perception

the ability to perceive objects three-dimensionally

Binocular Cues

depth cues that depend on the combination of the images in the left and right eyes and on the way the two eyes work together

Convergence

another binocular cue to depth and distance

Monocular Cues

available for the image in one eye, either right or left; powerful, and under normal circumstances they can provide a compelling impression of depth

Apparent Movement

which occurs when we perceive a stationary object as moving

Perceptual Constancy

the recognition the objects are constant and unchanging even though sensory input about them is changing

Frequency

the number of cycles that pass though a point in a given time interval

Pitch

the perceptual experience of the frequency of a sound, whether it is high like a whistle or low like a bass horn

A Sound Waves Amplitude

measured in decibels (dB); the amount of pressure the sound wave produces relative to a standard; 0 dB is the weakest sound the human ear can detect

Outer Ear

consists of the pinna and the external auditory canal

Pinna

outer, visible part of the ear; collects sounds and channels them into the interior ear

Middle Ear

channels and amplifies the sound through the eardrum, hammer, anvil, and stirrup to the inner ear

Eardrum, or tympanic membrane

separates the outer ear from he middle ear and vibrates in response to sound; it is the first structure that sound touches in the middle ear

Cochlea

a tubular, fluid-filled structure that is coiled up like a snail

Place Theory

each frequency produced vibrations at a particular place on the basilar membrane

Frequency Theory

the perception of a sound's frequency depends on how often the auditory nerve fires

Volley Principle

a cluster of nerve cells can fire neural impulses in rapid succession, producing a volley of impulses

Auditory Nerve

carries neural impulses to the brain's auditory areas

Thermoreceptors

sensory nerve ending under the skin, response to temperature changes at or near the skin and provide input to keep the bodies temperature at 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit; 2 types of these which are warm and cold

Pain

the sensation that warns us of damage to the body

Papille

contain taste buds; the receptors for taste

Olfactory Epithelium

lining the roff of the nasal cavity; contains a sheet of receptor cells for smell, so sniffing maximizes the chances detecting an odor

Kinesthetic Senses

provide information about movement, posture and orientation

Vestibular Senses

provide information about balance and movement; tell us whether our head is tilted, moving, slowing down, or speeding up

Proprioceptive Feedback

information about the positions of our limbs and body parts in relation to the other body parts

Semicircular Canal

the inner ear contains the sensory receptors that detect head motion cause when we tilt or move our heads and/or bodies

signal detection theory

An approach to perception that focuses on decision making about stimuli in the presence of uncertainty.

opponent-process theory

Theory stating that cells in the visual system respond to complementary pairs of red-green and blue-yellow colors; a given cell might be excited by red and inhibited by green, whereas another cell might be excited by yellow and inhibited by blue.