AP Psych Unit 3 Sensation & Perception Vocab

Sensation

Detecting information through your senses.

Perception

How your brain organizes and understands sensory information.

Psychophysics

The study of how physical stimuli relate to what we experience.

Absolute Threshold

The weakest stimulus you can detect 50% of the time.

Signal Detection Theory

How we decide whether we notice a stimulus based on signals and distractions.

Priming

Being influenced by something you experienced earlier.

Just Noticeable Difference (JND)

The smallest difference between two things you can notice.

Weber’s Law

The bigger the original stimulus, the bigger the change needed to notice a difference.

Sensory Adaptation

Becoming less aware of a constant stimulus over time.

Transduction

Turning sensory information into electrical signals for the brain.

Pupil

The opening in the eye that lets light in.

Iris

The colored part of the eye that controls the pupil.

Lens

Focuses light onto the retina.

Accommodation

The lens changing shape to focus on objects.

Retina

The light-sensitive layer at the back of the eye.

Acuity

Sharpness or clarity of vision.

Optic Nerve

Carries visual information from the eye to the brain.

Rods

Eye cells that help you see in dim light.

Cones

Eye cells that detect color and detail.

Fovea

The center of the retina where vision is sharpest.

Feature Detectors

Brain cells that respond to specific visual features, like lines and edges.

Trichromatic Theory

Color vision comes from three types of cones: red, green, and blue.

Opponent-Process Theory

Color vision uses opposing pairs: red-green, blue-yellow, and black-white.

Color Constancy

Seeing an object's color as the same under different lighting.

Middle Ear

The part of the ear containing tiny bones that carry sound vibrations.

Cochlea

A spiral-shaped structure in the inner ear that changes vibrations into neural signals.

Inner Ear

The part of the ear that helps with hearing and balance.

Place Theory

We hear different pitches based on where the cochlea vibrates.

Frequency Theory

We hear pitch based on how quickly auditory nerves send signals.

Volley Theory

Groups of neurons take turns sending signals to detect higher pitches.

Conduction Hearing Loss

Hearing loss caused by problems transferring sound through the outer or middle ear.

Sensorineural Hearing Loss

Hearing loss caused by damage to the cochlea or auditory nerve.

Kinesthesis

Your sense of where your body parts are and how they move.

Vestibular Sense

Your sense of balance and body movement.

Selective Attention

Focusing on one thing while ignoring others.

Inattentional Blindness

Not noticing something visible because your attention is elsewhere.

Depth Perception

The ability to see distance and understand how far away things are.

Visual Cliff

An experiment that tests whether babies can sense depth.

Binocular Cues

Depth clues that require both eyes.

Monocular Cues

Depth clues that can be seen with just one eye.

Perceptual Constancy

Seeing objects as the same size, shape, or color even when their appearance changes.

Perceptual Adaptation

Adjusting to changes in what you see.

Perceptual Set

Expecting to see something a certain way based on past experiences.

Convergence

Your eyes turning inward when looking at something close.

Retinal Disparity

The slight difference between the images seen by each eye.

Continuity

Seeing smooth, connected patterns instead of separate pieces.

Proximity

Seeing objects close together as a group.

Similarity

Seeing objects that look alike as belonging together.

Closure

Filling in missing parts to see a complete image.

Cocktail Party Effect

Focusing on one conversation while ignoring other conversations.

Phi Phenomenon

The illusion of movement created by rapidly flashing stationary lights or images.