Cognitive Psychology Chapter 3

Perception

Experiences resulting from the stimulation of the senses.

Inverse Projection Problem

The task of determining an object responsible for a particular image on the retina.

Viewpoint Invariance

The ability to recognize objects despite seeing them from different angles/viewpoints.

Bottom-Up Processing

Processing that starts with the information received by the receptors; looking at something that creates an image to the retina.

Top-Down Processing

Knowledge that enables people to rapidly identify objects and scenes based on knowledge and expectations.

Speech Segmentation

The ability to tell when one word in a conversation ends and a new one begins.

Transitional Probabilities

The likelihood that one sound will follow another within a word.

Statistical Probabilities

The process of learning transitional probabilities.

Helmholtz’s Theory Of Unconscious Inference

The idea that perception involves unconscious assumptions about the environment.

Likelihood Principle

We perceive the object that is most likely to cause the pattern of stimuli we receive.

Unconscious Inference

The result of unconscious assumptions or inferences about the environment.

Apparent Movement

When movement is perceived despite nothing actually moving.

Principle of Good Continuation

Connected points resulting in straight or smoothly curving lines are seen as belonging together.

Law of Pragnanz

Every stimulus is perceived in the simplest form possible.

Principle of Similarity

Similar things are perceived as grouped together.

Physical Regularities

Regularly occurring physical properties of the environment.

Semantic Regularities

Characteristics associated with the functions carried out in different types of senses.

Oblique Effect

The tendency to perceive horizontals and verticals more easily than other orientations.

Scene Schema

Visualizations that contain information based on our knowledge of different kinds of scenes.

Bayesian Inference

A statistical method named after Thomas Bayes, incorporating prior probability and likelihood.

Prior Probability

Initial belief about the probability of an outcome.

Likelihood

Extent to which the available evidence is consistent with the outcome.

Theory of Natural Selection

Characteristics that enhance an animal’s ability to survive and reproduce will be passed on.

Brain Ablation (Lesioning)

The study of the effect of removing parts of the brain in animals.

Mirror Neurons

Neurons that respond both when observing an action and when performing the same action.

Size-Weight Illusion

The phenomenon when larger objects seem lighter than smaller objects of the same weight.