Perception and Sensation Vocabulary

Vocabulary flashcards covering key concepts in perception, sensory processing, depth perception, and Gestalt principles.

Perception

The process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events.

Bottom-Up Processing

Analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information.

Top-Down Processing

Information processing guided by higher-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expectations.

Schemas

Concepts or mental frameworks that organize and interpret information.

Perceptual Set

A mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another.

Attention

The mental process of concentrating effort on specific stimuli or aspects of the environment.

Selective Attention

The focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus.

Cocktail Party Effect

The ability to attend to one voice among a sea of competing voices.

Inattentional Blindness

Failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere.

Depth Perception

The ability to see objects in three dimensions although the images that strike the retina are two-dimensional, allowing us to judge distance.

Visual Cliff

A laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals.

Binocular Cues

Depth cues, such as retinal disparity and convergence, that depend on the use of two eyes.

Convergence

A binocular cue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object.

Retinal Disparity

A binocular cue for perceiving depth; by comparing images from the retinas in the two eyes, the brain computes distance.

Monocular Cues

Depth cues available to either eye alone, such as interposition and linear perspective.

Relative Clarity

A monocular cue for perceiving depth; light from distant objects passes through more atmosphere, so clear objects are perceived as closer than hazy objects.

Relative Size

A monocular cue for perceiving depth; if two objects are assumed to be similar in size, the one that casts the smaller retinal image is perceived as farther away.

Texture Gradient

A monocular cue for perceiving depth; a gradual change from a coarse, distinct texture to a fine, indistinct texture signals increasing distance.

Linear Perspective

A monocular cue for perceiving depth; parallel lines appear to meet in the distance.

Interposition

A monocular cue for perceiving depth; if one object partially blocks our view of another, we perceive it as closer.

Perceptual Constancies

Perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent lightness, color, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change.

Color Constancy

Perceiving familiar objects as having consistent color, even if changing illumination alters the wavelengths reflected by the object.

Perceptual Adaptation

In vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field.

Apparent Motion

An optical illusion of movement created by a rapid sequence of still images or flashing lights.

Change Blindness

Failing to notice changes in the environment.

Gestalt Psychology

A psychological approach emphasizing that we tend to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes.

Closure

A Gestalt principle describing the perceptual tendency to fill in gaps to create a complete, whole object.

Figure and Ground (figure-ground)

The organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground).

Grouping

The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups.

Proximity

A Gestalt grouping principle stating that we group nearby figures together.

Similarity

A Gestalt grouping principle stating that we group similar figures together.