Cognition Unit 2.1 and 2.2

Selective Attention

choosing what to pay attention to and excluding other stimulus

cocktail party effect

focusing your hearing on one specific thing, even though NOISE is all around you

inattentional blindness

failing to see VISIBLE objects when your attention is directed elsewhere

change blindness

failing to notice CHANGES to the environment

perceptual set

mental predisposition to percieve one thing and not another

schemas

determination of perceptual sets by creating concepts with experience, and then organizing unfamiliar info into them

motivation

percpetions change based on rewards given

emotions

perceptions change based on how you feel

context

perceptions change based on setting

gestalt psychology

an organized whole, emphsizes out tendedency to integrate peices into meaningful wholes

figure-ground

organization of visual field into objects that stand out from their surroundings

ambiguous figure: image that contains 2 images

proximity

tendency to group nearby objects together

continuity

tendency to create continuous patterns and perceive connected objects as uninterrupted

similarity

grouping objects together based on how similar they are to each other

closure

filling in gaps to create a complete, whole object

connectedness

perception of uniform or linked shapes as one unit

depth perception

seeing objects in 3 dimensions despite hitting the retina in 2 dimensions

retinal disparity

binocular cue

because the two eyes see slightly differently, the brain computes distant based on the difference between the two

convergence

binocular cue

the brain combines retinal images

eyes inwards=close

eyes outwards=far

relative clarity

more blurry=farther away

clearer=closer

because more light travels through farther away objects

relative size

larger=closer

smaller=farther

because they reflect onto the retina differently

texture gradient

more texture=closer

less texture=farther

interposition

if one object partially blocks another, we percieve it as closer

linear perspective

parallel lines seem to converge/come to a point as it gets farther away

stroboscopic effect

illusion of continuous movements experienced when viewing a rapid series of slightly varying still images

phi phenomenon

illusion of movement created when two or more adjacent light blink on and off in succession (flickering Christmas lights)

autokinetic effect

illusory movement of a still spot of light in a dark room

relative motion

motion or speed of an object w/ respect to a particular point

close=opposite motion

far=same motion

EX: riding in car + looking out window

perceptual adaptation

ability to change sensory input if your sensory was inverted or artifically displaced

EX: inverted goggles

cognition

all mental activties associated with thinking, knowing, remebering and communicating

metacognition

cognition about out cognition, keeping track of and evaluating mental processes

prototypes

mental images/best example for a category

makes it quick and easy to sort into categories

assimilation

intrerpreting our new experiences interms of existing schemas

accommodation

incorporating new info to alter existing schemas

convergent

narrowing problems into best solution