Ch 6: Sensation and Perception Flashcards
Sensation
detect physical energy
Perception
give things meaning
Senses - (7)
- Vision
- Hearing
- Taste
- Touch
- Smell
- Vestibular
- Kinesthesis
Bottom Up Processing
begin with senses and move up to the brain
Doesn’t tell you what you’re sensing
Top Down Processing
Higher level thinking is used
use all “experiences” and “causes” that you know to figure something out
Absolute Threshold
the minimum stimulation needed to detect a stimulus 50% of the time
how much of a stimulation is needed to detect a stimulus
Signal Detection Theory
- goes against Absolute Threshold
- senses heighten when in extreeme cases or special circumstances
- brain senses better, senses do not get better
- e.g. war
Subliminal
below the Absolute Threshold
can’t sense it
Subliminal Messages
- messages that you can’t sense
- e.g. a picture flashes before your eyes that you can’t see
- no evidence it can make you do something big
Weber’s Law
the larger or stronger the stimulus, then you need an even stronger one to notice a difference
Sensory Adaptation
your senses will adapt to repeated new stimulations from being used to it
Visual Capture
the eye is the most dominant sense
capturing an image
Cornea
transparent shield that protects the eye
Iris
color of the eye
regulates the pupil
Pupil
opening in the eye
*Lens
Focuses incoming light to fovea - Accomodation
Fovea
the correct part where light should go in the eye
gives the best vision
focal point of the eye
Bipolar cells and Ganglean Cells
Sends info to the brain
Transduction
converts outside energy into a neural message
Nearsightedness
can’t see far away, but can see up close
Farsightedness
can’t see close up, but can see far away
Cataract
cloudy film covers lens
old age
Astigmatism
“slime” on cornea - bump on cornea
requires lasic surgery
Young, Helmholtz Trichomatic Theory
you have 3 different cones
- Red
- Green
- Blue
when the cones cross, you get different colors
Opponent Process Theory of Color
3 cones, but each has an opponent color
- Red - Green
- Blue - Yellow
- White - Black
Explains After-Image Effect
Color Deficent
Red/Green defficent - Dichromatic - most common
*Color Constancy
Brain remembers what certain colors things should be and tries to make you happy
glancing at something, that thing can look a different color because that’s what you think it should be
Olfaction
Smell
route:
nasal receptors -> Olfactory Nerve -> Olfactory Bulb -> memory bank
Anosmia
loss of smell
Gustatory
Taste
taste buds
Gustatory receptors
can be burned, but come back in 7-14 days
alcohol and smoking = lose sensivity
5 basic tastes
- Sour
- Salty
- Sweet
- Bitter
- *UMAMI - meat taste
*spicy is not a taste
*lips have largest area of sensory neurons in body per inch
Audition
Hearing
Decibles
measuring unit for sound
140 - Rock Band
60-Normal Conversation
20-Whisper
Tymphanic Membrane
(ear drum)
amplfies sound to keep it going through ear
if punctured - hearing loss - conduction deafness - will heal
Eustachin Tube
releaves pressure when swallowing
leads to throat
Hammer, Iacas, Stirup
(Madeus, Anvil, Stapes)
bones that help move sound by vibrating
Cilia
- Hairs on the cochlea
- each attached to a nerve
- hears sound when ear fluid gets it wet
- louder sounds = more cilia stimulated
Auditory Nerve
nerve from cilia to brain
goes to right and left sides at the same time
Vestibular Sense
Balance Sense
controlled by semi-circle canals
Place Theory
Theory about hearing different pitches
certain place in cochlea is stimulated
Frequency Theory
Theory about hearing different pitches
certain # of cilia need to go down
Kinesthesis Sense
knowing where your body parts are pinting
in muscles, joints, and tendons
Sensory Restriction
taking a day off
reducing the amount of stimulus coming in
Deprivation
no stimulus for days
makes people go crazy
Ways to stop pain #1
Gate Theory
a bucket of ice water down back - causes too much stimuli to jam other signals
Ways to stop pain #2
Distract Mind
when having a baby, mother takes a course to help stop pain
distracts the mind from the pain
Ways to stop pain #3
Endorphins
get body to release endorphines - natural pain killers
Ways to stop pain #4
Drugs
mimic endorphines
McGurk Effect
using more than one sense at a time - Sensory Interaction
a blending of 2 senses - hear and see something different
Influences on Perception - (4)
- Experiences
- Needs
- Moods
- *Collective Perception
-
Experience - past experiences give you wrong answers
- e.g. red, white, and ? - most say “blue” because of USA colors
-
Needs - when you need something, you tend to see it when it’s not there
- e.g. hungry, far away yellow curved track could look like McDonald’s sign
-
Moods - different moods change how you see or feel things
- e.g. get into an argument before an event - event seems worse than it really is
-
Collective Perception - (group think)
- group of people think one way - make others think that same way
Selective Attention
- Multi-tasking
- can do 2 things, but can only really focus on 1
- e.g. cell phone experiment - people on cell phones miss 1/2 of street signs
Change Blindness
when focusing on one thing, we can change your environment and you will not notice
Organization - Gestalt
- Brain likes to see the whole
- organizes using 4 ways
- Proximity
- Similarity
- Continuity
- Connectedness
- Closure
Auto Kinetic Effect
in dark, when you stare at a single light, it will appear to move when it actually is standing still
Phi Phenomenon
Lights that blink will still look on - moving circle of dots
Stroboscopic Motion
if you flip, in rapid progression, a series of still pics, they will move
e.g. flip bok, stop motion
Visual Cliff
lab tool to test depth perception
table with clear glass on half of it
Perception - (2)
-
Binocular Cues
- Retnal Disparity
- Convergence
-
Monocular Cue
- __interposition
- light+shadow
- linear perspective
- relative clarity
- relative height
- motion parallox
- relative size
- texture gradient
-
Binocular Cues - using 2 eyes to percieve depth
- Retnal Disparity - images come into each eye’s retna in different places
- Convergence - both eyes turn in when something is close
-
Monocular Cues - using one eye to percieve depth
- interposition - closer obj. blocks others
- light+shadow - closer obj. are brighter(reflect more)
-
linear perspective - parallel lines come together far away
- ponzo effect
- relative clarity - hazy (fog) obj. looks farther away
- relative height - taller obj. looks farther away
- motion parallox - as you go forward, fixed obj. look like they’re going backward
- relative size - larger obj. look closer if 2 obj. are the same size
- texture gradient - closer obj. are in more detail
