Chapter 6: Perception

Question 0

Selective Attention

Answer 0

Focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus, as in the cocktail party effect.

Question 1

Perception

Answer 1

Organizing & interpreting sensory info. Enables us to recognize meaningful objects & events.

Question 2

Cocktail Party Effect

Answer 2

Your ability to attend to any one voice among many.

Question 3

Inattentional Blindness

Answer 3

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

Question 4

Change Blindness

Answer 4

After a brief visual interruption you fail to notice changes in your visual field.(directions, gorilla)

Question 5

Change Deafness

Answer 5

The failure to notice slight changes in our auditory field.

Question 6

Choice-blindness blindness

Answer 6

Exhibiting denial (blindness) to falling victim to a hypothetical experiment.

Question 7

Pop-out phenomenon

Answer 7

When distinct stimulus, such as a smiling face in a crowd of crying people, draws attention. Not our choice.

Question 8

Illusions

Answer 8

A perception , as of visual stimuli, that represents what is perceived in a way different from reality.

Question 9

Visual Capture

Answer 9

Tendency for vision to dominate other senses.

Question 10

Gestalt

Answer 10

An organized whole. Gestalt psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of info into meaningful wholes.

Question 11

Figure-ground

Answer 11

The organization of visual field (figures) that stand out from their surroundings (ground)

Question 12

Grouping

Answer 12

Perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups.

Question 13

Proximity

Answer 13

We group nearby figures together. We are not 6 separate lines, but 3 sets of 2 lines.

Question 14

Similarity

Answer 14

Group together figures similar to each other. We see triangles & circles as vertical columns of similar shapes, not as horizontal rows of dissimilar shapes.

Question 15

Choice blindness

Answer 15

the failure to notice our selection of a particular stimulus has changed.

Question 16

Depth perception

Answer 16

The ability to see objects in 3D although the images that strike the retina are 2D. Allows us to judge distance.

Question 17

Visual cliff

Answer 17

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

Question 18

Binocular cues

Answer 18

Depth cues such as retinal disparity & convergence, that depend on the use of 2 eyes.

Question 19

Retinal Disparity

Answer 19

By comparing images from the 2 eyeballs, the brain computes distance - the greater the disparity (distance) between 2 images, the closer the objects.

Question 20

Convergence

Answer 20

A binocular cue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes move inward when looking at an object. The greater the inward strain, the loser the object.

Question 21

Monocular cues

Answer 21

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

Question 22

Relative size

Answer 22

In judging distance, the one that casts the smaller retinal image is perceived as further away.

Question 23

Relative clarity

Answer 23

Because light from distant objects passes through more atmosphere, we perceive hazy objects as farther away than sharp, clear objects.

Question 24

Continuity

Answer 24

Smooth continuous patterns rather than discontinuous ones.

Question 25

Closure

Answer 25

We fill in gaps to create a complete object.

Question 26

Connectedness

Answer 26

Because they are uniform & linked, we perceive them as a single unit.

Question 27

Perceptual constancy

Answer 27

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

Question 28

Perceptual adaption

Answer 28

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

Question 29

Context effects

Answer 29

The influence of environmental factors in one’s perception of a stimulus.

Question 30

Perceptual set

Answer 30

A mental predisposition to perceive one thing & not another.

Question 31

Schema

Answer 31

A concept of framework that organizes and interprets info.

Question 32

Human factors psychologists

Answer 32

A branch of psychology that explores how people & machines interact & how machines & physical environments can be made safe & easy to use.

Question 33

Extrasensory perception

Answer 33

The controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input (telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition)

Question 34

Parapsychology

Answer 34

The study of paranormal phenomena (ESP, psychokinesis)