Exam 4 LAST EXAM BITCHES Flashcards
Top-DOwn Processing effects on perception
◦ Perception is a combination of bottom-up and
top-down processing
◦ Bottom-up
Raw sensory data
◦ Top-down
Expectations learned through previous experience
You don’t experience the world as it is,
you only experience your interpretation
Examples of TOp-Down processing
- strawberries are red . . . right?
- Gesalt Principles
- Attentional Blindness/Change Blindness
- Bugs vs. Daffy
Priming effects on perception
Priming effects
◦ Influences perception
◦ Primes activate different perceptual heuristics
Automatic perceptual “shortcuts”
◦ The same thing perceived differently due to
context
◦ Same thing perceived as two entirely different
categories
Examples of priming effects
Perception wasn’t “duck” vs. “sort of a duck”
Duck vs. Rabbit
Fish vs. Girl
Social perceptions examples
◦ Self-Concepts Self-serving biases Positive Illusions ◦ Stereotypes ◦ Eyewitness Identifications ◦ Illusory Correlations ◦ Self-Fulfilling Prophecies ◦ Attribution Errors
The Rashomon Effect
◦ Contradictory descriptions of the same event by
different people
(one murder, four stories)
WHy are eyewitness testimonies unreliable?
Errors due to attention and emotional arousal
◦ Memory requires attention and encoding
◦ Can’t remember what you never paid attention to
Fear and stress can impact attention
◦ Attention narrows (“tunnel vision” )
◦ Attention fixates (gets stuck on one thing)
◦ But, attention may fixate on small details that aren’t
helpful for making a correct identification
- WEAPON FOCUS
- FAMILIARITY ERRORS
- WELLS AND BRADFIELD
The Kuleshov Effect
Principle of Film Editing
◦ Meaning conveyed by juxtaposed images
◦ The same scene or image interpreted differently
due to context
A man’s neutral expression interpreted as…
Sadness (paired with a woman in a coffin)
Hunger (paired with a bowl of soup)
Lust (paired with a provocative image of a woman)
◦ The film viewer “fills in the blanks” and makes an
interpretation consistent with the context
- KEY AND PEELE SKIT
Illusory Correlation
◦ An illusory correlation is a perceived relationship that
does not, in fact, exist
- superstitions, stereotypes, full moon
Positive Illusions and Mental Health
• Positive Illusions and Mental Health
• Most assume that proper mental health is marked by
realistic views of the world
• Research suggests that most well-adjusted people may
have slightly unrealistic views about themselves
Pros and Cons of Positive Illusions
• Benefits of positive illusions
• Elevate positive mood and reduce negative mood
• Foster social bonds by making people more outgoing
• Promote pursuit and persistence at goals
• Costs of positive illusions
• Positive illusions may be detrimental if overestimation
of abilities leads to poor performance
Self and Positive Illusions
Unrealistically positive views of self
• The “everyone is above average” effect
• Believe positive traits are more true of self than
negative traits
• Believe positive traits are unique but negative traits are
common
Exaggerated perceptions of control
• Believe we have more control over events than we do
• Personally would rather throw the dice to win a game.
Unrealistic optimism
• Believe positive events more likely to happen to self
than to other people
POsitive Illusions and ROmantic PArtners
Positive Illusions about romantic partners
improve relationship satisfaction
Idealization in romantic relationships
◦ People are more satisfied in relationships when
partners have positive illusions of them
◦ Happier in relationships when partners see us
more positively than we see ourselves
Best when obvious weaknesses are verified but when
subjective evaluations are more favorable
“Oh I know that it’s seems like he’s being rude, he’s just very
focused on his thoughts”
ENtity Theory
Belief that talent is something you are
“born with”
Either have it or don’t
INcremental Theory
Belief that any ability can be improved with
hard work
Talent can be achieved through effort
Pygmalion in the Classroom
◦ Rosenthal & Jacobsen (1968)
Some students randomly labeled as “bloomers” that
would start to perform better throughout the year
Students in the two groups start off equally, but by the
end of the year the “late bloomers” did much better
They “blossomed”
The teacher’s expectations ended up changing how the
students performed
Confirmation Bias
◦ The tendency to pay attention to and
interpret information in ways that confirm
your original expectations
◦ Confirmation bias allows people to believe
what they want to believe, even if their
beliefs seem to contradict evidence
Postive Testing
Only asking questions in way that to would confirm an
expectation.
Not asking questions that could disconfirm expectations
- dispute over child custody
WHy do people believe strange things?
Top-down effects on perception
◦ Expectations influence what we perceive
◦ Brain “fills in the blanks”
◦ Can perceive things that aren’t really there
Evolutionary influences on perception
◦ Brain wired to detect certain types of stimuli
over others
Faces, bugs, spiders, snakes
Notice how easy it is to hallucinate a bug when
you just found one crawling on you?
Optimal Distinctiveness
◦ People want to feel unique but also accepted
◦ Extreme beliefs may help fulfill both social needs
◦ Feel special and unique
◦ May bring acceptance into a larger social network
Get support from other believers
◦ Positive feelings about self get reinforced
Intelligence and Bizarre Beliefs
Illusory beliefs may be held by very
intelligent people
Sir Issac Newton
◦ Considered one of greatest scientists of all time
◦ Inventor of Calculus
◦ First theory of Gravity
◦ But… believed in alchemy and witchcraft
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
◦ Writer of the Sherlock Holmes novels
◦ Believed in mystical creatures and was fooled by
the “Cottingley Fairies” hoax
POsitive Symptoms of Schizophrenia
◦ “Positive Symptoms” (excesses of behavior) Hallucinations Hearing voices Delusions Paranoia Derailment Inappropriate Emotions
Negative SYmptoms of Schizophrenia
◦ “Negative Symptoms” (deficits of behavior) Catatonia Apathy Flattened emotions Avolition Poverty of Speech
