Psychology/Sociology Chapter 3: Sensation and Perception

Question 1

Pain threshold for sound

Answer 1

130-140 dB

Question 2

Auditory nerve is composed of a bundle of fibers made up of

Answer 2

Both bipolar and unipolar cells

The human cochlear (i.e. auditory) nerve is comprised of about 30,000 nerve fibers, most of which are bipolar (2 neurite branches) but there are also unipolar (1 neurite) cells present in the cochlear ganglia.

Question 3

Sound-induced vibrations depolarize hair cells of the cochlea by opening ion channels that are gated in what way?

Answer 3

Mechanically

Sound wave-induced vibration of hair cells generates tension within the cell membrane that directly activate ion channels responsible for auditory signaling. This type of ion channel is a mechanically-gated channel, such that upon its activation, it generates a depolarizing current within the cell.

Question 4

Lateral geniculate nucleus

Answer 4

is a visual information relay center in the thalamus. The LGN detects and interprets information from the retina and passes it on to the primary visual cortex in the occipital lobe.

Question 5

parietal lobe integrates

Answer 5

multiple inputs of sensory information, from spatial sense and navigation (proprioception) to temperature (thermoreceptors) and touch (mechanoreceptors)

Question 6

signal detection theory

Answer 6

refers to the ability to pick up the true or false presence or absence of stimuli in the environment

Question 7

motion parallax

Answer 7

refers to the fact that objects close to us move further across our visual field than objects that are far from us

Question 8

the context effect

Answer 8

the context effect refers to the influence of environmental characteristics on a person’s perception of a stimulus. For example, a participant may have better recall when the original learning and recall take place in similar environments.

B.