Sensation and Perception

Question 1

An intruder is hiding in Hannah’s wardrobe and confronts her when she comes home from work. Which nervous system is the most likely to be activated?

Answer 1

Her sympathetic nervous system.

Question 2

What is the Corpus callosum

Answer 2

A part of the brain which is a band of neural fibres linking the right and left hemispheres

Question 3

Neurogenesis in the adult human brain is known to:

Answer 3

contribute to brain plasticity.

Question 4

When compared to communication of the nervous system communication of the endocrine system

Answer 4

is slow and global.

Question 5

Out of every 100 photons entering the eye, roughly __________ are detected by photoreceptors

Answer 5

10

Question 6

In psychophysics, Weber’s Law states that:

Answer 6

the just noticeable difference increases as the background stimulus intensity increases

Question 7

psychophysics is the …

Answer 7

scientific study of the relationship between physical characteristics of stimuli and sensory capabilities

Question 8

The Theory of indirect perception asserts that…

Answer 8

perceptual experience is NEITHER of the world NOR just what is sensed

Question 9

The parasympathetic nervous system is…

Answer 9

a network of nerves that relaxes your body after periods of stress or danger. It also helps run life-sustaining processes, like digestion, during times when you feel safe and relaxed

Question 10

What is the sympathetic nervous system

Answer 10

a network of nerves that helps your body activate its “fight-or-flight” response. This system’s activity increases when you’re stressed, in danger or physically active.

Question 11

What is the somatic nervous system

Answer 11

is the part of the peripheral nervous system associated with the voluntary control of body movements via skeletal muscles

Question 12

What is the peripheral nervous system.

Answer 12

our peripheral nervous system (PNS) is that part of your nervous system that lies outside your brain and spinal cord. It plays key role in both sending information from different areas of your body back to your brain, as well as carrying out commands from your brain to various parts of your body.

Question 13

What is brain plasticity

Answer 13

Neural plasticity, also known as neuroplasticity or brain plasticity, can be defined as the ability of the nervous system to change its activity in response to intrinsic or extrinsic stimuli by reorganizing its structure, functions, or connections.

Question 14

what is the just noticeable difference

Answer 14

also known as the difference threshold, is the minimum level of stimulation that a person can detect 50% of the time

Question 15

Overall, the Gestalt laws show us that:

Answer 15

the visual system makes various assumptions about the world

These principles aim to show how complex scenes can be reduced to more simple shapes. They also aim to explain how the eyes perceive the shapes as a single, united form rather than the separate simpler elements involved.

Question 16

Signal detection theory is

Answer 16

a method of differentiating a person’s ability to discriminate the presence and absence of a stimulus (or different stimulus intensities) from the criterion the person uses to make responses to those stimuli.

Question 17

What is Direct Perception or Naive Realism

Answer 17

1.Observers directly perceive the world
2.perceptions should be directly determined by the stimulus
3.perceptions should be unambiguous, i.e. the sensorymeasurements should be sufficient to result in an accuratepercept

Question 18

What are the main Problems with Direct Perception or Naive Realism

Answer 18

1. Illusions - bi-stable illusions show a changing perceptual experience despite an unchanging stimulus.
2. Perceptual ambiguity -The sensory measurements you make are not always sufficient to decide on one unique correct percept
   3.The problem of identity - Do the things we perceive possess identifiable, mind independent characteristics?
   4) The problem of skepticism How can we know that what we perceive exists at all?

Question 19

“Because our senses cannot put us in contact with external objects directly, we cannot have certainty of whether what we perceive actually exists in the external world.”

Is a counter to which theory of perception?

Answer 19

Direct Perception or Naive Realism

Question 20

Describe Indirect perception

Answer 20

Perceptions are of our internal mental model(representation) of the world, not of the world itself.You do not experience the world (direct perception).You experience a model of the world (indirect perception).

Question 21

What can solve the illusion and ambiguity issues of direct Perception. Our internal representation (or explanation or story) of the world can vary even if the external world does not.

Answer 21

The Theory of Indirect perception

Question 22

Perception is described as an inverse problem
provide a description of an inverse problem

Answer 22

Inverse problem: the process of calculating from a set of observations the causal factors that produced them.We start with the effects and must then estimate the causes, as opposed to starting with the causes and then calculating the effects (forward problem)

Question 23

How does the brain attempt to solve the inverse problem of perception?

Answer 23

The brain interprets sensory data But it makes assumptions gestalt perception assumptions (or regularities) and uses previous experience objects and scenes

Question 24

What approach is described below

Perception is ‘different than the sum of its parts’.
We receive and process sensory input(bottom-up).
But more is added to the perceptual experience, and this comes from within our minds/brains (top-down).

Answer 24

The Gestalt approach

Question 25

Cloud shapes are an example of which Gestalt Law

Answer 25

Gestalt law: Emergence
Innate disposition to perceive patterns in stimuli based on top-down principles.

Question 26

What are the Gestalt laws: Principles of grouping

Answer 26

Closure
Similarity
Symmetry
Proximity
Continuity
Common fate

Question 27

Changing stimulus which provide the same perceptual categorization

such as a face seen from multiple angles or light environments

is an example of what

Answer 27

Gestalt law: Perceptual constancies/invariance

Question 28

The below is a description of what?

A mental representation or image containing the critical and distinctive features of a person, object or other perceptual phenomenon. Mental templates which allow us to parse and classify sensory input. This may explain perceptual constancies. This is an unconscious process, we only experience the end result: ‘qualia’

Answer 28

Perceptual schema

Question 29

The below is a description of what?
What you eventually perceive depends on your readiness to interpret stimuli in a particular way. This is heavily influenced by context, experience, personality, mood, culture, age,arousal and many other factors….

Answer 29

Perceptual set

Question 30

what is Molyneux’s Problem

Answer 30

Assume a blind man can tell the difference between a cube and a sphere by the way they feel when he touches them.

If the man was then given the ability to see could he tell which was the sphere and which was the cube simply by looking at them.

Question 31

What does the Absence of hue-sensitive photo-pigment in certain cone photo-receptors lead to

Answer 31

Colour-deficient vision such as :
‘Dichromats’ are colour-blind to only one of the colour systems
‘Monochromats’ are entirely colour-blind, being sensitive to only the black-white system.

Question 32

Who Said “Perception is externally guidedhallucination.”

Answer 32

Roger N. Shepard