Sensation and Perception Flashcards
Gate control theory is most useful for:
A. identifying ways to relieve pain.
B. identifying ways to relieve chronic stress.
C. understanding the cause of colorblindness.
D. understanding the cause of synesthesia.
Answer A is correct. An implication of gate control theory is that pain can be relieved by “closing the gate” by, for example, applying heat or cold to the affected area.
Theo is not color blind but his wife, Tillie, is red-green color blind. Which of the following describes the likelihood that the biological children of Theo and Tillie will be red-green color blind?
A. Their male and female children will be red-green color blind.
B. Their male children will be red-green color blind, but their female children will not be red-green color blind.
C. Their female children will be red-green color blind, but their male children will not be red-green color blind.
D. Their male and female children may or may not be red-green color blind.
Answer B is correct. To identify the correct answer to this question, you need to know that red-green color blindness is caused by a recessive gene on the X chromosome. Because males have only one X chromosome, they are red-green color blind when they inherit this gene from their mothers. In the situation described in this question, the mother is red-green color blind, which means she has two recessive genes for colorblindness. Consequently, her biological sons will inherit the gene from her and will be color blind. However, because females have two X chromosomes, they are red-green color blind only when they inherit the recessive gene from their mothers and fathers. The father in this question is not red-green color blind, so his daughters will not have the recessive gene on both X chromosomes and will not be color blind.
A psychologist interested in the relationship between the magnitude of physical stimuli and psychological sensations finds that doubling the weight of an object doubles the sensation of heaviness but that doubling the brightness of a light more than doubles the sensation of brightness. This finding is most consistent with which of the following?
A. Stevens’s power law
B. Fechner’s law
C. Weber’s law
D. Gerstmann’s law
Answer A is correct. The researcher’s finding is most consistent with Stevens’s power law, which proposes that there’s an exponential relationship between psychological sensation and the magnitude of a physical stimulus and that the exponent varies for different kinds of stimuli (e.g., the exponent is different for weight and light).
Afterimages and red/green and blue/yellow colorblindness are explained by which of the following?
A. opponent-process theory
B. trichromatic theory
C. Weber’s law
D. Fechner’s law
Answer A is correct. Opponent-process theory proposes that there are three types of opponent-process cells – red/green, blue/yellow, and white/black. It explains afterimages and red/green and blue/yellow colorblindness.
In the context of signal detection theory, d’ (d-prime) is a measure of:
A. the just noticeable difference.
B. the base rate.
C. background noise.
D. sensitivity.
Answer D is correct. Sensitivity refers to a perceiver’s ability to distinguish between the signal (stimulus) and noise and is estimated with d’.
Whenever Corky looks at numbers, each number elicits a different color (1 elicits red, 2 elicits blue, etc.). This is referred to as:
A. anosognosia
B. prosopagnosia
C. achromatopsia
D. synesthesia
Answer D is correct. Synesthesia is “a condition in which sensations in one sensory modality spontaneously trigger an associated sensation in another modality” (Freberg, 2010, p. 222).
Of the following, which is most responsible for depth perception of objects that are at a close distance?
A. motion parallax
B. interposition of objects
C. retinal disparity
D. linear perspective
Answer C is correct. Retinal disparity refers to differences in retinal images in the left and right eyes and is responsible for depth perception of objects that are at a close distance. In contrast, motion parallax, interposition of objects, and linear perspective are responsible for depth perception of objects that are at a greater distance.
