Unit 2A: Perception Flashcards
What is selective attention?
Focusing consciousness awareness on a particular stimulus
What is the cocktail party effect?
Being able to talk to one person within a sea of many if you’re at a party
Being able to hear your name while focusing on another conversation
what is inattentional blindness caused by?
It is caused by focusing attention on some part of the environment
What is change blindness?
failing to notice changes in the environment: a form of inattentional blindness
What is a perceptual set?
A set of mental tendencies and assumptions that affects(top-down) what we hear, taste, feel, and see.
What are schemas?
Concepts that organize and interpret unfamiliar information
How does context influence how we see things?
By factors of framing, expectations, cultural influences, and social influences.
Motivation
Motives give us energy to work towards a goal. Like context, they can bias our interpretations of neural stimuli.
Emotion
Emotions can shove our perceptions in one direction or another. Example: sad music making you sad when you have nothing to be sad about
What is gestalt?
An organized whole. Example: Clusters of dots grouped closely together, creating the perception of separate groups.
What is figure-ground?
The organization of the visual field into objects (like figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground)
What are the three main grouping principles?
Proximity: Objects close to each other are perceived as related. Example: Dots arranged in clusters appear as distinct groups.
Similarity: Elements that are similar are grouped together. Example: Circles of the same color appear as part of the same group.
Closure: Your mind fills in missing parts of an incomplete shape to see it as a whole. Example: A broken circle is still perceived as a circle.
What is the visual cliff?
a laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals
What are binocular cues?
A depth cue, such as retinal disparity, that depends on the use of two eyes.
Convergence:
Retinal images are combined by the brain
Retinal disparity:
each retina receives a slightly different image of the world
Monocular cues:
depth cues available to each eye separately
What is relative clarity?
The idea that objects with greater clarity and detail appear closer to the viewer, while objects that are blurrier or hazier appear farther away.
What is relative size?
When two objects are known to be the same or similar in actual size, the one that appears smaller is perceived as being farther away, while the one that appears larger is perceived as being closer.
What is texture gradient?
As objects move farther away, their texture appears to become smaller, more compressed, and less detailed. This gradient of texture helps us judge how far or close things are by observing how the texture patterns change with distance.
What is linear perspective?
A visual technique used to create the illusion of depth and distance on a flat surface. It works by depicting parallel lines that appear to converge as they recede into the distance, eventually meeting at the vanishing point.
What is interposition?
(also known as overlap) a depth cue in visual perception where one object partially blocks or overlaps another, giving the impression that the blocked object is farther away.
What is apparent movement?
As we move, stable objects may appear to move.
Stroboscopic movement
An illusion of continuous movement (as in a motion picture) exxperienced when viewing a rapid series of slightly varying still images
What is the phi phenomenon?
An illusion of movement created when two or more sdjacent lights blink on and off in quick succession
what is the auto kinetic effect?
the illusory movement of a still spot of light in a dark room
what is perceptual constancy?
perceiving objects as unchanging regardless of the viewing angle, distance, or illumination.
what is color constancy?
perceiving familiar obejcts as having consistent color, even if lighting alters the color.
what is brightness constancy?
constant brightness is perceived even if its illumination varies.
what is shape constancy?
we perceive the form of familiar objects as constant
what is size constancy?
we percieve an object as having an unchanging size, while distance varies.
What does the human mind become “furnished” from?
experience
what is perceptual adaptation?
adjusting to changed sensory input. Example: upside down glasses from demo
