Unit Four Flashcards
Sensation
Process where our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment
Perception
Process of organizing and interpreting sensory info enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events
Bottom up processing
Start with sensory receptors and work to brain integration of sensory info
Ex lines angles and colors forming picture
Top down processing
Construct perceptions Drawing on our experience and expectations,
Ex consider title, apprehensive expressions then direct attention to aspects that give those observations meaning I
Selective attention
Focusing of conscious awareness in particular stimulus
Inattentional blindness
Failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere
Change blindness
Failing to notice changes in the environment
Psychophysics
Study of relationships between physical characteristics of stimuli (like intensity) and our psychological experience with them
Absolute threshold
The minimum stimuli needed to detect a particular stimulus 50% of the time
Signal detection theory
Theory predicts when we will detect weak signals (measured as ratio of hits to false alarms)
What does signal detection theory believe detection depends on
Persons experience, expectations, motivation, and alertness
Subliminal
Below ones absolute threshold for conscious awareness
Priming
The activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, predisposing ones perception, memory, or response
Difference threshold
Minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50% of time
(Just noticeable difference)
Webers law
Principle that to be perceived different two stimuli must differ by a constant percentage (rather than amount)
Sensory adaptation
Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation
Transduction
Conversion of one form of energy into another, like senses into neural impulses for brain to interpret
Wavelength
Distance from the peak of one wave to the peak of the next
Determined hue/color
Hue
Dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength of light
Intensity
Amount of energy in a wave, perceived as brightness or loudness, and determined by amplitude or height of wave
Pupil
Adjustable opening in the center of the eye through which light enters
Iris
Ring of Colored muscle tissue, controls pupil size opening
Lens
Transparent piece behind pupil, chances shape to help focus images on retina
Retina
Light sensitive inner surface of eye, contains receptor rods, cones, and layers of neurons that begin process visual info
Rods
Retinal receptors that detect black, white, grey, necessary for peripheral vision and twilight
Cones
Retinal receptors that are in the center of the retina, function in daylight or well light,they detect fine detail and color sensation
Optic nerve
Nerve that carries neural impulse from eye to brain
Blind spot
Point at which optic nerve leaves eye, blind because no receptor cells are there
Fovea
Central focal point in the retina, where the cones cluster around
Feature detectors
Nerve cells in brain that respond to specific features of stimuli
Ex shape, angle, movement
Parallel processing
Processing many aspects of a problem simultaneously, sub dimensions like color, movement, form and depth.
What does parallel processing contrast with
Step by step and conscious problem solving
Young helmholtz trichromatic (3 color) theory
Theory retina contains three different color receptors (red, blue, green) and when stimulated in combination it produces perception of any color
Opponent process theory
Opposing retinal processes enable color vision (blue-green, yellow-blue, black_white) explains after images. Ex some cells stimulated by red and not green, vis versa
Audition
Sense or act of hearing
Frequency
Number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time, determines pitch
Pitch
Tones experienced highness or lowness, depends on frequency
Middle ear
Between cochlea and eardrum, containing tiny bones that concentrate the vibrations of eardrum and send to cochlea
Inner ear
Internist part of the ear, contains cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs
Place theory
Theory in hearing that links the pitch we hear with the place where the cochlea a membrane is stimulated
Explains high pitched sounds
Frequency theory
Theory in hearing that the brain reads pitch by monitoring the frequency of neural impulses traveling up the auditory nerve
Explains low pitched sounds
Conduction hearing loss
Caused by damage to the mechanical system that conducts sound waves to the cochlea
Eardrum or tiny bones
What are the tiny bones in the middle ear
Hammer
Anvil
Stirrup
Sensorineural hearing loss
Damage to the cochlea a receptor cells or auditory nerves, also called nerve deafness
Kinesthesis
The system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts
Vestibular sense
Sense of body movement and position including balance, monitors head position and movement.
Gate control theory
Theory spinal cord contains neurological hate that blocks or allows pain signals
How is the gate controlled
Opened by activity of pain signals traveling up small nerve fibers
Closed by activity in larger fibers or by info coming from brain
Sensory interaction
Principle that one sense may influence another was when small influences taste
What is the cocktail party effect
Ability to attend to only one voice amount many, like someone says your name at a party and you instantly focus on it
Change deafness
When speaker changes and people don’t notice
Choice blindness
Not noticing their choice is different , ex flashed female faces, asked which prettier, when shown their “choice” they explain it even tho they didn’t choose it
Choice blindness blindness
When asking if they’d notice the choice switch (after already partaking in it) and they said they would when they hadn’t
Pop out
Not choosing to attend to the stimuli but they draw our eye and demand attention
Masking stimulus
Interrupts the brains processing before conscious perception
What does priming images to people suggest
Sometimes we feel what we do not know and can’t describe
How does much of our information processing occur
Automatically, out of sight off the radar of our concious mind
Can subliminal persuasion manipulate us?
No, subtle fleeting effect
Why if we stare at an object without flinching does it not vanish from sight
Eyes always moving, enough to guarantee that stimulation on the eyes receptors continually changes
What benefit does sensory adaptation give to us
Freedom to focus on informative changes in environment without being distracted by un informative background stimulation
Sensory adaptation reinforces what fundamental lesson
We perceive the world not exactly as it is but as it is useful for us to perceive it
Light wavelength
Hue/color
Light frequency
Short is blue
Big is red
Light amplitude is
Intensity and brightness
Sound amplitude
Loudness measured in decibels, increased by X10 when goes up 10
Sound frequency and pitch
F goes up, pitch does up
Wavelength and frequency
Short wavelength, high frequency
Long wavelength low frequency
Light travel of eye
Light enters cornea, passes through pupil (surrounded by iris), lens focus light rays into an image on the retina, retina receptor cells concert particles of light energy into neural impulses toward the brain, there impulses are reassembled into upright image
Follow light into the retina processes
Into Rods and cones, light energy would trigger chemical changes, spark neural signals, activate bipolar cells which activate the ganglion cells, axons of ganglion converge to form optic nerve which would Carrie the info to the brain.
Pathway from eyes to visual cortex
Ganglion axons firm optic nerve which runs to thalamus where they synapse with neurons that run to visual cortex
What responds to more complex patterns from feature detectors
Supercluster cells
Blindsight
Localized area of blindness in part of their field of vision
Retinal processing
Receptor rods and cones->bipolar cells->ganglion cells
How do we hear
Convert sound waves into neural activity
How we hear through every part
Outer ear funnels sound waves through auditory cannal to eardrum, middle ear transmits the vibrations through the bones to cochlea (in inner ear), cochlea membrane curates and so does the fluid, ripples basilar member, bend hair cells, triggers nerve cells converging into auditory nerve, sends neural messages to auditory cortex
What accounts for most hearing loss
Damage to hair cells
What alerts us to hearing damage
Ringing
Volley principle
Neural cells alternate firing and can achieve combined frequency above 1000 waves
Vestibular sacs
Contain fluid that moves when your head rotates or tilts
Why is there a dizzyafter affect
The fluid in kinestetic receptors and canals doesn’t do back to their neural state right away
Nociceptors
Sensory receptors that detect hurtful temp, pressure, chemicals
Tinnitus
Ringing ear sensation, phantom sounds
Personal experience of pain biological influence
Activity in spinal cords large and small fibers
Genetic differences in endorphin production
Brain interpretation of CNS activity
Personal experience of pain psychological influence
Attention to pain
Learning based on experience
Expectations
Personal experience of pain social cultural influences
Prescience of others
Empathy for others pain
Cultural expectations
Umami taste
Flavor enhancer mono sodium glutamate
Taste and smell is what kind of sense
Chemical
McGurk effect
Hear ga see BA
Perceive da
Attractiveness of smells depends on
Learned associations
Sensation is to
As perception is to
Detection
Interpretation
Prosopagnosia-problem with facial recognition, have a deficiency in
Top down processing
Intensity is to brightness as wavelength is to
Hue
