PSYC 1300 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Presupposition, Ponzo Illusion, Explicit Memory
Psych Exam 2 Study Guide
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Chapter 6: Sensation and Perception
•Sensation
•The process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and
represent stimulus energies from our environment
•Perception
•The process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to
recognize meaning objects and events
•Three basic steps to all our sensory systems:
•Receive sensory stimulation, often using specialized receptor cells
•Transform that stimulation into neural impulses
•Deliver the neutral information to our brain
•Transduction
•Process of converting one form of energy into another that our brain can use
•In sensation, the transforming of stimulus energies (such as sights, sounds, and
smells) into neural impulses our brain can interpret
•Absolute Threshold
•The minimum stimulus energy needed to detect a particular stimulus 50% of the
time
•Sensory Adaptation
•Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation
•Perceptual Set
•A mental presupposition to perceive one thing and not another
•A set of mental tendencies and assumptions that affects (top-down) what we hear,
taste, feel, and see
•Tendency to perceive things one way, instead of another
•Whatever you want to see, you expect to see
Psych Exam 2 Study Guide
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•Why it is so hard to catch typos on your own paper
•Gestalt Psychology
•Emphasize our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes
•The idea that we have the ability to focus on one figure, everything else fades into
the background
•As we look ahead, we cannot separate the perceived scene into our left and right
fields of view. It a whole, seamless scene. Our conscious perception is an integrated
whole.
•Figure - ground
•The organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from
their surrounding (the ground)
•Depth Perception
•The ability to see objects in three dimensions although the images that strike the
retina are two-dimensional
•Allows us to judge distance
•Enables us to estimate an object’s distance from us
•Visual Cliff
•A laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals
•Answer question: are we born with depth perception?
•Infants are reluctant to venture onto the glass over the cliff
•Binocular Cues
•Depth cues, such as retinal disparity, that depend on the use of two eyes
•Retinal disparity
•By comparing two images from the retinas in the two eyes, the brain computes
distance—the greater the difference between the two images, the closer the
object
Psych Exam 2 Study Guide
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•ex: hold your two fingers, with tips half an inch apart, directly in front of your nose,
and your retinas will receive quite different views. If you close one eye and then
the other, you can see the differences.
•Convergence
•The movement of your eye muscles tell you what distance an object is
•Monocular Cues
•Depth cues, such as interposition and linear perspective, available to either eye
alone
•How do we judge if a person is 10 or 100 meters away? Retinal disparity won’t
help, because there won’t be much difference between the images cast on our
right and left retinas. At such distances, we depend on monocular cues
•Linear Perspective
•Two parallel lines that extend into the distance, they will appear to come
together at some point in the horizon
•ex: train tracks “coming together” in the distance
•Can lead to optical illusions
•Texture Gradient
•As the distance of something increases, the texture becomes finer and finer
until it can’t be distinguished
•Closer object appear to have a more detailed texture
•Farther object has a smoother, finer texture
•Perceptual Constancy
•Perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent color, brightness, shape, and
size) even as illumination and retinal images change
•Once you recognize something for as it is, you will recognize it at any distance,
angle, and illumination
