CMN 2181 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Selective Perception, Ingroups And Outgroups, Cultural Relativism

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Communication
• Course: CMN 2181
• Professor: Peruvemba Jaya

Document Summary

Lecture #3: the influence of culture on perception. We respond to sensory stimuli by selecting, organizing and interpreting it to create a meaningful picture. The process occurs in stages; each stage involves a specific operation on incoming information. In perception, we use our sensory organs to identify the existence of stimuli and subject it to evaluation and interpretation. Perception is a subjective process, open to the influence of such factors as culture, personal experiences, and values. It is at the very center of how we communicate. The perception process consists of three stages: selection, categorization, and interpretation. The first stage in the perception process is selection, in which information is received via the senses, attended to, and interpreted by the brain. It is impossible to meaningfully process all available stimuli from our environment, so we engage in selective perception. In this stage, we group persons, objects, and events on the basis of their similarities.