Psychology 1000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Sensory Threshold, Psychophysics, Habituation

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 1000
• Professor: L. Fazakas-Dehoog

Document Summary

Perception: selection, organization and interpretation of sensory input. Psychophysics: the study of how physical stimuli are translated into psychological experience. Stimulus: information in the environment that is picked up by the receptors in our ns. Large numbers of stimuli outside of range of what ns can detect. Difference threshold: the minimal amount the stimulus needs to be increased or decreased to be judged as different from the original stimulus. How much you need to turn the music up to notice difference in threshold (aka just noticeable difference - jnd) Webers law: the difference threshold (jnd) is directly proportional to the magnitude of the stimulus with which the comparison is being made. Audition - music at 20 decibels, how much would u need to increase by to hear a differnece. Multiply 20 by the fraction (1/20) = need to increae by 1 decible. Sensory adaptation (habituation): the diminishing sensitivity to a constant stimulus over time.