PSY 102 Chapter Notes - Chapter 4: Extrasensory Perception, Multisensory Integration, Color Constancy
30 Mar 2017
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Sensation refers to the detection of physical energy by our sense organs, including our eyes, ears, skin, nose, and tongue, which then relay information to the brain. Perception is the brain"s interpretation of these raw sensory inputs. In other words, sensation first allows us to pick up the signals in our environments, and perception then allows us to assemble these signals into something meaningful. Most of the time, filling-in (perception) is adaptive, as it helps us make sense of our often confusing and chaotic perceptual worlds. But sometimes it can fool us, as in the case of visual illusions (naive realism). The first step in sensation is converting external energies or substances into a language the nervous system understands (action potential). Transduction is thus, the process by which the nervous system converts an external stimulus, like light or sound, into electrical signals within neurons. For all of our senses, activation is greatest when we first detect a stimulus.
