Psychology Chapter 6 - Sensation and Perception

Talia is 45 years old. She has started to notice that newspaper print is too small for her to read. Talia needs reading glasses because the lenses of her eyes are less able to adjust, or _____.

accommodate

Fusiform face area

an area of human cortex, located at the boundary between the occipital and temporal lobes, that is selectively activated by human faces

Myopia

nearsightedness; lack of foresight

Psychokinesis

"mind over matter" ie levitating a table or influencing the roll of a die

Retinal disparity

A binocular cue for perceiving depth. By comparing retinal images from the two eyes, the brain computes distance-the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object.

Iris

A colored muscle that dilates or constricts in response to light intensity.

Blindsight

A condition in which a blind person has some spared visual capacities in the absence of any visual awareness.

Farsightedness

A condition in which faraway objects are seen more clearly than near objects because the image of near objects is focused behind the retina

Nearsightedness

A condition in which nearby objects are seen more clearly than distant objects because distant objects focus in front of the retina

Monocular cues

A depth cue, such as interposition or linear perspective, available to either eye alone.

Binocular cues

A depth cue, such as retinal disparity, depends on the use of two eyes.

Cochlear implant

A device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating the auditory nerve through electrodes threaded into the cochlea.

Context effects

A given stimulus may trigger different perceptions because of the immediate context.

Visual cliff

A laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals.

Conduction hearing loss

A less common form of hearing loss, caused by damage to the mechanical system that conducts sound waves to the cochlea.

Perceptual set

A mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another. Preexisting schemas influence top-down processing of ambiguous sensation interpretation through experience. What determines this? Schemes organize and interpret unfamiliar information through experience.

Prosopagnosia

A neurological disorder that impairs the ability to recognize faces, sensation exists, but perception does not. Affects the right side of the brain.

Nociceptors

Sensory receptors that enable the perception of pain in response to potentially harmful stimuli

Embodied cognition

The influence of bodily sensation, gestures, and other states on cognitive preferences and judgments.

Hypnosis

A social interaction in which one person (the hypnotist) suggests to another (the subject) that certain perceptions, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors will spontaneously occur.

Dissociation

A split in consciousness, which allows some thoughts and behaviors to occur simultaneously with others.

Posthypnotic suggestions

A suggestion, made during a hypnosis session, to be carried out after the subject is no longer hypnotized; used by some clinicians to help control undesired symptoms and behaviors.

Pitch

A tone's experienced highness or lowness; depends on frequency.

Stroboscopic movement

A type of apparent movement based on the rapid succession of still images, as in motion pictures

Genna's irises are constricting. Based on information provided in the text. Genna is MOST likely ____ someone. a. refusing b. trusting c. bored by d. interested in

A. refusing

Using sound as your example, explain how these concepts differ: absolute threshold, subliminal stimulation, and difference threshold.

Absolute threshold is the minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular sound (such as an approaching bike on the sidewalk behind you) 50 percent of the time. Subliminal stimulation happens when, without your awareness, your sensory system processes a sound that is below your absolute threshold. A difference threshold is the minimum difference needed to distinguish between two stimuli (such as between the sound of a bike and the sound of a runner coming up behind you) 50 percent of the time

Phi phenomenon

An illusion of movement created when two or more adjacent lights blink on and off in quick succession.

Gestalt

An organized whole. This German psychologist emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes.

Bottom-up processing

Analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information A -> /-\ -> A

Anna is reading her psychology text. The activation of receptors in her retina is called ________. Her interpretation of the stimuli as particular words is called ________. a. perception; transduction b. sensation; perception c. transduction; sensation d. perception; sensation

B. sensation; perception

With respect to theories of color perception, the ____theory applies to the first stage of color processing, whereas the ____ theory applies to the second stage. a. opponent-process; trichromatic b. trichromatic; opponent-process c. place; frequency d. Hering; Young-Helmholtz

B. trichromatic; opponent-process

Subliminal

Below one's absolute threshold for conscious awareness

Which of the following options has NOT been proven to reduce pain?

C. Phantom limb sensation

Marc is driving his 12-year-old car. He notices a sound coming from the engine, which involves _____ processing. He immediately starts thinking that the sound is similar to the sound his car made the last time he has it repaired, which involves _____ processing. a. perception; sensation b. transduction; perception c. sensation; perception d. perception; transduction

C. sensation; perception

The local fire department sounds an alarm. The conversion of the siren's sound waves into neural impulses exemplifies the process of: a. conduction b. detection c. transduction d. transmission

C. transduction

Cataracts

Clouding of the eye lens; Results in blurred vision, cause unknown. Treatable: Replace cloudly lens with clear lens

James is threading a needle under a bright light bulb. During this task, James's vision is driven mainly by the ____ in his ____. a. cones; fovea b. rods; cornea c. rods; fovea d. cones; cornea

Cones; fovea

Transduction

Conversion of one form of energy into another. In sensation, the transforming of stimulus energies, such as sights, sounds, and smells, into neural impulses our brain can interpret

Denise wears an extremely bright safety yellow sweatshirt when she cycles to the gym after dark. The sweatshirt's brightness reflects the ____ of the light it reflects. a. long wavelength b. short wavelength c. low amplitude d. high amplitude

D. high amplitude

As you walk into a brightly lit room, the black structure in the center of your eye seems to shrink to a tiny black dot. This response is caused by the action of the eye structure called the: a. fovea b. lens c. cornea d. iris

D. iris

Glaucoma

Damage to the optic nerve, preventing transmission of neural impulses. Results form pressure cannot be cured, but can be controlled

Macular degeneration

Deterioration of the central portion of the retina, the medula. The cells in the medula fail to transmit neural impulses

Length

Determines the pitch

Sensory adaptation

Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation. Increases focus by reducing background chatter. Influences how the world is perceived in a personally useful way. Influences emotions.

Sweet

Energy source

Kisharra encounters an intriguing article reporting a case of a neuropsychological disorder called prosopagnosia. She learns that prosopagnosia reflects an inability to recognize ____ and results from damage to the ____ hemisphere. a. words; right b. faces; left c. faces; right d. words; left

Faces;right

Weber's law

For an average person to perceive a difference, two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum percentage (not a constant amount); the exact percentage proportion varies. Depending on the stimulus.

Sound waves

From the environment into the brain. Sound waves compress and expand air molecules. The eye detect these brief pressure changes.

Marissa's preterm baby is stimulated with hand-massage several times each day. She can expect that her baby will:

Gain weight faster and be able to go home sooner than preterm babies who are not stimulated with hand massage.

Motives

Give us energy as we work toward a goal. Like context, they can bias our interpretations of neural stimuli.

Amplitude

Height of a wave

Tinnitus

a jingling; a ringing or buzzing in the ear

Place theory

In hearing, the theory that links the pitch we hear with the place where the cochlea's membrane is stimulated. (Also called place coding).

Frequency theory

In hearing, the theory that the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency of a tone, thus enabling us to sense its pitch. (Also called temporal coding).

Bipolar cells

In the retina, the specialized neurons that connect the rods and cones with the ganglion cells.

Ganglion cells

In the retina, the specialized neurons that connect to the bipolar cells; the bundled axons of the ganglion cells form the optic nerve.

Top-down processing

Information processing guided by higher-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expectations T/-\E C/-\T

Astigmatism

Irregular shape of cornea changing way light passes through to the retina. Results in Myopia and/or hyperopia; cause: not known.

Where are the kinesthetic receptors and the vestibular sense receptors located?

Kinesthetic receptors, called proprioceptors, are located in our joints, tendons, and muscles. Vestibular sense receptors are located in our inner ear.

What is the rapid sequence of events that occurs when you see and recognize a friend?

Light waves reflect off the person and travel into your eyes. Receptor cells in your retina convert the light waves' energy into neural impulses sent to your brain. Your brain detector cells and work teams process the subdimensions of the visual input-including color, movement, form, and depth-separately but simultaneously. Your brain interprets this information, based on previously stored information and your expectation, and forms a conscious perception of your friend.

Railroad tracks appear to converge in the distance. This provides a cue for depth perception known as ____

Linear perspective

Long waves have ______ frequency and _______ pitch. Short waves have ______ frequency and ______ pitch.

Low frequency—and low pitch; High frequency—and high pitch.

Subliminal persuasion

May produce a fleeting, subtle, but not powerful, enduring effect on behavior.

Telepathy

Mind-to-mind communication.

Feature detectors

Nerve cells in the brain's visual cortex that respond to specific features of the stimulus, such as shape, angle, or movement.

Color-deficient vision.

Others less fortunate, mostly male, have the genetically sex-linked condition of this

Vestibular sense

Our balance sense-our sense of body movement and position that enables our sense of balance.

Kinesthesia

Our movement sense-our system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts.

Olfaction

Our sense of small

Gustation

Our sense of taste

Precognition

Perceiving future events, such as an unexpected death in the next month.

Perceptual constancy

Perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent color, brightness, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change. A top-down process

Clairvoyance

Perceiving remote events, such as a house on fire across the country.

Size consistency

Perception of objects as having constant size even when our distance from them varies. Perception of the form of familiar objects as constant even the retina receives changing images.

Does perceptual set involve bottom-up or top-down processing? Why?

Perceptual set involves top-down processing, because it draws on your experiences, assumptions, and expectations when interpreting stimuli.

Which theory of pitch perception would best explain a symphony audience's enjoyment of a high-pitched piccolo? How about a low-pitched cello?

Place theory; frequency theory.

Bitter

Potential poisons

Sour

Potentially toxic acid

Signal detection theory

Predicts how and when we will detect a faint stimulus amid background noise

Parallel processing

Processing many aspects of a stimulus or problem simultaneously.

Umami

Proteins to grow and repair tissue

Placebo

Reduces CNS attention and responses to pain.

Cones

Retinal receptors that are concentrated near the center of the retina and that function in daylight or in well-lit conditions. Cones detect fine detail and give to color sensations.

Rods

Retinal receptors that detect black, white, and gray, and are sensitive to movement. Rods are necessary for peripheral and twilight vision, when cones don't respond.

What is the rough distinction between sensation and perception?

Sensation is the bottom-up process by which your sensory receptors and your nervous system receive and represent stimuli. Perception is the top-down process by which your brain creates meaning by organizing and interpreting what your senses detect.

Subliminal sensation

Sensation that is too fleeting to enable exploitation with subliminal messages.

Phantom limb sensations

Sensations that come even when a limb is missing

Sensory receptors

Sensory nerve endings that respond to stimuli

Salty

Sodium essential to physiological processes

Tetrachromatic color vision

Some lucky people, mostly female, can see up to 100 million colors thanks to a genetic condition known as what?

Subliminal stimuli

Stimuli that are too fleeting to enable exploitation with subliminal messages

Psychologist Linda Bartoshuk researched what?

Supertasters and how they can taste some things that the rest of us cannot.

If an ESP event did occur under controlled conditions, what would be the next step to confirm that ESP really exists?

The ESP event would need to be replicated

Moon illusion

The Moon looks up to 50 percent larger when near the horizon than when high in the sky.

What are two key theories of color vision? Are they contradictory or complementary? Explain.

The Young-Helmholtz trichromatic theory dhows that the retina and thalamus for red-green, blue-yellow, and white-black. These theories are complementary and outline the two stages of color vision. First, the retina's receptors for red, green, and blue respond to different color stimuli. Second, the receptors' signals are then processed by the opponent-process cells on their way to the visual cortex in the brain.

Perceptual adaptation

The ability to adjust to changed sensory input, including an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field.

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.

Intensity

The amount of energy in a light wave or sound wave, which influences what we perceive as brightness or loudness. Intensity is determined by the wave's amplitude (height).

Relative luminance

The amount of light an object reflects relative to its surroundings

Thalamus

The brain's sensory control center, located on top of the brainstem; it directs messages to the sensory receiving areas in the cortex and transmits replies to the cerebellum and medulla

Fovea

The central focal point in the retina, around which the eye's cones cluster.

Middle ear

The chamber between the eardrum and cochlea containing three tiny bones-hammer (malleus), anvil (incus), and stirrup (stapes)-that concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea's oval window.

Extrasensory perception (ESP)

The controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input; includes telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition.

Hue

The dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength of light; what we know as the color names blue, green, and so forth.

Wavelength

The distance from the peak of one light or sound wave to the peak of the next. Electromagnetic wavelengths vary from the short blips of gamma rays to the long pulses of radio transmission.

Inner ear

The innermost part of the ear, containing the cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs.

Convergence

The inward angle of the eyes focusing on a near object

Retina

The light-sensitive inner surface of the eye, containing the receptor rods and cones plus layers of neurons that begin the processing of visual information

Difference Threshold (JND)

The minimum difference a person can detect between any 2 stimuli 50% of the time; increases with stimulus size

Absolute threshold

The minimum stimulus energy needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time German scientist and philosopher Gustav Fechner (1801-1887) studied the edge of our awareness of these faint stimuli, which he called an _____ _____

Sensorineural hearing loss

The most common form of hearing loss, caused by damage to the cochlea's receptor cells or to the auditory nerve; also called nerve deafness.

Optic nerve

The nerve that carries neural impulses from the eye to the brain.

Frequency

The number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time (for example, per second).

Figure-ground

The organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground).

Grouping

The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups.

Blind spot

The point at which the optic nerve leaves the eye, creating a "blind" spot no receptor cells are located there.

Sensory interaction

The principle that one sense can influence another, as when the smell of food influences its taste.

Perception

The process by which our brain organizes and interprets sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events

Sensation

The process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment

Accommodation

The process by which the eye's lens change shape to focus near or far objects on the retina

Audition

The sense or act of hearing. Helps us adapt and survive

Why is it that after wearing shoes for a while, you cease to notice them (until question like this draw your attention back to them)?

The shoes provide constant stimulation. Thank to sensory adaption, we tend to focus primarily on changing stimuli.

Pupil

The small adjustable opening through which light enters the eye

Synesthesia

The stimulation of one sense (hearing a number or musical note) triggers an experience of another (sensing a specific color, taste, or smell)

Parapsychology

The study of paranormal phenomena, including ESP and psychokinesis (also called telekinesis)

Psychophysics

The study of relationships between the physical characteristics of stimuli, such as their intensity, and our psychological experience of them. Stimulus -> Sensation -> Perception

Linear perspective

The tendency for parallel lines to appear to converge on each other

Brightness constancy

The tendency to perceive the apparent brightness of an object as the same even when the light conditions change. Also called lightness constancy

Opponent-process theory

The theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, blue-yellow, white-black) enable color vision. For example, some cells are stimulated by green and inhibited by red; others are stimulated by red and inhibited by green.

Young-Helmholtz trichromatic (three-color) theory

The theory that the retina contains three different types of color receptors-one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue-which, when stimulated in combination, can produce the perception of any color.

Gate-control theory

The theory that the spinal cord contains a neurological "gate" that blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on to the brain. The :gate" is opened by the activity of pain signals traveling up small nerve fibers and is closed by activity up small nerve fibers and is closed by activity in larger fibers or by information coming from the brain.

Lens

The transparent structure behind the pupil that changes shape to help focus images on the retina

Social influence theory

Theory that hypnotic subjects are just role-playing; so caught up in a hypnotized role that they convince themselves it's real; trying to be a "good subject"; imaginative acting

James Gibson

This person argued for an ecological approach to perception, in which our perceptions depend on an object's context.

Samantha opens her eyes in the morning to see flowers by her bedside. At that point, her eyes are receiving light energy, which they change into neural messages for the brain to process. This conversion of one form of energy into another is called:

Transduction

Antjuan's pupils are dilating. Based on the textbook's discussion, Antjuan is MOST likely _____ someone. a. refusing b. bored by c. trusting d. disgusted by

Trusting

How do we normally perceive depth?

We are normally able to perceive thanks to both binocular cues (such as retinal disparity) and monocular cues (which include relative height, relative size, relative motion, linear perspective, and interposition).

How does our system for sensing smell differ from our systems for touch and taste?

We have four basic touch senses and five basic taste sensations. But we have no specific smell receptors. Instead, different combinations of odor receptors send messages to the brain, enabling us to recognize some 1 trillion different smells

Optic chiasm

the point at which the optic nerves from the inside half of each eye cross over and then project to the opposite half of the brain

Social perception

the process of interpreting information about another person

Cornea

the transparent layer forming the front of the eye, which bends light to help provide focus