Psychology Unit 4 Study Guide

After a stroke, a patient awakens and discovers that she feels completely dissociated from her leg, and is somewhat disgusted when she sees the leg attached to her body. Which sense has been damaged by the stroke?

kinesthetic sense

Molecules given off by many substances circulating in the air are perceived as smells if the molecules are absorbed by:

olfactory cells.

Which of the following theories explains color vision?

opponent-process theory

Because the two teams wore uniforms of different colors, Cheri perceived the ten basketball players as two distinct groups. This best illustrates the principle of:

similarity

Retinal disparity refers to the

somewhat different images our two eyes receive of the same object.

Which of the following statements would the Gestalt psychologists most likely agree with?

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

If someone shouts "Help!" how does our brain determine where the sound is coming from?

The cry will arrive at one ear first and more loudly, helping the brain figure out where it came from

The head of a drum vibrating back and forth is most similar to which of the following structures in the ear

Tympanic membrane

Light enters the eye in the form of:

waves of electromagnetic energy.

Trichromatic theory states that color vision is produced by which three kinds of cones

Red, green, blue

Which of the following questions would the Gestalt psychologists be most interested in?

How does the brain organize parts of images into a whole image?

A stereo with the volume knob turned all the way up will produce sounds with high:

Amplitude

Seeing an image of a green rectangle after staring at a red rectangle for an extended time is known as:

An afterimage

In Maya's physics class, her teacher demonstrated a technique that increased the amplitude of a light wave. She noticed that the increased amplitude led to greater

Brightness

Relative height is a cue involving our perception of objects higher in our field of vision as:

Farther away

The monocular depth cue in which an object blocking another object is perceived as closer is:

Interposition

A person who has difficulty bringing an image into focus and seeing fine detail is most likely having difficulty with which part of the eye?

Lens

A time lag between the time a sound reaches your left ear and when it reaches your right ear is important for accurately

Locating sounds

The height, or amplitude, of a sound wave determines its:

Loudness

A mental rule you use to organize sensations into perceptions is called a:

Perceptual set

After hearing rumors about the outbreak of an infectious disease, Alyosha began to perceive his normal aches and pains as disease-related symptoms. His reaction best illustrates the impact of

Perceptual set

The length (frequency) of a sound wave determines a sound's highness or lowness, also called

Pitch

If you sit in a cold classroom for long enough, eventually you won't feel as cold because of:

Sensory adaptation

Seeing two columns of triangles and one column of circles in the image here demonstrates which of the following Gestalt principles

Similarity

Because of size constancy, if a person sees a car drive away down the road, what will happen to the person's perception of the size of the car?

The person will perceive the car as the same size, even though it is farther away.

How would our perception of objects change without perceptual constancy?

The size, shape, and lightness of objects would seem to be constantly changing

Relative clarity is a cue for depth perception in which closer objects:

appear clearer and more distinct than do distant objects.

According to the principle of similarity, objects that look similar are likely to be perceived as:

belonging in the same group

The cochlea is a:

fluid-filled tube in which sound waves trigger nerve impulses.

Gestalt psychologists were most interested in which part of perceptual experiences?

how parts are organized into whole perceptions

Which of the following concepts gives us the ability to see an object as having a constant level of lightness no matter how the lighting conditions change?

lightness constancy

Jody's dog looks just as black in the brilliant sunlight as it does in the dim light of the back yard. This example illustrates what is known as:

lightness constancy.

The perception that the dog on the left side of the image is smaller than the dog at the right side of the image is because of which of the following monocular depth cues?

linear perspective

Which of the following statements is the best definition of sensation?

processing information from the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and skin

Seeing three pairs of vertical lines in the accompanying image demonstrates which of the following Gestalt principles

proximity

The accompanying visual illusion is called:

the Müller-Lyer illusion.

Sensory adaptation refers to

the filtering out of non-changing stimuli in the environment.

The accompanying image changes if you look at it upside down because:

we assume an overhead light source, causing us to interpret shading in the image differently.

When we use our past experiences and expectations to organize and interpret sensations, we are using:

top-down processing.

Which two theories together best describe color vision?

trichromatic and opponent-process theories

The minimum amount of stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus is:

Absolute threshold

Sunglasses that are designed to stop short-wavelength light from coming into the eye will have the greatest affect on which one of the following colors?

Blue

If you briefly saw a picture of your mother's face but part of the picture was missing, your brain might fill in the missing piece of the visual image because of which Gestalt principle?

Closure

The Gestalt principle that explains the tendency to fill in gaps to perceive disconnected parts as a whole object is called

Closure

As a rock musician who has experienced prolonged exposure to high-amplitude music, Tim is beginning to lose his hearing. It is most likely that this hearing loss involves problems in the

Cochlea

Which receptor cell detects color?

Cone

Seeing a wavy line going through a horizontal line in the accompanying image demonstrates which of the following Gestalt principles?

Continuity

The clear covering on the front of the eye that protects the rest of the structures in the eye is the

Cornea

Successfully jumping across a small stream depends on which of the following visual abilities?

Depth perception

Which structure moves in reaction to sound waves traveling down the auditory canal?

Eardrum

The interaction of taste and smell is:

Flavor

A small whistle that produces a very high-pitched sound makes sound waves with high

Frequency

Which of the following perceptual theories would best help explain why you perceive a cube in the accompanying image

Gestalt theory

One of the strongest schemas we use to organize visual information is the schema for:

Human faces

If you are standing in the middle of some train tracks, the tracks will appear to converge at some point in the distance because of which of the following depth cues?

Linear perspective

The perception that the line at the bottom of the image is smaller that the line at the top of the image is caused by which of the following monocular depth cues?

Linear perspective

According to the concept of perceptual sets, if you want to make sure a friend enjoys a new movie, which of the following strategies should you use

Make sure your friend is convinced that the movie will be very funny.

Most people perceive a face in the image here. Which of the following statements best explains why

Our schema for human faces is very strong, leading us to often organize visual images into faces.

You look at a painting and see a peaceful farm scene, but your friend looks at the same painting and says, "It looks like something really bad is about to happen to those people." Which of the following concepts might best explain your different perceptions?

Perceptual set

The Gestalt principle that explains the tendency to perceive objects that are close together as belonging to a group is called:

Proximity

If an object of known size appears small, your brain assumes it to be far away from you. This rule describes the monocular depth cue

Relative size

The function of most of the structures of the eye is to get light into the eye and project it onto the

Retina

The retina contains most of which of the following kinds of receptor cells?

Rods

The two kinds of receptor cells in the retina are:

Rods and cones

Although textbooks frequently cast a trapezoidal image on the retina, students typically perceive the books as rectangular objects. This illustrates the importance of:

Shape constancy

In drawing class, you learn that the top of a coffee mug is an ellipse, not a circle. You may not have noticed this fact before due to the effect of which of the following?

Shape constancy

We perceive the door as a rectangle in each of the accompanying images because of which perceptual principle?

Shape constancy

Which of the following concepts creates the perception that an object's shape does not change even though our angle of view of the object changes?

Shape constancy

The most basic Gestalt grouping principle that involves seeing items that resemble each other as part of the same group is

Similarity

If two objects make the same size image on the retina, we will perceive the object that appears to be closer as ________ the object that appears to be more distant.

Smaller than

A person who is extremely sensitive to bitter tastes and avoids any food with a bitter taste may be likely to be a:

Supertaster

Which of the following senses is best described as a chemical sense?

Taste

The accompanying visual illusion is called

The Ames room

A prism can disperse white light into distinct colors by frequency. The color with the longest wavelength is red, while the color with the shortest wavelength is:

Violet

Which of the following statements is the best summary of perceptual constancy?

We perceive an object as unchanging even as the image of the object on the retina changes

Which of the following statements is the best summary of the concept of size constancy?

We perceive an object's size as unchanging even though the image on the retina grows smaller as the object moves farther away.

Which of the following is the best summary of the relationship between sensations and perceptual sets

We use perceptual sets to organize sensations into perceptions.

A friend calls you and says, "I found this Web site that plays songs backward and I heard these totally weird messages." Which of the following is an accurate explanation for these "messages" your friend heard?

Your friend most likely listened to the backward songs using a specific perceptual set, causing your friend to hear a message.

Compared with cones, rods have a lower

absolute threshold for light

The organization of the visual field into figures and background is called:

figure-ground relationships.

Whether you perceive a saxophone player or the woman's face in the accompanying image depends on

figure-ground relationships.

Whether you perceive the men or the arrows in the accompanying image depends on:

figure-ground relationships.

Which theory states that pain messages can be blocked by some touch sensations carried by nonpain nerve fibers?

gate-control theory

Signal detection theorists study:

how stimulus, environmental, and organismic variables cause our perception or misperception of stimuli.

The trichromatic theory describes

how we perceive millions of color combinations.

Gibson and Walk's visual cliff experiments demonstrated that very young infants won't move over the visual cliff. These findings indicate that

humans may be born with accurate depth perception.

A person who is color deficient usually:

is missing either red or green cones.

Depth cues that can be used by artists in two-dimensional pictures are called:

monocular cues.

During an essay exam at school, you write so much that your hand begins to hurt. After the test is over you rub your hand and the pain lessens. Gate-control theory would explain that the pain lessened because

other touch sensations (like rubbing) close the gate on the pain sensations.

The basic skin senses are:

pain, warmth, cold, and pressure.

According to gate-control theory, which of the following actions might stop pain sensations temporarily?

rubbing the area of skin that hurts

Which of the following statements is the best example of lightness constancy?

seeing a white t-shirt as still white even in a room with very dim lighting

Which of the following situations could the opponent-process theory explain better than the trichromatic theory

seeing an afterimage after seeing a flash from a camera

Which of the following statements is the best example of size constancy?

seeing an elephant run away from you, but still seeing the elephant as large even though it is far away

A person has a very high fever, and after recovering notices a severe lack of balance. Which part of the vestibular sense was most likely damaged by the fever?

semicircular canals in the inner ear

The vibrations of the eardrum are transmitted to the oval window by:

three tiny bones located in the middle ear.

Which theory of color vision explains color blindness as a lack of red, green, or blue cones?

trichromatic theory

The theory that explains color vision as a combination of red, green, and blue cones in the retina is called the

trichromatic theory.

Sound is produced by

vibrations traveling through the air, sensed by structures in the ear.

Which of the following situations is a perceptual set most likely to influence?

watching a dramatic movie