Intro to Psychology Chapter 5

An airplane is descending into its destination airport. Currently it is about 500 feet above ground. The amplitude of its noise is about ____________ decibels.

110

When two friends talk over lunch, the amplitude of their conversation is about ____________ decibels.

60

A neutral facial expression may be perceived as sadder at a funeral than at a circus. This best illustrates:

a context effect

Mrs. Costello lives in Florida. She is gripped by a vision of her sister gravely injured in a car wreck happening that very moment in Pennsylvania. Mrs. Costello is inconsolable. Her husband calmly disproves her vision by calling his sister-in-law; her cheery voice greets him on the phone. Clearly, Mrs. Costello does not have the ability of ______________ that she believes she possesses.

clairvoyance

You are a building contractor surveying the progress on a home that is being built. From one angle, it appears that the home is completely framed. However, when you move to the right, you see the gaps. This illustrates the principle of:

closure

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

conduction hearing loss

Julio is working on a series of landscape paintings. He wants to create a realistic depiction of the English countryside. To turn the flat surface of the canvas into a three-dimensional painting, he would use the technique of:

linear perspective

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

linear perspective

In vision, the amplitude of a light wave relates to our perception of the brightness of a stimulus. To which perceptual dimension might the amplitude of a sound wave correspond in hearing?

loudness

a coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear; sound waves traveling through the cochlear fluid trigger nerve impulses

cochlea

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

cochlear implant

Even when seen through sunglasses, grass appears equally as green as it does without glasses. This best illustrates:

color constancy

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

cones

James is threading a needle under a bright lightbulb. During this task, James' vision is driven mainly by the __________ in his _________.

cones; fovea

According to the Gestalt psychologists, we perceive smooth, continuous patterns rather than discontinuous ones. This is called the principle of:

continuity

Denise wears an extremely bright yellow safety sweatshirt when she cycles to the gym after dark. The sweatshirt's brightness reflects the ____________ of the light it reflects.

high amplitude

a laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals

visual cliff

the distance from the peak of one light wave or sound wave to the peak of the next

wavelength

information processing guided by higher-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expecations

top-down processing

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

vestibular sense

Jay is 48 years old. He recently had his sight restored after 45 years of blindness. He could associate people with their distinct features (e.g., hair color), but could not recognize their faces. He was also not good at judging the size of objects as their distance from him changed. His case suggests that:

vision is partly an acquired sense

_____________ is a German word meaning "form" or "whole."

Gestalt

Mia is attracted to a man she is chatting with in a nightclub. What is probably happening to her eyes?

Her pupils are dilating

the minimum stimulus needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time

absolute threshold

The minute Mark walks into his mother-in-law's house to visit, he is struck by the strong smell of his mother-in-law's perfume. However, after about 10 minutes, Mark no longer notices the smell. This is probably the result of sensory _____________.

adaptation

the sense or act of hearing

audition

After a rap concert, as Dominique walks out into the fresh air, she notices her ears are ringing. This ringing indicates possible damage to the hair cells of her ______________ membrane.

basilar

After an evening at the opera, as Enrique walks into the fresh air, he notices his ears are ringing. This ringing indicates possible damage to the hair cells of his:

basilar membrane

a depth cue, such as retinal disparity, that depends on the use of two eyes

binocular cue

Your 7-month-old niece is just learning to crawl. Your sister has agreed to have her participate in an experiment that incorporates a visual cliff. What is most likely being studied in this experiment?

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

depth perception

A snack manufacturer finds that it must increase the salt content of its chips by 8 percent in order for a sample of consumers to notice that the chips are saltier than they were before. This example most nearly illustrates the concept of a(n):

difference threshold

You are looking for a new roommate. You invite a person who you hope will agree to be your new roommate to meet you in your apartment. Your mother, who is a real estate agent, tells you to bake cookies and make hot tea just before your prospective roommate arrives. She explains that the hot drink and smell of cookies will affect this person's judgement of you. This is an example of a(n) _____________ cognition.

embodied

As Ted walks through a park, he hears the sound of a dog barking and is able to recognize the direction of the sound and if the dog is nearby. Ted is able to do this because:

he has two ears and the sound will travel first to the ear nearest to the sound

You wake up early in the morning and your room is fairly dark. You look over and see your shirt hanging on a hook. You know it's your red shirt because you hung it up there before you went to bed, but in the dark you can't see its color. It looks dark gray to you. Why is that?

in the dim light, the cones in your eyes are ineffectual

The cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs make up the ___________ ear.

inner

depth cues available to each eye separately

monocular cues

processing many aspects of a stimulus or problem at once (form, depth, color)

parallel processing

the process by which our brain organizes and interprets sensory information, transforming it into meaningful objects and events

perception

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

perceptual adaption

perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent color, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change

perceptual constancy

mental tendencies and assumptions that set us up to perceive one thing and not another

perceptual set

Enrico is having trouble telling the difference between the sound of a tuba and the sound of a piccolo. Even though a piccolo produces much shorter, faster sound waves than does a tuba, he has trouble picking out the differences in the ______________ of these sounds.

pitch

Within the eye itself, the _____ is the final destination for light waves.

retina

After many years of playing extremely loud rock music, Kyle has suffered significant hearing loss, which cannot be corrected with a hearing aid. Kyle is suffering from _____________ hearing loss.

sensorineural

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

sensorineural hearing loss

reduced sensitivity in response to constant stimulation

sensory adaption

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

sensory interaction

sensory nerve endings that respond to stimuli

sensory receptors

The phrase "THE CAT" appears in block letters as part of an advertising slogan on a billboard. The A and H are nearly identical in the stylized font that is used. However, the context of the words in which the letters appear encourages readers to perceive the arrangement of three line segments as completely different letters in each case. This example reflects _____________ processing.

top-down

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

changing 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

transduction

Your 8-year-old cat ran away, got into a neighbor's cellar, and was stuck there for two months. Luckily, there was enough food and water in the basement for Minnie to survive. However, it was pitch black. When your neighbor returned from her 2-month vacation, she found Minnie and returned her to you. How will this sensory deprivation affect Minnie's vision?

Her vision will be unaffected by this sensory deprivation

the principle that, to be perceived as different, two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum percentage (rather than a constant amount)

Weber's Law

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

Young-Helmholtz trichromatic (three-color) theory

After a rap concert, as Jamie walks into the fresh air, she notices her ears are ringing. This ringing indicates possible damage to:

hair cells of the basilar membrane

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

blind spot

Sensory analysis starts at the receptors and works to integrate the sensory information in the brain. This process is called _____________ processing.

bottom-up

analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information

bottom-up processing

Perceiving remote events is to perceiving future events as ___________ is to __________.

clairvoyance; precognition

the minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50 percent of the time. we experience the difference threshold as a 'just noticeable difference'

different threshold

One may see one's relationship with one's partner or roommate as less stable when wobbly chairs and a rickety table predominate than when the furniture feels more solid. This example illustrates the concept of:

embodied cognition

the idea that the mind is not only connected to the body but that the body influences the mind

embodied cognition

the influence of bodily sensations, gestures, and other states on cognitive preferences and judgements

embodied cognition

Several days ago Mitchell fell and hurt his ankle. Although it bothered him a little, he continued to walk on it. When he finally went to the doctor for X-rays, he found out he had a broken bone. It is likely that Mitchell carries a gene that boosts the availability of ___________.

endorphins

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

extrasensory perception (ESP)

nerve cells in the brain's visual cortex that respond to specific features of a stimulus, such as shape, angles, or movement

feature detectors

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

figure-ground

Pat turns to look directly at a brightly colored bird her friend has spotted in the garden. Pat is ensuring that the bird's image falls directly on her:

fovea

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

frequency

an organized whole. ____________ psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes

gestalt

the perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into meaningful groups

grouping

You are waiting for your friend to give you a ride on his new motorcycle. As your friend pulls up the driveway, the brakes squeal loudly. You get on, and then your friend steps on the engine. As the motorcycle accelerates, the engine roars loudly. The high-pitched squeal of the brakes was caused by ______________ sound waves, and the equally loud but low-pitched roar of the engine was caused by ___________ sound waves.

high-frequency; low-frequency

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

hue

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

hypnosis

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

inner ear

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

intensity

Marty and Becky are in the mood to have a hamburger for lunch. Marty wants to grill the hamburger outside instead of cooking it on top of the stove because he says he likes the taste of a grilled hamburger more than one cooked on the stove. The difference in taste Marty prefers is actually caused by the smell of the charcoal embedded into the hamburger. This is an example of sensory _____________.

interaction

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:

iris

our movement sense- our system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts; ex: twist your wrist one degree, and your brain receives an immediate update

kinesthesia

Randy is playing the piano. His left hand plays notes that are _____________ in _____________ than does his right hand.

lower; frequency

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

middle ear

You read about an accident at a railroad crossing and wonder about the cause. Perhaps the car's driver overestimated the distance of the train because the parallel tracks stimulated the ____________ depth cue of linear perspective.

monocular

An injury could stimulate ____________, specialized receptors that can detect hurtful temperatures, pressure, or chemicals.

nociceptors

Phantom limb sensations and other experiences of amputees show that the brain can produce pain in the absence of:

normal sensory input

the theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, blue-yellow, white-black) enable color vision. For example, some cells are turned "on" by green and turned "off" by red; others are turned on by red and off by green

opponent-process theory

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

optic nerve

Maria has a persistent itch on her arm. This is MOST likely caused by the stimulation of _____________ receptors.

pain

After hearing that Bryce had served a prison sentence, Janet began to perceive his friendly behavior as insincere and manipulative. This best illustrates the impact of:

perceptual sets

Professor Brandt shows his study participants a picture of an adult-child pair. He tells half of the participants that they are looking at a parent and her child. He tells the other half that they are looking at a day-care worker and a child in the day-care center. The group that thinks the pair is related rates them as looking more alike than the group that thinks they are not related. Professor Brandt is MOST likely conducting a study on:

perceptual sets

a tone's experienced highness or lowness; depends on frequency

pitch

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

posthypnotic suggestion

In a song inspired by the television show The Twilight Zone, an American vocal group sang the lines "Unpretentious/girl from Memphis/saw the future/through a "third eye." These lines underscore a specific ESP ability called:

precognition

Jen believes that if she really concentrates, she can see the number drawn in the coming week's lottery. Jen believes she is capable of:

precognition

the activation, often unconsciously, of associations in our mind, thus setting us up to perceive, remember, or respond to objects or events in certain ways

priming

Affecting physical events or objects with one's mind is called ___________.

psychokinesis

Damon, who is among the 8% of males with colorblindness, suffers from the most common form of color blindness. Which statement BEST illustrates Damon's experience of color?

red apples on a tree seem to be the same color as the surrounding green leaves

A team of scientists failed to find the same results when they attempted to repeat Bem's experiments on the ability to predict the future. In other words, Bem's work failed to find support by means of:

replication

the fovea is found within the:

retina

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

retina

a binocular cue for perceiving depth. by comparing images from the two eyes, the brain computes distance- the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object; because your eyes are about 2 inches apart, your retinas receive slightly different images of the world. by comparing these two images, your brain can judge how close an object is to you

retinal disparity

retinal receptors that detect black, white, and gray; necessary for peripheral and twilight vision, when cones don't respond

rods

You are playing "Ring Around the Rosie" with your little cousins and are spinning around and around. When you stop, you still feel as though you are spinning because your _____________ canals and kinesthetic receptors haven't returned to their neutral state.

semicircular

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

sensation

There is no scientific support for extrasensory perception. The distinction between sensation and perception means that:

sensation is necessary for perception

Why do our sensory systems adapt after prolonged exposure to a constant stimulus?

so that we detect potentially important changes in what's going on

below a person's absolute threshold for conscious awareness

subliminal

a neurological condition in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway (for example, hearing) leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway (such as vision). Simply put, when one sense is activated, another unrelated sense is activated at the same time.

synesthesia

"We can practically read each other's minds and feel each other's emotions!" Tim exclaims in describing his relationship with his long-time partner. Tim is attributing the ESP ability of __________ to the relationship.

telepathy

Mind-to-mind communication is to __________ as mind over matter is to ____________.

telepathy; psychokinesis

Which statement about skin is false? a) the skin has receptors that are sensitive to temperature b) the sensations detected by the skin can be a combination of four sensations c) the skin has only two basic and distinct skin sense: pain and temperature d) the skin has receptors that are sensitive to pressure

the skin has only two basic and distinct skin sense: pain and temperature