Psychology 1000 Chapter 4

After a stroke, Kevin has difficulty perceiving motion. The stroke most likely damaged brain area _____, part of the _____ stream of visual processing.

MT; dorsal

Timbre corresponds to differences in the _____ of sound waves.

complexity

Humans lack visual clarity in peripheral vision. This is because of the small number of _____ located there.

cones

The door swings open and then closes again as Delroy's roommate enters the apartment. Delroy continues to see the door as rectangular even though the shape of its image on his retina progresses from a wide rectangle, through a series of parallelograms, to a very narrow rectangle, and then back again. Delroy's perception of the door as an unchanging rectangle exemplifies perceptual _____.

constancy

Three groups of volunteers take part in an experiment. In one group, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is applied to the occipital lobe. In a second group, TMS is applied to the parietal lobe. Finally, in a third group, no TMS is applied. All participants report the items they see in each of a series of brief displays of colored letters flashed on a screen. The group experiencing no TMS is a(n) _____ group in this experiment.

control

In an experiment, colored letters flash briefly on a computer screen. On each trial, participants are asked to report the letters in their correct colors and to rate their confidence in their responses. In one condition, participants are required simultaneously to monitor the screen for the appearance of a particular digit. In this experiment, confidence rating is a(n) _____ variable.

dependent

A snack manufacturer finds that it must increase the salt content of its potato 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) _____ threshold.

difference

Carlos was just touched on his cheek, which is a(n) _____. In order for Carlos to know if he was kissed or slapped, Carlos needs a(n) _____. two distinct activities.

sensation; perception

Taylor avoids certain types of lettuce because she thinks they are too bitter. Taylor may be a(n) _____.

supertaster

The visual areas of the brain are mainly located in the occipital and _____ lobes.

temporal

Which constitutes perceptual constancy with respect to vision?

the human interpretation of the environment

Some neuroscientists have recommended that the _____ visual pathway be renamed the _____ pathway.

"where"; "how"

The human ear is most sensitive to sounds ranging in frequency from about _____ to about _____ Hz.

1,000; 3,500

Which alternative best expresses the visual acuity of an eagle, hawk, or another species of raptor?

20/2

Humans have about _____ types of olfactory receptor neurons for smell; this allows people to distinguish more than _____ separate smells.

350; 10,000

Throbbing, dull, lingering pain is transmitted by _____ fibers.

C

Binocular disparity as a cue to depth perception was first discovered by:

Charles Wheatstone.

The image of the television screen on the wall moves from place to place on Suleiman's retina as he turns his head from one friend to another during a conversation, yet he does not perceive the television as sliding back and forth across the wall. Later, Suleiman perceives Carol as walking toward the kitchen, even though he keeps her image stable on his fovea by moving his head as she walks. Based on these examples, which statement best describes the relationship between head movements and motion perception.

Head movements complicate motion perception.

Which statement best describes the path of optic nerve impulses in the brain?

Impulses from the left half of each eye travel to the right side of the brain; impulses from the right half of each eye travel to the left side of the brain.

Based on letter identification experiments, such as those performed by Anne Treisman and Hilary Schmidt, which alternative most accurately describes the relative effect of limiting participants' attention on a) the prevalence of illusory conjunctions, and b) participants' confidence in their responses?

Limiting attention should have more effect on the prevalence of illusory conjunctions than on confidence.

Which alternative best captures the relationship between pictorial and monocular depth cues?

Monocular cues are synonymous with pictorial depth cues.

_____is the process by which sensory input is selected, organized, and interpreted.

Perception

In an experiment, colored letters flash briefly on a computer screen. On each trial, participants are asked to report the letters in their correct colors. In one condition, participants are required simultaneously to monitor the screen for the appearance of a particular digit. What effect should the concurrent digit-monitoring task have on the accuracy of participants' letter responses on the one hand, and participants' confidence in their responses on the other?

The digit-monitoring task should decrease participants' accuracy, but have little effect on their confidence in their responses.

Tarik's bag of marbles is twice as heavy as Ted's. If it takes 5 extra marbles to make Ted's bag feel heavier, it will take 10 extra marbles to make Tarik's bag feel heavier. This best illustrates _____ law.

Weber

The function relating the value of a stimulus along some dimension to the just noticeable difference is known as _____ law.

Weber

In a vision science laboratory, a monkey is viewing simple visual stimuli on a screen while an electrode records activity from a cell in area V1 of the monkey's brain. On one trial, the cell begins responding actively. The monkey is probably viewing:

a line in a specific orientation.

The early use of cochlear implants has been associated with improved speech and language skills for deaf children. If this is true, researchers should find _____ correlation between the age of cochlear implantation and scores on measure of language skills among deaf children.

a negative

Research on many wine drinkers demonstrated that:

a wine's price has a top-down influence on its perceived taste.

A zero-decibel sound is one that a person can just barely hear. Zero decibels, therefore, corresponds to the _____ threshold of human hearing.

absolute

According to gate-control theory, a back massage would most likely reduce physical aches and pains by causing the:

activation of specific neural fibers in the spinal cord.

Micha lives next to a sewage treatment plant. Visitors notice the odor immediately whenever they visit, but Micha does not to notice the smell. Micha is demonstrating smell:

adaptation.

The brightness of a color and the loudness of a sound both reflect the _____ of a wave form.

amplitude

Sensation and perception: of a sensation in order to form a mental representation.

are two distinct activities.

Dr. Rodriguez is interested in how people combine elements of their visual perception, rather than seeing the elements as separate. She is researching the _____ problem.

binding

Benny's S-cones are not functional. Benny is likely to have trouble perceiving:

blue

Sherlock, the dog, takes his job of protecting his owners' home very seriously. He sits at the window all day and barks whenever he perceives a threat. The problem is he often barks at innocuous things such as the rustling of the wind or a car door shutting a block away. In terms of detecting threats, Sherlock makes many _____.

false alarms

Taste and smell combine to cause a person to experience _____.

flavor

Michelle turned her head to look directly at an unusual butterfly that her friend spotted in the garden. In doing so, Michelle ensures that the insect's image falls on her _____.

fovea

Hertz is to decibel, as _____ is to amplitude.

frequency

Part is to whole, as _____ is to _____.

geon; template

Olfaction is to _____, as smell is to taste.

gustation

Following sensory adaptation, the absolute threshold is _____ than it is before adaptation.

higher

An observer in a signal detection experiment responds "yes" when the stimulus is presented. This is termed a(n) _____.

hit

When a person views two objects that project the same retinal image size, the one that appears more distant will seem larger. This explains many _____.

illusions

According to the text, supertasters may be at a(n) _____ risk for such health problems as colon cancer. Supertasters may also be at a(n) _____ risk for obesity and heart disease.

increased; decreased

In an experiment, colored letters flash briefly on a computer screen. On each trial, participants are asked to report the letters in their correct colors and to rate their confidence in their responses. In one condition, participants are required simultaneously to monitor the screen for the appearance of a particular digit. Whether participants must watch for a digit is a(n) _____ variable in this experiment.

independent

In the Ames room, the parallel lines formed by the edges of interlocking black tiles seem to converge toward the back of the room. This illustrates the depth cue of _____.

linear perspective

The region of the brain involved in motion perception is the:

middle temporal area.

_____ depth cues rely on the relationship between distance and size.

monocular

In the Ames room, the parallel lines formed by the edges of interlocking black tiles seem to converge toward the back of the room. This illustrates the _____ depth cue of _____.

monocular; linear perspective

The early use of cochlear implants has been associated with improved speech and language skills for deaf children. If this is true, researchers should find a(n) _____ correlation coefficient between the age of cochlear implantation and scores on the measure of language skills among deaf children.

negative

The absolute threshold for touch is _____ correlated with the density of touch receptors in the part of the body being stimulated.

negatively

The absolute threshold for touch is _____ correlated with the density of touch receptors in the part of the body that is being stimulated.

negatively

On each trial in an experiment, participants search displays of orange Xs and Os for a target defined by a unique feature such as a blue X. The number of orange letters varies from trial to trial. Participants press a key as soon as they find the blue X, and the computer records participants' response times. What type of relationship should the researcher expect to find between the number of orange letters in the display and the time it takes participants to find the blue X?

no relationship

In the scheme of "big issues" in psychology, the monocular cue of familiar size best illustrates the importance of:

nurture

When Pablo entered a Mexican bakery, he noticed the smell of fresh sweet bread. This elicited memories of visits to his grandmother's house, which then produced sad feelings because he has missed her since she died last year. This sequence of the smell producing the memories, and then the emotional response, is explained by the _____ approach to odor identification.

object-centered

In an experiment, European-American and African-American college students plunge their forearms into freezing water. Participants are asked to keep their hand in the water as long as they can stand it. The length of time each participant keeps their hand in the water is taken as a measure of their pain tolerance. In this study, the length of time each participant keeps their hand in the water is a(n) _____ definition of the _____ variable of pain tolerance.

operational; dependent

Damage to portions of the _____ lobe results in a higher likelihood that individuals will display illusory conjunctions.

parietal

Touch information is relayed from the thalamus to somatosensory cortex in the _____ lobe.

parietal

Despite fluctuations in sensory signals, human perceptions remain fairly consistent. This reflects the principle of _____.

perceptual constancy

Loudness is to amplitude, as _____ is to frequency.

pitch

After part of his basilar membrane was damaged, Joshua experienced a noticeable loss of hearing for high-pitched sounds only. Joshua's hearing loss is best explained by the _____ code mechanism of the ear to encode sound-wave frequencies.

place

Accommodation refers to the:

process by which the lens changes shape in order to focus images on the retina.

Dr. Breiland examines the relationship between the physical properties of light, such as its amplitude and wavelength, and a person's perception of color. Which term most accurately describes Dr. Breiland's field of study?

psychophysics

Introspection is to subjective, as _____ is to objective.

psychophysics

A(n) _____ tone corresponds to a simple sound wave.

pure

Margaret is experiencing pains in her abdomen and goes to the doctor, who tells her that she has suffered a mild heart attack. Margaret's experience of pain in her abdomen and not in her chest is an example of:

referred pain

Pablo is standing on the beach and the sea is choppy. He observes that the crests of distant waves appear not only smaller, but also higher in his field of vision than do the crests of waves nearer the beach. This example illustrates the monocular depth cues of:

relative size and relative height.

Adelaide notices a flicker of motion out of the corner of her eye as she hurries down a dim alley late at night. Adelaide's vision is driven mainly by her photoreceptors known as _____.

rods

The human sense of taste involves five main types of taste sensations:

salt, sour, bitter, sweet, and umami.

Brain damage is LEAST likely to affect:

sensation

Stimulation, registration, and detection are associated with the information processing activity of _____.

sensation

Anna is reading her psychology text. The activation of receptors in her retina is called _____; her interpretation of the stimuli as particular words is termed _____.

sensation; perception

A consumer psychologist shows participants a variety of objects they might find at a department store. Participants either look at or touch the objects for varying lengths of time. The psychologist then asks the participants how much they would be willing to pay for the items. According to the text:

the longer participants touch the items, the more they would be willing to pay for them. However, the length of time participants look at the items should have no effect on how much they would be willing to pay.

The sensory receptors that signal information about changes in skin temperature are called:

thermoreceptors.

Each cone contains one of _____ types of photopigment.

three

Which perceptual quality is correctly matched with the sound wave characteristic that it reflects?

timbre--the mix of wave forms in the sound wave

People tend to rate wine as tasting more pleasant when they think it costs more. Because this finding reflects the effects of experience or expectations, it represents a(n) _____ influence on perception.

top down

For the sense of taste, chemical signals are converted into neural messages at the papillae. This is an example of the general process of _____.

transduction

In the visual system, ganglion cells convert the light detected by the retina into electrical impulses, which then travel to the brain. This example illustrates the process of:

transduction?

Brightness is to amplitude as hue is to _____.

wavelength

Which set contains a discrepant element?

{decibel, wavelength, pitch}

Dr. Ambroise is interested in how people combine elements of their visual perception, rather than seeing the elements as separate. She is researching the:

binding problem

Making an analogy between hearing and vision, the auditory hair cells in the _____ are similar to the _____ in the retina.

cochlea; rods and cones

A researcher uses fMRI to trace activity in two distinct regions of participants' temporal lobes as they view a series of faces displayed on a computer screen. For each face, the researcher computes a difference score by subtracting the overall level of activity in the second temporal lobe area from the overall level of activity in the first temporal lobe area. According to the text, the greater the average difference score:

the greater the support for the modular view.