AP Psych: Chapter 6 - Perception- Selective Attention/Perceptual Illusions/Perceptual Organization

change blindness

failing to notice changes in the environment

choice blindness

failing to notice choices and preferences

inattentional blindness

failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere

relative luminance

amount of light an object reflects relative to its surroundings

Phi Phenomenon

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

convergence

Eight binocular queue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object; the greater the inward strain, the closer the object

retinal disparity

a binocular cue for perceiving depth

visual cliff

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

cocktail party effect

ability to attend to only one voice among many

gestalt

an organized whole; these psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes

monocular cues

depth cues, such as interposition and linear perspective, available to either eye alone (relative size, interposition, relative clarity, texture gradient, relative height, relative motion, linear perspective, light and shadow)

binocular cues

depth cues, such as retinal disparity and convergence, that depend on the use of two eyes

perceptual constancy

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

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

selective attention

the focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus, as in the cocktail party effect

Moon illusion

the interplay between perceived size and perceived distance helps explain this illusion.

figure-ground

the organization of the visual field into objects that stand out from their surroundings

grouping

the perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups (proximity, similarity, continuity, connectedness, closure)

perception

the selection, organization, and interpretation of sensory input

visual capture

the tendency for vision to dominate the other senses

lightness constancy

we perceive an object as having a constant lightness even while its illumination varies

size constancy

we perceive objects as having a constant size, even while our distance from them varies