Sensation and perception lecture notes ss
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The document provides an overview of sensation and perception. It discusses the distinction between sensation, which is the activation of receptors, and perception, which is how sensations are interpreted. It describes various sensory thresholds and adaptation. The main senses are outlined, including vision, hearing, taste, and smell. Vision involves light stimulation of the eye and color perception. Hearing involves the detection of sound waves. Taste and smell involve the detection of chemicals.
Sensation and perception lecture notes ss
- 3. Learning Objectives • • • • • • • LO 7.1 What are the distinctions between sensation and perception? LO 7.2 What is a sensory threshold? What is sensory adaptation? LO 7.3 What forms of energy can humans sense? LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? LO 7.6 How do the senses of taste and smell work, and how are they alike? LO 7.7 What other sensory systems does the human body use?
- 4. Sensation and Perception LO 7.1 What are the distinctions between sensation and perception? • Sensation - the activation of receptors in the various sense organs. • Perception - the method by which the sensations experienced at any given moment are interpreted and organized in some meaningful fashion.
- 5. Sensory Thresholds LO 7.2 What is a sensory threshold? What is sensory adaptation? • Sense organs: – eyes – ears – nose – skin – taste buds
- 6. Sensory Thresholds LO 7.2 What is a sensory threshold? What is sensory adaptation? • Just noticeable difference (jnd or the difference threshold) - the smallest difference between two stimuli that is detectable 50 percent of the time by 50 percent of the people tested.
- 7. Sensory Thresholds LO 7.2 What is a sensory threshold? What is sensory adaptation? • Absolute threshold - the lowest level of stimulation that a person can consciously perceive 50 percent of the time the stimulation is presented by 50 percent of the people tested.
- 8. Table 7.1 Examples of Absolute Thresholds
- 9. Habituation and Sensory Adaptation LO 7.2 What is a sensory threshold? What is sensory adaptation? • Habituation - tendency of the brain to stop attending to constant, unchanging information. • Sensory adaptation - tendency of sensory receptor cells to become less responsive to a stimulus that is unchanging.
- 10. Sensory Receptors LO 7.3 What forms of energy can humans sense? • Sensory receptors - specialized forms of neurons. – stimulated by: visible light waves, sound waves, thermal energy (heat), pressure, and chemical substances.
- 11. Figure 7.1 Some Forms of Energy We Can Sense
- 12. Psychological Aspects to Light LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Brightness - determined by the amplitude of the wave—how high or how low the wave actually is. The higher the wave, the brighter the light appears to be. Low waves are dimmer.
- 13. Psychological Aspects to Light LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Color - or hue, is determined by the length of the wave. – Long wavelengths are found at the red end of the visible spectrum (the portion of the whole spectrum of light that is visible to the human eye), whereas shorter wavelengths are found at the blue end. • Saturation - refers to the purity of the color people see; mixing in black or gray would also lessen the saturation.
- 14. Figure 7.2 The Visible Spectrum The wavelengths that people can see are only a small part of the whole electromagnetic spectrum.
- 15. Structure of the Eye LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Cornea – clear membrane that covers the surface of and protects the eye. • Aqueous humor – clear, watery fluid that supplies nourishment to the eye. • Iris - round muscle (the colored part of the eye) in which the pupil is located; can change the size of the pupil, letting more or less light into the eye; helps focus the image.
- 16. Structure of the Eye LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Lens – another clear structure behind the iris, suspended by muscles; finishes the focusing process begun by the cornea. • Visual accommodation - the change in the thickness of the lens as the eye focuses on objects that are far away or close.
- 17. Structure of the Eye LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Vitreous humor - jelly-like fluid that also nourishes the eye and gives it shape.
- 18. Figure 7.3 Structure of the Eye Light enters the eye through the cornea and pupil. The iris controls the size of the pupil. From the pupil, light passes through the lens to the retina, where it is transformed into nerve impulses. The nerve impulses travel to the brain along the optic nerve.
- 19. Structure of the Eye LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Retina – final stop for light in the eye. Contains 3 layers: – Ganglion cells – Bipolar cells
- 20. Structure of the Eye LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Retina (continued) – Photoreceptors that respond to various light waves Rods - visual sensory receptors found at the back of the retina, responsible for noncolor sensitivity to low levels of light. Cones - visual sensory receptors found at the back of the retina, responsible for color vision and sharpness of vision.
- 21. Retina, Rods, and Cones LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Transduction – the transformation of energy from one form to another. • Blind spot - area in the retina where the axons of the three layers of retinal cells exit the eye to form the optic nerve, insensitive to light.
- 22. Figure 7.4 The Parts of the Retina (a) Light passes through ganglion and bipolar cells until it reaches and stimulates the rods and cones. Nerve impulses from the rods and cones travel along a nerve pathway to the brain. (b) On the right of the figure is a photomicrograph of the long, thin rods and the shorter, thicker cones; the rods outnumber the cones by a ratio of about 20 to 1.
- 23. Figure 7.4 (continued) The Parts of the Retina (c) The blind spot demonstration. Hold the book in front of you. Close your right eye and stare at the picture of the dog with your left eye. Slowly bring the book closer to your face. The picture of the cat will disappear at some point because the light from the picture of the cat is falling on your blind spot.
- 24. Figure 7.5 Crossing of the Optic Nerve Light rays enter the eyes to fall on the retina. Light falling on the left side of each eye's retina (from the right visual field, shown in yellow) will stimulate a neural message that will travel along the optic nerve to the left visual cortex in the occipital lobe of the left hemisphere. Notice that the message from the left eye goes directly to the left occipital lobe, while the message from the right eye crosses over to the left hemisphere (the optic chiasm is the point of crossover). The optic nerve tissue from both eyes joins together to form the left optic tract before going on to the left occipital lobe. For the left visual field (shown in blue), the messages from both right sides of the retinas will travel along the right optic track to the right visual cortex in the same manner.
- 25. How the Eyes Work LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Dark adaptation - the recovery of the eye's sensitivity to visual stimuli in darkness after exposure to bright lights. – Night blindness - a person has difficulty seeing well enough to drive at night or get around in a darkened room or house.
- 26. How the Eyes Work LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Light adaptation - the recovery of the eye's sensitivity to visual stimuli in light after exposure to darkness. – Fovia - central area of the retina; contains a concentration of cones and is responsible for visual acuity.
- 27. Color Vision LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Trichromatic theory - theory of color vision that proposes three types of cones: red, blue, and green. • Afterimages - images that occur when a visual sensation persists for a brief time even after the original stimulus is removed.
- 28. Color Vision LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Opponent-process theory - theory of color vision that proposes four primary colors with cones arranged in pairs: red and green, blue and yellow. – Lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) of thalamus
- 29. Figure 7.6 Color Afterimage Stare at the white dot in the center of this oddly colored flag for about 30 seconds. Now look at a white piece of paper or a white wall. Notice that the colors are now the normal, expected colors of the American flag. They are also the primary colors that are opposites of the colors in the picture and provide evidence for the opponent-process theory of color vision.
- 30. Color Blindness LO 7.4 How does the sense of vision work? • Caused by problems with the cones in the eye's retina. • People who are color-blind cannot differentiate between certain colors. – Red-green colorblindess - either the red or the green cones are not working. • Sex-linked inheritance.
- 31. Sound LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Wavelength – interpreted as frequency or pitch (high, medium, or low). • Amplitude – interpreted as volume (how soft or loud a sound is). • Purity – interpreted as timbre (a richness in the tone of the sound). • hertz (Hz) - cycles or waves per second, a measurement of frequency.
- 32. Figure 7.7 Sound Waves and Decibels (a) A typical sound wave. The higher the wave, the louder the sound; the lower the wave, the softer the sound. If the waves are close together in time (high frequency), the pitch will be perceived as high. Waves that are farther apart (low frequency) will be perceived as having a lower pitch.
- 33. Figure 7.7 (continued) Sound Waves and Decibels (b) Decibels of various stimuli. A decibel is a unit of measure for loudness. Psychologists study the effects that noise has on stress, learning, performance, aggression, and psychological and physical well-being. Research on the hazards of loud noises led the National Basketball Association to put an 85-decibel limit on the sound system played at basketball arenas (Heisler, 1995).
- 34. Structure of the Ear LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Pinna - the visible part of the ear. • Auditory canal - short tunnel that runs from the pinna to the eardrum (tympanic membrane). – When sound waves hit the eardrum, it vibrates and causes three tiny bones in the middle ear to vibrate. Hammer Anvil Stirrup
- 35. Structure of the Ear LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Cochlea - snail-shaped structure of the inner ear that is filled with fluid. • Organ of Corti – rests in the basilar membrane; contains receptor cells for sense of hearing. • Auditory nerve - bundle of axons from the hair cells in the inner ear; receives neural message from the organ of Corti.
- 36. Figure 7.8 The Structure of the Ear (a) This figure shows the entire ear, beginning with the outer ear. The vestibular organ includes the semicircular canals and the otolith organs (inside the round structures just above the cochlea). (b) The middle ear. Sound waves entering through the ear canal cause the eardrum to vibrate, which causes each of the three bones of the middle ear to vibrate, amplifying the sound. The stirrup rests on the oval window, which transmits its vibration to the fluid in the inner ear.
- 37. Figure 7.8 (continued) The Structure of the Ear (c) The inner ear. Large spaces are filled with fluid that vibrates as the oval window vibrates. The basilar membrane contains the organ of Corti, which sends signals to the auditory cortex of the brain by way of the auditory nerve. (d) A close-up view of the basilar membrane with the hair cells of the organ of Corti. Notice the axons leaving the hair cells to form the auditory nerve.
- 38. Theories of Pitch LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Pitch - psychological experience of sound that corresponds to the frequency of the sound waves; higher frequencies are perceived as higher pitches. • Place theory - theory of pitch that states that different pitches are experienced by the stimulation of hair cells in different locations on the organ of Corti.
- 39. Theories of Pitch LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Frequency theory - theory of pitch that states that pitch is related to the speed of vibrations in the basilar membrane. • Volley principle - theory of pitch that states that frequencies from about 400 Hz to 4000 Hz cause the hair cells (auditory neurons) to fire in a volley pattern, or take turns in firing.
- 40. Types of Hearing Impairments LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Conductive impairment - sound vibrations cannot be passed from the eardrum to the cochlea. The cause might be a damaged eardrum or damage to the bones of the middle ear (usually from an infection).
- 41. Types of Hearing Impairments LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Sensorineural impairment - the problem lies either in the inner ear or in the auditory pathways and cortical areas of the brain. Normal aging causes loss of hair cells in the cochlea, and exposure to loud noises can damage hair cells.
- 42. Types of Hearing Impairments LO 7.5 How does the sense of hearing work? • Tinnitus - fancy word for a continuous ringing in one's ears that remains after a sound has ceased, and it can also be caused by infections or loud noises.
- 43. Taste LO 7.6 How do the senses of taste and smell work, and how are they alike? • Gustation - the sensation of a taste. • Taste buds - taste receptor cells in mouth; responsible for sense of taste.
- 44. Taste LO 7.6 How do the senses of taste and smell work, and how are they alike? • Five Basic Tastes: – Sweet – Sour – Salty – Bitter – “Brothy” (unami)
- 45. Figure 7.9 The Tongue and Taste Buds—A Crosscut View of the Tongue (a) The right side of this drawing shows the nerves in the tongue's deep tissue.
- 46. Figure 7.9 (continued) The Tongue and Taste Buds—A Crosscut View of the Tongue (b) The taste bud is located inside the papillae and is composed of small cells that send signals to the brain when stimulated by molecules of food.
- 47. Figure 7.9 (continued) The Tongue and Taste Buds—A Crosscut View of the Tongue (c) Microphotograph of the surface of the tongue, showing two different sizes of papillae. The taste buds are located under the surface of the larger red papillae, whereas the smaller and more numerous papillae form a touch-sensitive rough surface that helps in chewing and moving food around the mouth.
- 48. Smell LO 7.6 How do the senses of taste and smell work, and how are they alike? • Olfaction (olfactory sense) – Sense of smell. • Olfactory bulbs – Areas of the brain located just above the sinus cavity and just below the frontal lobes that receive information from the olfactory receptor cells.
- 49. Smell LO 7.6 How do the senses of taste and smell work, and how are they alike? • At least 1,000 olfactory receptors. – Each have about a half dozen to a dozen little “hairs” (ciliar) that project into the cavity and send signals to the brain.
- 50. Figure 7.10 The Olfactory Receptors (a) A cross section of the nose and mouth. This drawing shows the nerve fibers inside the nasal cavity that carry information about smell directly to the olfactory bulb just under the frontal lobe of the brain (shown in green).
- 51. Figure 7.10 (continued) The Olfactory Receptors (b) A diagram of the cells in the nose that process smell. The olfactory bulb is on top. Notice the cilia, tiny hairlike cells that project into the nasal cavity. These are the receptors for the sense of smell.
- 52. Somesthetic Senses LO 7.7 What other sensory systems does the human body use? • Somesthetic senses - the body senses consisting of the skin senses, the kinesthetic sense, and the vestibular senses. – “Soma” – body – “Esthetic” – feeling
- 53. Somesthetic Senses LO 7.7 What other sensory systems does the human body use? • Skin senses - the sensations of touch, pressure, temperature, and pain. – Visceral pain - receptors detect pain (and pressure) in the organs. – Somatic pain - pain sensations in the skin, muscles, tendons, and joints are carried on large nerve fibers. – Gate-control theory - pain signals must pass through a “gate” located in the spinal cord.
- 54. Somesthetic Senses LO 7.7 What other sensory systems does the human body use? • Kinesthetic sense - sense of the location of body parts in relation to the ground and each other. – Proprioceptive receptors (proprioceptors) • Vestibular senses - the sensations of movement, balance, and body position.
- 56. Learning Objectives • • LO 8.1 LO 8.2 • • • • LO LO LO LO 8.3 8.4 8.5 8.6 What is the nature of attention? What are perceptual constancies, and why are they important? What are the Gestalt principles of perception? What are monocular and binocular depth cues? How do visual illusions work? How do our experiences and expectations influence perception?
- 57. Nature of Attention LO 8.1 What is the nature of attention? • We are able to use our powers of attention to focus on certain stimuli in our environment and ignore the rest. • Can focus attention on an object or sensation willingly or unwillingly. • Paying attention is the first step in the process of perception.
- 58. Perceptual Constancies LO 8.2 What are perceptual constancies, and why are they important? • Size constancy - the tendency to interpret an object as always being the same actual size, regardless of its distance. • Shape constancy - the tendency to interpret the shape of an object as being constant, even when its shape changes on the retina.
- 59. Perceptual Constancies LO 8.2 What are perceptual constancies, and why are they important? • Brightness constancy - the tendency to perceive the apparent brightness of an object as the same even when the light conditions change.
- 60. Figure 8.1 Shape Constancy Three examples of shape constancy are shown here. The opening door is actually many different shapes, yet we still see it as basically a rectangular door. We do the same thing with a triangle and a circle—although when we look at them from different angles they cast differently shaped images on our retina, we experience them as a triangle and a circle because of shape constancy.
- 61. Gestalt Principles LO 8.3 What are the Gestalt principles of perception? • Gestalt psychology - early perspective in psychology focusing on perception and sensation, particularly the perception of patterns and whole figures.
- 62. Gestalt Principles LO 8.3 What are the Gestalt principles of perception? • Figure–ground – The tendency to perceive objects, or figures, as existing on a background. • Reversible figures – Visual illusions in which the figure and ground can be reversed.
- 63. Figure 8.2 Figure–Ground Illusion What do you see when you look at this picture? Is it a goblet? Or two faces looking at each other? This is an example in which the figure and the ground seem to “switch” each time you look at the picture.
- 64. Gestalt Principles LO 8.3 What are the Gestalt principles of perception? • Proximity – The tendency to perceive objects that are close to each other as part of the same grouping. • Similarity – The tendency to perceive things that look similar to each other as being part of the same group.
- 65. Gestalt Principles LO 8.3 What are the Gestalt principles of perception? • Closure – The tendency to complete figures that are incomplete. • Continuity – The tendency to perceive things as simply as possible with a continuous pattern rather than with a complex, broken-up pattern.
- 66. Gestalt Principles LO 8.3 What are the Gestalt principles of perception? • Contiguity – The tendency to perceive two things that happen close together in time as being related.
- 67. Figure 8.3 Gestalt Principles of Grouping The Gestalt principles of grouping are shown here. These are the human tendency to organize isolated stimuli into groups on the basis of five characteristics: proximity, similarity, closure, continuity, and common region.
- 68. Figure 8.3 (continued) Gestalt Principles of Grouping The Gestalt principles of grouping are shown here. These are the human tendency to organize isolated stimuli into groups on the basis of five characteristics: proximity, similarity, closure, continuity, and common region.
- 69. Depth Perception LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Depth perception - the ability to perceive the world in three dimensions. • Studies of depth perception. – Visual cliff experiment.
- 70. Figure 8.4 The Visual Cliff Experiment In the visual cliff experiment, the table has both a shallow and a “deep” side, with glass covering the entire table. When an infant looks down at the deep-appearing side, the squares in the design on the floor look smaller than the ones on the shallow side, forming a visual cue for depth. Notice that this little girl seems to be very reluctant to cross over the deep-appearing side of the table, gesturing to be picked up instead.
- 71. Monocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Monocular cues (pictorial depth cues) – cues for perceiving depth based on one eye only. – Linear perspective – the tendency for parallel lines to appear to converge on each other. – Relative size - perception that occurs when objects that a person expects to be of a certain size appear to be small and are, therefore, assumed to be much farther away.
- 72. Monocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Monocular cues (continued) – Interposition (overlap) - the assumption that an object that appears to be blocking part of another object is in front of the second object and closer to the viewer. – Aerial perspective - the haziness that surrounds objects that are farther away from the viewer, causing the distance to be perceived as greater.
- 73. Monocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Monocular cues (continued) – Texture gradient - the tendency for textured surfaces to appear to become smaller and finer as distance from the viewer increases. – Motion parallax - the perception of motion of objects in which close objects appear to move more quickly than objects that are farther away.
- 74. Monocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Monocular cues (continued) – Accommodation - as a monocular clue, the brain's use of information about the changing thickness of the lens of the eye in response to looking at objects that are close or far away.
- 75. Binocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Binocular cues - cues for perceiving depth based on both eyes. – Convergence - the rotation of the two eyes in their sockets to focus on a single object, resulting in greater convergence for closer objects and lesser convergence if objects are distant.
- 76. Binocular Cues LO 8.4 What are monocular and binocular depth cues? • Binocular cues (continued) – Binocular disparity - the difference in images between the two eyes, which is greater for objects that are close and smaller for distant objects.
- 77. Perceptual Illusions LO 8.5 How do visual illusions work? • Müller-Lyer illusion - illusion of line length that is distorted by inwardturning or outward-turning corners on the ends of the lines, causing lines of equal length to appear to be different.
- 78. Perceptual Illusions LO 8.5 How do visual illusions work? • Moon illusion – the moon on the horizon appears to be larger than the moon in the sky. – Apparent distance hypothesis
- 79. Perceptual Illusions LO 8.5 How do visual illusions work? • Illusions of Motion: – Autokinetic effect - a small, stationary light in a darkened room will appear to move or drift because there are no surrounding cues to indicate that the light is not moving. – Stroboscopic motion - seen in motion pictures, in which a rapid series of still pictures will appear to be in motion. – Phi phenomenon - lights turned on in a sequence appear to move.
- 80. Figure 8.5 The Muller-Lyer Illusion ̈ (a) Which line is longer? In industrialized Western countries, people generally see the lines in part (a) in situations similar to those in part (b). According to one theory, people have become accustomed to seeing right angles in their environment and assume that the short, slanted lines are forming a right angle to the vertical line. (continued on next slide)
- 81. Figure 8.5 (continued) The Muller-Lyer Illusion ̈ They make that assumption because they are accustomed to seeing corners, such as the ones depicted in the house interiors shown below in part (b). Consequently, in part (a), they tend to perceive the line on the right as slightly longer than the line on the left.
- 82. Factors that Influence Perception LO 8.6 How do our experiences and expectations influence perception? • Perceptual set (perceptual expectancy) - the tendency to perceive things a certain way because previous experiences or expectations influence those perceptions. • Top-down processing - the use of preexisting knowledge to organize individual features into a unified whole.
- 83. Factors that Influence Perception LO 8.6 How do our experiences and expectations influence perception? • Bottom-up processing - the analysis of the smaller features to build up to a complete perception.
- 84. Figure 8.6 Perceptual Set Look at the drawing in the middle. What do you see? Now look at the drawings on each end. Would you have interpreted the middle drawing differently if you had looked at the drawing of the man or the sitting woman first?
- 85. Figure 8.7 The Devil's Trident At first glance, this seems to be an ordinary three-pronged figure. But a closer look reveals that the three prongs cannot be real as drawn. Follow the lines of the top prong to see what goes wrong.