Perception

Perception

Allows us to make sense of sensory input

MEANINGFUL and USEFUL INTERPRETATIONS

Selective Attention

The focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus Cocktail party effect You can only focus on

a certain amount of stimulus at once… advantages and dangers of multitasking

How many passes does the team in white make?

Inattentional Blindness

Failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere Moonwalking

bear Change blindne

ss Change

deafness

Form Reception

Figure-ground relationship - the organization of the visual field into objects (figures) that stand out from their surroundings (ground) Whatever you are paying

attention to (visual, auditory, touch stimulus) becomes the figure, and everything else is the background

Gestalt Psychology

Emphasizes our tendency to integrate piece of information into meaningful wholes. when people are

exposed to a cluster of sensations, they automatically try to organize them into a whole

Gestalt Grouping Principles

The tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups to construct meaning Proximity Similarity Continuity Closure Connectedness

Grouping

Grouping helps us construct meaning but also can make us victims of perceptual illusions.

Binocular Cues

Depth cues that rely on the use of both eyes

Retinal Disparity

The brain compares the images from the two eyeballs and computes the difference the greater the disparity between images,

the closer the object.

Convergence

The extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object the greater the strain, the closer the

object. Hold your finger at arms length from

your eyes and bring it towards your face slowly… the strain is the lens curving while trying to determine depth.

Depth Perception

Seeing objects in three dimensions; allows us to judge distance

Is depth perception innate? Visual cliff – a lab device

for testing depth perception in infants and young animals

Found that babies who can crawl have a somewhat developed sense of depth perception and newborn animals were also reluctant to go over the cliff.

Monocular Depth Cues

Cues that can be used by a single eye to judge distances and perceive depth.

Light and Shadow

The perception of depth due to shadows

Interposition

Overlapping of images causes objects we see in entirety to be judged closer than one whose outline is interrupted by another object.

Texture Gradient

The further away an object is, the less detail it has

Linear Perspective

Perception that parallel lines converge at a distance

Relative Motion

Near objects appear to move opposite your direction, far objects move with you

Relative Height

Items higher in the visual field appear to be farther away

3D Chalk Art

Photos Video

Perceptual Constancy

the ability to perceive objects as unchanging even as illumination and retinal images change (we can identify things even if their color, illumination, or angle change) Shape constancy Size constancy Lightness constancy

Perceptual Adaptation

In vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field When people are given glasses that

distort the world, they are initially disoriented, but soon adapt to the new context and can navigate it with ease. We coordinate our movements in response to our environment (or perceived environment)

Mary had a a little lamb

Perceptual Set

A mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another. Experiences, expectations, and

assumption result in the formation of concepts/schemas organize and interpret information which then dictate what we perceive

We see what we believe/want/think we see.

Subliminal Senses

subliminal - below one's absolute threshold for conscious awareness priming - the activation, often

unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one's perception, memory, or response.

Psychological Priming - Money

While we can sense subliminal stimuli, this information does not have the power to persuade us to act overtly in certain ways.

Synesthesia

Simultaneous stimulation of multiple sensory experiences (i.e. Seeing Sounds, Blue smells etc.)

Affects 1 in 25,000 people

Extrasensory Perception

Extrasensory perception (ESP) – the controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input; said to include telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition

Parapsychology – the study of paranormal phenomena, including ESP and psychokinesis Psychokinesis – mind over matter: levitating, controlling

things with the mind ESP▪ Telepathy – mind to mind communication▪ Clairvoyance – perceiving remote events▪ Precognition – perceiving future events

Parapsychology cannot gain scientific credit because it cannot reproduce its results.