Chapter 4

Question 1

What is audiology?

Answer 1

Science concerned with hearing

Question 2

What is ophthalmology?

Answer 2

Study of the eye’s structure, function and diseases

Question 3

What are sensation and perception?

Answer 3

Processes through which we detect and understand different types of stimuli

Question 4

What is perception?

Answer 4

Process of organizing and interpreting sensory information

Question 5

What is sensation?

Answer 5

Process of receiving energy from stimuli in our internal or external environment and transforming this energy into action potentials

Question 6

What is transduction?

Answer 6

The process by which a specialized receptor cell converts energy from an external stimulus (e.g., light, sound, heat) to an internal electrical signal (action potentials).

Question 7

What are the three things sensory systems have in common?

Answer 7

Specialized receptor cells, transduction and multiple subsystems

Question 8

Differentiate between bottom up and top down processing

Answer 8

Bottom-up processing: sensory receptors register information about the external environment and send it up to the brain for interpretation
Top down processing: Begins with some sense of what is happening due to past experiences and applies it to incoming information

Question 9

How are sensory receptors connected to the brain?

Answer 9

Sensory receptors detect stimulus and transmit it to afferent (sensory) nerves which bring the information to the brain

Question 10

List the different types of sensory receptors, type of energy reception and sense organ

Answer 10

Vision: photoreception (detection of light): eyes
Hearing: mechanoreception (detection of vibration): ears
Touch: mechanoreception (detection of pressure): skin
Smell: Chemoreception (detection of chemical stimuli): nose
Taste: Chemoreception (detection of chemical stimuli): tongue

Question 11

Define absolute threshold

Answer 11

minimum amount of stimulus energy that a person can detect 50% of the time

Question 12

Define difference threshold

Answer 12

The degree of difference that must exist between two stimuli before the difference is detected.

Question 13

What is Weber’s law?

Answer 13

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

Question 14

Define subliminal perception

Answer 14

The detection of information below the level of conscious awareness.

Question 15

Signal detection theory

Answer 15

An approach to perception that focuses on decision making about stimuli under conditions of uncertainty.

Question 16

Define attention

Answer 16

The process of focusing awareness on a narrow aspect of the environment.

Question 17

Define selective attention

Answer 17

The act of focusing on a specific aspect of experience while ignoring others.

Question 18

Define sensory adaptation

Answer 18

A change in the responsiveness of the sensory system to the average level of stimulation.

Question 19

What is light?

Answer 19

A form of electromagnetic energy that can be described in terms of wavelengths: 400 - 700 nm

Question 20

Do light waves of greater or smaller amplitude make brighter light?

Answer 20

greater

Question 21

What two structures in the eye bring an image into focus and how?

Answer 21

The cornea and lens bend the light falling on the surface of eye to bring an image into focus

Question 22

What is a retina

Answer 22

The multilayered, light-sensitive surface in the eye that records electromagnetic energy and converts it to neural impulses for processing in the brain.

Question 23

What are two kinds of visual receptor cells and how do they differ in how they respond to light

Answer 23

Rods and cones. Rods locating in retina and are very light sensitive - work well at night
Cones are used for colour perception and operate best during the day

Question 24

What is the fovea?

Answer 24

tiny area in the centre of the retina that allows us to see fine details

Question 25

Are rods or cones located on the fovea?

Answer 25

Cones

Question 26

Define optic nerves

Answer 26

The structure at the back of the eye, made up of axons of the ganglion cells, that carries visual information to the brain for further processing.

Question 27

What is the visual cortex?

Answer 27

Located in the occipital lobe - major part of cerebral cortex and is used for vision where visual information is processed

Question 28

What are feature detectors

Answer 28

Neurons in the brain’s visual system that respond to particular features of a stimulus.

Question 29

How is sensory information processed so quickly

Answer 29

Parallel processing: The simultaneous distribution of information across different neural pathways.

Question 30

Define trichromatic theory

Answer 30

Theory stating that colour perception is produced by three types of cone receptors in the retina that are particularly sensitive to different, but overlapping, ranges of wavelengths.

Question 31

What did young and helmholtz reason?

Answer 31

If the combination of any three wavelengths of different intensities is indistinguishable from any single pure wavelength, the visual system must base its perception of colour on the relative responses of three receptor systems - cones sensitive to red, blue and green

Question 32

What is the opponent process theory

Answer 32

Theory stating that cells in the visual system respond to complementary pairs of red-green and blue-yellow colours; a given cell might be excited by red and inhibited by green, whereas another cell might be excited by yellow and inhibited by blue.

Question 33

Define figure-ground relationship

Answer 33

The principle by which we organize the perceptual field into stimuli that stand out (figure) and those that are left over (ground).

Question 34

Define Gestalt psychology

Answer 34

A school of thought that arose amongst German and Austrian psychologists in the early 1900s to explain how people naturally organize their perceptions according to certain patterns.

Question 35

What are the three main principles of gestalt

Answer 35

Closure: When we view disconnected or incomplete figures, we fill in the spaces and see them as complete figures Proximity: When we view objects that are near each other, they tend to be seen as a unit Similarity: When we view objects that are similar to each other, they tend to be seen as a unit

Question 36

Define depth perception

Answer 36

The ability to perceive objects three-dimensionally and perceive their distance from you.

Question 37

Define binocular cues

Answer 37

Depth cues that depend on the combination of the images in the left and right eye and on the way the two eyes work together.

Question 38

Define convergence

Answer 38

A binocular cue to depth and distance in which the muscle movements in an individual’s two eyes provide information about how deep and/or far away something is.

Question 39

Define monocular depth cues

Answer 39

Powerful depth cues available from the image in one eye, either the right or the left.

Question 40

Define apparent movement

Answer 40

The perception that a stationary object is moving.

Question 41

Examples of monocular cues

Answer 41

Familiar size, height in the field of view, linear perspective, overlap, shading, clarity, texture gradient

Question 42

define perceptual constancy

Answer 42

The recognition that objects are constant and unchanging even though sensory input about them is changing.

Question 43

Three types of perceptual constancy

Answer 43

Size, shape and colour constancy

Question 44

Sound wave amplitude

Answer 44

Amount of pressure the sound wave produces

Question 45

How many parts is the ear divided into

Answer 45

3 Outer, middle, inner ear

Question 46

What does the outer ear consist of

Answer 46

The outermost part of the ear, consisting of the pinna and the external auditory canal.

Question 47

Function of pinna

Answer 47

funnels sound into the interior of the ear

Question 48

What does the middle ear consist of

Answer 48

The part of the ear that channels sound through the eardrum, hammer, anvil, and stirrup to the inner ear.

Question 49

What does the inner ear consist of

Answer 49

The part of the ear that includes the oval window, cochlea, and basilar membrane and whose function is to convert sound waves into neural impulses and send them to the brain.

Question 50

Definition of place theory

Answer 50

Theory on how the inner ear registers the frequency of sound, stating that each frequency produces vibrations at a particular spot on the basilar membrane.

Question 51

Define frequency theory

Answer 51

Theory on how the inner ear registers the frequency of sound, stating that the perception of a sound’s frequency depends on how often the auditory nerve fires.

Question 52

Define volley principle

Answer 52

Modification of frequency theory stating that a cluster of nerve cells can fire neural impulses in rapid succession, producing a volley of impulses.

Question 53

How does the brain process auditory information

Answer 53

Auditory nerve: The nerve structure that receives information about sound from the hair cells of the inner ear and carries these neural impulses to the brain’s auditory areas.

Question 54

What are tactile receptors

Answer 54

Receptors where sensations from them are perceived as pain

Question 55

Fast and slow pathways

Answer 55

Fast pathway: Myelinated A-delta fibres connect directly with the thalamus and then to the motor and sensory areas of the cerebral cortex; sharp localized pain Slow pathway: Un-myelinated C-delta fibres transmit pain information through the limbic system; delays information by seconds

Question 56

What are papillae

Answer 56

Rounded bumps above the tongue’s surface that contain the taste buds, the receptors for taste.

Question 57

Define olfactory epithelium

Answer 57

The lining of the roof of the nasal cavity, containing a sheet of receptor cells for smell.

Question 58

What are kinesthetic senses

Answer 58

Senses that provide information about movement, posture, and orientation.

Question 59

What are vestibular sense

Answer 59

Sense that provides information about balance and movement.

Question 60

Define semicircular canals

Answer 60

Three fluid-filled circular tubes in the inner ear containing the sensory receptors that detect head motion caused when an individual tilts or moves the head and/or the body.

Question 61

What is located at the base of the semicircular canals

Answer 61

Two organs—the utricle and saccule—that detect sustained changes in head position such as a tilt of the head to the left or right.