Class 5

Question 1

transduction

Answer 1

how physical energy is converted into sensory neural impuluses

Question 2

psychophysics

Answer 2

methods that measure the strength of stimulus and observer’s sensitivity to stimulus

Question 3

just noticeable difference (JND)

Answer 3

minimal change in a stimulus that can just barely be detected

Question 4

signal detection theory

Answer 4

response to stimulus depends on both a person’s sensitivity to the stimulus in the presence of noise and the person’s response criterion

Question 5

sensory adaptation

Answer 5

process whereby sensitivity to prolonged stimulation tends to decline over time as an organism adapts to current conditions (getting used to wearing an uncomfortable pair of jeans or a bad smell or some shit)

Question 6

accommodation

Answer 6

process whereby the eye maintains a clear image on the retina

Question 7

rods

Answer 7

rods- photoreceptors that become active under low-light conditions for night vision
scotopic, black/white

Question 8

area V1

Answer 8

part of occipital lobe that contains primary visual cortex

Question 9

ventral stream

Answer 9

travels across occipital lobe to temporal lobes. detects object’s shape and identity (what it is)

Question 10

sensation

Answer 10

how our sense organs receive info about environment

Question 11

perception

Answer 11

how people select, organize, and interpret sensations

Question 12

cones

Answer 12

photoreceptors that detect color, operate under normal daylight conditions, and allow us to focus on fine detail

phototopic, low sensitivity, color

Question 13

dorsal stream

Answer 13

travels up occipital lobe to parietal lobes. identify location and motion of object (where it is)

Question 14

what stimulates each sense:

smell
taste
touch
hearing
vestibular (balance)
sight

Answer 14

smell- odorants (olfactory receptor neurons ORNs)
taste- chemical substances (papillae and taste buds, also smell)
touch- mechanical pressures, toxins, temperature (transductions of skin sensations into neural signals using receptors under the skin)
hearing- sound waves = mechanical (cochlea)
vestibular- liquid = mechanical (vestibular system, 3 fluidfilled semicircular canals and adjacted organs next to cochlea in ear)
sight- light waves (photoreceptor cells: rods and cones I think)

Question 15

visual agnosia

Answer 15

inability to recognize objects by sight (visual representation is damaged, has trouble with

prosopagnosia is inability to recognize faces

Question 16

myopia

Answer 16

nearsightedness

Question 17

hyperopia

Answer 17

farsightedness