Readings Exam 2

Question 1

the spatial component of visual imagery is supported in…

Answer 1

the parietal regions

Question 2

visual aspects are supported in the …

Answer 2

the temporal lobe

Question 3

temporal structure activation

Answer 3

temporal structures are activated when people imagine visual properties of objects.

Question 4

patients with parietal damage will…

Answer 4

not be able to describe the location of familiar objects or landmarks from memory but can describe the appearance of objects.

Question 5

cognitive maps

Answer 5

are our imaginal representations of the world. often we will imagine ourselves in our world and plan how we will get from one location to another.
A survey map is basically a spatial image of the environemnt.

Question 6

route map

Answer 6

a path that indicates specific places but contains no spatial information. In this example, if you had planned a journey from 1 to 2, you would have no idea where location 2 was and therefore would not be able to make an alternate route if needed. More like an action plan.

Question 7

Foo, Warren, Duchon and Tarr (2005)

Answer 7

performed an experiment that used the presence of landmarks to promote creation of different types of mental maps. Found that people were much better in the ‘forest’ condition, where coloured trees were provided as landmarks.

Question 8

Egocentric representation

Answer 8

representation of ‘space as we percieve it’.

Question 9

allocentric representation

Answer 9

is not specific to a particular viewpoint. e.g a map which is not provided from a persons viewpoint.

Question 10

what brain structure is important in allocentric and egocentric representations?

Answer 10

the hippocampus appears to be important in supporting allocentric representations while the parietal cortex is important in egocentric.

Question 11

Mental maps

Answer 11

mental maps often have a hierarchical structure in which smaller regions are organised within larger regions.
when people have to work out the relative positions of two locations, they will often reason in terms of the relative positions of larger areas that contain the two locations.

Question 12

visual perception and visual imagery

Answer 12

the same brain regions are used for both processes.

Question 13

sensation

Answer 13

sensation is the process by which sense organs gather information about the environment and transmit it to the brain for initial processing.

Question 14

perception

Answer 14

perception is the related process by which the brain selects, organises and interprets sensations.

Question 15

sensory receptors

Answer 15

sensation begins with an environmental stimulus, sensory receptors then responds to the environmental stimuli and typically generate action potentials in adjacent sensory neurons.

Question 16

transduction

Answer 16

the process of converting stimulus information into neural impulses is called transduction.

Question 17

absolute threshold

Answer 17

is the minimum amount of energy needed for an observer to sense that stimulus is present.

Question 18

signal detection theory

Answer 18

SGT asserts that judgements about the presence or absense of stimulus reflect the observer’s sensitivity to the stimulus and the observer’s response bias.

Question 19

difference threshold

Answer 19

is the lowest level of stimulation required to sense that a change in stimulation has occurred.

Question 20

weber’s law

Answer 20

according to weber’s law, regardless of the magnitude of the two stimuli, the second must differ by a constant proportion from the first for it to be percieved as different.

Question 21

fechner’s law

Answer 21

the magnitude of a stimulus prows lagarithmically as the subjective experience of intensity grows arithmetically, so that people subjectively experience only a fraction of actual increases in stimulation.

Question 22

steven’s power law

Answer 22

according to steven’s power law, subjective intensity increases in a linear fashion as actual intensity grows exponentially.

Question 23

sensory adaption

Answer 23

the tendency of sensory systems to respond less to stimuli that continue without change.

Question 24

subliminal perception

Answer 24

the tendency to perceive information outside our conscious awareness.

Question 25

basic processes of the eyes;

Answer 25

light is focused on the retina by the cornea, pupil and lens, and the retina transduces this visual imagine into a code that the brain can read.

Question 26

retina

Answer 26

includes two kinds of photoreceptors; rods and cones.

Question 27

rods and cones…

Answer 27

excite bipolar cells which in turn excite or inhibit ganglion cells whose axons constitute the optic nerve.

Question 28

ganglion cells

Answer 28

• axons are the optic nerve.

- have receptive fields (areas that are excited or inhibited by the arriving sensory information).

Question 29

optic nerve

Answer 29

from the optic nerve, visual information travels along two pathways.

1. to the superior colliculus in the midbrain which is particularly involves in eye movements.
2. to the lateral geniculate nucleus in the thalamus and on to the visual cortex.

Question 30

feature detectors,

Answer 30

respond only when stimulation in their receptive field matches a particular pattern or orientation.

Question 31

‘what’ pathway

Answer 31

involved in determining what an object is.

Question 32

‘where’ pathway

Answer 32

involved in locating the object in space, following its movement and guiding movement towards it. `

Question 33

young-helmoltz/ trichromatic theory

Answer 33

suggests that the eye contains three types of receptors, which are most sensitive to wave lengths experienced as red, green and blue.
operates at the level of retina.

Question 34

opponent process theory

Answer 34

suggests that the colours experience reflect three antagonistic colour systems; blue-yellow, red-green, black-white.
operates at higher neural levels.

Question 35

proprioceptive senses

Answer 35

register body position and movement.

Question 36

vestibular sense

Answer 36

provides information on the position of the body in space by sensing gravity and movement.

Question 37

kinaesthesia

Answer 37

provides information about the movement and position of the limbs and other parts of the body relative to one another.

Question 38

perception involves…

Answer 38

the organisation and interpretation of sensory experience.

Question 39

form perception

Answer 39

refers to the organisations into meaningful shapes and patterns (percepts). Described by Gestalt psychologists.

Question 40

recognition-by-components

Answer 40

the theory argues that people percieve and categorise objects by first breaking them down into elementary units.

Question 41

perceptual illusions

Answer 41

can be produced by the brain’s efforts to organise percepts.

Question 42

depth perception

Answer 42

is the organisation in three dimensions; based on bionocular and monocular visual cues.

Question 43

motion perception

Answer 43

the perception of movement, relies on motion detectors from the retina through the cortex. Appears to involve two systems:

1. calculates motion from the changing image on the retina.
2. uses information from eye muscles about the movement of the eyes.

Question 44

perceptual constancy

Answer 44

refers to the organisation of changing sensations into percepts that are relatively stable.
three types of perceptual constancy; colour, shape, size.

Question 45

perceptual interpretation

Answer 45

generating meaning from sensory experience.

Question 46

direct perception

Answer 46

theorises that the meaning or adaptive significance of a percept is often obvious immediate and innate.

Question 47

bottom-up processing

Answer 47

begins with raw sensory data that feed ‘up’ to the brain

Question 48

top down processing

Answer 48

begins with the observer’s expectations and knowledge,

Question 49

motives

Answer 49

expectations based on both the current context and enduring knowledge structures (schemas) influence the way people interpret outgoing sensory experience. Motives can also influence perception including motives to avoid perceiving stimuli with uncomfortable content.

Question 50

consciousness

Answer 50

an integrated view suggests that consciousness is a specialised processing function that montitors and controls current states for the purpose of maximising adaption. Conciousness highlights or inhibits information based on its relevance to adaption and its emotional consequences.
involves a network of neurons distributed throughout the brain.

Question 51

damage to hind brain structures + consciousness

Answer 51

damage to these structures, particularly the reticular formation, can lead to a complete loss of consciousness.

Question 52

brains structures and perception

Answer 52

the prefrontal cortex, the thalamus and midbrain regions of the reticular formation are thought to highlight perceptions, thoughts, emotions or goals.

Question 53

sleep functions

Answer 53

thought to be involved in homeostasis, immune functioning and consolidation of memory.

Question 54

freud and dreams

Answer 54

Freud viewed dreams as a window into the language of unconscious associative thoughts, feelings and wishes. while not supported, Freud believed that all dreams had a repressed sexual or aggressive wish.

Question 55

latent content

Answer 55

involved in Freud’s theory. thought to be the underlying meaning of dreams. Most modern theorists believe latent content is anything that is emotionally pressing.

Question 56

manifest content

Answer 56

the storyline of dreams according to Freud. Modern theorists believe that content reflects the concerns and metaphors that people experience in their waking cognition.

Question 57

biological view of dreaming

Answer 57

proposes that dreams reflect cortical interpretations of random neural signals arising from the midbrain during REM sleep.

Question 58

Johnannes muller

Answer 58

developed the source-filter model of speech.

Question 59

Division of phones

Answer 59

can be split into vowel and consonant speech sound stimuli.

Question 60

the right hemisphere and language

Answer 60

researchers agree that the corresponding cortical regions in the right hemisphere contribute to language by adding the emotional colouring evident in speech prosody, and presumably by interpreting this and other nonverbal aspects of language.

Question 61

emotion

Answer 61

a complex set of regulatory and cognitive functions defined in related changes in physiology and behaviour, accompanied by feelings that help humans and other animals respond flexibly to biologically significant stimuli.

Question 62

limbic forebrain structures and emotion

Answer 62

some structures of the limbic forebrain, such as the amygdala are critical for emotional information processing.

Question 63

Priotirisation

Answer 63

features of the environment that elicit emotional responses recieve priority in perception and attention. The rapidity of this prioritisation suggests cortical and subcortical structures.