Unit 4: Sensation and Perception

Question 1

The process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment.

Answer 1

Sensation

Question 2

The process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events.

Answer 2

Perception

Question 3

Analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain’s integration of sensory information.

Answer 3

Bottom-Up Processing

Question 4

Information processing guided by higher-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expectations.

Answer 4

Top-Down Processing

Question 5

The focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus.

Answer 5

Selective Attention

Question 6

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

Answer 6

Inattentional Blindness

Question 7

Failing to notice changes in the environment.

Answer 7

Change Blindness

Question 8

Conversion of one form of energy into another. In sensation, the transforming of litmus energies, such as sights, sounds, and smells, into neural impulses our brain can interpret.

Answer 8

Transduction

Question 9

The study of relationship between the physical characteristics of stimuli, such as their intensity, and our psychological experience of them.

Answer 9

Psychophysics

Question 10

The minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time.

Answer 10

Absolute Threshold

Question 11

A theory predicting how and when we detect the presence of a faint stimulus (signal) amid background stimulation (noise).

Answer 11

Signal Detection Theory

Question 12

Below one’s absolute threshold for conscious awareness.

Answer 12

Subliminal

Question 13

The activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one’s perception, memory, or response.

Answer 13

Priming

Question 14

The minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50 percent of the time.

Answer 14

Difference Threshold

Question 15

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

Answer 15

Weber’s Law

Question 16

Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation.

Answer 16

Sensory Adaptation

Question 17

A mental predispostion to perceive one thing and not another.

Answer 17

Perceptual Set

Question 18

The controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input; includes telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition.

Answer 18

Extrasensory Perception (ESP)

Question 19

The study of paranormal phenomena, including ESP and psychokinesis.

Answer 19

Parapsychology

Question 20

The dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength of light; what we know as the color names blue, green, and so forth.

Answer 20

Hue

Question 21

The amount of energy in a light or sound wave, which we perceive as brightness or loudness, as determined by the wave’s amplitude.

Answer 21

Intensity

Question 22

The adjustable opening in the center of the eye through which light enters.

Answer 22

Pupil

Question 23

A ring of muscle tissue that forms the colored portion of the eye around the pupil and controls the size of the pupil opening.

Answer 23

Iris

Question 24

The transparent structure behind the pupil that changes shape to help focus images on the retina.

Answer 24

Lens

Question 25

The light-sensitive inner surface of the eye, containing the receptor rods and cones plus layers of neurons that begin the processing of visual information.

Answer 25

Retina

Question 26

The process by which the eye's lens changes shape to focus near or far objects on the retina.

Answer 26

Accommodation

Question 27

Retinal receptors that detect black, white, and gray; necessary for peripheral and twilight vision, when cones don't respond.

Answer 27

Rods

Question 28

Retinal receptors cells that are concentrated near the center of the retina and that function in daylight or in well-lit conditions.

Answer 28

Cones

Question 29

The nerve that carries neural impulses from the eye to the brain.

Answer 29

Optic Nerve

Question 30

The point at which the optic nerve leaves the eye, creating a "blind" spot because no receptor cells are located there.

Answer 30

Blind Spot

Question 31

The central focal point in the retina, around which the eye's cones cluster.

Answer 31

Fovea

Question 32

Nerve cells in the brain that respond to specific features of the stimulus, such as shape, angle, or movement.

Answer 32

Feature Detectors

Question 33

The processing of many aspects of a problem simultaneously; the brain's natural mode of information processing for many functions, including vision.

Answer 33

Parallel Processing

Question 34

The theory that the retina contains three different color receptors - one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue - which, when stimulated in combination, can produce the perception of any color.

Answer 34

Young-Helmholtz Trichromatic theory

Question 35

The theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, yellow-blue, white-black) enable color vision.

Answer 35

Opponent-Process Theory

Question 36

An organized whole. Gestalt psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes.

Answer 36

Gestalt

Question 37

the organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground).

Answer 37

Figure-Ground

Question 38

The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups.

Answer 38

Grouping

Question 39

The ability to see objects in three dimensions although the images that strike the retina are two-dimensional; allows us to judge distance.

Answer 39

Depth Perception

Question 40

A laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals.

Answer 40

Visual Cliff

Question 41

Depth cues, such as retinal disparity, that depend on the use of two eyes.

Answer 41

Binocular Cues

Question 42

A binocular cue for perceiving depth: By comparing images from the retinas in the two eyes, the brain computes distance - the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object.

Answer 42

Retinal Disparity

Question 43

Depth cues, such as interposition and linear perspective, available to either eye alone.

Answer 43

Monocular Cues

Question 44

An illusion of movement created when two or more adjacent light blink on and off in quick succession.

Answer 44

Phi Phenomenon

Question 45

Perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent shapes, size, brightness, and color) even as illumination and retinal images change.

Answer 45

Perceptual Constancy

Question 46

Perceiving familiar objects as having consistent color, even if changing illumination alters the wavelengths reflected by the object.

Answer 46

Color Constancy

Question 47

In vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field.

Answer 47

Perceptual Adaptation

Question 48

The sense or act of hearing

Answer 48

Audition

Question 49

The number of complete wavelength that pass a point in a given time.

Answer 49

Frequency

Question 50

A tone's experienced highness or lowness; depends on frequency.

Answer 50

Pitch

Question 51

The chamber between the eardrum and cochlea containing three tiny bones that concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea's oval window.

Answer 51

Middle Ear

Question 52

A coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear; sound waves traveling through the cochlear fluid trigger nerve impulses.

Answer 52

Cochlea

Question 53

The innermost part of the ear, containing the cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs.

Answer 53

Inner Ear

Question 54

Hearing loss caused by damage to the cochlea's receptor cells or to the auditory nerves; also called nerve deafness.

Answer 54

Sensorineural Hearing Loss

Question 55

Hearing loss caused by damage to the mechanical system that conducts sound waves to the cochlea.

Answer 55

Conduction Hearing Loss

Question 56

A device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating the auditory nerve through electrodes threaded into the cochlea.

Answer 56

Cochlear Implant

Question 57

In hearing, the theory that links the pitch we hear with the place where the cochlea's membrane is stimulated.

Answer 57

Place Theory

Question 58

In hearing, the theory that the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency of a tone, thus enabling us to sens its pitch.

Answer 58

Frequency Theory

Question 59

The theory that the spinal cord contains a neurological "gate" that blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on to the brain. The "gate" is opened by the activity of pain signals traveling up small nerve fibers and is closed by activity in larger fibers or by information coming form the brain.

Answer 59

Gate-Control Theory

Question 60

The system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts.

Answer 60

Kinesthesia

Question 61

The sense of body movement and position, including the sense of balance.

Answer 61

Vestibular Sense

Question 62

The principle that one sense may influence another, as when the smell of food influences its taste.

Answer 62

Sensory Interaction

Question 63

In psychological science, the influence of bodily sensations, gestures, and other states on cognitive preferences and judgments.

Answer 63

Embodied Cognition