Terms : Hide Images
| 110801870 | sensation | the process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment | |
| 110801871 | perception | the process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events | |
| 110801872 | bottom-up processing | analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information | |
| 110801873 | top-down processing | information processing guided by higher-level mental process, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expectations | |
| 110801874 | psychophysics | the study of relationships between the physical characteristics of stimuli, such as their intensity, and our psychological experiences of them | |
| 110801875 | absolute threshold | the minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus 50% of the time | |
| 110801876 | difference threshold | the minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50% of the time. We experience the difference threshold as a just noticeable difference (also called just noticeable difference) | |
| 110801877 | Weber's law | the principle that, to be perceived as different, two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum percentage (rather two constant amounts) | |
| 110801878 | signal detection theory | a theory predicting how and when we detect the presence of a faint stimulus ("signal") amid background stimulation ("noise"). Assumes there is no single absolute threshold and detection depends partly on a person's experience, expectations, motivation, and level of fatigue. | |
| 110801879 | subliminal stimulation | below one's absolute threshold for conscious awareness | |
| 110801880 | sensory adaptation | diminished sensitivity as a consequences of constant stimulation | |
| 110801881 | transduction | conversion of one form of energy into another. In sensation, the transforming of stimulus energies, such as sights, sounds, smells, into neural impulse our brains can interpret | |
| 110801882 | cornea | the clear tissue that covers the front of the eye | |
| 110801883 | pupil | the adjustable opening in the center of the eye through which light enters | |
| 110801884 | iris | a ring of muscle tissue that forms the colored portion of the eye around the pupil and controls the size of the pupil opening | |
| 110801885 | lens | the transparent structure behind the pupil that changes shape to help focus images on the retina | |
| 110801886 | retina | 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 | |
| 110801887 | cones | retinal receptor cells that are concentrated near the center of the retina and that function in daylight or in well-lit conditions. The cones detect fine detail and give rise to color sensations. | |
| 110801888 | fovea | the central point of in the retina, around which the eye's cones cluster | |
| 110801889 | bipolar cells | specialized cells which connect rods and cones to the ganglion cells of the optic nerve | |
| 110801890 | ganglion cells | the specialized cells which lie behind the bipolar cells whose axons form the optic nerve which takes the information to the brain | |
| 110801891 | optic nerve | the nerve that carries neural impulses from the eye to the brain | |
| 110801892 | feature detectors | nerve cells in the brain that respond to specific features of the stimulus, such as shape, angle, or movement | |
| 110801893 | trichromatic theory | Visual theory, stated by Young and Helmholtz that all colors can be made by mixing the three basic colors: red, green, and blue; a.k.a the Young-Helmholtz theory. | |
| 110801894 | afterimages | images that occur when a visual sensation persists for a brief time even after the original stimulus is removed | |
| 110801895 | color blindness | a variety of disorders marked by inability to distinguish some or all colors | |
| 110801896 | opponent-process theory | the theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, yellow-blue, white-black) enable color vision. For example, some cells are stimulated by green and inhibited by red; others are stimulated by red and inhibited by green | |
| 110801897 | blind spot | the point at which the optic nerve leaves the eye, creating a "blind" spot because no receptor cells are located there | |
| 110801898 | amplitude | greatness of magnitude | |
| 110801899 | frequencey | the number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time (for example, per second) | |
| 110801900 | pitch | the property of sound that varies with variation in the frequency of vibration | |
| 110801901 | decibels | a unit of measurement of loudness | |
| 110801902 | ear canal | either of the passages in the outer ear from the auricle to the tympanic membrane | |
| 110801903 | eardrum | tightly stretched membrane located at the end of the ear canal that vibrates when struck by sound waves | |
| 110801904 | middle ear | the chamber between the eardrum and cochlea containing three tiny bones (hammer, anvil, and stirrup) that concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea's oval window | |
| 110801905 | inner ear | the innermost part of the ear =, containing the cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs | |
| 110801906 | cochlea | a coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear through which sound waves trigger nerve impulse | |
| 110801907 | oval window | membrane that covers the opening between the middle ear and inner ear | |
| 110801908 | basilar membrane | A structure that runs the length of the cochlea in the inner ear and holds the auditory receptors, called hair cells. | |
| 110801909 | hair cells | Receptor cells within the cochlea that transduce vibrations into nerve impulses | |
| 110801910 | place theory | in hearing, the theory that links the pitch we hear with the place where the cochlea's membrane is stimulated | |
| 110801911 | frequency theory | 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 sense its pitch | |
| 110801912 | conduction-hearing loss | hearing loss caused by damage to the mechanical system that conducts sound waves to cochlea | |
| 110801913 | sensorineural-hearing loss | hearing loss caused by damage to the cochlea's receptor cells or to the auditory nerves; also called nerve deafness | |
| 110801914 | cochlear implant | a device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating the auditory nerve through electrodes threaded into the cochlea | |
| 110801915 | pain | a somatic sensation of acute discomfort | |
| 110801916 | gate-control theory | the theory that the spinal cord contains a neurological "gate" that blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on the brian. 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 from the brain. | |
| 110801917 | sensory interaction | the principle that one sense may influence another, as when the smell of food influences its taste | |
| 110801918 | four basic taste sensations | bitter, sweet, salty, sour | |
| 110801919 | chemical sense | Can distinguish thousands of different odors and flavors. Identification begins at membrane receptors on sensory cells | |
| 110801920 | olfactory receptor cells | sensory receptors for smell, constantly replaced every 30 to 60 days. when stimulated by airborne molecules, the stimulation gets passed to its axons which bundle to create the olfactory nerve | |
| 110801921 | kinesthesis | the system for sensing the position and movement of individual body part | |
| 110801922 | vestibular sense | the sense of body movement and position, including the sense of balence | |
| 110801923 | selective attentive | the focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus, as in the cocktail party effect | |
| 110801924 | gestalt | an organized whole. Gestalt psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes | |
| 110801925 | figure-ground | the orginization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground) | |
| 110801926 | grouping | the perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups | |
| 110801927 | proximity | grouping nearby figures together | |
| 110801928 | similarity | grouping together figures that are similar to eachoter | |
| 110801929 | continuity | perceiving smooth, continuous patterns rather than discontinuous ones. | |
| 110801930 | connectedness | because they are uniform and liked, we perceive the the two dots and the line between them as a single unit | |
| 110801931 | closure | a Gestalt principle of organization holding that there is an innate tendency to perceive incomplete objects as complete and to close or fill gaps and to perceive asymmetric stimuli as symmetric | |
| 110801932 | depth perception | the ability to see objects in three dimensional although the images that strike the retina are two-dimensional; allows us to judge distance | |
| 110801933 | visual cliff | a laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals | |
| 110801934 | binocular cues | depth cues, such as retinal disparity and convergence, that depend on the use of two eyes | |
| 110801935 | retinal disparity | a binocular cue for perceiving depth: By comparing images from the two eyeballs, the brain computes distance-the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object | |
| 110801936 | convergence | a binocular cue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object. The greater the inward strain, the closer the object | |
| 110801937 | monocular cues | depth cues, such as interposition and linear perspective, available to either eye alone | |
| 110801938 | interposition | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; if one object partially blocks our view of another, it is perceived as closer | |
| 110801939 | relative size | a monocular cues for perceiving depth; whereby larger objects are perceived as closer than smaller ones | |
| 110801940 | texture gradient | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; a gradual change from a coarse distinct texture to a fine, indistinct texture signals increasing distance. objects far away appear smaller and more densely packed | |
| 110801941 | relative height | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; objects higher in our field of vision are perceived as farther away | |
| 110801942 | relative motion | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; while you are moving, the nearer an object is, the faster it seems to move | |
| 110801943 | motion parallax | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; while you are moving, the nearer an object is, the faster it seems to move | |
| 110801944 | linear perspective | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; the more parallel lines converge, the greater their perceived distance | |
| 110801945 | light and shadow | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; a dimmer object seems farther away | |
| 110801946 | motion perspective | eight monocular cues | |
| 110801947 | phi phenomenon | the illusion of movement created by presenting visual stimuli in rapid succession; an illusion of movement created when two or more adjacent lights blink on and off in quick succession | |
| 110801948 | perceptual constancy | perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent lightness, color, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change | |
| 110801949 | perceptual adaption | in vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field | |
| 110801950 | perceptual set | a mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another | |
| 110801951 | extrasensory perception | the controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input. Said to include telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition | |
| 110801952 | parapsychologists | those who study of paranormal phenomena, including ESP and psychokinesis |
