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42 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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What are the 7 steps of the perceptual process? What is thought of as the last additional factor |
1. stimulus 2. light is reflected/transformed 3. receptor processes 4. neural processing 5. perception 6. recognition 7. action Knowledge |
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What is the principle of transformation? What step in the perceptual process does this correspond to?
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-stimuli and responses created by stimuli are transformed, between the environmental stimulus and perception -first transformation: light hits tree, reflected from tree to eyes. Light is transformed as it is focused by the eye's optical system Step 2 |
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What is this: everything a person perceives is based not on direct contact with stimuli but on representations of stimuli that are formed on the receptors and on activity in the person's nervous system |
-principle of representation |
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What is the 'result' of the first two steps of the perceptual process |
an image on the retina |
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What are two things visual receptors do when they receive light |
1. Transduct: transform environmental energy into electrical energy 2. shape perception by the way they respond to stimuli |
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What allows receptors to transform light energy into electrical energy |
-visual pigment: light sensitive chemical that reacts to light |
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How is a stimulus represented once transduction has occurred? What step is this a part of? |
Step 4 of neural processing tree is represented by electrical signals in thousands of visual receptors |
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What are two functions of the network of neurons that operate within the perceptual process in step 4 |
1. transmit signals from receptors, through the retina, to the brain, and then within the brain 2. change those signals as they are transmitted |
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what is neural processing and why does it occur |
changes of signals as they are transmitted. It usually occurs because the path from the receptors to the brain is winding, forks in the road |
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What are the names of the primary receiving areas for each sense |
-vision: occipital lobe -temporal lobe: hearing -parietal lobe: skin senses -frontal lobe: signals from all the senses |
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Where in the perceptual processes does conscious experience begin to occur? |
-Steps 5,6,7 (perception, recognition, action) |
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What is visual form agnosia and what does it say about Steps 5, 6, 7 |
-inability to recognize objects -tells us why it is important to distinguish between perception and recognition. Ppl with this can perceive all the characteristics of certain objects, but not recognize what the object is. Shows that recognition can happen before perception, making these steps at times interchangeable |
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What is the difference between bottom-up processing and top-down processing |
-bottom up: data-based (stimuli reaching receptors) -top down: knowledge based |
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what does the rat-man demonstration tell us about the perceptual process |
-shows how recently acquired knowledge can affect perception (top-down vs bottom-up) |
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How can you break down the 7 step perceptual process into categories |
-stimuli (steps 1 and 2) -physiology (steps 3 and 4) -perception (steps 5, 6, 7) |
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What are two different approaches to studying perception? |
-physiological approach -psychophyical approach |
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what is the psychophysical appraoch |
-measures the relationship between the stimuli and the behavioral response -one relationship: straight from stimuli to perception |
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what is the physiological approach |
-involves measuring two relationships: the relationship between stimuli (steps 1-2) and physiological response (steps 3-4) and the relationship between physiological responses (steps 3-4) and behavioral responses (steps 5-7) |
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is the physiological or psychophysical approach used to understand the oblique effect |
-physiological |
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what is the oblique effect |
enhanced sensitivity to vertically and horizontally oriented visual stimuli compared to obliquely oriented (slanted) stimuli. This effect has been demonstrated by measuring both perception and neural responding |
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How does the oblique effect tell us things about perception? |
-using optical brain imaging that measured activity over a large area of a ferret's visual cortex, researchers found that horizontal or vertical orientations (stimuli) caused larger brain responses (physiological responses) than slanted orientations -physiology-perception relationship exists, not merely stimulus-perception |
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what is an absolute threshold |
the minimum intensity with which a stimulus can be detected |
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what are Fechner's 3 methods for determining threshold? what are they all called collectively? |
-methods of limits, adjustment, constant stimuli -classical psychophysical methods |
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describe Fechner's method of limits |
-'yes' to 'no' -experimenter presents stimuli in ascending/descending order. Point where person did or did not pick up on stimuli is threshold -def: a psychophysical method for measuring threshold in which the experimenter presents sequences of stimuli in ascending and descending order |
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describe Fechner's method of adjustment |
-a pshychophysical method in which the experimenter or the observer adjusts the stimulus intensity in a continuous manner until the observer detects the stimulus |
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what is Fechner's method of constant stimuli |
-def: a psychophysical method in which a number of stimuli with different intensities are presented repeatedly in a random order -yes or no -5-9 stmiuli -disadvantage: time consuming |
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what is the difference between Fechner's method of limits and adjustment |
-adjustment: observer (not the experimenter) adjusts the stimulus intensity continuously until he or she can just barely detect the stimulus -adjustment is continuous, limits is descending or ascending separated stages |
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what is thought to be the most accurate of Fechner's methods and why |
-method of constant stimuli because it involves many observations and stimuli are presented in random order, which minimizes how presentation can affect observer's judgement on the next trial |
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what is the difference threshold. what is the difference between this and the absolute threshold |
-difference threshold: minimum difference between two stimuli before we can tell the difference between them -absolute threshold: minimum stimulus intensity that can just be detected |
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What is Weber's law |
a law stating that the ration of the difference threshold to the value of the stimulus is constant. According to this relationship, doubling the value of a stimulus will cause a doubling of the difference threshold |
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What is the Weber fraction |
-Difference threshold/standard Stimulus -DL/S -ratio of difference threshold to the value of the standard stimulus in Weber's law -the fact that the Weber fraction remains the same = Weber's Law |
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Each sense has its own Weber fraction. What are they? (rank order) |
-electric shock : 0.01 -lifted weight: 0.02 -sound intensity: 0.04 -light intensity: 0.08 -taste (salty): 0.08 |
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What is magnitude estimation? |
-a psychophysical method in which the subject assigns numbers to a stimulus that are proportional to the subjective magnitude of the stimulus |
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What is response compression? |
-when the increase in perceived magnitude is smaller than the increase in actual stimulus intensity |
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what is response expansion |
-when the increase in perceived magnitude is greater than the increase in stimulus intensity |
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what is stevens law |
a law concerning the relationship between the physical intensity of a stimulus and the perception of the subjective magnitude of the stimulus. The law is calculated using a power function |
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what is the significance of a power function |
used to calculate stevens law |
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what is a power function, mathematically |
-P=KS^n -P= perceived magnitude -K= constant -S= stimulus intensity -n= a power |
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What are other ways of measuring the behavioral response to a stimulus besides thresholds/magnitudes? |
-phenomenological method -visual search |
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what is the phenomenological method |
a person is asked to describe what he or she is perceiving or to indicate when a particular perception occurs |
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what is visual search |
-observer's task is to find one stimulus among many, as quickly as possible |
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How can a threshold be influenced by how a person chooses to respond? How are differing responses compared? |
-response criterion -signal detection theory |
