Psy 201 Quiz 5-6

Front 1

visual illusion

Back 1

phenomenon that plays on the difference between our perception of a visual stimulus and its physical reality

Front 2

retina

Back 2

thin inner surface of the back of the eyeball, contains the photoreceptors that transduce light into neural signals (cones and rods)

Front 3

size constancy

Back 3

perceptual principle that allows us to perceive that the size of an object appears to stay independent of its distance or position

Front 4

Adelbert Ames (1880-1955)

Back 4

American scientist who studied optics and the psychology of visual perception. He assumed that much of what people perceive depends on what they expect to see based on past experiences and knowledge. Developed Ames Room in the 1940s

Front 5

Sensation

Back 5

experience associated with a simple stimulus. The sense organs' responses to external stimuli and transmission of these responses to the brain.

Front 6

Perception

Back 6

organization and interpretation of sensory information. the processing, organizing, and interpretation of sensory signals

Front 7

Three stages of visual processing

Back 7

I. Modification of light energy by accessory structures of the eye

II. transduction of the stimulus energy into a neural representation

III. perceptual representation of the stimulus

Front 8

Fovea

Back 8

center of the retina, where cones are densely packed "upper stuff" is pushed aside, only made of
cones, no rods
-high light sensitivity, low spatial resolution

Front 9

types of photoreceptors and their functions

Back 9

cones: retinal cells that respond to higher levels of illumination and result in color perception (less sensitive to light)

rods: retinal cells that respond to low levels of illumination and result in black and white perception, responsible for night vision

Front 10

ganglion cells

Back 10

first cells in visual pathway to generate action potentials, send signals along their axon from inside the eye to the thalamus

Front 11

optic nerve

Back 11

bundle of axons

Front 12

What is the neural code?

Back 12

-more action potentials (spikes), the more intense the stimulus
-"quality" of the stimulus is defined by the type of the neuron and how it connects with other neurons

Front 13

transduction

Back 13

translating light (photons) into electrical signals

Front 14

qualitative information

Back 14

knowing whether a nearby traffic light is red or green, the difference between sounds, difference between a salty and sweet taste

Front 15

quantitative information

Back 15

speed of particular neurons firingm a more rapidly firing neuron is responding at a higher frequency, e.g. brighter light, a louder sound, or heavier weight

Front 16

coarse coding

Back 16

sensory qualities are coded by only a few different types of receptors

Front 17

absolute threshold

Back 17

minimum intensity of stimulation that must occur before you experience a sensation

Front 18

temporal summation

Back 18

action potentials that follow each other within a certain time window will be integrated

Front 19

Clicker Question:
You wake up in the middle of the night and try to see the clock in the dim light. You will be more likely to be able to read the time if you look at the clock with your ____ because it has the largest number of _____.

Back 19

b. Periphery; rods

Front 20

Clicker Question:
A critical part of the neural code consists of:
a. the length of spikes that wander down the neural axons
b. duration of each spike wandering down the neural axons
c. frequency of spikes that wander down neural axons
d. chemicals that wander down the neural axons

Back 20

c. the frequency of spikes that wander down the neural axons

Front 21

Clicker Question:
Which of the following constellations is achieved through high neuronal convergence between rods on the one hand and ganglion cells on the other?

Back 21

c. high light sensitivity, low spatial resolution

Front 22

receptive field

Back 22

region of visual space which neurons in the primary visual cortex are sensitive
-consists of center and surround. when there is no light, the cell fires at its baseline rate
-when light shines in the center, the neural firing frequency increases
-when light is shined at surround, neural firing frequency decreases
-when light is shined in center and in surround, cells firing is similar to baseline rate

Front 23

lateral inhibition

Back 23

visual process in which adjacent photoreceptors tend to inhibit one another

Front 24

how do we see?

Back 24

1. stimuli-light waves must strike your eye to view an image
2. receptor- light waves enter eyeball through pupil, which determines how much light enters, size of pupil is controlled by iris
3. cornea focuses the incoming light, light rays bent farther inward by the lens, which focuses light to form an upside down image on retina
4. rods and cones on retina convert light waves into electrical impulses, signals then are processed by bipolar, amacrine, and horizontal cells, info from these cells is then passed to ganglion cells, which generate action potentials that are transmitted to optic nerve
5. pathway to brain

Front 25

what creates our "blind spot"?

Back 25

optic nerve, no receptors at blind spot because it is where the nerves leave the eye

Front 26

Clicker Question:
If light falls on parts of the off-region of a ganglion cell's receptive field but not on the on-region:
a. the cell's response does not change
b. the cell's response is increased
c. the cell's response in reduced
d. the receptive field starts to shrink

Back 26

c. the cell's response is reduced

Front 27

Clicker Question:
There are reasons to believe that the basic way in which neurons in the retina interact:

Back 27

c. can be found all over the brain

Front 28

Clicker Question:
The ganglion cells whose firing rates are being decreased during the detection of edges are being inhibited by:

Back 28

c. light falling on the surrounds of their receptive fields

Front 29

The more light in the center, the _____the net response. The more light in the periphery, the _____ the net response.

Back 29

greater; lower

Front 30

Receptive fields

Back 30

optimal stimuli-retina-LGA-V1

Front 31

Clicker Question:
As we go upstream from V1, receptive fields:

Back 31

C. either become larger and less complex or smaller and more complex.

Front 32

Where is the primary visual cortex (V1) located?

Back 32

occipital lobe

Front 33

Hearing

Back 33

auditory neurons in the thalamus extend their axon to primary auditory cortex (A1), which is in the temporal lobe

Front 34

Touch

Back 34

touch info. from the thalamus is projected to the primary somatosensory cortex (S1), which is in the parietal lobe. the most sensitive areas of the body, such as lips and fingers, have a great deal of S1

Front 35

Vision

Back 35

primary visual cortex (V1) is in the occipital lobe

Front 36

Taste

Back 36

thalamus

Front 37

Simple cells

Back 37

respond more to lines of particular orientations

Front 38

Line orientation/neural firing frequency

Back 38

1. neuron responds minimally to the vertical bar
2. neuron responds a little more to the slanted bar
3. neuron responds most to the horizontal bar
-firing rate of simple cells decreases as the orientation of the line segment is rotated away from the preferred orientation

Front 39

Clicker Question:
Of two objects that assume the exact same size on the retina the object that according to surrounding depth cues is closer:
a. will appear smaller
b. will appear larger
c. will appear less dark
d. will appear closer

Back 39

a. will appear smaller

Front 40

Important role of primary visual cortex (V1)

Back 40

extract edges and contours that define the boundaries of an object

Front 41

Gestalt Psychology

Back 41

"gestalt" means shape or form, organized whole, and holds that our brains use innate (built in) principles to organize sensory information

Front 42

Gestalt Principles

Back 42

1. proximity-the closer 2 figures are to each other, the more likely we are to group them and see them as part of the same object

2. similarity- we tend to group figures according to how closely they resemble each other

3. good continuation- we tend to interpret intersecting lines as continuous (hot dog)

4. closure- we tend to complete figures even when gaps exist (abe lincoln with apple over head)

5. illusory contours- we tend to perceive contours even when they do not exist

Front 43

objects close to the horizon appear to be ______

Back 43

farther away

Front 44

linear perspective

Back 44

repeating elements of a texture become smaller and smaller as they recede in the distance

Front 45

familiar size

Back 45

we know how large familiar objects are, so we can tell how far away they are by their retinal images

Front 46

texture gradient

Back 46

as a uniformly textured surface recedes, its texture continuously becomes denser (ex: mountain in distance)

Front 47

Binocular depth cues

Back 47

cues of depth perception that arise from the fact that people have two eyes

Front 48

Monocular depth cues

Back 48

cues of depth perception that are available to each eye alone

Front 49

Binocular disparity

Back 49

a cue of depth perception that is caused by the distance between a person's eyes, which provides each eye with a slightly different image

Front 50

Stereoscopic vision

Back 50

ability to determine an object's depth based on that object's projections to each eye

Front 51

occlusion

Back 51

a near object occludes (blocks) an object that is farther away

Front 52

relative size

Back 52

far-off objects project a smaller retinal image than close objects do

Front 53

Four classes of depth cues

Back 53

monocular cues: pictoral and movement produced

binocular cues: binocular disparity and oculomotor

Front 54

Clicker Question:
When enjoying Monet's paintings of water lilies, you notice that some lilies appear to be more distant than others because they have been painted smaller and more densely packed. This perception is based on the pictorial cue for depth known as:

Back 54

a. texture gradient

Front 55

Holistic

Back 55

fits to the intuitive impression that perception of objects is "direct"

Front 56

Cerebral Achromatopsia

Back 56

damage to the posterior temporal lobes-patients are unable to discriminate colors

Front 57

Anne Treisman

Back 57

psychologist who specialized in study of attention, and proposed that separate systems analyze objects' different visual features. Humans automatically identify primitive features, such as color, shape, orientation, and movement, within an environment.

Front 58

Parallel Processing

Back 58

systems all process info. at the same time, and we can attend selectively to one feature by effectively blocking the further processing of the others

Front 59

Serial

Back 59

searching for two features

Front 60

flat search function

Back 60

serves as a criterion for whether or not a particular search is based on a specialized, visual module and thus allows "direct perception" (e.g. horizontal lines)

Front 61

are letter basic features?

Back 61

no

Front 62

Examples of basic features

Back 62

line endings are basic features, while circles are not

Front 63

How are complex, real-world objects recognized?

Back 63

geons
-derived from non-accidental properties which remain invariant no matter what the viewpoint is
-differ from each other in constellations of non-accidental features

Front 64

bottom-line

Back 64

recognition-by-components theory postulates a piecemeal approach where complex objects are constructed from basic building blocks (structuralist approach)

Front 65

perceiving faces

Back 65

visual perception of faces activates an are of the brain known as fusiform gyrus. The right hemisphere responds more strongly than the left, especially when faces were presented among objects.

Front 66

Bottom-Up processing

Back 66

hierarchical model of pattern recognition in which data are relayed from one processing level to the next, always moving to a higher level of processing
-sensation

Front 67

Top-down processing

Back 67

hierarchical model of pattern recognition in which info. at higher levels of processing can also influence lower, "earlier" levels
-imprints of your knowledge (words, numbers, etc.)

Front 68

change blindness

Back 68

inability to see change in the world right in front of our eyes

Front 69

Clicker Question:
Which of these terms do not fit to an automatic search?
a. attention
b. specialized visual module
c. flat search function
d. pop-out
e. basic/simple visual feature

Back 69

A. attention

Front 70

Clicker Question:
Which of these terms do not fit to the finding of a steep search function:
a. feature conjunction
b. attention
c. serial, effortful search
d. parallel processing
e. binding problem

Back 70

d. parallel processing

Front 71

Clicker Question:
When we obtain a flat search function we know that the search
a. ...was utilizing a basic visual feature
b. ...was based on a conjunction between basic features
c. ...was serial and effortful
d ...b and c

Back 71

a. ...utilizing a basic visual feature

Front 72

Clicker Question:
The integration of basic features through attention as described in the feature-integration theory is reminiscent of _____, the fact that basic features can be much more than just simple sensory experiences fits with ______.

Back 72

a. structuralism and empiricism; mentalism and gestalt psychology

Front 73

Clicker Question:
"Non-accidental features" are visual features that:

Back 73

a. are perceived the same way regardless of the angle from which they are viewed

Front 74

Clicker Question:
Between which of the following pairs of views can you detect a "theoretical tension"?
a. feature-integration theory and recognition-by-components theory
b. gestalt theory and the idea that faces are presented in a holistic manner
c. gestalt theory and feature integration theory
d. the idea that objects are recognized via templates and the view that faces are presented in a holistic manner

Back 74

c. gestalt theory and feature integration theory

Front 75

Clicker Question:
Dreaming is an example of...

Back 75

b. top-down processing that fully extends to sensory areas

Front 76

Clicker Question:
Our internal representation of the visual worlds is fairly accurate:

Back 76

b. for the current focus of visual attention only

Front 77

Clicker Question:
The idea of Cartesian theatre is incorrect because:

Back 77

d. doesn't solve homonoculus, and assumes all potentially is actually processed in our mind (a and c)

Front 78

What ways are faces special?

Back 78

-harder to recognize face parts than house parts
-process faces in "gestalt" like manner: whole, not just parts

Front 79

saccadic suppression

Back 79

constant eye movement, change of position, during change=blindness

Front 80

Parallel/automatic processing

Back 80

-automatic, pops out, something red among tons of green
-search function is flat

Front 81

Conjunctive search

Back 81

-spatial attention
-similar shapes, harder to decipher than a feature search
-ex: not shooting a human while hunting in the woods for deer

Front 82

What determines a ganglion cell's receptive field?

Back 82

neural convergence (between rods and cones)

Front 83

Template matching

Back 83

simple recognition device-letters do not use template, but faces do