Ap Psychology- Chapter 5 + 6

Front 1

Sensation

Back 1

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

Front 2

Perception

Back 2

the process of organizing and interpreting sensory information enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events

Front 3

Top-town processing

Back 3

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

Front 4

Prosopagnosia

Back 4

a neurological disorder characterized by the inability to recognize faces

Front 5

Psychophysics

Back 5

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

Front 6

Absolute Threshold

Back 6

the minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus (50%)

Front 7

Signal Detection Theory

Back 7

predicts how and when we detect the presence of a faint stimulus amid background stimulation

Front 8

Subliminal

Back 8

below one's absolute threshold for conscious awareness

Front 9

Prime

Back 9

activation, often unconsciously of certain associations, thus predisposing one's perception, memory, or response

Front 10

Anthony Greenwald

Back 10

experiment in which he gave college kids tapes claiming to improve their self-esteem or memory. He switched the labels though, and there were no proven differences, but the kids thought they had changed

Front 11

Difference Threshold

Back 11

just noticeable difference/jnd is the minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50% of the time

Front 12

Weber's Law

Back 12

to be perceived as different, two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum percentage instead of constant amount

Front 13

Sensory Adaptation

Back 13

diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation

Front 14

Transduction

Back 14

the process by which our sensory systems encode stimulus energy as neural messages.

Front 15

Wavelength

Back 15

the distance from the peak of one light or sound wave to the peak of the next

Front 16

Hue

Back 16

the dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength

Front 17

Intensity

Back 17

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

Front 18

Cornea

Back 18

protects eye and bends light to provide focus

Front 19

Pupil

Back 19

the adjustable opening in the center of the eye

Front 20

Iris

Back 20

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

Front 21

Lens

Back 21

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

Front 22

Accommodation

Back 22

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

Front 23

Retina

Back 23

the light-sensitive inner surface of the eye containing rod and cones plus layers of neurons

Front 24

Leonardo da Vinci

Back 24

the eye's water fluid bends the light rays, reinverting the image to the upright position

Front 25

Kepler

Back 25

retina does not receive upside down images, and does not read images as a whole

Front 26

Acuity

Back 26

the sharpness of vision

Front 27

Nearsightedness

Back 27

a condition in which nearby objects are seen more clearly than distant objects because distant objects focus in front of the retina

Front 28

Farsightedness

Back 28

a condition in which faraway objects are seen more clearly than near objects because near objects focus behind the retina

Front 29

Rods

Back 29

retinal receptor cells that detect black, white, and gray; necessary for peripheral and twilight vision when cones don't respond

Front 30

Cones

Back 30

retinal receptors that are concentrated near the center of the retina and that function in daylight or in well-lit conditions. Detect fine detail and give rise to color

Front 31

Blind Spot

Back 31

where the optic nerve leaves the eye there are no receptor cells

Front 32

Fovea

Back 32

the central focal point in the retina

Front 33

Feature Detectors

Back 33

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

Front 34

Parallel Processing

Back 34

the processing of several aspects of a problem simultaneously

Front 35

Issac Newton

Back 35

"light rays are not colored"

Front 36

Young-Helmholtz trichromatic theory

Back 36

the theory that the retina contains three different color receptors, one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue

Front 37

Hering's opponent-process theory

Back 37

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

Front 38

Color Constancy

Back 38

perceiving familiar objects as having consistent color

Front 39

Hearing

Back 39

transduce air pressure waves into neural messages

Front 40

Audition

Back 40

the sense or act of hearing

Front 41

frequency

Back 41

number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time

Front 42

Pitch

Back 42

a tone's experienced highness or lowness

Front 43

Decibels

Back 43

measuring unit for sound energy

Front 44

Eardrum

Back 44

a tight membrane that vibrates

Front 45

middle ear

Back 45

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

Front 46

Cochlea

Back 46

coiled, bony fluid filled tube in the inner ear through which sound waves trigger nerve impulses through the hammer, anvil and stirrup

Front 47

Hermann von Helmholtz's place theory

Back 47

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

Front 48

Frequency Theory

Back 48

the theory that the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency of a tone, thus enabling us to sense pitch

Front 49

Stereophonic

Back 49

three dimensional hearing

Front 50

Condition Hearing loss

Back 50

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

Front 51

Sensorineural hearing loss

Back 51

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

Front 52

Cochlear Implant

Back 52

a device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating the auditory nerve through electrodes threading into the cochlea

Front 53

Melzack and Wall's Gate control theory

Back 53

the theory that the spinal cord contains a neurological "gate" taht blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on to the brain.

Front 54

Sensory interaction

Back 54

the principal that one sense may influence another, as when the smell of food influences its tase

Front 55

Kinesthesis

Back 55

the system for sensing the poistion and movement of individual body parts

Front 56

Vestibular Sense

Back 56

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

Front 57

Selective Attention

Back 57

The focusing of conscious awareness on particular stimulus

Front 58

Cocktail party effect

Back 58

the abililty to attend to only one voice among many

Front 59

unintentional blindness

Back 59

failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere

Front 60

visual capture

Back 60

the tendency for vision to dominate the other senses

Front 61

gestalt

Back 61

an organized whole-->tendency to integrate pieces of info into a meaningful way

Front 62

figure-ground relationship

Back 62

the organization of the visual field into objects that stand out from their surroundings

Front 63

grouping

Back 63

the perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups

Front 64

Depth perception

Back 64

ablility to see object in 3-D

Front 65

Visual Cliff

Back 65

a lad device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals

Front 66

Binocular cues

Back 66

depth cues,

Front 67

retinal disparity

Back 67

a binocular cue for perceiving depth

Front 68

convergence

Back 68

a binocular cue for perceiving depth

Front 69

Monocular cuse

Back 69

depth cues, inerposition and linear perspective

Front 70

stroboscopic movement

Back 70

the brain will perceive continuous movement in rapid series of slightly varying images

Front 71

Phi Phenomenon

Back 71

illusion of movement when two or more adjacent lights blink on and off

Front 72

Perceptual constancy

Back 72

perceiving objects as changing, even though they cant-- angle of view

Front 73

Lightness constancy

Back 73

perceive an object as having a constant lightness even white its illumination varies

Front 74

Critical Period

Back 74

an optimal period shortly after birth when an organisms exposure to cetain stimuli or experiences producesproper development

Front 75

perceptual adaptation

Back 75

ability to adjust to an artificially displaces or even inverted visual field

Front 76

perceptual set

Back 76

a mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another

Front 77

schemas

Back 77

concepts that organize and interpret unfamiliar info

Front 78

Human Factors Psychologists

Back 78

a branch of psychology that explore how people and machines interact and how machines and physical environments can be and safe and easy to use

Front 79

ESP

Back 79

perception can occur apart from sensory input--> telepathy

Front 80

Parapsychology

Back 80

the study of paranormal phenomena including ESP and psychokinesis