Sensation & Perception
Daily Double (200 pts) You notice when a store shrinks a 10-ounce bag of chips by an ounce, but you never notice when a 32-ounce bottle loses an ounce. What principle explains why? (same reason Tiago couldn't tell the difference between the 2 textbooks)
What is Weber's Law
The sensitive surface of the eye that acts like the film in a camera and contains photoreceptors is called
What is the retina
You can lose your sense of taste after a cold even though your taste buds work fine. Which sensory system is actually the problem?
Smell
This ability allows you to recognize that a distant person is not shrinking, even though their image on your retina becomes smaller as they move farther away.
What is Size Constancy?
These terms describe depth cues that use one or both of our eyes
monocular cues
binocular cues
Certain parts of the body like your fingertips and lips are very sensitive because they have more of these
What are nerve endings
Students heard “Stairway to Heaven” backwards and heard nothing. After seeing the “hidden” lyrics, they suddenly heard the words. What processing shift does this show?
What is top-down Processing
This is a transparent structure that changes shape to focus images on the retina.
The Lens
Which flavor is associated with and likely evolved to avoid poison?
Bitter
You notice a shirt looks the same, whether seen under bright yellow light in a classroom or soft blue lighting at home, thanks to this perceptual process.
What is color constancy
A laboratory device designed to safely for test for depth perception in infants and young animals
What is a visual cliff
What are three parts of touch or the skin senses?
Pressure, temperature and pain
What part of the brain has the job of putting all the sensory information (other than smell) together and acting upon it?
The thalamus
then it goes to the Cerebral cortex for further processing
Fluid-filled structure of the inner ear where sound waves are changed to neural impulses.
Cochlea
The term for the sense of smell
olfaction
Even when you see this object from different angles, such as a rectangle turning into a trapezoid on your retina, you still recognize its true form.
What is Shape Constancy
This monocular depth cue involves the tendency to perceive parallel lines converging in the distance, providing cues about the relative distance of objects.
What is linear perspective (Just perspective is also fine)
Rubbing your elbow after you smack it helps lessen the pain because distracting touch signals can block pain signals on the way to the brain. What theory explains this?
What is gate theory?
What is the minimum amount of difference to detect that two stimuli are not the same?
difference threshold
Colorblindness is caused by defective ________ in the retina
Cones
List the 5 different taste categories discussed in class
salty, sweet, sour, bitter, umami
**Oleogustus (fat) is also one not discussed but will not be on assessments**
This phenomenon explains why a white piece of paper still appears white whether in a brightly lit room or under dim candlelight.
What is Brightness constancy?
This visual phenomenon, essential for depth perception, occurs because each eye receives a slightly different image due to their distinct positions, allowing the brain to perceive depth and three-dimensional space. What is it?
Retinal disparity
This sense allows us to tell the position and motion of our body parts
Kinesthetic Sense
What is the minimum amount of stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus?
What is the absolute threshold
This term describes the sharpness of your vision
Visual Acuity
The Olfactory bulb processes which of our 5 main senses?
Smell
Researchers showed kids unfamiliar objects from different angles. Younger kids thought the objects changed; older kids didn’t. What key idea about perceptual constancies did this support?
Perceptual constancies are learned not inborn
List 3/6 of the monocular cues for vision
1. perspective/ relative size
2. clearness/ relative clarity
3. overlapping/interposition
4. shadow
5. gradient texture
6. Motion Parallax
This organ in the inner ear is responsible for telling you that you are physically upright without your eyesight or balance.
Semi-Circular Canals
(Vestibular system)