Ch 5 Westmont Psych

the sense organs' responses to external stimuli and the transission of these responses to the brain

processing, organization, and interpretation of sensory signals; an internal representation of the stimulus

sensory receptors produceneural impulses when they receive physical or cheical stimulation

the differences in the types of stimuli

The speed/amount of stimuli

psychological experiences with physical stimuli

minimum intensity of a stimulus that must occur for you to notice a stimulus

minimum difference between two stimuli in order for the stimuli to be noticed as different

difference threshold is based on a proportion of the original stimulus rather than a fixed amount of stimulus (i.e. bigger the original stimulus, the bigger the difference must be for you to notice)

detecting a stimulus requires making a subjective judgment about its presence or absence

decrease in sensitivity to a constant level of stimulation

Sense of Taste

sense of smell

layer of tissue within the nose with smell receptors

brain center for smell; below frontal lobes

Sense of touch

Sense of sound perception

pattern of changes in air pressure that results in the perception of sound

• Cornea: clear outer covering
• Retina: contains photoreceptors that transduce light into neural signals
• pupil: lets in light waves
• iris: changes shape to let in light

retinal cells that help with night vision

retinal cells that help distinguish colors

center of retina with dense cones

photorecptors who sense an edge/border sends this information to neighboring photorecptors

optical illusion in which identical stimuli appear different when presented against different backgrounds

perception of our limbs in space

perception of balance

• proximity: grouping close images/seeing them as the same image
• similarity: grouping according to resemblance
• Continuation: we interpret intersecting lines as continuous
• Closure: completion of figures where gaps exist

pattern recognition where data is relayed from lower to higher levels of processing

pattern recognition where data is relayed from higher to lower levels of processing

we can more easily remember people's faces who are the same race as us

depth perception cues because we have two eyes

depth perception cues from each individual eye alone

depth perception cues because there is distance between our eyes, causing each eye to see something slightly different