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| The process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment. |
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| The process of organizing and enterpreting sensory informatin, enabling us to recognize meaningfulobjects and events. |
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| Analysis that begins with the sense receptors and works up to the brain's intepration of sensory information. |
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| Information processing guided by highter-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions on our experience and expectations. |
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| The study of relationships between the physical characteristics of stimuli, such as their intensity, and our psychological experience of them. |
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| The minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time. |
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| Below one's absolute threshold for conscious awareness. |
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| The minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50 percent of the time. We experience the difference threshold as a just noticeable difference. |
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| The principle that, to be perceived as different, two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum percentage (rather than a constant amount). |
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| Diminished sensitivity as a conswquence of constant stimulation. |
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| The distance from the peak of one light or sound wave to the peak of the next. Electromagnetic wavelengths cary from the short blips of cosmic rays to the long oulses of radio transmission. |
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| The dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength of light; what we know as the color names blue, green, and so forth. |
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| The amount of energy in a light or sound wave, which we perceive as brightness or loudness, as determined by the wave's amplitude. |
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| The process by which the eye's lens changes shape to focus near or far objects on the retina. |
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| The light-sensitive inner surface of the eye, containing the receptor rods and cones plus layers of neurons that begin the processing of visual information. |
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| Retinal receptors that detect black, white, and gray; necessary for peripheral and twilight vision, when cones don't respond. |
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| Receptor cells that are concentrated near the center of the retina and taht function in daylight or in well-lit conditions. They cones detect fine detail and give rise to color sensations. |
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| The nerve that carries neural impulses from the eye to the brain. |
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| The point at which the optic nerve leaves the eye, creating a "blind" spot because no receptor cells are located there. |
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| Nerve cells in the brain that respond to specific features of the stimulus, such as shape, angle, or movement. |
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| The processing of several aspects of a problem simultaneously; the brain's natural mode of information processing for many functions, including vision. Contrasts with the step-by-step processing of most computers and of conscious problem solving. |
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| Young-Helmholtz trichromatic (three color) theory |
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| The theory that the retina contains three different color receptors- one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue- which when stimulated in combination can produce the perception of any color. |
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| The theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, yellow-blue, white-black) enable color vision. For example, some cells are stimulated by green and inhibited by red; others are stimulated by red and inhibited by green. |
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| Perceiving familiar objects as having consistent color, even if changing illuminatino alters the wavelengths reflected by the object. |
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| The tendency for vision to domicate the other senses, as when we perceive voices in films as coming from the screen we see rather than from the projector behind us. |
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| The number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time (for example, per second). |
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| A tone's highness or lowness; depends on frequency. |
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| The chamber between the eardrum and cochlea containing three tiny bones (hammer, anvil, and stirrup) that concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea's oval window. |
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| The innermost part of the ear, containing the cochlea, semicircular canals, and vesibular sacs. |
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| A coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear through which sound waves trigger nerve impulses. |
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| The theory that the spinal cord contains a neurological "gate" that blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on to the brain. The "gate" is opened by the activity of pain signals traveling up small nerve fibers and is closed by activity in larger fibers or by information coming from the brain. |
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| The principle that one sense may influence another, as when the smell of food influences its taste. |
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| The system for senseing the position and movement of individual body parts. |
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| The sense of body movement and position, including the sense of balance. |
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| An organized whole. Gestalt psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaninful wholes. |
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| The organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground). |
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| The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups. |
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| That ability to see objects in three dimensions although the images that strike the retina are two-dimenstional; allows us to judge distance. |
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| A laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals. |
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| Depth cues, such as retinal disparity and convergence, that depend on the use of two eyes. |
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| Distance cues, such as linear perspective and overlap, available to either eye alone. |
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| A binocular cue for perceiving depth: By comparing images from teh two eyeballs, the brain computes distance- the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object. |
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| A binocular cue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object. |
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| Perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent lightness, color, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change. |
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| In vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field. |
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| A mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another. |
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