PSYCHOLOGY

(9th Edition)
David Myers
PowerPoint Slides
Aneeq Ahmad
Henderson State University

Worth Publishers, 2010

Sensation and
Perception
Chapter 6
2

Sensation
Sensing the World:
Some Basic Principles
Thresholds
Sensory Adaptation

Vision
The Stimulus Input: Light Energy

The Eye
Visual Information Processing
Color Vision
3

Hearing
The Stimulus Input: Sound Waves

The Ear
Hearing Loss and Deaf Culture

Other Important Senses

Touch

Pain
Taste
Smell
4

Perceptual Organization
Form Perception
Depth Perception

Motion Perception
Perceptual Constancy

Perceptual Interpretation
Sensory Deprivation and Restored
Vision
Perceptual Adaptation
Perceptual Set
Perception and the Human Factor

Is There Extrasensory Perception?

Claims of ESP
Premonitions or Pretensions?

Putting ESP to Experimental Test

Sensation & Perception

How do we construct our representations of the
external world?
To represent the world, we must detect physical
energy (a stimulus) from the environment and
convert it into neural signals. This is a process
called sensation.
When we select, organize, and interpret our
sensations, the process is called perception.
8

Bottom-up Processing
Analysis of the stimulus begins with the sense
receptors and works up to the level of the brain
and mind.

Letter A is really a black blotch broken down into

features by the brain that we perceive as an A.
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Top-Down Processing
Information processing guided by higher-level
mental processes as we construct perceptions,
drawing on our experience and expectations.

THE CHT
10

Making Sense of Complexity

Our sensory and perceptual processes work
together to help us sort out complex images.

The Forest Has Eyes, Bev Doolittle

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Sensing the World

Senses are natures gift that suit an organisms
needs.
A frog feeds on flying insects; a male silkworm
moth is sensitive to female sex-attractant odor; and
we as human beings are sensitive to sound
frequencies that represent the range of human
voice.

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Exploring the Senses

What stimuli cross our threshold for
conscious awareness?

13

Psychophysics
A study of the relationship between physical
characteristics of stimuli and our psychological
experience with them.
Physical World

Psychological
World

Light

Brightness

Sound

Volume

Pressure

Weight

Sugar

Sweet
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Thresholds

Proportion of Yes Responses

1.00
0.50
0.00

Absolute Threshold: Minimum stimulation needed

to detect a particular stimulus 50% of the time.

5
10
15
20
Stimulus Intensity (lumens)

25

15

Subliminal Threshold
Subliminal Threshold:
When stimuli are below
ones absolute threshold for
conscious awareness.

Kurt Scholz/ Superstock

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Webers Law
Two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum
percentage (rather than a constant amount), to be
perceived as different. Weber fraction: k = dI/I.

Stimulus

Constant (k)

Light

8%

Weight

2%

Tone

3%
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Sensory Adaptation
Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of
constant stimulation.

Put a band aid on your arm and after awhile

you dont sense it.

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Now you see, now you dont

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Vision

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Transduction

In sensation, the transformation of stimulus energy

(sights, sounds, smells) into neural impulses.

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Both Photos: Thomas Eisner

The Stimulus Input: Light Energy

Visible
Spectrum

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Physical Characteristics of Light

1. Wavelength (hue/color)
2. Intensity (brightness)

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Wavelength (Hue)
Hue (color) is the
dimension of
color determined
by the
wavelength of the
light.
Wavelength is the
distance from the
peak of one wave
to the peak of the
next.
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Wavelength (Hue)

Violet

Indigo

400 nm
Short wavelengths

Blue

Green

Yellow

Orange

Red

700 nm
Long wavelengths

Different wavelengths of light result

in different colors.
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Intensity (Brightness)
Intensity:
Amount of
energy in a
wave
determined by
the amplitude.
It is related to
perceived
brightness.
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Intensity (Brightness)

Blue color with varying levels of intensity.

As intensity increases or decreases, blue color
looks more washed out or darkened.

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The Eye

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Parts of the eye

1. Cornea: Transparent tissue where light enters
the eye.
2. Iris: Muscle that expands and contracts to
change the size of the opening (pupil) for light.
3. Lens: Focuses the light rays on the retina.
4. Retina: Contains sensory receptors that process
visual information and sends it to the brain.

29

The Lens
Lens: Transparent
structure behind the
pupil that changes shape
to focus images on the
retina.
Accommodation: The
process by which the
eyes lens changes shape
to help focus near or far
objects on the retina.
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Retina
Retina: The lightsensitive inner
surface of the eye,
containing receptor
rods and cones in
addition to layers of
other neurons
(bipolar, ganglion
cells) that process
visual information.
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Optic Nerve, Blind Spot & Fovea

Optic nerve: Carries neural impulses from the eye to the
brain. Blind Spot: Point where the optic nerve leaves the
eye because there are no receptor cells located there.
Fovea: Central point in the retina around which the eyes
cones cluster.

http://www.bergen.org

32

Test your Blind Spot

Use your textbook. Close your left eye, and fixate
your right eye on the black dot. Move the page
towards your eye and away from your eye. At
some point the car on the right will disappear due
to a blind spot.

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Photoreceptors

E.R. Lewis, Y.Y. Zeevi, F.S Werblin, 1969

34

Bipolar & Ganglion Cells

Bipolar cells receive messages from
photoreceptors and transmit them to ganglion
cells, which converge to form the optic nerve.

35

Visual Information Processing

Optic nerves connect to the thalamus in the
middle of the brain, and the thalamus connects to
the visual cortex.

36

Feature Detection

Ross Kinnaird/ Allsport/ Getty Images

Nerve cells in the visual cortex respond to

specific features, such as edges, angles, and
movement.

37

Shape Detection

Ishai, Ungerleider, Martin and Haxby/ NIMH

Specific combinations of temporal lobe activity

occur as people look at shoes, faces, chairs and
houses.

38

Visual Information Processing

Processing of several aspects of the stimulus
simultaneously is called parallel processing. The
brain divides a visual scene into subdivisions such
as color, depth, form, movement, etc.

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From Sensation to Recognition

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Color Vision
Trichromatic theory: Young and von Helmholtz
suggested that the eye must contain three receptors
that are sensitive to red, blue and green colors.

Standard stimulus

Comparison stimulus

Max

Medium

Low

Blue

Green

Red

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Color Blindness
Genetic disorder in which people are blind to
green or red colors. This supports the
Trichromatic theory.

Ishihara Test

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Opponent Colors

Gaze at the middle of the flag for about 30

Seconds. When it disappears, stare at the dot and report
whether or not you see Britain's flag.
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Hearing

44

Hearing
The Stimulus Input: Sound Waves
Sound waves are compressing and expanding air
molecules.

45

Sound Characteristics
1. Frequency (pitch)
2. Intensity (loudness)

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The Ear

Dr. Fred Hossler/ Visuals Unlimited

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The Ear
Outer Ear: Collects and sends sounds to the
eardrum.
Middle Ear: Chamber between eardrum and
cochlea containing three tiny bones (hammer,
anvil, stirrup) that concentrate the vibrations
of the eardrum on the cochleas oval window.

Inner Ear: Innermost part of the ear,

containing the cochlea, semicircular canals,
and vestibular sacs.
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Cochlea
Cochlea: Coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the
inner ear that transforms sound vibrations to
auditory signals.

49

Intensity (Loudness)

Intensity
(Loudness):
Amount of energy
in a wave,
determined by the
amplitude, relates
to the perceived
loudness.

50

Loudness of Sound

Richard Kaylin/ Stone/ Getty Images

120dB

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70dB

Frequency (Pitch)
Frequency (pitch):
The dimension of
frequency
determined by the
wavelength of
sound.
Wavelength: The
distance from the
peak of one wave
to the peak of the
next.
52

Localization of Sounds
Because we have two ears, sounds that reach
one ear faster than the other ear cause us to
localize the sound.

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Localization of Sound
1. Intensity differences
2. Time differences
Time differences as small as 1/100,000 of a second
can cause us to localize sound. The head acts as a
shadow or partial sound barrier.

54

Touch

Bruce Ayers/ Stone/ Getty Images

The sense of touch is a mix of four distinct skin

sensespressure, warmth, cold, and pain.

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Skin Senses
Only pressure has identifiable receptors. All other
skin sensations are variations of pressure, warmth,
cold and pain.

Pressure

Burning hot

Vibration

Vibration

Cold, warmth and pain

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Pain
Pain tells the body that something has gone
wrong. Usually pain results from damage to the
skin and other tissues. A rare disease exists in
which the afflicted person feels no pain.

AP Photo/ Stephen Morton

Ashley Blocker (right) feels neither pain

nor extreme hot or cold.

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Biopsychosocial Influences

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Gate-Control Theory
Melzack and Wall (1965, 1983) proposed that our
spinal cord contains neurological gates that
either block pain or allow it to be sensed.

Gary Comer/ PhototakeUSA.com

59

Pain Control
Pain can be controlled by a number of therapies
including, drugs, surgery, acupuncture, exercise,
hypnosis, and even thought distraction.

Todd Richards and Aric Vills, U.W.

Hunter Hoffman, www.vrpain.com

60

Taste
Traditionally, taste sensations consisted of sweet,
salty, sour, and bitter tastes. Recently, receptors for
a fifth taste have been discovered called Umami.

Sweet

Sour

Salty

Bitter

Umami
(Fresh
Chicken)
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Sensory Interaction
When one sense affects another sense, sensory
interaction takes place. So, the taste of strawberry
interacts with its smell and its texture on the
tongue to produce flavor.

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Smell
Like taste, smell is a chemical sense. Odorants
enter the nasal cavity to stimulate 5 million
receptors to sense smell. Unlike taste, there are
many different forms of smell.

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Smell and Memories

The brain region for
smell (in red) is closely
connected with the
brain regions involved
with memory (limbic
system). That is why
strong memories are
made through the sense
of smell.
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Body Position and Movement

The sense of our body parts position and
movement is called kinesthesis. The vestibular
sense monitors the head (and bodys) position.

Bob Daemmrich/ The Image Works

http://www.heyokamagazine.com

Whirling Dervishes

Wire Walk

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Perceptual Organization
How do we form meaningful perceptions
from sensory information?
We organize it. Gestalt psychologists
showed that a figure formed a whole
different than its surroundings.
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Form Perception
Organization of the visual field into objects
(figures) that stand out from their surroundings
(ground).
Time Savings Suggestion, 2003 Roger Sheperd.

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Grouping
After distinguishing the figure from the ground,
our perception needs to organize the figure into
a meaningful form using grouping rules.

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Grouping & Reality

Although grouping principles usually help us construct
reality, they may occasionally lead us astray.

Both photos by Walter Wick. Reprinted from GAMES

Magazine. . 1983 PCS Games Limited Partnership

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Depth Perception

Innervisions

Depth perception enables us to judge distances.

Gibson and Walk (1960) suggested that human
infants (crawling age) have depth perception. Even
newborn animals show depth perception.

Visual Cliff

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Binocular Cues
Retinal disparity: Images from the two eyes differ. Try
looking at your two index fingers when pointing them
towards each other half an inch apart and about 5 inches
directly in front of your eyes. You will see a finger
sausage as shown in the inset.

71

Monocular Cues
Relative Size: If two objects are similar in size, we
perceive the one that casts a smaller retinal image
to be farther away.

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Monocular Cues

Interposition: Objects that occlude (block) other

objects tend to be perceived as closer.

Rene Magritte, The Blank Signature, oil on canvas,

National Gallery of Art, Washington. Collection of
Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon. Photo by Richard Carafelli.

73

Monocular Cues
Relative Height: We perceive objects that are higher in our
field of vision to be farther away than those that are lower.

Image courtesy of Shaun P. Vecera, Ph. D.,

adapted from stimuli that appered in Vecrera et al., 2002

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Monocular Cues
Relative motion: Objects closer to a fixation point
move faster and in opposing direction to those
objects that are farther away from a fixation point,
moving slower and in the same direction.

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Monocular Cues
Linear Perspective: Parallel lines, such as railroad
tracks, appear to converge in the distance. The
more the lines converge, the greater their
perceived distance.
The New Yorker Collection, 2002, Jack Ziegler
from cartoonbank.com. All rights reserved.

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Monocular Cues
Light and Shadow: Nearby objects reflect more light into
our eyes than more distant objects. Given two identical
objects, the dimmer one appears to be farther away.

From Perceiving Shape From Shading by Vilayaur

S. Ramachandran. 1988 by Scientific American, Inc.
All rights reserved.

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Perceptual Constancy

Perceiving objects as unchanging even as

illumination and retinal images change.

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Color Constancy
Perceiving familiar objects as having consistent
color even when changing illumination filters
the light reflected by the object.

Color Constancy

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Size-Distance Relationship
The distant monster (below, left) and the top red
bar (below, right) appear bigger because of
distance cues.

Alan Choisnet/ The Image Bank

From Shepard, 1990

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Size-Distance Relationship
Both girls in the room are of similar height.
However, we perceive them to be of different
heights as they stand in the two corners of the
room.

Both photos from S. Schwartzenberg/ The Exploratorium

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Ames Room

The Ames room is designed to demonstrate the sizedistance illusion.

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Lightness Constancy

The color and brightness of square A and B are the same.

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Perceptual Interpretation
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) maintained that
knowledge comes from our inborn ways of
organizing sensory experiences.
John Locke (1632-1704) argued that we learn to
perceive the world through our experiences.
How important is experience in shaping our
perceptual interpretation?
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Sensory Deprivation & Restored

Vision
After cataract surgery,
blind adults were able
to regain sight. These
individuals could
differentiate figure and
ground relationships,
yet they had difficulty
distinguishing a circle
and a triangle
(Von Senden, 1932).
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Facial Recognition

Courtesy of Richard LeGrand

After blind adults

regained sight, they were
able to recognize distinct
features, but were unable
to recognize faces.
Normal observers also
show difficulty in facial
recognition when the
lower half of the pictures
are changed.
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Sensory Deprivation

Kittens raised
without exposure to
horizontal lines later
had difficulty
perceiving horizontal
bars.
Blakemore & Cooper (1970)
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Perceptual Adaptation

Courtesy of Hubert Dolezal

Visual ability to adjust

to an artificially
displaced visual field,
e.g., prism glasses.

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Perceptual Set
A mental predisposition to perceive one thing
and not another. What you see in the center
picture is influenced by flanking pictures.

From Shepard, 1990.

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Perceptual Set
Other examples of perceptual set.

Dick Ruhl

Frank Searle, photo Adams/ Corbis-Sygma

(a) Loch ness monster or a tree trunk;

(b) Flying saucers or clouds?
90

Context Effects
Context can radically alter perception.

Is the magician cabinet on the floor or hanging from the

ceiling?
91

Cultural Context
Context instilled by culture also alters
perception.

To an East African, the woman sitting is balancing a metal

box on her head, while the family is sitting under a tree. 92

Perception Revisited
Is perception innate or acquired?

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Is There Extrasensory Perception?

Perception without sensory input is called
extrasensory perception (ESP). A large percentage
of scientists do not believe in ESP.

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Claims of ESP
1. Telepathy: Mind-to-mind communication. One
person sending thoughts and the other
receiving them.
2. Clairvoyance: Perception of remote events,
such as sensing a friends house on fire.
3. Precognition: Perceiving future events, such as
a political leaders death.

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