SENSATION & PERCEPTION
CHAPTERS 4 & 5AP PSYCHOLOGY
SENSATION
How do we take in information?
• A sense is a system that translates information from outside the nervous system into neural activity.
• Messages from senses are called sensations– For example, vision is the system through which
the eyes convert light into neural activity. This tells the brain something about the source of the light (brightness) or about the objects from which the light is reflected (round, red, etc).
Elements of a Sensory System
1. Energy (light, sound waves, etc) contains info about the world
2. Accessory Structures (lens, ear, etc) modify energy.3. Transduction- the process of converting incoming
energy into neural activity through sensory receptors4. Sensory nerves transfer the coded activity to the
Central Nervous System.5. Thalamus processes and relays the neural response
(except in smell).6. Cortex receives input and produces the sensation and
perception
Figure 4.1: Elements of a Sensory System
How does physical energy get converted into neural activity?
CODING - translation of the physical properties of a stimulus into a pattern of neural activity that specifically identifies those physical properties.
Doctrine of Specific Nerve Energies - stimulation of a particular sensory nerve provides codes for that one sense, no matter how the stimulation takes place
Temporal Code - involves changes in the timing of the neurons firing. Ex: A bright light will cause some neurons in the visual system to fire faster than a dim light.
Spatial Code - the location of the firing neurons provides information about the stimulus (tells us where the sensation is coming from).
HEARING• Sound is a repetitive
fluctuation in the pressure of a medium, such as air.
• In a place like the moon, which has almost no atmospheric medium, sound cannot exist
• When you speak, your vocal cords vibrate, producing fluctuations in air pressure that spread as waves. A wave is a repetitive variation in pressure that spreads out in 3 dimensions.
Physical Characteristics of Sound
1. Amplitude- (intensity) difference in air pressure from the baseline to the peak of a wave.
2. Wavelength- the distance from one peak wave to the next.
3. Frequency- number of complete waves, or cycles, that pass by a given point in space every second. Described in a unit called hertz, (Hz). 1 cycle per second is 1 hertz
Figure 4.2: Sound Waves and Waveforms
Psychological Dimensions of SoundWhat do we actually hear?
1. Loudness- determined by amplitude. Greater amplitude = Louder sounds
2. Pitch- how high or low a tone sounds. Determined by frequency.
– High frequency = High Pitch – Low Frequency = Low Pitch
3. Timbre- (pronounced “tamber”) is the quality of the sound
The Ear• Auditory accessory
structures modify sound waves before information affects neural signals– Pinna – crumpled part of ear
that funnels sound through the ear canal
– Tympanic Membrane – eardrum – tightly stretched membrane in the middle ear where sound waves strike
– Vibrations of the tympanic membrane are transferred through 3 tiny bones - malleus (hammer), incus (anvil), stapes (stirrup)
Sound Waves 1
Auditory Transduction• After sound passes through the oval window, it
enters the inner ear or cochlea - this is where transduction occurs
• The basilar membrane forms the floor of this long tube
• Sound waves bend hairs of the organ of Corti – a group of cells which rest on the membrane
• Hair cells connect with fibers from the auditory nerve, a bundle of axons that goes into the brain
Figure 4.4: The Cochlea
Sound Waves 2
Auditory Pathways
• Auditory nerve brainstem thalamus• The information coded in the activity of
auditory nerve fibers is conveyed to the brain and processed further
• Information is relayed from the auditory nerve to an area of the cerebral cortex called the primary auditory cortex
• Various aspects of sound processed in different regions of auditory system.
• Certain parts of auditory cortex process certain types of sounds.
Auditory Transduction
How we hear?
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSO765hyxrc&feature=related
Sensing Pitch
• Different people may experience the “same” sound as different pitches.
• Pitch-recognition abilities influenced by genetics.– Cultural factors are also partly responsible
for the way in which a pitch is sensed.
Locating Sounds
• Determined partly by the very slight difference in when sound arrives at each ear.
• The brain also uses information about the difference in sound intensity at each ear.
Coding Intensity and Frequency
• The more intense the sound, the more rapid the firing of a given neuron.
• Frequency appears to be coded in two ways: place theory and frequency-matching theory
Coding Frequency: Place Theory
• Sounds produce waves that move down the basilar membrane.– Where the wave peaks
depends on the frequency of the sound.
• Hair cells at a particular place on the membrane respond most to a particular frequency.
Coding Frequency: Frequency Matching Theory
• Firing rate of an auditory nerve matches a sound wave’s frequency.
• Sometimes called the “volley theory” of
frequency coding.
Vision• Light – electromagnetic radiation• Visible light has a wavelength from just under 400 nanometers to 750
nanometers • Light intensity –
– How much energy the light contains – Determines the brightness of light
• Light Wavelength – – The difference between peaks in light waves– Determines what color we see
Figure 4.7: Spectrum of Electromagnetic Energy
The spectrum of electromagnetic energy
Physical Properties of Light Waves
Short wavelength=high frequency(bluish colors, high-pitched sounds)
Long wavelength=low frequency(reddish colors, low-pitched sounds)
Great amplitude(bright colors, loud sounds)
Small amplitude(dull colors, soft sounds)
Accessory Structures of the Eye• Cornea – curved, transparent layer through which light rays enter
the eye• Pupil – opening in the eye through which light passes• Iris – colorful part of the eye which adjusts the amount of light
entering the eye• Lens – bends rays, focusing them on the retina• Retina – Surfaces at back of the eye onto which the lens focuses
light rays
Figure 4.8: Major Structures of the Eye
Vision• Accommodation- the process by which the
eye’s lens changes shape to help focus near or far objects on the retina Acuity- the sharpness of vision Nearsightedness- condition in which nearby
objects are seen more clearly than distant objects because distant objects in front of retina
Farsightedness- condition in which faraway objects are seen more clearly than near objects because the image of near objects is focused behind retina
How Light enters the eye
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15P8q35vNHw
Vision
Normal Vision Nearsighted Farsighted
Converting Light into Images
• Visual transduction is the conversion of light energy into neural activity.
• Conversion done by photoreceptors in the retina.
• Two main types of photoreceptors: Rods and cones.
Rods and Cones
Rods peripheral retina detect black, white
and gray twilight or low light
Cones near center of retina fine detail and color
vision daylight or well-lit
conditions
Interactions in the Retina
• Photoreceptor cells connect to bipolar cells and then to ganglion cells
• Axons of the ganglion cells form the optic nerve, which extends out of the eye and into the brain
• Each neuron of a sensory system has a receptive field – part of the retina and the region of the environment to which that cell responds
Figure 4.11: Center-Surround Receptive Fields of Ganglion
Cells
Figure 4.12: The Hermann Grid
The cell whose receptive field includes the space at the intersection has more whiteness shining on its inhibitory surround than the cell whose receptive field is just to the right of the intersection. The output of the
intersection cell will be lower than that of the one on the right, creating the impression of a shadow.
Visual Pathways• Axons from ganglion cells converge as a bundle of fibers called
the optic nerve and exit the eyeball at one spot• The exit point has no photoreceptors and is insensitive to light
creating a blind spot• About ½ the fibers of the optic nerve cross over to the opposite
side of the brain at the optic chiasm (part of the bottom surface of the brain)
Visual Pathways con’t• Axons from most of ganglion cells in
retina form synapses in the thalamus, in a specific region called the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN)
• Neurons in the LGN relay the visual input to the primary visual cortex, located in the occipital lobes in the back of the brain
Pathways from the Eyes to the Visual Cortex
Visual Representations• Receptive fields of neurons are characterized
by parallel processing and hierarchical processing– Parallel Processing of visual properties: Brain conducts separate
kinds of analysis simultaneously on the same information.– The “what” system– The “where” system
– Hierarchical Processing of visual properties: • Individual cells in the visual cortex receive input from several
LGN neurons.• Cortical cells respond to specific features of objects in the
visual field – Feature detectors
Light Conversion
Seeing Color• Hue – color determined by the
dominant wavelength in the mixture of the light (excludes black, white, gray)
• Saturation – purity of a color
• Brightness – overall intensity of the wavelengths that make up light
Visual Information Processing
Trichromatic (three color) Theory Young and Helmholtz three different retinal color receptors
Trichromatic Theory of Color
• Any color can be produced by mixing pure lights of blue, green, and red.
• There are three types of cones, each most sensitive to particular wavelengths.
• Ratio of the activities of the three types of cones indicates what color is sensed.
Opponent-Process Theory
• Ewald Hering
• Each of the three color sensitive elements are organized as pairs, where each pair member opposes, or inhibits, the other– Red-Green– Blue-Yellow– Black-White
Trichromatic and Opponent-Process Theories
Opponent-Process Theory
Figure 4.20: Color Coding and Ganglion Cells
The Chemical Senses
• Olfaction detects airborne chemicals– Our sense of smell
• Gustation detects chemicals in solution that come into contact with receptors inside the mouth– Our sense of taste
Figure 4.23: The Olfactory System
Olfactory System
• Employs about 1,000 different types of receptors.
• Only sense that does not send its messages through the thalamus.
• Processing in several brain regions including frontal lobe and amygdala
• Strong relationship between olfaction and emotional memory
Olfactory System (cont’d.)
• Only sense that does not send its messages through the thalamus.
• Pathways from olfactory bulb sends information on for further processing in several brain regions.– Including frontal lobe and amygdala.
• Strong relationship between olfaction and emotional memory.
Pheromones
• Chemicals released by one animal, and when detected by another, can shape the second animal’s behavior or physiology.
• Role of pheromones in humans not clear
Age, Sex and Sense of Smell
Women
Men
10-19 20-29 30-39 40-49 50-59 60-69 70-79 80-89 90-99Age Group
4
3
2
0
Numberof correct
answers
Women and young adults have best sense of smell
Smell, Taste, and Flavor
• Smell and taste act together to form system known as flavor.
• Tastes and odors can prompt strong emotional responses.
• Nutritional state can affect taste and flavor of food and motivation to eat particular foods.
• Flavor includes other characteristics of food.
Somatic Senses and the Vestibular System
• Somatosensory systems are spread throughout the body
• Somatic senses include:– Skin senses of touch, temperature, and
pain– Kinesthesia
• Vestibular system tells the brain about the position and movement of the head
Touch
• Energy detected is physical pressure on tissue.
• Many nerve endings in the skin act as touch receptors.
• Touch is both an active and passive sense.
• Changes in touch provide most important sensory information.
Coding of Touch Information
• Intensity of the stimulus is coded by:– Firing rate of individual neurons and– The number of neurons stimulated.
• Location is coded by the location of the neurons responding to the touch.
Temperature
• Some of the skin’s sensory neurons respond to a change in temperature.– “Warm” and “cold” fibers
• Sensations of touch and temperature sometimes interact.
• Stimulation of the touch sense can have psychological and physiological effects.
Pain
• Pain provides information about impact of world on body.
• Information-carrying aspect of pain very similar to that of touch and temperature.
• Two types of nerve fibers carry pain signals from skin to the spinal chord.
• Cerebral cortex plays role in the experience of pain.
Figure 4.25: Pain Pathways
Modulating Pain
• Gate Control Theory theory that the spinal cord contains a
neurological “gate” that blocks pain signals or allows them to pass on to the brain
“gate” opened by the activity of pain signals traveling up small nerve fibers
“gate” closed by activity in larger fibers or by information coming from the brain
• Natural Analgesics– Serotonin– Endorphins
Proprioceptive Senses
• Sensory systems that provide information to the brain about:– The position of the body.– What each of part of the body is doing.
• Vestibular sense indicates the position of the head in space and its general movements.– Sense of balance.
Vestibular Sense
• Organs:– Vestibular sacs– Otoliths– Semicircular canals
• Neural connections to:– The cerebellum– The autonomic nervous system– The eye muscles
Kinesthesia
• Sense that indicates where the parts of the body are with respect to one another.– Necessary guide for
movement.
• Kinesthetic information comes primarily from the joints as well as muscles.
PERCEPTION
Three Approaches to Perception
• Computational – tries to determine the computations that a machine would have to solve perceptual problems
• Constructivist – reality is constructed from fragments of sensory information
• Ecological – environment contains most of the information needed to form perceptions
Psychophysics
• Describes the relationship between the physical energy in the environment and the psychological experience of that energy
• Absolute Threshold – the minimum detectable amount of environmental energy a sensory system can detect
Absolute Thresholds Table 5.1
Signal-Detection Theory
• Sensitivity – a person’s ability to pick out a particular stimulus or signal
• Response Criterion – a person’s willingness or reluctance to say that a stimulus is present
• Signal-Detection Theory – model of our personal sensitivity and response criterion combined to determine whether or not a near-threshold stimulus has occurred
Figure 5.4: Signal Detection
Judging Differences Between Stimuli
• Difference Threshold or Just-Noticeable Difference (JND)
• JND determined by two factors:– How much of a stimulus was there to
begin with?– Which sense is being stimulated?
Click the link below to see how JND impacts the consumer world:http://www.psfk.com/2009/03/media-arts-mondays-just-noticeable-
difference.html
Weber’s Law
• Weber’s Constant
• Law States That JND = KI– K is the Weber’s constant for a particular
sense.– I is the amount, or intensity, of the
stimulus.• The smaller K is, the more sensitive a sense is
to stimulus differences
Magnitude Estimation
• Magnitude estimation is how our perception of stimulus intensity is related to actual stimuli strength
• Fechner’s Law– Constant increases in physical energy will
produce smaller increases in perceived magnitude
• Steven’s Power Law– Describes a wider range of sensations
Perceptual Illusions
• Illusion – incorrect perception of a stimulus
• Delusion – a false belief
• Hallucination – a perception in the absence of a stimulus
Figure 5.5: Length Illusions
Figure 5.6: Organize This!
Perceptual Illusions
Ames room
Perceptual Illusions
Ames room
Basic Processes in Perceptual Organization
• Figure-Ground Organization– Perceptual apparatus picks out some objects to be figures,
while others are less relevant in the background
• Grouping– Inherent properties of the stimulus environment lead people
to group them together Grouping Principles
Proximity--group nearby figures together Similarity--group figures that are similar Continuity--perceive continuous patterns Closure--fill in gaps Connectedness--spots, lines, and areas are seen as unit when
connected Synchrony – occur at the same time Common region – located within some boundary Connectedness – connected by other elements
Figure 5.7: Reversible Images
Figure-Ground
Figure 5.8: Gestalt Principles of Perceptual Grouping
More Grouping Principles
Perceptual Organization
• Likelihood Principle– We perceive objects in the way that
experience tells us is the most likely physical arrangement (consistent with Constructivism)
• Simplicity Principle– We organize stimulus elements in a way
that gives us the simplest possible perception
Figure 5.9: Impossible Objects
Perception of Location and Distance
• Two-Dimensional Location – uses an equation that takes information about where an image strikes the retina and adjusts it based on information about movement of your eyes and head– Visual dominance – bias toward using
visual information when it conflicts with information from other senses
Depth Perception• Our ability to perceive distance, allowing people to
experience the world in three-dimensions1. Interposition – closer objects block the view of
things further away2. Relative Size – the object producing a larger
image on the retina is perceived as closer3. Height in the Visual Field – more distant objects
are higher in the visual field4. Texture Gradient – graduated change in texture –
less detailed as distance increases5. Linear Perspective – the closer together 2
converging lines are, the greater the perceived distance
6. Clarity, Color, Shadow – distant objects appear hazier
7. Motion Parallax – objects closer appear to move rapidly, while those distant appear motionless
Figure 5.10: Stimulus Cues for Depth Perception
Cues Based on Physiology
• Accommodation – muscles surrounding the lens either tighten (to focus on close objects) or relax (to focus on distant objects)
• Convergence – each eye rotates inward to see closer objects
• Binocular Disparity – the difference between the two retinal images of an object provides distance cues
Perceptual Organization: Depth Perception
Visual Cliff
Perceptual Organization: Depth Perception
Relative Size
Perceptual Organization: Depth Perception
Interposition
Perceptual Organization: Depth Perception
Perception of Motion
• Looming – a rapid expansion in the size of an image so that it fills the retina and is perceived as an approaching object
• Stroboscopic Motion – our tendency to perceive motion through a series of flashing rapid light
Perceptual Constancy
• The perception of objects as constant in size, shape and color
• Size Constancy – occurs as objects move closer or farther away
• Shape Constancy – occurs as an object appears the same, even though the shape of its retinal image changes
• Brightness Constancy – occurs so that no matter how the amount of light striking an object changes, its perceived brightness remains constant
Figure 5.12: A Size Illusion
Perceptual Organization: Muller-Lyer Illusion
Figure 5.13: Brightness Contrast
Recognizing the Perceptual World
• The brain analyzes the incoming pattern of the stimulus and compares that pattern to information stored in the memory– Top-down processing – guided by knowledge and
expectations• Our experiences create schemas, or mental
representations of what we know about the world
– Bottom-up processing – relies on specific, detailed information from sensory receptors that are integrated and assembled into a whole
Parallel Distributed Processing Models (PDP)
• Units in a network operate parallelsimultaneously
• Each element is connected to all other computational elements
• Recognition occurs as a result of the simultaneous operation of connected units
Attention
• The process of directing and focusing certain psychological resources to enhance perception, performance, and mental experience
Articles
• http://www.hhmi.org/senses/
Illusions
• http://psylux.psych.tu-dresden.de/i1/kaw/diverses%20Material/www.illusionworks.com/index.html
Blind Spot Demonstration
• http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/blindspot1.html
Jeopardy
• http://www.uni.edu/walsh/jeopardy.html
More Information on Sensation and Perception
• http://www.muhlenberg.edu/depts/psychology/lsnodgrass/sp/dem_links.html
References
• http://college.cengage.com/psychology/bernstein/psychology/7e/instructors/index.html
• http://www.lbusd.k12.ca.us/millikan/Teacher_folder/HawkinsS/AdPlPsychology2.htm