Sensation and Perception

Recognizing a familiar song on the radio.

Understanding the meaning of a sentence.

Feeling the warmth of the sun on your skin.

Forming an opinion about a political issue.

Using previous experiences to interpret new information.

Starting with expectations to understand sensory input.

Analysis that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information.

Focusing on the whole picture rather than individual details.

Identifying the individual notes in a musical chord.

Reading a word even when some of the letters are missing.

Detecting a faint odor in the air.

Feeling the texture of a fabric.

Add the same amount of salt as the first pinch.

Add a percentage of salt that exceeds the just noticeable difference.

Add salt until the taster says it tastes good.

Add a fixed amount of salt, regardless of the original amount.

The intensity of the stimulus alone.

Our expectations, motivation, and alertness.

The absolute threshold for the stimulus.

Sensory adaptation to the stimulus.

Immediately noticing the smell of perfume when you walk into a room.

Gradually becoming less aware of the noise of a fan after a few minutes.

Turning up the volume on the TV to hear it better.

Seeing a faint star in the night sky after focusing your eyes.

Absolute threshold

Perceptual set

Sensory adaptation

Weber's Law

The ability to focus on multiple conversations at once.

The tendency to become inattentive in noisy environments.

The ability to attend to only one voice among many.

The experience of inattentional blindness at social gatherings.

Proximity

Similarity

Closure

Continuity

Retinal disparity

Convergence

Interposition

Binocular fusion