Psychology Around Us:

Chapter 5
Sensation & Perception
 Learning Objectives (1 of 2)
1. Describe characteristics shared by all the senses,
including receptor cells, transduction, and thresholds,
and differentiate between top-down and bottom-up
processes of perception.
2. Summarize the biological changes that underlie smell
and taste.
 Learning Objectives (2 of 2)
3. Describe how the different senses of touch work
and what can happen when things go wrong.
4. Summarize what happens when we hear.
5. Describe key processes in visual sensation and
perception.
The Dress
 Sensation and Perception
• Sensation – the act of using our sensory systems to detect
environmental stimuli
– What stimuli can our body detect? And how?
• Perception – the conscious recognition and identification of a
sensory stimulus
– How does our brain make sense of the information our sense have
detected?
 Sensation and Perception - Types
• Both sensation and perception are critical for our interpretation and
interaction with our environment

Sensory System Physical Stimuli

Olfactory (smell) Odourants (airborne chemicals)
Somatosensory (touch, heat, pain) Pressure or damage to the skin
Gustatory (taste) Chemicals (typically in food)
Auditory (hearing) Sound waves
Visual (sight) Light (photons)

Sensory transduction converts environmental stimuli into neural activity

 Sensory Receptor Cells
• Sensory receptor cells – specialized cells that convert a specific form of
environmental stimuli into neural impulses
• Sensory transduction – the process of converting a specific form of
environmental stimuli into a neural impulse that our brain can read
Sensory Homunculus
Thresholds: Testing the Limits (1 of 2)
• Absolute threshold – the smallest amount of a stimulus that one [most
people] can detect:
– Smell – a drop of perfume diffused throughout a six-room apartment
– Taste – 5 millilitres of sugar in 9 litres of water
– Touch – an insect’s wing falling on your cheek from a height of about a
centimetre
– Hearing – the tick of a watch at 6 metres in a quiet room
– Sight – a candle flame 50 kilometres away on a clear, dark night
Thresholds: Testing the Limits (2 of 2)
• Difference threshold (just noticeable difference) – the minimal difference
needed to notice a difference between two stimuli
• Signal detection theory – the response to a signal in every situation depends
on an individual’s ability to differentiate between the signal and noise, and on
their response criteria
 Sensory Adaptation
Repeated stimulation of a sensory cell leads to a reduced response.
Examples:
• The tag in your shirt that bothered you this morning, but now you don’t
even notice it!
• The sound of the train that passes by your home several times a day,
which you no longer notice.
 Processing Sensory Information (1 of 2)

• Bottom-up processing – perception that proceeds by transducing

environmental stimuli into neural impulses that move successively into
more complex brain regions
– You take thousands of individual data points of visual stimuli and put them
together to create an image of your mother; this is what happens in your
digital camera
 Processing Sensory Information (2 of 2)

• Top-down processing – perception processes led by cognitive

processes, such as memory or expectations
– You recognize some of those data points and immediately
match them to your previous knowledge about your mother’s
face
 Perceptual Set
• Perceptual set is the readiness to interpret a certain stimulus in a certain way
Duck/Rabbit and others
 The Chemical Senses: Smell
• Odourants – airborne chemicals that
are detected as odours
• Olfactory receptor neurons – sensory
receptor cells that convert chemical
signals from odourants into neural
impulses that travel to the brain
 The Chemical Senses: Taste (1 of 2)
• Papillae – bumps on the tongue that contain clumps of taste
buds
• Taste buds – clusters of sensory receptor cells that convert
chemical signals from food into neural impulses that travel to
the brain
 The Chemical Senses: Taste (2 of 2)
Five taste receptors on your tongue:
1. Sweet
2. Sour
3. Bitter
4. Salt
5. Umami – the taste of monosodium
glutamate (MSG)
 Eating is more than Taste and Smell

• Overall sensations from eating are based on more than

smell and taste.
• Consistency of food is relayed to the brain by inputs from
touch receptors located on the tongue.
• Some foods are rejected due to texture.
 The Development of Smell and Taste
• Smell is relatively well-developed at birth. Newborns can show
a preference for the odour of their mother’s milk.
• Taste is also well developed at birth. Infants show a
preference for sweet and an aversion to bitter.
• Why might infants begin life with these senses well-
developed?
 Individual Differences in Taste and
Smell
• Females are generally more sensitive to odours than
males.
• Taste is variable in individuals; some are more sensitive
to bitter substances than others.
– E.g. “super-tasters”
 Smell and Taste Disorders
• Ageusia – inability to taste, a rare disorder
• Anosmia – inability to detect odours
• Hyposmia – reduced ability to smell
• Reflex epilepsy – a seizure occurs only after exposure to a
specific odour
• Migraine headaches – specific odours can trigger migraines
 Tactile or Cutaneous Senses
The tactile or somatosensory system is a combination of skin senses,
including:
• Pressure
• Touch
• Temperature
• Vibration
• Pain
The tactile senses rely on a variety of receptors located in different parts of
the skin.
 Different Somatosensory Receptors
(1 of 3)
• Free nerve endings
– Located near the surface of the skin
– Function: detect touch, pressure, pain, and temperature
• Meissner’s corpuscles
– Located in fingertips, lips, and palms (hairless skin areas)
– Function: transduce information about sensitive touch
 Different Somatosensory Receptors
(2 of 3)
• Merkel’s discs
– Located near the surface of the skin
– Function: transduce information about light to moderate
pressure against the skin
 Different Somatosensory
Receptors (3 of 3)
• Ruffini’s end-organs
– Located deep in the skin
– Function: register heavy pressure and movement of the joints
• Pacinian corpuscles
– Located deep in the skin
– Function: respond to vibrations and heavy pressure
Steps to Perceiving Touch
 Two Pathways of Pain
• Fast pathway (myelinated pathway) – sharp, localized pain is felt
quicker because it travels along myelinated neurons to the brain
• Slow pathway (unmyelinated pathway) – these inputs
communicate with brain regions involved in processing emotions;
pain we perceive via the slow pathway is more often burning pain
than sharp pain
 Development of Tactile Senses
• Developed at birth.
• After birth, the ability to respond to different somatosensory
stimuli is dependent on brain development and learning.
• The work of Harry Harlow demonstrated that touch is
necessary for healthy development.
 Tactile Senses: Individual Differences
• Women have a lower threshold for detecting pain than men, which may be
due to differences in the nervous system.
• Neuroimaging studies have revealed that people’s brains react differently
depending on their sensitivity to pain.
 Gate control theory of pain
• Patterns of neural activity can actually close a “gate” that
prevents messages from reaching parts of the brain where they
are perceived as pain.
 Disorders of the Tactile Senses
(1 of 2)
• Chronic pain is the most common abnormality associated
with the somatosensory system.
o Endorphins and enkephalins are naturally occurring chemicals
produced by the nervous system that have pain-relieving properties
o Opiates such as morphine, heroin, and oxycodone mimic the body’s
pain relief system
o Gate control theory and touch sensations can help alleviate acute
pain.
 Disorders of the Tactile Senses
(2 of 2)
• No pain (familial dysautonomia) – rare genetic condition
associated with an inability to detect pain or temperature and
produce tears.
• Phantom limb sensations – tactile hallucinations of touch,
pressure, vibration, and pain in the body part that no longer
exists.
Phantom Limbs
BREAK TIME!
 The Auditory Sense: Hearing (1 of 2)

• Sound waves – vibrations of the air in the frequency of

hearing.
• Frequency – the number of cycles per second in a wave
– Determines pitch of sound
– Measured in units called Hertz (Hz), which represent cycles
per second
– We hear best in the range of 2000 − 5000 Hz
The Auditory Sense: Hearing (2 of 2)

• Amplitude – the magnitude (height of a wave)

– Determines loudness
– Measured in units called decibels (dB)
How the Ear Hears (1 of 4)
 How the Ear Hears (2 of 4)
• Sound waves enter the outer ear
• Waves hit the tympanic
membrane (eardrum)
• Waves pass into the middle ear,
which contains the three smallest
bones in the human body: the
ossicles: maleus (hammer), incus
(anvil), and stapes (stirrup)
 How the Ear Hears (3 of 4)
• Stapes hits the oval window,
causing a wave to form in the
fluid in the cochlea
• The fluid deflects the basilar
membrane, bending its hair
cells that transduce the fluid
sound wave into electrical
activity
• As hair cells move, neural
impulses are created and
sent to the brain
 How the Ear Hears (4 of 4)
• Tonotopic map
o Sound travels to the brainstem, the thalamus and then the auditory
cortex
o In the auditory cortex, sound is received in a tonotopic map
o Certain frequencies are always received by specific areas of auditory
cortex
 Identifying Frequency and Pitch
(1 of 2)
• Frequency theory
– Different sound frequencies are converted into
different rates of action potentials
– High-frequency sounds produce a more rapid firing
than do low-frequency sounds
 Identifying Frequency and Pitch
(2 of 2)
• Place theory
– Differences in sound frequency activate different
regions of the basilar membrane
– The brain equates the place activity occurred on the
basilar membrane with a particular frequency
 Absolute Pitch
• The ability to recognize or produce any note on a musical scale.
• Western countries – approximately 1 in 10,000 people have it
• It develops between 3 and 6 years of age
• Those who speak tonal languages (Mandarin Chinese) are more likely
to have absolute pitch.

Singer Mariah Carey was born

with absolute (perfect) pitch.
Do You Hear What I Hear?
Soundwaves detectable by different
animals
 Sound Adaptation
• The muscles around our ears can contract so less of the sound
wave enters the ear
• Our ears become less sensitive to continuous noises
• Our brains filter out sounds that are not important
• Cocktail party effect – the brain picks up on relevant sounds,
even in a noisy environment
 Sound Localization
• General loudness – louder sounds seem closer
• Loudness in each ear – the ear closer to the sound hears a
louder noise than the ear farther from the sound
• Timing – sound waves will reach the ear closer to the source
of the sound before they reach the ear farther away
 Development of Hearing
• Babies can hear before they are born
• Ability to recognize and respond appropriately to
sounds develops in the first few months after birth
• Infants prefer speech (especially mom’s) to non-
speech
 Hearing Loss (1 of 2)
• Deafness – loss of hearing (partial or complete)
– Can be genetic, caused by infection, physical trauma
(headphone use), exposure to toxins, high doses of common
medications such as Aspirin
• Tinnitus – ringing in the ear
– Due to abnormalities in the ear
– One of every 200 people experiences tinnitus
 Hearing Loss (2 of 2)
• Medical devices that are implanted in the ear and are
wired to the nerves that send sound information to the
brain
– Cochlear implants – are they a good idea?
 The Visual Sense: Sight
Visible light and the electromagnetic spectrum
 How the Eye Works (1 of 2)
• Light enters the eye
• Muscles in the iris (coloured
part of the eye) adjust pupil size
to control the amount of light
allowed in
• Muscles also change the shape
of the lens to bring the object
into focus
 How the Eye Works (2 of 2)
• The lens focuses the light on the
retina, multi-layered sheet of nerve
cells
• Photoreceptors (sensory receptor
cells for vision called rods and
cones) are located in the retina
• There are two classes of
photoreceptors (rods and cones),
which transduce the light waves
into a neural impulse
 The Retina (1 of 2)
Rods
• Detect light
• Used for periphery and night
vision
• Not as acute as cones (i.e., fuzzy
vision)
• Many more rods than cones (over
100 million)
 The Retina (2 of 2)
Cones
• Used for central and colour vision
• Very acute (i.e., very clear)
o The fovea (centre of retina)
contains all cones
• Not as many cones (4.5 to 6 million)
 Seeing in Colour (1 of 3)
• Hue – the experience of colour based on the wavelength
of light; green, blue, red, and other colours
• Saturation – purity of color; how bright or vivid it is
• Brightness – how much light is reflected from the object
 Seeing in Colour (2 of 3)
• Trichromatic theory – there are three different sensors
for colour and each type responds to a different range of
wavelengths of light
– We see more than three colours, which is the variety of
colours arise from combining the three colours.
 Seeing in Colour (3 of 3)
• Opponent process theory – colour pairs work to inhibit
one another in the perception of colour
– Retinal ganglion cells are arranged in opposing cells:
red-green, yellow-blue, black-white
– Support for this theory – we cannot see mixes of certain
colors: reddish green or bluish yellow
Negative Afterimages
 Colour Blindness
Most people who are colour blind cannot distinguish between red and green.
 Is Your Blue My Blue?
• https://ismy.blue/
Human vs. Other Animal Visual
Spectrum
The Dress Again
BREAK TIME!
 Visual Fields
The optic nerve carries messages from each eye (visual field) to the visual cortex
(occipital lobe).
Visual Pathway
• The optic nerve contains the axons of 1 million
ganglion cells that exit the eye via the blind spot
and project to the thalamus
• From the thalamus, neurons project to the visual
cortex
“What” and “Where” Pathways
 “What” Pathway
• Helps us determine the identity of an
object
• Visual agnosia – damage to the “what”
pathway; cannot visually recognize
objects
• Prosopagnosia – a form of visual agnosia
in which people cannot recognize faces
 “Where” Pathway
Locating objects in space
Hemi-neglect – damage to the “where”
pathway; people ignore one side of their
visual field
• Example: eat food on only one side of plate
• People with damage to the right side of
their “where” pathways neglect the left
side of their visual field
NOW, LET’S TAKE A “TOP-DOWN”
PERSPECTIVE ON VISUAL PERCEPTION
 Gestalt (Top-Down Processing) Laws
(1 of 5)
Proximity:
Objects that are physically close together are grouped together.
(In the figure below, we see 3 groups of 6 hearts, not 18 separate
hearts).
Gestalt (Top-Down Processing) Laws
(2 of 5)
Similarity:
Similar objects are grouped together (the
green-coloured dots are grouped together and
perceived as the number 5).
 Gestalt (Top-Down Processing)
Laws (3 of 5)
Continuity:
Objects that continue a pattern are grouped together
 Gestalt (Top-Down Processing)
Laws (4 of 5)
Closure:
We fill in small gaps in objects so that they are perceived as
whole objects
 Gestalt (Top-Down Processing)
Laws (5 of 5)
Figure ground:
The tendency to perceive one aspect as the figure and the other
one as the background
 How Many Legs?
The brain is organized to perceive meaningful
images. This one is impossible!
 Depth Perception
• Binocular cues – cues from both eyes
• Retinal disparity – different images of objects are cast
on the retinas of each eye
• Convergence – the tendency of the eyes to move toward
each other as we focus on objects up close
Retinal Disparity
 Monocular Cues – Cues from One
Eye (1 of 4)
Some examples:
a) Relative height – we see objects that
are higher in our visual plane as
farther away than those that are
lower
Monocular Cues – Cues from One
Eye (2 of 4)
b) Texture gradient – we can see
more details of textured
surfaces, such as the wood grain
on a restaurant table, that are
closer to us
 Monocular Cues – Cues from One
Eye (3 of 4)
c) Relative height – when we look at
two objects we know are about the
same size, if one seems smaller
than the other, we see it as farther
away than the other
 Monocular Cues – Cues from One
Eye (4 of 4)
d) Linear perspective – parallel lines seem to converge in the distance
 Monocular Cues and Illusions (1 of 2)
The Müller-Lyer illusion: The line on the right appears longer, but both lines are
the same length.
 Monocular Cues and Illusions (2 of 2)
The Ponzo illusion: The converging lines make the upper bar seem larger, but
both bars are identical in length.
 Pavement Patty, West Vancouver,
BC
Would seeing this on the road ahead slow you down? The BCAA Traffic Safety Foundation and
West Vancouver District had an artist design a decal that when applied flat on the road creates
a three-dimensional image of what appears to be a child on the road. The image of “Pavement
Patty,” which plays with our two-dimensional depth cues, really made drivers slow down during
its week on the road.
Magnetic Hill, Moncton, NB
 Perceptual Constancies: Shape
and Size Constancy (1 of 3)
• Perceptual constancy – our top-down tendency to view objects
as unchanging, despite shifts in the environmental stimuli we
receive
• Size constancy – we perceive objects as the same size,
regardless of the distance from which it is viewed
• Shape constancy – we see an object as the same shape, no
matter from what angle it is viewed
Perceptual Constancies: Shape
and Size Constancy (2 of 3)

The Ames room

 Perceptual Constancies: Shape
and Size Constancy (3 of 3)
• The Ames room: a number of Ames room sets were built for the Lord of
the Rings movies to help make the hobbits appear smaller than
Gandalf or Aragorn.
 The Visual Sense: Sight (1 of 2)
The development of sight
• Newborns can see, but their vision will improve significantly by
two months of age
• At eight months of age, visual acuity is similar to adults
• Experience with the visual world is necessary for normal visual
system development
 The Visual Sense: Sight (2 of 2)
Visual impairment and loss
• Strabismus – lack of coordinated movement of both eyes; affects
about 2%−4% of the population
• Amblyopia – a loss of visual abilities in a weaker eye; abnormal
development of the brain’s visual cortex due to a failure to receive
coordinated visual stimulation from both eyes by the age of six
 Visual Impairments and Loss
• About half a million people in Canada have visuals
impairments
• Each year, 50,000 Canadians lose their sight

• How do people adapt to visual impairments?

– Braille – a form of reading skill used by individuals suffering
from visual impairments
– What else?
 The Other Senses: Vestibular and
Kinesthetic
• Kinesthetic – receptor cells in your muscles tell the brain
when we are moving and where our body parts are in
space
• Vestibular – located in the semicircular canals of our
inner ears; the movement of fluid tells us if we are
standing up or swaying from side to side
 Tying it Together: Your Brain and
Behaviour
What sensory systems are activated when you eat pizza?
Another example
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