Perception

MEHREEN AFTAB
“Change the way you look at things and the things you
look at change.”

WAYNE W. DYE
Perception
Perception refers to the way sensory information is organized, interpreted, and consciously
experienced.

our perceptions are built from sensations (smell, vision, taste, touch, auditory).

Perception involves both bottom-up and top-down processing.

Bottom-up processing refers to the fact that perceptions are built from sensory input.

Top-down processing refers to how we interpret those sensations is influenced by our available
knowledge, our experiences, and our thoughts.
sensory adaptation

Not all sensations result in perception. In fact, we often don’t perceive stimuli that remain relatively constant over
prolonged periods of time. This is known as sensory adaptation.

For example “ticking of clock” Upon first entering the room, you can hear the ticking of the clock; as you begin to
engage in conversation with classmates or listen to your professor greet the class, you are no longer aware of the
ticking.

Attention

Attention plays a significant role in determining what is sensed versus what is perceived.

Failure to notice something that is completely visible because of a lack of attention is called inattentional
blindness.
Signal detection theory: The ability to identify a stimulus when it is set in a confusing background.
This ability is influenced by our motivation e.g mother is awakened by a quiet murmur from her baby
but not by other sounds that occur while she is asleep.
Perceptual organization
Perceptual organization is the process of grouping visual elements together
(organization) so that one can more readily determine the meaning of the visual as a
whole (perception). 

To know where the objects in our environment are, the first thing that we have to do is separate the
objects from one another and from the background. Then the perceptual system can determine the
position of the objects in a three-dimensional world, including their distance from us and their patterns
of movement.
Perceiving objects

The Gestalt psychologists emphasized the importance of perceiving whole objects or forms, and
proposed a number of principles to explain how we organize objects.

Separation of the object

The image projected on our retina is a mixture of changing brightnesses and colors. Somehow
our perceptual system organizes that mixture into a set of separate objects projected against a
background.
Figure and ground
refers to the tendency of the visual system to
simplify a scene into the main object that we
are looking at (the figure) and everything else
that forms the background (or ground).The
regions seen as a figure contain the objects of
interest – they appear more solid than the
ground and appear in front of it.
Grouping of objects

The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli

into clear groups. There are four principles of
grouping according to gestalt.

1. proximity

This principle asserts that things that are close

to one another tend to be grouped together. For
example, we read this sentence like this, notl
iket hiso rt hat.
2. similarity

According to this principle, things that are alike

tend to be grouped together. For example, when
watching a football game, we tend to group
individuals based on the colors of their
uniforms.

3. continuity

The law of continuity suggests that we are

more likely to perceive continuous, smooth
flowing lines rather than jagged, broken lines.
4. closure

The principle of closure states that we

organize our perceptions into complete objects
rather than as a series of parts.
Perceiving distance

To know where an object is, we must know its distance or depth.

A retina is a two-dimensional surface onto which a three-dimensional world is projected.

The retina therefore directly reflects height and width, but depth information is lost and must somehow
be reconstructed on the basis of subtle pieces of information known collectively as depth cues.

There are two types of depth cues:

1. Binocular cue

Binocular cues are defined as the ability of both of our eyes to perceive

an object in three-dimensional space. It's much easier for our brains to
accurately calculate the depth and distance of objects when we use both
eyes. These cues are based on different images that our two separate
eyes produce.

The term binocular disparity is used to refer to the difference in the

views seen by each eye.

The disparity is largest for objects that are seen at close range and
becomes smaller as the object move away into the distance.

The use of binocular cues is limited to objects that are relatively close.
2. Monocular cues

A monocular cue is a depth perception cue that can be perceived with only one eye.

objects that are further away like distant clouds, cityscapes, or mountains, here, binocular cues are
relatively ineffective and other cues, known as monocular cues, must be used, and the task of the visual
system is not straightforward.

There are five monocular cues that are used to perceive distant objects.

1. Relative size. If an image contains a collection of similar objects that differ in size, the viewer
interprets the smaller objects as being farther away.
2. Interposition. If one object is positioned so that it obstructs the view of the other, the viewer
perceives the overlapping object as being nearer.

3. Relative height. Among similar objects, those that appear closer to the horizon are perceived as
being farther away.

4. Perspective. When parallel lines in a scene appear to converge in the image, they are perceived as
vanishing in the distance.

5.Shading and shadows. Whenever a surface in a scene is blocked from receiving direct light, a
shadow is cast. If that shadow falls on a part of the same object that is blocking the light, it is called an
attached shadow or simply shading.
If it falls on another surface that does not belong
to the object casting the shadow, it is called a
cast shadow. Both kinds of shadows are
important cues to depth in the scene, giving us
information about object shapes, distances
between objects, and where the light source is in
a scene.

Depth perception

The ability to perceive the three-dimensional

world with the help of depth cues is known as
depth perception.
Perceiving motion

If we are to move around our environment effectively, we need to know not only the locations of
stationary objects but also the trajectories of moving ones.

Motion. Have you ever noticed that if you are moving quickly – perhaps on a fast-moving train –
nearby objects seem to move quickly in the opposite direction while more distant objects move more
slowly (though still in the opposite direction)? Extremely distant objects, such as the moon, appear not
to move at all. The difference in the speeds with which these objects appear to move provides a cue to
their distance from us and is termed motion parallax.
 Perceptual constancies
Size constancy

The perceived size of an object remains the same, even though the size of its image on the retina
changes.

For example Try holding your left hand a few inches in front of your nose and your right hand at arm’s
length. Your right hand should appear to be about half the size of your left hand. Still, you know your
right hand did not suddenly shrink, because you have seen it many times at various distances.

.
To perceive your hand accurately, you had to
draw on past experience to provide a top-down
plan for constructing your perception
Shape constancy

In shape constancy the shape of an object

remains stable, regardless of its orientation and
angle from which we view it, even though the
shape of its retinal image changes.
Color constancy

Color Constancy is the ability to perceive colors of objects, regardless to the color of the light
source. 

For example see what we mean by this, suppose you are looking at something, say a piece of red
paper, and asked to name its color. Color constancy refers to the fact that you would report the paper to
be red whether it were inside a room lit by an incandescent bulb, which illuminates the paper with one
particular set of wavelengths or outside in the noonday sun, which illuminates the paper with a very
different set of wavelengths.
Brightness constancy

refers to the fact that the brightness of objects appears to stay the same as lighting conditions change.
Thus, a black velvet shirt can look just as black in sunlight as in shadow, even though it reflects
thousands of times more light when it is directly illuminated by the sun.
Illusion -An illusion is a mistaken or distorted perception.

Muller Lyer illusion

The Muller-Lyer illusion is a well-known

optical illusion in which two lines of the same
length appear to be of different lengths. The
illusion was first created by a German 
psychologist named Franz Carl Muller-Lyer in
1889.
The Depth Cue Explanation

Depth plays an important role in our ability to judge distance. One explanation of the Muller-Lyer
illusion is that our brains perceive the depths of the two shafts based upon depth cues. When the fins
are pointing in toward the shaft of the line, we perceive it as sloping away much like the corner of a
building. This depth cue leads us to see that line as further away and therefore shorter.

When the fins are pointing outward away from the line, it looks more like the corner of a room sloping
toward the viewer. This depth cue leads us to believe that this line is closer and therefore longer.
Stroboscopic motion

Stroboscopic motion is an illusion when lights

or images are flashed quickly and the brain
perceives them as moving. A great example of
stroboscopic motion is a flip book. One image
is quickly replaced by another image with
slight alteration to the original ,resulting is a
'motion' picture. The brain perceive these
flashing images as a whole rather than seeing
the pictures as separate images, following the
concept of Gestalt Theory.
Issues in perception
Direct and Indirect Perception

Direct approach to perception argues that the usually reliable cues in the visual display of a scene directly provide
information about depth and distance.

The direct view assumes that the perceiver picks up the information given by the environment naturally and
without reflecting on them, which has led many to call this approach an ecological one

vs

Indirect approach to perception argues that our judgments of depth are made on the basis of our past experience
with the depth cues.

we construct the scene to produce a perception of depth and distance. These perceptual processes have led some to
call this the constructivist approach
Empirical theory- von Helmholtz

all of our knowledge of visual perception resulted from our past visual experiences.

When we are confronted with a new visual scene we interpret it by inferring .

unconscious inferences, as von Helmholtz called them, occur rapidly and without conscious thought
—the inferences are a visual habit.

Nativistic theory

to the nativistic view, the nature of the visual system (the eye and the brain) determines visual
perception.
the bottom-up analysis focuses on the gradient
of texture that appears to recede into the
distance toward the mountains in the
background. Since this receding texture is a
component of depth and distance in our three-
dimensional world, we directly see the picture
as containing depth.

The indirect or top-down approach provides an

alternative interpretation of your perception of
Ålesund. The interpretation from the top-down
position asserts that your perception of depth
and distance in a photograph is an illusion.
Awareness in perception

Can meanings and interpretations be applied to sense data automatically, without our being verbally aware of them, or
is verbal awareness a necessary part of perception?

Blindsight: Detection without Awareness- Case study of D.B

D. B. had a large portion of his right visual cortex surgically removed to eliminate the headaches, the left visual fi eld
did not have the same representation in the brain as did the right visual fi eld.

The blind part of the visual field is called a scotoma; D. B. had a scotoma in the left half of the visual field of each eye.

some informal observations seemed to show that D. B. could locate objects in his blind field.

he could reach for a person’s outstretched hand accurately, even though he could not see it.

he could correctly guess the orientation (horizontal or vertical) of a stick that he claimed he could not see, attribute his
success to lucky guess.
Weiskrantz- undertook a series of controlled experiments to determine the visual capacity of D. B.’s scotoma.

Everyone has a blind spot in each eye. It is the part of the retina where the nerves exit the eyeball and thus is
insensitive to light.

Since the blind spot was much smaller than D. B.’s fi eld of blindness and since he could not detect targets in his
blind spot, Weiskrantz had chosen target stimuli with appropriate characteristics to test in the blind field.

throughout the testing he claimed not to see the targets for which he was required to make forced-choice
judgments.

He attributed his success to lucky guesses, because he simply could not see the target stimuli.

Blindsight is the name that Weiskrantz used to describe visual capacity in a scotoma (the blindfield) when there is
no acknowledged awareness of perception
Current research on vision suggests that there are two types of visual systems in the brain:

One is important for identifying objects, and the other system has to do with detection and movement.

Apparently, the problem suffered by D. B. was that the system concerned with identification was
destroyed during the operation performed to cure his headaches.
Selecting dependent variable
the psychologist must determine whether the verbal report is a useful dependent variable that provides a reliable and valid indicator of the
observer’s experience.

Dependent variables seem to provide insight into the observer’s phenomenological experience, which is the internal awareness of the external
world.

Deciding on the usefulness of a verbal report is sometimes very difficult.

How does the psychologist know when the response of the observer qualifies as a useful dependent variable?

It qualifies only when a verifiable relationship between the response and a previous perceptual event can be directly concluded.

Natsoulas (1967) defined a report as a presumed or confirmed relationship between some preceding or synchronous event (℮і) and the response.

E.g

pigeon pecked one key when it saw the stimulus and a different key when it did not. Appropriate reinforcement contingencies ensured that the
pigeon’s behavior was controlled by the stimulus. According to the definition just given, do the pigeon’s pecking responses qualify as reports?
a pigeon could be trained to tell us its absolute visual threshold (Blough, 1958). You will recall that the
pigeon pecked one key when it saw the stimulus and a different key when it did not. Appropriate
reinforcement contingencies ensured that the pigeon’s behavior was controlled by the stimulus.

According to the definition just given, do the pigeon’s pecking responses qualify as reports? In this
instance, the preceding event (ei) is the stimulus, with particular reference to its intensity. A peck on
one key indicates that the stimulus is below the threshold, whereas a peck on the other shows that the
pigeon can see the stimulus.

This relationship is the direct inference called for in the definition. Knowing the response—that is,
which key is pecked—allows a direct inference as to whether the pigeon can see the stimulus. We must
conclude, therefore, that the pecking responses do indeed qualify as reports.
Now we can consider D. B.’s case in a slightly different way. His two classes of perceptual reports—
the verbal one and the detection/localization one—are in conflict. The difficulty in understanding this
conflict arises for two reasons. First, humans tend to place a great deal of emphasis on verbal reports as
indicators of phenomenological experience. Thus, the verbal report must be the “correct” one,

Second, people make the incorrect assumption that all perceptual reports will have the same preceding
synchronous event.
More recent work by Weiskrantz (2002) with D. B. points importantly to the ei approach to
understanding perception. An offhand comment by D. B. to Weiskrantz led to a remarkable discovery.
After showing that he could not detect gratings (parallel lines) but could guess their orientation
correctly, D. B. commented that he could see the gratings after he closed his eyes.

An afterimage arises after looking at a visual stimulus, usually for several seconds. After the stimulus
is removed, there is initially a positive afterimage that is similar in brightness and color of the original
stimulus .

After a brief period, the positive afterimage usually becomes a negative afterimage, which is opposite
in brightness and complementary in color (a red stimulus appears green in the negative afterimage).
D. B. demonstrated complementary colored afterimages, and grating afterimages with appropriate
orientations. Although he could not distinguish a circle from a square visually, D. B. was perfect in
distinguishing those objects in his afterimages.