Perception

• The ability to see, hear, or become aware of something through the senses.
• The state of being or process of becoming aware of something in such a way.

The retina is the area in back of the eye that contains your rods and cones. Rods help you detect movement while cones help you see color. Both of these receptors transfer light into electrical impulses so that your brain can interpret them.

The cones are receptor cells that help us see fine details of things and tend to help us see in situations where there is light or daylight. The majority of cones are in the center of the retina (we have approximately 6 million cones in each eye).

There are two types of receptor cells in the human eye; the cones and the rods. The rods are the receptors in the eye which detect movement. Rods are also used in night vision.

A schema is a cognitive system which helps us organize and make sense of information. For example, you may have a conceptual framework or developed a schema that all homeless people are rude. Because of this schema, you organize your actions around it and more readily look for information that supports this view while discarding information that disagrees with this perspective.

This sort of depth perception requires both of our eyes, which is referred to as binocular cues (depth cues that requires both of our eyes).

Cues that require only one of our eyes to see them

Situational cues are contextual cues in the environment that signal a person that an action or event may occur. It can also be a signal that the person needs to respond in particular ways.

Nonverbal cues are communication signals without the use of vocabulary. A facial expression of sadness would be an example of a nonverbal cue.

- the tendency to notice some things more than others

- can be caused by experience, context or expectations

Method

• Took participant to a room they said was an "office" and told them to wait
• Left for 5 mins. then took them to another room and got them to recall what was in the office

Findings

• They recalled traditional office objects, including books - there weren't any
• Participants didn't remember the wine, skull or picnic hamper

Conclusion

• Participants using "office" schema

AIM-to find out whether context would alter perception

Method

• Showed a context scene, eg. a kitchen, for 2 secs
  
• Got people to identify objects that were appropriate(eg. loaf of bread); inappropriate, similar(eg.mailbox); inappropriate, different(drum)

Findings (% of correct identifications)

• 83%-appropriate, 40%-similar, 49%-different
• 64% identifications with no context

Conclusion

• our expectations affect our perception

Strengths:

• controlled the time each image was shown
• participants all knew what to do
• 2 sets of data not used because of lack of glasses