Chapter 4 vocab

1. Sensation- any concrete, conscious experience resulting from stimulation of a specific

sense organ, sensory nerve, or sensory area in the brain.
2. Perception- the ability to see, hear, or become aware of something through the senses.
3. White light- a brilliant light reported to be experienced by some people when dying or
undergoing near-death experiences
4. Cornea-the transparent layer forming the front of the eye.
5. Iris- a flat, colored, ring-shaped membrane behind the cornea of the eye, with an
adjustable circular opening (pupil) in the center.
6. Lens- a nearly transparent biconvex structure suspended behind the iris of the eye, the
sole function of which is to focus light rays onto the retina.
7. Pupil- the opening within the iris through which light passes before reaching the lens
and being focused onto the retina
8. Retina- layer of nervous tissue that covers the inside of the back two-thirds of the
eyeball, in which stimulation by light occurs, initiating the sensation of vision
9. Blind spot-an obscuration of the visual field
10. Rod- a type of photoreceptor cell in the retina, they are sensitive to light levels and help
give us good vision in low light, they are concentrated in the outer areas of the retina
and give us peripheral vision
11. Cone- a type of photoreceptor cell in the retina, give us our color vision, cones are
concentrated in the center of our retina in an area called the macula and help us see
fine details, the retina has approximately 120 million rods and 6 million cones
12. Color blindness- can happen when one or more of the color cone cells are absent, not
working, or detect a different color than normal. Severe color blindness occurs when all
three cone cells are absent
13. Afterimage-visual illusion in which retinal impressions persist after the removal of a
stimulus, believed to be caused by the continued activation of the visual system
14. Audition- formal phrase for hearing
15. Pitch- the subjective attribute that permits sounds to be ordered on a musical scale
16. Timbre- the perceptual attribute relating to the quality of a sound
17. Intensity-the quantitative value of a stimulus or sensation
18. Decibels- a logarithmic unit used to express the ratio of acoustic or electric power
19. Eardrum- a thin flap of skin at the end of the ear canal
20. Cochlea- a bony, spiral-shaped, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear through which sound
waves travel and trigger nerve impulses
21. Hair cells- any of the sensory receptors for hearing, located in the organ of Corti within
the cochlea of the inner ear, they respond to vibrations of the basilar membrane via
movement of the fine hair-like structures that protrude from them
22. Auditory nerve-is a sensory nerve, it is found in the head and transmits information
from the inner ear to the brain in the form of sound (energy that impinges on
the ear drum
23. Cutaneous receptors- the types of sensory receptor found in the dermis or epidermis
24. Olfaction- the sense of smell, involving stimulation of receptor cells in
the olfactory epithelium (located in the nasal passages) by airborne volatile substances
called odorants
25. Cilia-microscopic, hair-like structures on the surface of cells that beat in unison to create
movement
26. Olfactory bulbs- brain structure responsible for our sense of smell
27. Pheromones- a chemical signal that is released outside the body by members of a
species and that influences the behavior of other members of the same species
28. Taste receptors- chemically react with food molecules and saliva to produce taste
29. Size constancy- the ability to perceive an object as being the same size despite the fact
that the size of its retinal image changes depending on its distance from the observer.
30. Color constancy- a process that allows the brain to recognize a familiar object as being a
consistent color regardless of the amount or wavelengths of light reflecting from it at a
given moment.
31. Brightness constancy- the tendency to perceive a familiar object as having the
same brightness under different conditions of illumination
32. Space constancy-the ability to keep objects in the environment steady by perceiving
either. ourselves or outside objects as moving
33. Depth perception- the visual ability to perceive the world in three dimensions, coupled
with the ability to gauge how far away an object is
34. Visual cliff-involves an apparent, but not actual drop from one surface to another,
originally created to test babies' depth perception
35. Binocular disparity- refers to the difference in image location of an object seen by the
left and right eyes, resulting from the eyes' horizontal separation
36. Visual texture- an attribute of a two-dimensional figure or a two-dimensional rendering
of a three-dimensional object that describes its surface characteristics
37. Gestalt-an organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts.
38. Similarity-degree of identity of two mental representations
39. Closure- when you see an image that has missing parts, your brain will fill in the blanks
and make a complete image so you can still recognize the pattern
40. Proximity-how close an object or person is physically to you
41. Illusion- a distortion of the senses, which can reveal how the human brain normally
organizes and interprets sensory stimulation
42. Muller-Lyer illusion- a well-known optical illusion in which two lines of the same length
appear to be of different lengths
43. Reversible figure- an ambiguous figure in which the perspective easily shifts, so that at
certain times specific elements appear to make up a distinct figure while at others those
same elements appear as an indistinct background
44. Subliminal perception- the registration of stimuli below the level of awareness,
particularly stimuli that are too weak for an individual to consciously perceive them