Writing Assignment Title: Week five reflective

Writing

Student name: Wanqiu Liu

Institution name: Diablo Valley College

Course name: Psy101 - Introduction to Psychology

Professor name: Meera Bhadra

Date: September 25, 2022

Topic number 1: Think about a time when you failed to notice something around you

because your attention was focused elsewhere. If someone pointed it out, were you

surprised that you hadn't noticed it right away?

I remember on my first trip to Europe, my friend and I agreed to have dinner at a

restaurant, but on my way to meet her, my attention was completely drawn to the

elegant buildings lining the street, as I was majoring in architecture at the time in

college. I was walking and praising the architects for their beautiful designs when I

heard my name being called and suddenly I realized I had passed the restaurant and
hadn't noticed my friend at all. According to that experience, we can know that

attention affects sensation and perception and plays a significant role in determining

what is sensed versus what is perceived(PSYCHOLOGY by Openstax, p151). Failure

to notice something that is completely visible because of a lack of attention is called

inattentional blindness. (Psychology by Openstax, p151), I think my experience was a

good example of inattentional blindness.

Topic number 2: As mentioned in the chapter, food's flavor represents an interaction

of both gustatory and olfactory information. Think about the last time you were

seriously congested due to a cold or the flu. What changes did you notice in the

flavors of the foods that you ate during this time?

Taste (gustation) and smell (olfaction) are chemical senses that employ receptors on

the tongue and in the nose that bind directly with taste and odor molecules in order to

transmit information to the brain for processing. (PSYCHOLOGY By Openstax,

p180). The last time I experienced severe congestion due to flu or cold was when I had

Covid-19. The principal factors that I experienced were the lack of taste the flavor. I

could not smell or taste; even the sourest fruit did not amuse me. I could even give a

bite to an onion without any repercussions. When we have a cold, we usually

experience nasal congestion, which causes us to lose our sense of smell, Interactions

between the senses of taste and smell enhance our perceptions of the foods we eat.

(Brainfacts.org, 2012), that's why we can't taste foods' flavor when we have a cold.
Topic number 3: Have you ever listened to a song on the radio and sung along only

to find out later that you have been singing the wrong lyrics? Once you found the

correct lyrics, did your perception of the song change?

It happened to me several times. Moreover, with songs in different languages. I used

to think I was fine singing, and then when I figured out the lyrics; I felt that I was

enjoying nonsense; probably, it was just the melody of the song that made me enjoy it,

and I was not conscious of what I was singing about. For example, the first time I

heard The Beatles, I loved their rhythm and melody, but when I checked the subtitles

and realized the lyric's meaning, it changed my perception.This phenomenon reminds

me of Gestalt psychology which refers to the idea that the brain creates perceptions

that are not just the sum of available sensory inputs, but that it does so in a predictable

way.(Psychology OpenStax, p172).

Reference:

Psychology OpenStax

https://openstax.org/books/psychology-2e/pages/5-personal-application-questions
Taste and Smell - BrainFacts.

https://www.brainfacts.org/Thinking-Sensing-and-Behaving/Taste/2012/Taste-and-Sm

ell