SENSATION AND PERCEPTION
Unit 3.1, 3.2, and 3.3
, TRANSDUCTION
• Sensation occurs when special receptors in the sense organs—the eyes,
ears, nose, skin, and taste buds—are activated, allowing various forms of
outside stimuli to become neural signals in the brain.
• This process of converting outside stimuli, such as light, into neural
activity is called transduction.
• The sensory receptors are specialized forms of neurons, the cells that make up
the nervous system. Instead of receiving neurotransmitters from other
cells, these receptor cells are stimulated by different kinds of energy, e.g.
• Physical Information → Electrical information
• a condition known as synesthesia, lit “joined sensation.”
• signals that come from the sensory organs either go to places in the brain
where they weren’t meant to be or are processed differently.
, SENSORY THRESHOLDS
• Ernst Weber tried to determine the smallest difference between two
weights that could be detected → Weber’s law of just noticeable
differences (jnd,).
• JND or the difference threshold is the smallest difference between two
stimuli that is detectable 50% of the time, and whatever difference
between stimuli might be, it is always a constant. E.g. spoons of sugar
• Gustav Fechner studied the absolute threshold which is the lowest level
of stimulation that a person can consciously detect 50% of the time the
stimulation is present.
• Fechner developed methods and theories that lead to establishment of a
field called psychophysics.
Unit 3.1, 3.2, and 3.3
, TRANSDUCTION
• Sensation occurs when special receptors in the sense organs—the eyes,
ears, nose, skin, and taste buds—are activated, allowing various forms of
outside stimuli to become neural signals in the brain.
• This process of converting outside stimuli, such as light, into neural
activity is called transduction.
• The sensory receptors are specialized forms of neurons, the cells that make up
the nervous system. Instead of receiving neurotransmitters from other
cells, these receptor cells are stimulated by different kinds of energy, e.g.
• Physical Information → Electrical information
• a condition known as synesthesia, lit “joined sensation.”
• signals that come from the sensory organs either go to places in the brain
where they weren’t meant to be or are processed differently.
, SENSORY THRESHOLDS
• Ernst Weber tried to determine the smallest difference between two
weights that could be detected → Weber’s law of just noticeable
differences (jnd,).
• JND or the difference threshold is the smallest difference between two
stimuli that is detectable 50% of the time, and whatever difference
between stimuli might be, it is always a constant. E.g. spoons of sugar
• Gustav Fechner studied the absolute threshold which is the lowest level
of stimulation that a person can consciously detect 50% of the time the
stimulation is present.
• Fechner developed methods and theories that lead to establishment of a
field called psychophysics.
