BASIC PSYCHOLOGICAL

PROCESSES
PRESENTED BY:
PALLAVI A RAO
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
DEPARTMENT OF FORENSIC SCIENCE
KRISTU JAYANTI COLLEGE, BENGALURU
 CONTENTS OF THE PRESENTATION
• Sensation- selection
• Sensory adaptation
• Analysis and coding
• Perception: sensing, perceiving, classifying
• Gestalt principles
SENSATION
 INTODUCTION
◦ Our ability to experience the world around us begins with sensation, a fundamental psychological
process that allows us to detect and respond to environmental stimuli.
◦ Sensation involves gathering information through our five senses—sight, hearing, touch, taste,
and smell—and converting it into signals the brain can understand.
◦ However, not all sensory information is equally important. The brain must process and refine these
inputs through selection, sensory adaptation, and analysis & coding to make sense of our
surroundings efficiently.
• Selection helps us focus on important stimuli while ignoring distractions.
• Sensory adaptation allows us to adjust to constant stimuli over time.
• Analysis and coding transform sensory data into meaningful information for further processing.
◦ Together, these processes enable us to navigate and interact with the world smoothly.
◦ Understanding how sensation works lays the foundation for perception, where the brain interprets
and gives meaning to what we sense.
•

SELECTION Sensory Adaptation

◦ The brain cannot process all the sensory ◦ Sensory adaptation is the process by which our sensory
information at once. receptors become less responsive to an unchanging
stimulus over time.
◦ Selection helps focus on the most relevant
◦ This allows the brain to focus on new or important changes
stimuli while ignoring unimportant ones.
in the environment while ignoring constant, unimportant
◦ Example: In a noisy classroom, you focus on stimuli.
your teacher’s voice while tuning out ◦ It occurs automatically and helps prevent sensory overload,
background chatter. it enhances efficiency by conserving cognitive resources for
detecting novel stimuli and it can happen in all senses,
◦ Factors Affecting Selection: including sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell.
• Intensity – Stronger stimuli (bright lights, ◦ Examples:
loud sounds) grab attention. ◦ Getting used to a strong perfume after wearing it for a while.
• Novelty – Unfamiliar or unexpected stimuli ◦ No longer feeling the weight of a wristwatch after wearing it
stand out. for some time.
• Personal Relevance – Things important to us ◦ Adjusting to dim lighting after spending time in a dark room.
(our name in a crowd) capture our attention.
 Analysis and Coding
◦ Analysis and coding refer to how the brain processes and interprets sensory information by
breaking it down into components (analysis) and converting it into a meaningful neural
representation (coding).
◦ This ensures that the brain can efficiently recognize, store, and respond to sensory input.
◦ Analysis (Breaking Down Sensory Information)
• The brain does not receive whole perceptions; instead, it receives raw sensory signals (e.g., light
waves, sound waves).
• These signals are broken down into their basic features, such as:
• Vision: Color, shape, depth, motion.
• Hearing: Pitch, loudness, tone.
• Touch: Pressure, temperature, texture.
◦ Example: When you see a dog, your brain first detects colors, edges, and shapes separately before
forming a complete image of the dog.
 Analysis and Coding
◦ Coding (Transforming Sensory Input into Neural Signals)
• Once analyzed, sensory data must be converted into neural codes that the brain can understand.
• This process ensures that the information remains accurate and meaningful as it travels through
the nervous system.
• Different senses use different types of coding:
• Temporal Coding: The timing of neural signals represents stimulus intensity (e.g., faster
signals for a louder sound).
• Spatial Coding: The location of activation in the brain corresponds to the type of stimulus
(e.g., different parts of the retina detect different colors).
◦ Example: When you hear a song, your brain codes the sound waves into neural signals, allowing
you to recognize the melody and lyrics.
Why Is Analysis
and Coding
Important?
• It allows the brain to
interpret raw sensory data
accurately.
• It ensures fast and
efficient processing for
quick reactions (e.g.,
recognizing a danger
signal).
• It helps in memory
formation, as coded
sensory data is stored for
future recognition.
PERCEPTION
 INTRODUCTION
◦Perception is the cognitive process by which
we organize and interpret sensory
information from the environment to form a
meaningful understanding of the world
around us.
◦This process is fundamental in psychology as
it explains how we make sense of the vast
amount of stimuli we encounter every day.
◦The process of perception can be divided into
three key stages: sensing, perceiving, and
classifying.
 Sensing: The Initial Detection of Stimuli
◦ Sensing is the first step of perception and involves the detection of external stimuli through
our sensory organs. This is the basic level of interaction with the world, where sensory
receptors in the eyes, ears, skin, nose, and tongue detect different types of stimuli—light,
sound, touch, taste, and smell.
◦ Example: Imagine you're sitting in a park, and you hear the sound of birds chirping. This
is the sensing phase, where your auditory system detects sound waves in the air. The
sensory receptors in your ears pick up vibrations from the environment, which are
translated into electrical signals that the brain can process.
◦ Example: While walking into a bakery, you may sense the smell of freshly baked bread.
The olfactory receptors in your nose detect the molecules in the air, sending signals to the
brain, indicating the presence of the scent.
◦ In this stage, the stimuli are raw data with no meaningful interpretation—just the facts.
The brain hasn't yet processed this information, but it has gathered the sensory input.
 Perceiving: Interpreting and Making Sense of Sensory
Information
◦ Once sensory data is collected, the brain moves to the perceiving stage, where it interprets and
makes sense of the information. Perception is an active process involving cognitive mechanisms
such as attention, memory, experience, and expectations. The brain integrates sensory input with
prior knowledge and context to form an understanding of what is happening.
◦ Example: When you hear the sound of birds chirping, your brain doesn’t just register "sound"; it
recognizes that these are likely birds and that it’s a sign of a peaceful, natural environment, likely
indicating morning or daytime. Your prior experience and knowledge help you make sense of what
you hear, associating it with a familiar context (e.g., "Oh, it's morning, and I’m in the park").
◦ Example: If you're at a party and someone calls your name, your brain quickly recognizes that the
voice you hear is familiar and likely coming from a specific person you know. The brain uses prior
knowledge of the voice and context (the party setting) to perceive the sound as someone addressing
you.
 Perceiving: Interpreting and Making Sense of
Sensory Information
Top-Down Perception (Thinking First)
Top-down perception occurs when we use prior knowledge, experiences, expectations, or context to
interpret sensory information. In this type of perception, our brain applies what we already know or
expect to make sense of the world around us.
◦ Example 1: Reading a Sentence with Missing Letters Imagine you're reading a sentence like this: "I
couldn't believe the news." Despite the spelling errors, you can still understand the meaning of the
sentence. This is because, based on your prior knowledge of language and how words are typically
structured, your brain "fills in" the missing or incorrect letters. You're using your expectations about
language to interpret what you're reading, rather than just relying on the exact sensory input.
◦ Example 2: Recognizing a Familiar Face in a Crowd When you see someone in a crowd, you might
instantly recognize them, even from a distance or in poor lighting, because your brain uses prior
experience and knowledge about that person’s features. You don't need to analyze every detail of their
face; your brain quickly interprets the image based on the expectation that it is the person you're familiar
with.
 Perceiving: Interpreting and Making Sense of
Sensory Information
Bottom-Up Perception (Seeing First)
Bottom-up perception, on the other hand, involves perceiving the world based only on the raw sensory
information we receive. It’s about processing the individual components of sensory input (like shapes,
colors, and sounds) and building up an understanding from scratch, without any influence from prior
knowledge or expectations.
◦ Example 1: Seeing a New Object for the First Time If you're looking at a completely unfamiliar object
—say, a new type of gadget you’ve never seen before—your brain processes it based on its individual
features (like its shape, color, size, and texture) and then works to figure out what it is. There are no
assumptions or prior knowledge influencing your perception; you're interpreting the object purely from the
sensory data.
◦ Example 2: Hearing an Unknown Sound Imagine you hear a strange noise while walking in the dark.
Initially, you won't be sure what it is. Your brain processes the raw sound data (pitch, volume, rhythm) and
tries to figure out its source. It might take a moment to decide whether it's an animal, a person, or some
other environmental noise. You are building up your understanding based solely on the sound, not on any
expectations.
 Classifying: Organizing Information
into Categories
◦ Once the brain has perceived the sensory information, it classifies it into categories or
recognizes it as part of a known concept or object. This stage is critical because it allows the
brain to organize and store information in a way that makes it easier to retrieve and use
later.
◦ Example: In the park scenario, after hearing birds chirping, your brain classifies the sounds
into a known category (i.e., “birds”). You might then link this perception to the concept of
"nature" or "peaceful morning," organizing the information into a broader understanding of
your environment.
◦ Example: Imagine you see an object in the distance, and at first, it looks unfamiliar. As you get
closer, you recognize it as a chair. Your brain classifies it as a "furniture" object, based on your
knowledge of what a chair is and its typical function in a room or outdoor setting.
 Classifying: Organizing Information
into Categories
◦The classification process can also involve
more complex cognitive functions such as
categorization or conceptualization,
which allow us to group information into
broader, more abstract categories based on
shared features. For example, we might
classify a range of objects as "animals,"
even though they vary greatly (dogs, cats,
birds) based on shared characteristics like
being living, breathing creatures.
name the color of words
 Examples of Perception in Everyday Life

◦ Optical Illusions: An optical illusion is a perfect example of how perception can be deceived. For instance, in the
classic Ames Room illusion, people appear to shrink or grow as they move across the room, even though the room
is shaped normally. This occurs because our brain misinterprets visual information and classifies it incorrectly based
on prior assumptions about size and perspective.
◦ Facial Recognition: Humans have an extraordinary ability to perceive and classify faces. Studies show that we are
able to detect familiar faces even in complex, crowded environments. However, this ability also shows how
perception can be influenced by context. For example, if someone sees a face in an ambiguous or blurry image, they
may perceive it as familiar due to their prior knowledge and expectations, even if it isn't the face of the person they
think it is.
◦ The Stroop Effect: This is a well-known psychological test that demonstrates how perception and classification can
be influenced by conflicting information. In the Stroop test, people are shown words printed in different colors, such
as the word "red" written in green ink. When asked to name the ink color, people often struggle because their brain
has to reconcile the conflicting information (the word "red" vs. the green color), showing the complexity of
perceiving and classifying sensory data.
 GESTALT
PRINCIPLES
 What are the Gestalt Principles?
◦ Gestalt principles are key concepts in psychology that explain how we perceive and organize
visual information. They focus on how our minds naturally group elements together to form
patterns and make sense of what we see.
◦ These principles help us make sense of the world in a quick, intuitive way by grouping similar
items, completing shapes, and simplifying complex images.
◦ By understanding Gestalt principles, you can see how our brains automatically organize and
interpret visual information.
◦ Gestalt Principles are principles/laws of human perception that describe how humans group
similar elements, recognize patterns and simplify complex images when we perceive objects.
◦ Designers use the principles to organize content on websites and other interfaces so it is
aesthetically pleasing and easy to understand.
 What are the Gestalt Principles?
◦"Gestalt" is German for "unified whole". German psychologists
Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolfgang Kohler created the
Gestalt Principles in the 1920s.
◦The whole is other than the sum of the parts. —Kurt Koffka
◦They wanted to understand how people make sense of the confusing
things they see and hear. They identified a set of laws that address the
natural compulsion to find order in disorder.
◦According to this, the mind "informs" what the eye sees by
perceiving a series of individual elements as a whole.
 Proximity
◦Definition: Objects that are close to each other
are perceived as a group.
◦We group closer-together elements,
separating them from those farther apart.
When you group elements in your design,
users will see it as one distinct entity on the
screen.
◦Example: Imagine a series of dots scattered on
a page. If some dots are closer together, your
brain will naturally group them as clusters,
while the dots farther apart will seem separate
 Similarity

◦Definition: Objects that are similar in shape, size, color, or

texture are perceived as belonging together.
◦When items, objects or elements share superficial
characteristics, we perceive them as grouped. We can see
the similarity principle in branding and design system
guidelines.
◦Example: If you see a series of red circles and blue squares in a
grid, your mind will naturally group the red circles together and
the blue squares together.
 Figure-Ground
◦This principle is about how we distinguish objects from their background. Our
brain naturally identifies the main object (figure) and separates it from the less
important background (ground).
◦Example: Imagine you're looking at a picture where a white vase is drawn on a
black background. You automatically see the vase as the "figure" and the black
area as the “ground.”
◦If you look closely, you might notice that the same picture could also be seen as
two faces facing each other (the vase’s shape also looks like two profiles). The
vase and the faces are "figure-ground reversals," showing how we can shift our
perception.
 Continuity
◦This principle states that we tend to perceive smooth, continuous lines
or patterns, rather than sharp or abrupt changes. Our eyes and brains
like to follow a path that feels continuous.
◦Example: Imagine a curved line that’s interrupted by a few small
breaks. Even with the breaks, your brain will still "fill in the gaps" and
see it as a continuous curved line. If the line was jagged with sharp
angles, you'd be more likely to see it as separate segments rather than
one continuous shape.
 closure
◦Our minds tend to "close" or complete incomplete figures. If a shape
is missing part of its boundary, we will mentally fill in the gap to see it
as a whole object.
◦Example: If you see a circle that's missing a small section, you still
recognize it as a circle. Your brain fills in the missing part because we
expect a circle to be complete, even though the drawing isn’t.
 Common Fate
◦The principle of common fate is a Gestalt psychology principle that
states that objects that move together are perceived as a group. It's
based on the human tendency to group things that move in a similar
way.
◦Examples of common fate
◦A flock of birds flying together
◦A school of fish swimming in a synchronized motion
 Symmetry
◦The Law of Symmetry asserts that the human eye tends to perceive
symmetrical elements as belonging together regardless of their
distance. Symmetrical figures are seen as a whole more readily than
asymmetrical ones.
◦This symmetry is not limited to identical mirroring. It can also involve
balance in terms of weight, orientation, or value, creating a pleasing
harmony that resonates with viewers.
THANKYOU