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Perception
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Perception is a process by which

organisms interpret and organize
sensation to produce a meaningful
experience of the world as it allows us
to interpret what our sensory organs
sense as objects, events, people, and
situations.
Sensations to Perceptions
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1. Stimulus - It is an object or event that has an

impact or an effect on an organism and it is
detected by the senses i.e., stimulus for vision
is the light and the sense organs are the eyes.
2. Transduction - It refers to changing physical
energy into electrical signals (neural impulses)
that can make their way to the brain. i.e., your
ears receive energy (sound waves) and
transduce (or convert) this energy into neural
messages that make their way to your brain
and are processed as sounds.
 Cont…
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3. Primary Areas of Brain - these

transforms impulses to basic sensations.
4. Association Areas of Brain - these
assemble all the bits of sensory
information from the primary Areas to
make meaningful images, sounds, smell,
taste or feel.
5. Personalized Perceptions - varies on
every person. It does not mirror reality
but rather include our biases, emotions
and memories to reflect reality.
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PERCEPTUAL
organization

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 Perceptual Organization
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It is a task performed by the perceptual system

to determine what edged and other stimuli go
together to form an object. It is also a
perceptual organization that makes a person
to separate the figure from the ground.
Psychologists have focused on two basic
processes to explain and understand the way
our perceptual system organize more
naturalistic scenes.
1. Figure-ground organization
2. Grouping
 1. Figure-Ground
Organization
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We tend to automatically distinguish between a

figure and a ground: the figure (detailed)
stands out against the background.
Figure is a part of visual field that has
meaning, stands in front of the rest and
always seems to include the edges that
separate it from the less relevant ground, or
background.
Reversible figures – you an also reverse your
perceptual organizational of what is figure
and what is ground.
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 2. Grouping
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To distinguish between figure and ground, our

perceptual system must first identify stimulus
elements in the environment that belongs together
as figure.
We tend to group certain elements together more or
less automatically as a whole. These wholes are said
to be different or greater than just the sum of
individual sensations i.e., water is more than the just
an assortment of hydrogen and oxygen atoms.
The grouping process follow the Gestalt psychology.
The Gestalt psychologists proposed a number of
principles, or “Gestalt Laws”, that describe how
perceptual systems group stimuli into a world of
shapes and objects.
 COMMON FATE
Objects that are moving in
the same direction at the
same speed are perceived
together.

SIMILARITY
Similar elements are
percieved to be part
of a group.

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 CLOSURE
We tend to fill in the
missing outlines to form
a complete object. Gaps
are easy to see and
tendency to fill in
missing contours can be
strong that you see faint
PROXIMITY connection that does not
The closer objects or really exist.
events are to one
another, the more
likely they are to be
percieved as
belonging together. 12
 SYNCHRONY
Stimuli that occur at
the same time are
likely to be
perceived as
belonging together.

CONTINUITY
Sensations that appear to
create a continuous
form are percieved as
belonging together.
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 DEPTH
PERCEPTION

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 Depth Perception
Depth perception is our ability to
perceive distance.
It is the ability of our eye and brain to
add a third dimension, depth, to all
visual perceptions.
The cues for depth perception are
divided into two major classes:
i. binocular (depends on the movement
of both eyes)
ii. monocular (produced by signals from
 i. Binocular Depth Cues

1. Convergence - based on signals sent from

muscles that turn the eyes
•to focus on near or approaching objects,
these muscles turn the eyes inward, toward
the nose
•the brain uses the signals
sent by these muscles to
determine distance of the
object
 Cont…
2. Retinal Disparity -
depends on the
distance between the
eyes
•because of their
different positions,
each eye receives a
slightly different image
•the distance between
the right and left eyes'
images is the retinal
disparity
 ii. Monocular Cues
1. LINEAR PERSPECTIVE
The property of parallel lines
converging in the distance, at
infinity, allows us to reconstruct
the relative distance of two parts
of an object, or of landscape
features.
2. RELATIVE SIZE
If two objects are known to be the
same size (e.g., two trees) but
their absolute size is unknown,
relative size cues can provide
information about the relative
depth of the two objects.
 3. INTERPOSITION
If one object partially
blocks the view of
another object, humans
perceive it as closer. The
overlapping object
appears closer than the
object that is overlapped.
4. TEXTURE
GRADIENT
Fine details on nearby
objects can be seen
clearly, whereas such
details are not visible on
faraway objects. Texture
 5. ATMOSPHERIC
PERSPECTIVE
It is created by the
presence of dust, fog or
clouds. We perceive
clearer objects as being
nearer than the hazy or
cloudy ones
6. MOTION
PARALLAX
It is based on the speed
of moving objects.
Nearby things pass
quickly, while far off
objects appear
PERCEPTUAL
CONSTANCY

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 Perceptual Constancy
Predisposition or readiness to perceive
something in a particular way.
The four best-known constancies are
1.size
2.shape
3.color
4.brightness
 Perceptual Constancies
Size Constancy Color Constancy
The tendency to perceive The tendency to perceive
an object as being of one objects as keeping their
size no matter how far color even though
away the object is. different light might
Learned through change the appearance
experience of their color. Learned
through experience
Shape Constancy Brightness Constancy
The knowledge that an The tendency to perceive
item has only one shape an object as being
no matter what angle you equally bright even when
view it from. Learned the intensity of the light
through experience around it changes.
Learned through
experience
PERCEPTUAL
ILLUSIONS

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 ILLUSIONS
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Illusion is a perceptual experience in which you

perceive an image as being so strangely
distorted that, in reality, it cannot and does not
exist.
Created by manipulating perceptual cues so
that your brain can no longer interpret space,
size, and depth cues.
Impossible Figure - a perceptual experience
in which the drawing seems to defy basic
geometric laws.
Moon Illusion - the moon appears to
be huge when it is near the horizon but
appears really small when it's high in
the sky.
Ames Room Illusion
– the perception can
be distorted by
changing depth cues.
 Ponzo Illusion

Ponzo Illusion - The human mind

judges an object's size based on its
background
Müller-Lyer illusion - occurs because of
conflicting cues.
 Attention
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Attention is a process of directing and focusing

certain psychological resources to enhance
perception, performance and mental experience.
 Attention is used to direct sensory and perceptual
systems toward certain stimuli,
 to select specific information for further processing,
 to ignore or screen out unwanted stimuli,
 to allocate the mental energy required to process
selected stimuli,
 to regulate the flow of resources necessary for
performing a task or coordinating several tasks at once.
 Types of Attention
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1. Directing/selective attention: It is a goal-

directed control over attention that occurs
when you purposely focus your attention in
order to perform a task, such as listening for
you name at noisy place.
Voluntary control reflects top-down
processing, because attention is guided by
intentions, beliefs, expectations, motivation, or
other knowledge-based factors.
 2. Ignoring Information
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Ignoring information though voluntarily or

involuntarily is also known as “inattentional blindness”.
Inattentional blindness is the failure to notice an
unexpected stimulus that is in one's field of vision when
other attention-demanding tasks are being performed.
It is categorized as an attentional error and is not
associated with any vision deficits.
This typically happens because humans are overloaded
with stimuli, and it is impossible to pay attention to all
stimuli in one's environment. This is due to the fact that
they are unaware of the unattended stimuli. Inattentional
blindness also has an effect on people’s perception. i.e.,
magicians also take advantage of inattentional blindness.
 3. Divided Attention
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People can sometimes divide their attention in ways that

allow them to do more than one thing at a time, a skill
sometimes called multitasking.
Divided attention occurs when we are required to perform
two (or more) tasks at the same time and attention is
required for the performance of both (all) the tasks.
Examples include driving a car whilst carrying on a
conversation with a passenger and eating dinner whilst
watching the news.
When people are required to do more than one task at a
time, performance on at least one of the tasks often declines.
It is generally agreed that humans have a limited capacity
to process information and when several tasks are performed
at the same time, that capacity can be exceeded.