1. Perceptual Interpretation Module 17

2. Perceptual Interpretation
Sensory Deprivation and Restored Vision
Perceptual Adaptation
Perceptual Set
Perception and Human Factor

3. Perceptual Interpretation
Is there Extrasensory Perception?
Claims of ESP
Premonitions or Pretensions?
Putting ESP to Experimental Test.

4. Perceptual Interpretation
Immanuel Kant ( ) maintained that knowledge comes from our inborn ways of organizing sensory experiences.
John Locke ( ) argued that through our experiences we also learn to perceive the world.
How important is experience in shaping our
perceptual interpretation?

5. Restored Vision
After cataract surgery blind adults were able to regain sight. These individuals could differentiate figure and ground relationship however had difficulty discriminating a circle and a triangle (Von Senden, 1932).
OBJECTIVE 17-1| Describe the contribution of restored-vision and sensory deprivation research in our understanding of the nature-nurture interplay in our perceptions.

6. Facial Recognition
After blind adults were able to regain sight they were unable to recognize faces, they would only recognize distinct features. Normal observers also show difficulty in facial recognition when lower half of the pictures are changed.
Courtesy of Richard LeGrand

7. Perceptual Adaptation
Visual ability to adjust to an artificially displaced visual field, e.g., prism glasses.
OBJECTIVE 17-2| Explain how the research on distorting goggles increases our understanding of the adaptability of perception.
Courtesy of Hubert Dolezal

8. Perceptual Set
A mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another. What you see in the center picture is influenced by flanking pictures.
OBJECTIVE 17-3| Define perceptual set, and explain how it influences what we do or do not perceive. Right half of the class should close their eyes and the left half of the class should see the saxophonist for about 20 seconds. Then the left half of the class should close the eyes and the right half should see the woman’s face. All of them should then write their responses while watching the middle picture. Responses are compared to show perceptual set.
From Shepard, 1990.

9. Perceptual Set Other examples of perceptual set.
Frank Searle, photo Adams/ Corbis-Sygma
Dick Ruhl
(a) Loch ness monster or a tree trunk; (b) Flying Saucers or Clouds?

10. Schemas
Schemas are concepts that organize and interpret unfamiliar information.
Courtesy of Anna Elizabeth Voskuil
What we perceive not only comes from the environment but also from our minds. Schemas or concepts develop through experience.
Children's schemas represent reality as well as their abilities to represent what they see.

11. Face schemas are accentuated by specific features in the face.
Features on a Face
Face schemas are accentuated by specific features in the face.
Kieran Lee/ FaceLab, Department of Psychology,
University of Western Australia
Students recognized caricature of Arnold Schwarzenegger more than his actual photo.

12. Eyes and mouth play a dominant role in face recognition.
Eye & Mouth
Eyes and mouth play a dominant role in face recognition.
Portrait artists understood the importance of this recognition and therefore centered an eye in their paintings.
Courtesy of Christopher Tyler

13. Context Effects Context can radically alter perception.
OBJECTIVE 17-4| Explain why the same stimulus can evoke different perceptions in different contexts.
Is the “magician cabinet” on the floor or hanging from the ceiling?

14. Context instilled by culture also alter perception.
Cultural Context
Context instilled by culture also alter perception.
To an East African the sitting woman is balancing a metal box on her head and the family was sitting under a tree.

15. Is perception innate or acquired?
Perception Revisited
Is perception innate or acquired?

16. Perception & Human Factors
Human factors psychologists design machines that assist our natural perceptions.
OBJECTIVE 17-5| Describe the role human factors psychologists play in creating user-friendly machines and work settings.
Photodisc/ Punchstock
Courtesy of General Electric
The knobs for the stove burners on the right is easier to understand than one on the left.

17. Human Factors & Misperceptions
Understanding human factors can enable us in designing equipment that can avoid disaster.
Two-thirds of airline crashes are due to human error. Largely based on errors of perception.

18. Human Factors in Space
To combat conditions of monotony, stress and weightlessness in traveling to Mars, NASA engages Human Factor Psychologists.
Transit Habituation (Transhab), NASA

19. Is There Extrasensory Perception?
Perception without sensory input is called extrasensory perception (ESP). A large percentage of scientists do not believe in ESP.
OBJECTIVE 17-6| Identify the three most testable forms of ESP, and explain why most research psychologists remain, skeptical of ESP.

20. Claims of ESP
Paranormal phenomena include claims of astrological predictions, psychic healing, communication with the dead and out-of-body experience, but the most relevant are telepathy, clairvoyance and precognition.

21. Claims of ESP
Telepathy: Mind-to mind communication. One person sending thoughts and the other receiving it.
Clairvoyance: Perception of remote events. Like sensing a friend’s house on fire.
Precognition: Perceiving future events. Such as a political leader’s death.

22. Premonitions or Pretensions?
Can psychics see the future? Can psychics aid police in identifying locations of dead bodies? What about psychic predictions of the famous Nostradamus?
The answers to these questions are NO! Nostradamus’ predictions are “retrofitted” to events that took place afterwards.

23. Putting ESP to Experimental Test
In an experiment with 28,000 individuals, Wiseman tested psychically influencing or predicting a coin toss. People were able to correctly influence or predict a coin toss 49.8% of the time.