| Term | Definition |
|---|
| selective attention | focusing of conscious awareness on a particular stimulus, as in the cocktail party effect. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 237) |
| inattentional blindness | failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 238) |
| Gestalt | an organized whole. Gestalt psychologists emphasized our tendency to integrate pieces of information into meaningful wholes. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 242) |
| visual capture | tendency for vision to dominate the other senses. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 242) |
| figure-ground | organization of the visual field into objects (the figures) that stand out from their surroundings (the ground). (Myers Psychology 8e p. 243) |
| grouping | Gestalt idea - perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 243) |
| binocular cues | depth cues, such as retinal disparity and convergence, that depend on the use of two eyes. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 245) |
| depth perception | ability to see objects in three dimensions although the images that strike the retina are two-dimensional; allows us to judge distance. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 245) |
| visual cliff | laboratory device for testing depth perception in infants and young animals. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 245) |
| monocular cues | depth cues, such as interposition and linear perspective, available to either eye alone. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 246) |
| retinal disparity | binocular cue for perceiving depth: By comparing images from the two eyeballs, the brain computes distance—the greater the disparity (difference) between the two images, the closer the object. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 246) |
| convergence | binocular cue for perceiving depth; the extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object. The greater the inward strain, the closer the object. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 246) |
| perceptual constancy | perceiving objects as unchanging (having consistent lightness, color, shape, and size) even as illumination and retinal images change. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 250) |
| phi phenomenon | illusion of movement created when two or more adjacent lights blink on and off in quick succession. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 250) |
| perceptual adaptation | in vision, the ability to adjust to an artificially displaced or even inverted visual field. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 256) |
| perceptual set | a mental predisposition to perceive one thing and not another. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 257) |
| human factors psychology | branch of psychology that explores how people and machines interact and how machines and physical environments can be made safe and easy to use. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 261) |
| extrasensory perception (ESP) | controversial claim that perception can occur apart from sensory input. Said to include telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 264) |
| parapsychology | study of paranormal phenomena, including ESP and psychokinesis. (Myers Psychology 8e p. 264) |
| stroboscopic motion | illusion of movement is produced by showing the rapid progression of images or objects that are not moving at all |
| closure | gestalt idea for tendency to perceive a complete or whole figure even when there are gaps in what your senses tell you |
| necker cube | two dimensional figure of a cube that can be seen from different perspectives. |
| relative size | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; the smaller retinal image is farther away |
| relative height | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; objects higher in our field of vision are perceived as farther away |
| interposition | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; if one object partially blocks our view of another, we perceive it as closer |
| relative clarity | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; hazy objects are farther away than sharp, clear objects |
| texture gradient | graduated change in the texture, or grain, of the visual field, whereby objects with finer, less detailed textures are percived as more distant. |
| linear perspective | a monocular cue for perceiving depth; the more parallel lines converge, the greater their perceived distance |
| moon illusion | moon appears larger when it is near the horizon than when it's high in the sky. |
| ponzo illusion | Both horizontal rectangles are the same size but the top one looks longer because of linear perspective (railroad) |
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