Introduction to psychology: Highlights on sensation and perception
Perception is a type of mental activities in which an animal gains access to some features of the current state of its environment. The reality of the objects and events in one's surroundings are revealed through sensory signals, which arise from impact of materials and energy from environmental objects on the perceiver’s sensory organs. Perception results from an exchange of physical forces between a nervous system and the outside world, such as light, sound, heat and mechanical impact. There are two types of input, contact and ambient input. Sensation and perception involve transducing information from outside to the internal media of the mind. A person experiences objects and events in the world through a body, i.e. through a nervous system that encodes, transmits and integrates signals from the outside world. In the Chapter about Sensation and Perception, we need to master the following key concepts. We have five senses, what are they? Vision is the most important sensory chan