Perception and the senses
W
Perception
“The brain adding a vast amount of information to the information recieved� Richard Gregory
Necker cube
There are two ways of seeing this box. How do you see it? This is how i see it: 1. I see six faces of the cube. 2. I can see through it. 3. It is a 3D cube and you can place things inside.
Functional Areas Of the Brain. rea
tion A
unc otor F
4. Broca’s Area
10
.H
igh
er
Me n
tal
Fu
nc
3.
tio n
s
Mo
tor
9. M
2. Associati
1. Slight Image recognition Image perception. 2. Short term memories Emotion Equilibrium. 3. Initiation of voluntary muscles. 4. Muscles of speech.
5. Hearing. 6. Sensation from muscles and skin.
9. Eye movement and orientation.
7. Evaluation of weight, texture, temperature etc for subject recognition.
10. Concentration Judgement Planning Emotional expression Creativity Inhibition.
8. Written and spoken language comprehension.
11. Coordination of movement balance and equilibrium posture.
ea Ar
ea 6.
Se
ms
ory
Ar on cti
un
rF
7. S As oma soc to iati sen on sor Are y a 8.
We rn
ick
e’s
Are
a
5. Audition Area 1.Visual Area
ion Area
11. Motor Function
Scre
In the cinema people will always think the sound is coming from the screen in front of them but however it’s actually coming from the speakers at the side or the
back. This is because the brain gets tricked to thinking the sound is coming from the front because of the characters talking on the screen.
een
I Ear Canal
Vestibular Organ
Incus
Vestibular Nerve Cochlea Nerve Cochlear Organ
Ear Drum
Eustachian Tube
Vitreous Gel
Optic Nerve
Macula Fovea
Retina
Iris
Cornea
Pupil
Lens
P A
PA
A
AP
PA A
PAA
P
P
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA PA
PAPA
PA
PAP
PA PA PA
PAPA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA PA
PA
PA PA PA PA PA
PA
PA
A
PA PA PA
PA
PA
PA
PA PA
PA PA PA
PA
PA PA
PA
PA PA
PA
PA
PA PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PAPA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA P A P
PA
PA
PAPAPA PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PAPA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA
PA PAPA PA
PA PAPA
PA
PA
PAPA PA PA
PA
David Moore
A
PA
APA APAPA
A
PA
PA
A PA
PA
PA
PA PA
PA
PA
PA
PAPA
“Fascinating illusion in hearing well it’s a cross modal illusions is called McGurk effect, I once witnessed this in a large convention centre there were 5000 people in the audience and the speakers asked us to close our eyes and she played a syllable which was ‘PA’ and everyone heard pa and she asked us to open our eyes and there on the screen in front of us was a huge picture of somebody’s face who visual stimulus was saying ‘KA’ immediately on the first presentation of this everybody got the perception of either ‘KA’ or ‘Ta’ but not ‘Pa’ and this huge gasp going up the audience was incredible dramatic”
Richard Gregory “The brain locked away in this black box not of course recieve any light for example; directly although we see light but never enter inside the brain at all�
Outside the hollow mask
Inside the hollow mask
This is the English braille alphabet, each letter has six dots which allow blind people to read the letter by touching the rising dots.
Smell
How do smell and taste work? Smell and taste belong to our chemical sensing system (chemosensation). The complicated process of smelling and tasting begins when molecules released by the substances around us stimulate special nerve cells in the nose, mouth, or throat. These cells transmit messages to the brain, where specific smells or tastes are identified. Olfactory (smell nerve) cells are stimulated by the odors around us the fragrance from a rose, the smell of bread baking. These nerve cells are found in a tiny patch of tissue high up in the nose, and they connect directly to the brain. Gustatory (taste nerve) cells are clustered in the taste buds of the mouth and throat. They react to food or drink mixed with saliva. Many of the small bumps that can be seen on the tongue contain taste buds. These surface cells send taste information to nearby nerve fibers, which send messages to the brain. Our body’s ability to sense chemicals
is another chemosensory mechanism that contributes to our senses of smell and taste. In this system, thousands of free nerve endings especially on the moist surfaces of the eyes, nose, mouth, and throat identify sensations like the sting of ammonia, the coolness of menthol, and the “heat� of chili peppers.
Taste
v
What about the chemical sense of smell and taste, they work together can you explain how this work together?
But if your strawberry happened to be green then your appreciation will not as great?
Yes they follow to some extent to similar principles as the multi sensory neurons that integrate sound and vision in that there are convergent neurons between taste and smell and these also called flavor neurons.
Funnily enough the integration of taste and the smell inputs is quite stable but the integration of taste and vision are less so.
So these flavor neurons are formed by learned association, so unlike things like the rules of time and space which are more important for things like sound and vision for the chemical sense when were deal with food inputs. Effectively what these neurons learn is initially say the smell of strawberry and the taste of sweets and it puts these two repeatedly as the more you eat and drink as association the smell and the taste together to form a flavor neuron which is fairly stable of time because you want that taste to remain to be similar throughout the life time.
So this actually makes sense because obviously you want strawberries to taste like strawberries and to learn that and you obviously don’t want to put it in your mouth something which is strawberry which looks off. The case of mouldy cheese is a good example, you still recognized cheese the next time you have it, provided it didn’t have the mould on but you effectively learn on a one trial learning you can unlearn the relationship between visual are and the taste.
Mei Chan meiyear2.gdnm.org Meish.c@hotmail.com MChan1@students.ucreative.ac.uk