Sensation and Perception – ambiguous figures, illusions, bottom up vs. top down processing, perceptual set

Sensory receptors – transduction, sensory adaptation

Psychophysics – absolute threshold (signal detection – hit, miss, false alarm, correct rejection, response bias), difference threshold (JND or Weber’s law)

Vision – light (visual spectrum), wavelength (hue), amplitude (brightness), purity (saturation), additive color mixing, subtractive color mixing

Eye – cornea, iris, pupil, lens (accommodation), humor, retina (fovea), rods vs cones, optic nerve (blind spot)

Primary visual cortex – feature detectors

Dark adaptation

Color vision – trichromatic vs. opponent process (after image, color blindness)

Depth perception – monocular vs. binocular (retinal disparity) cues

Interposition, linear perspective, relative size, texture gradient, atmosphere perspective, shadow/shading, motion parallax

Real vs. apparent motion – induced, phi phenomenon, autokinetic effect

Vestibular system – semicircular canals, vestibular sacs, how linked with vision

Audition – wavelength (frequency, pitch), amplitude (loudness, decibels), timbre

Ear – pinna, auditory canal, ear drum, bones, cochlea, basilar membrane, hair cells

Pitch – place vs. frequency

Localizing sound

Smell (olfaction) – olfactory epithelium, olfactory bulbs

Effects of smell on humans (pheromones, memory)

Taste (gustation) – sweet, sour, salt, bitter, umami, papillae, taste buds

Factors that influence taste

Touch – 2 point threshold

Temperature

Pain – cognitive factors, gate control theory, endorphins

Kinesthetic sense

Perceptual organization – Gestalt – figure/ground, similarity, proximity, continuity, closure

Perceptual constancy – size, shape, brightness