Perception
Volledige vakbeschrijving
How does our brain construct a picture of the world around us? The ease with which we see, hear, feel and smell makes perception seem easy and effortless. However, this ability is astounding when one considers the complexity and diversity of our senses and, in particular, how systematically the millions of neurons in our brain work together to process all of the various sensory stimuli. The course will start with the following questions: ‘What is perception?’ and ‘How can we measure it?’. Subsequently, students will give detailed consideration to the question of how the visual brain system transforms light stimuli into the perception of colours, contrast, movement, depth and visual objects. Building on this, students will study how our auditory system converts sound stimuli into the perception of tones, music, contextual sounds and human speech. At the end of the course, students will "design" a new perceptual system (the sense of touch) based on basic functional and structural principles of visual and auditory perception.
Doelstellingen van dit vak
Knowledge about: Perception and research methods, structure and function of the eye, perception of colours and colour-blindness, subcortical and cortical visual pathways, brain damage and visual object recognition, Gestalt psychology and visual illusions, perception of depth and size, structure and function of the ear, subcortical and cortical auditory pathways, hearing problems, auditory scene analysis, structural and functional principles of perception.
Aanbevolen literatuur
Goldstein, E. (2014). Sensation and perception (9th ed). Wadsworth, Cengage learning; Wolfe, J.M., Kluender, K.R, Levi, D.M. et al. (2015). Sensation and perception (4th ed.). Sunderland: Sinauer associates, Inc; E-reader.
- M. Pijfers