Cognitive Approaches To Human Perception

Examining the current state of the research in perception stressing contributions in visual information processing, this volume provides an original and timely account of recent results obtained in this and other related areas of cognitive psychology. The scope of the book is intended to be broad, featuring state-of-the-art contributions from a number of outstanding researchers from different parts of the world -- the United States, Europe, and Australia. The intention is to update areas of considerable theoretical implications and active experimental investigation in this broad field called the "psychology of perception." This volume's main purpose is to highlight, from a cognitive position, a selected number of important theoretical and empirical topics which deal with critical issues in perception and other high level, related cognitive processes such as attention, mental representation, memory, word naming and semantic categorization. The studies reported were designed to answer many far-reaching questions including: * Is the global precedence effect due to low or high level processing? * Can veridical and illusory perception be explained by the same theory? * What is the relationship between attention and perception? * Is perception "direct" or an inferential process? * What mechanisms are involved in picture and word naming and categorization? * How can word and picture processing be modeled? The answers to these questions seek to unite theoretical perspectives on very important areas of cognitive psychology such as attention, perception, representation of visual objects and words, and human memory.

It takes little or no effort for us to gather information by means of our senses but it would be a mistake to take this as a sign that perception is simple. It was in the 20th century and after the establishment of psychology as a scientific discipline that the study of perception flourished. This important volume gathers together a selection of articles and essays which represent some of the most interesting discoveries and theories. It gives a flavour of the many different approaches and ideas taken by cognitive psychologists in this fascinating area. Topics covered include: attention, brain systems, object interpolation and completion, object recognition and classification, different types of objects, and information processing and models.

Imagery: Current Cognitive Approaches focuses on cognitive approaches to the study of imagery. Topics range from the brief image or icon, which serves as the source of storage in short-term memory, to global behavior changes, including hallucinatory imagery under the influence of drugs and hypnotic states. The role of the image in verbal learning and the relationship of the image to both sensory and cognitive aspects of perception are also considered. Comprised of six chapters, this book begins with a discussion on the relationship between imagery and language and a review of some specific evidence pertaining to the psycholinguistic problems of meaning, comprehension, and the learning and retention of verbal material. Subsequent chapters deal with visual perception and the function of iconic storage; different theoretical views on the definition of image; and processing of the stimulus in imagery and perception. The book concludes by analyzing how vivid imagery, "hallucinations", and other alterations in visual perception are produced by LSD and also by suggestions given under hypnosis. This monograph will be of interest to graduate students, teachers, and researchers of cognitive psychology, as well as to clinical psychologists and psychiatrists.

Because of the ease with which we perceive, many people see perception as something that "just happens." However, even seemingly simple perceptual experiences involve complex underlying mechanisms, which are often hidden from our conscious experience. These mechanisms are being investigated by researchers and theorists in fields such as psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, computer science, and philosophy. A few examples of the questions posed by these investigations are, What do infants perceive? How does perception develop? What do perceptual disorders reveal about normal functioning? How can information from one sense, such as hearing, be affected by information from another sense, such as vision? How is the information from all of our senses combined to result in our perception of a coherent environment? What are some practical outcomes of basic research in perception? These are just a few of the questions this encyclopedia will consider, as it presents a comprehensive overview of the field of perception for students, researchers, and professionals in psychology, the cognitive sciences, neuroscience, and related medical disciplines such as neurology and ophthalmology.

What are other people like? How do we decide if someone is friendly, honest or clever? What assumptions do we develop about them and what explanations do we give for their behaviour? The Perception of People examines key topics in psychology to explore how we make sense of other people (and ourselves). Do our decisions result from careful consideration and a desire to produce an accurate perception? Or do we jump to conclusions in our judgements and rely on expectations and stereotypes? To answer these questions the book examines models of person perception and provides an up-to-date and detailed account of the central psychological research in this area, focusing in particular on the social cognitive approach. It also considers and reflects on the involvement of culture in cognition, and includes coverage of relevant research in culture and language that influence the way we think and speak about others. As well as providing a valuable text in social psychology, The Perception of People also offers a direction for the integration of ideas from cognitive and social psychology with those of cultural psychology, anthropology, sociology, philosophy and social history. Clear explanation of modern research is placed in historical and cultural context to provide a fuller understanding of how psychologists have worked to understand how people interpret the world around them and make sense of the people within it. Ideal reading for students of social psychology, this engaging text will also be useful in subject areas such as communication studies and media studies, where the perception of people is highly relevant.

Cognitive psychology is a form of discipline within psychology that touches all parts of the perceptual, memory an thinking processes. Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of the thinking mind involving the total range of psychological processes. Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of the mind as an information processor. Cognitive psychologists try to build up cognitive models of the information processing that goes on inside people's minds, including perception, attention, language, memory, thinking and consciousness. Cognitive psychologists examine internal mental processes such as memory, perception, learning and language, and they are concerned with how people understand, diagnose, and solve problems and make decisions. Cognitive psychology generally favors the gathering of empirical data from scientific research methods instead of through clinically based observation (such as in the field of psychoanalysis) to reach conclusions and state a case. However, because cognitive psychology is a vast and diverse field, clinical observation can be useful in generating hypotheses for further research. The behaviorists approach only studies external observable (stimulus and response) behavior which can be objectively measured. They believe that internal behavior cannot be studied because we cannot see what happens in a person's mind (and therefore cannot objectively measure it). In comparison, the cognitive approach believes that internal mental behavior can be scientifically studied using experiments. Cognitive psychology assumes that a mediational process occurs between stimulus/input and response/output. This book is written for all those students who are associated with psychology. It is hoped that the contents of this book will explain different aspects of cognition and prepare you to comprehend future developments. An effort has been made to put a comprehensive view of cognitive psychology involving some of its multifarious components.

First published in 1967, this seminal volume by Ulric Neisser was the first attempt at a comprehensive and accessible survey of Cognitive Psychology; as such, it provided the field with its first true textbook. Its chapters are organized so that they began with stimulus information that came 'inward' through the organs of sense, through its many transformations and reconstructions, and finally through to its eventual use in thought and memory. The volume inspired numerous students enter the field of cognitive psychology and some of the today's leading and most respected cognitive psychologists cite Neisser's book as the reason they embarked on their careers.