Petra looked directly into a very bright light and has damaged her retina. The ophthalmologist has told her that she has sustained massive damage to her cones, but for the most part her rods have not been affected. One change that you could predict for Petra's vision is that she will now have:
No color vision
After leaving the primary visual cortex, the dorsal stream carries information to the:
Melody is looking up a phone number in a phone book with tiny print. She will be most likely able to read the number if she looks at the phone book with her...because it has the largest number of...
In general, as the cycle of sleep recurs through the night, it tends to contain
Less stage 4 and more REM
After being in a car crash, Yuri has the selective inability to recognize faces. He is most likely suffering from ____________ due to damage to his ____________.
Prosopagnosia; fusiform gyrus
After visual input has been processed in the primary visual cortex, signals are processed further along a number of pathways. Information about form and color is processed by the
Zachary is looking at a reversible figure, which first appears to be a vase, and then appears to be two faces. His perception of the figure keeps switching between these two interpretations. This switching perception is caused by the fact that
The figure-ground distinction in reversible figures is often ambiguous
Hamdi wakes up in the middle of the night and tries to see the clock in the dim light. He will be more likely to be able to read the time if he looks at the clock with his ____________ because it has the largest number of ____________.
Adam is looking into a box that presents slightly different pictures of the same object to his two eyes. Adam will see ____________, as a result of ____________.
One object in depth; stereoscopic vision
Natalie sat on her porch looking out at the field of soybeans. The fact that Natalie perceived the soybean plants as being grouped into a series of separate rows is consistent with the Gestalt principle of
You enter a room and notice a distinctive new smell. After a bit of time you no longer smell the odor. This illustrates the phenomenon of
The receptive field of a visual cell refers to the
The collection of rod and cone receptors that funnel signals to a particular visual cell in the retina
Night and peripheral vision depend mainly on __________, while daylight and acute vision depend mainly on __________.
Rod cells; cone cells
Timothy was painting a picture of a jet on a runway; however, in his painting the sides of the runway are parallel to each other. Timothy's picture will seem to lack depth because he has failed to make use of the monocular depth cue of
Subjects participating in an MRI study are shown pictures of several kinds of faces. To which of these types of faces will the fusiform gyrus show the greatest activation?
Any upright face
The center-surround arrangement of visual fields contributes to the eye being
A contrast (edge) detector
Rather than provide details about the party she just attended, Patty tried to give her overall impression, operating on the assumption of __________, that the whole may be greater than the mere sum of its parts.
The cells in the visual cortex that respond to a line of the correct width, oriented at the correct angle, and located in the correct position in its receptive field are called
Ashlynn was listening to a tape recording of a famous speech that was being played backward. She just heard gibberish until a classmate said the phrase "meet me in St. Louis" was clearly spoken. The tape was rewound and as Ashlynn listened this time, she also clearly heard the same phrase. Ashlynn's ability to detect the phrase the second time through the tape illustrates
The top-down processing model of perception
Charley has visual agnosia and is unable to recognize common, everyday objects. This condition most likely results from damage to the
In their early thirties, Glencora's parents went to work for a company in China. Glencora has lived in China since birth and went to Chinese public schools and a Chinese university. The major theory of cross-racial facial recognition would predict that Glencora would be best able to identify ____________ faces and her parents would be best able to identify ____________.
Juanita was drinking some warm punch and she thought she could just detect a faint taste of nutmeg in the punch. However when she took another sip the taste wasn't there. On the third sip she could just make out the taste of nutmeg again. It is very likely that the amount of nutmeg in the punch was
Just at her absolute threshold for taste
When Justin looked up at the night sky, he perceived the three stars that make up the belt in the constellation Orion as a single complete figure, rather than as individual stars. Justin's perception of the night sky illustrates the Gestalt principle of
Colleen and LaVonne are playing darts. Colleen throws her dart into the center of the target and LaVonne throws his dart into the outer ring. In an analogy to vision, Colleen would have been likely to hit a ____________ and LaVonne would have been likely to hit a ____________.
Feature analysis assumes that we progress from individual elements to the whole in the formation of our perceptions. This is a case of
Imagine that biologists have discovered an animal that has eyes very similar to human eyes, but that the only receptor cells in the retina are rods; there are no cones. Based on what is known about human vision you might expect that this animal would
Have no color vision
An electroencephalograph (EEG) is recording Alyssa's brain activity. She has just entered Stage 1 sleep when there is a sudden, loud crash in the sleep lab. It is likely that
The crash will wake Alyssa from her relatively light sleep
Riley is happy this morning because Jennifer, his 4-month-old infant, finally slept through the night for the first time. If EEG recordings were available for both Riley and Jennifer, a comparison would show
That Jennifer spent more than twice as much time in REM sleep
The idea that dreams are the cortex's attempt to make sense out of bursts of general firing from lower brain centers is the core of
The activation-synthesis theory of dreaming
Which of the following would be the best example of consciousness?
Gerard is savoring the taste of a fine wine
DeMarco has been diagnosed as being in a minimally conscious state. Which of the following behaviors is DeMarco most likely to exhibit?
Deliberate movements such as following a pencil with his eyes
A split-brain patient is shown a frog in her left visual field. She is asked to identify what she sees. She would most likely be able to:
Point to the frog with her left hand
Based on the "speculative interpreter" function of the left hemisphere, which of the following is true regarding memories and recognition?
Left brain memories tend to involve comprehensible stories and reconstructions based on details that "make sense."
Why are humans typically able to remain in the bed during sleep?
The brain is still processing information about its surroundings, thus you are aware of the boundaries of the bed.
Linnea said that she had dreams about what she was going to wear and what pencil to bring to class. What type of sleep must she have been in?
For the past month Mitchell has had difficulty falling asleep at night. Even though he goes to bed at his usual time, he lays awake for several hours before he finally drifts off to sleep. As a result, Mitchell has only been getting 5 to 6 hours of sleep, instead of the 8 hours he is used to. Mitchell is likely to find that his lack of sleep leads to
Impaired attention, especially on monotonous tasks
You are observing your friend Melissa while she is sleeping. She is tossing and turning. It is most likely that Melissa is currently in
NREM sleep and her movements are random
Katherine's new dentist plans to use hypnosis, instead of anesthesia, while he works on Katherine's teeth. Katherine asks you if she should go along with this, or if she should find another dentist. Based on research into the effects of hypnosis, you should tell her
Hypnosis can be an effective substitute for some anesthetic drugs
Angie has undergone some significant brain surgery to reduce her out-of-control seizures. As a result of this surgery, she is able to walk, talk, and think at near normal levels. She is, however, unable to report the name of an object shown to the left side of her visual field. She does not show the inability to name the object if it is shown to her right visual field. Based on this information, it is likely that Angie's surgery involved:
Severing of the corpus callosum
Which of the following is true regarding unconscious decision making?
Research has shown that unconscious thought conditions result in the best decisions regarding complex choices.
Abigail had a dream in which she was riding a unicycle toward mountains that reached all the way to the sky and disappeared into clouds shaped like toadstools. Abigail is convinced the dream represents an unconscious desire to quit her current job. According to Freud, the unicycle and toadstool-shaped clouds would represent
The manifest content of Abigail's dream
You may see the color green as a different hue from that seen by your best friend; this phenomenon can best be explained by:
What is WRONG with the following statement? "Manny got out of bed and began doing calisthenics during REM sleep, probably because he was dreaming about boot camp."
Research shows that we are virtually paralyzed in REM sleep.
Danielle had a dream in which she was playing rummy with an elephant wearing suspenders. The next instant, the elephant had changed into one of her grade school teachers and they were watching a purple sunset over a red ocean. According to the activation synthesis model of dreaming, the sudden bizarre changes in settings that took place in Danielle's dream represent
An interpretation of random neuron activity in lower brain centers
The difference between a persistent vegetative state and a coma is that people who are in a persistent vegetative state:
Do not respond to their surroundings
Differences between a REM dream and a non-REM dream include
REM dreams are more vivid, visual and story like
The length of time it takes to fall asleep depends on an array of factors. These do NOT include:
Whether they live in an industrialized or non industrialized country
One possible theory as to the reason humans need REM and slow wave sleep focuses on the possibility that they contribute to
The firming up of the learning that took place during that day
What part of the brain is known as the interpreter?
The left hemisphere, because it is vital in constructing a world that makes sense.
You and your friends are having a sleepover. One of the friends falls asleep and is snoring. The rest of you are talking loudly without waking her, but when you begin to make cookies, the smell jolts her from sleep immediately. How can this be?
The brain blocks out most stimuli even though it is processing the information; a good smell was worth attending to.
What part of the brain houses awareness?
Whichever part has the most neural activation at the moment
A device that measures electrical activity in the brain over time by the means of recording electrodes attached to the surface of the skin is
What a dream symbolizes, or the material that is disguised in a dream to protect the dreamer.
Eye/Retinal cells that respond to low levels of illumination and result in black-and-white perception.
Eye/Retinal cells that respond to higher levels of illumination and result in color perception.