Sensation and Perception

this the "cocktail party phenomenon" because at a cocktail party, a person typically focuses on just one conversation, ignoring other voices, the clink of ice cubes, music, and bursts of laughter across the room. The competing sounds all enter the nervous system, enabling the person to pick up anything important-such as the person's own name, spoken by someone several yards away. Unimportant sounds, though, are not fully processed by the brain.

CHAPTER 6

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The capacity for selective attention protects us in daily life from being overwhelmed by all the sensory signals bombarding our receptors. The brain is not forced to respond to everything the sense receptors send its way. The "generals" in the brain can choose which "field officers" get past the command center's gates. Those that do not seem to have anything important to say are turned back.

If you are not overloaded, try answering these questions.

1. Even on the clearest night, some stars cannot be seen by the naked eye because they are below the viewer's

threshold.

2. If you jump into a cold lake but moments later the water no longer seems so cold, sensory _ _ _ _ has occurred. 3. If you are immobilized in a hospital bed, with no one to talk to and no TV or radio, and you feel edgy and disoriented, you may be suffering the effects of _ _ __ 4. During a break from your job as a server in a restaurant, you decide to read. For 20 minutes, you are so engrossed that you fail to notice the clattering of dishes or orders being called out to the cook. This is an example of _ _ _ __ 5. In real-life detection tasks, is it better to be a naysayer or a yea-sayer?

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