Perceptual Processes (perceptual + process)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


Behind the Third-Person Effect: Differentiating Perceptual Processes for Self and Other

JOURNAL OF COMMUNICATION, Issue 4 2001
Douglas M. McLeod
This study investigated factors related to two types of judgments that make up the third-person perception: media effects on others and effects on self. Specifically, separate regression path models revealed that estimates of effects on others are based on a relatively naive schema for media effects that is similar to the "magic bullet" model of media effects (i.e., more exposure leads to greater effects). On the other hand, assessing effects on self involves a more complex, conditional effects model. The different pattern of results for the self and other models reflect the "fundamental attribution error" from attribution theory. The path models also extend results from the perceptual component to the behavioral component of the third-person effect by linking the explanatory variables to support for censorship. Both models showed that paternalistic attitudes were the strongest predictor of support for censorship. [source]


The Impact of Justice and Self-Serving Bias Explanations of the Perceived Fairness of Different Types of Selection Tests

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SELECTION AND ASSESSMENT, Issue 1-2 2004
N. Schmitt
Reactions to the use of the ACT/SAT, biodata, and situational judgment measures in college admissions decisions were collected from 644 college freshmen. Evaluation of a series of models of fairness perceptions indicated that self-serving bias and organizational justice explanations may both be responsible for these reactions. Examination of respondents' beliefs about their performance compared with other students' performance also elicited responses that may be attributable to concerns about distributive justice. A variety of perceptual processes may explain fairness perceptions, but from a practical perspective, it may be easiest to manipulate examinees' perceptions of the relevance, and indirectly, the perceived fairness of the selection procedures used to make major selection or admissions decisions. [source]


Looking for faces: Attention modulates early occipitotemporal object processing

PSYCHOPHYSIOLOGY, Issue 3 2004
Andreas Lueschow
Abstract Looking for somebody's face in a crowd is one of the most important examples of visual search. For this goal, attention has to be directed to a well-defined perceptual category. When this categorically selective process starts is, however, still unknown. To this end, we used magnetoencephalography (MEG) recorded over right human occipitotemporal cortex to investigate the time course of attentional modulation of perceptual processes elicited by faces and by houses. The first face-distinctive MEG response was observed at 160,170 ms (M170). Nevertheless, attention did not start to modulate face processing before 190 ms. The first house-distinctive MEG activity was also found around 160,170 ms. However, house processing was not modulated by attention before 280 ms (90 ms later than face processing). Further analysis revealed that the attentional modulation of face processing is not due to later, for example, back-propagated activation of the M170 generator. Rather, subsequent stages of occipitotemporal object processing were modulated in a category-specific manner and with preferential access to face processing. [source]


Perceptual Diversity: Is Polyphasic Consciousness Necessary for Global Survival?

ANTHROPOLOGY OF CONSCIOUSNESS, Issue 1 2001
Tara W. Lumpkin
Perceptual diversity allows human beings to access knowledge through a variety of perceptual processes, rather than merely through everyday waking reality. Many of these perceptual processes are transrational altered states of consciousness (meditation, trance, dreams, imagination) and are not considered valid processes for accessing knowledge by science (which is based primarily upon quantification, reductionism, and the experimental method). According to Erika Bourguignon's (1973) research in the 1970s, approximately 90 percent of cultures have institutionalized forms of altered states of consciousness, meaning that such types of consciousness are to be found in most human societies and are "normal." Now, however, transrational consciousness is being devalued in many societies as it is simultaneously being replaced by the monophasic consciousness of "developed" nations. Not only are we are losing (1) biodiversity (biocomplexity) in environments and (2) cultural diversity in societies, we also are losing (3) perceptual diversity in human cognitive processes. All three losses of diversity (bio, cultural, and cognitive) are interrelated. Cultures that value perceptual diversity are more adaptable than cultures that do not. Perceptually diverse cultures are better able to understand whole systems (because they use a variety of perceptual processes to understand systems) than are cultures that rely only on the scientific method, which dissects systems. They also are better stewards of their environments, because they grasp the value of the whole of biodiversity (biocomplexity) through transrational as well as scientific processes. Understanding through perceptual diversity leads to a higher degree of adaptability and evolutionary competence. From the perspective of an anthropologist who has worked with development organizations, development will continue to destroy perceptual diversity because it exports the dominant cognitive process of "developed" nations, i.e., monophasic consciousness. Destroying perceptual diversity, in turn, leads to the destruction of cultural diversity and biocomplexity. Drawing from research I conducted among traditional healers in Namibia, I conclude that development organizations need to listen to those who use transrational perceptual processes and also need to find a way to incorporate and validate perceptual diversity in their theoretical and applied frameworks. [source]


Blind drunk: the effects of alcohol on inattentional blindness

APPLIED COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 5 2006
Seema L. Clifasefi
Alcohol consumption is a major contributor to road accidents. While it is likely that perceptual processing deficits contribute to poorer driving performance among intoxicated individuals, we know little about alcohol's role in particular perceptual processes. For instance, we know that even sober individuals can fail to detect unexpected salient objects that appear in their visual fields, a phenomenon known as inattentionalblindness (IB; Mack & Rock, 1998). We were interested in whether these visual errors become more or less likely when subjects are under the influence of alcohol or just think that they are drunk. We told half our subjects that they had received alcohol, and half that they had received a placebo. This information was either true or false. Intoxicated subjects (regardless of what they were told) were more likely to show ,blindness' to an unexpected object in their visual field. This finding has practical implications for human performance issues such as driving and eyewitness memory, and theoretical implications for visual cognition. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]