Perception

SpEd 5351

What is Perception?
Ability to process stimuli meaningfully
To organize and interpret sensory stimuli
Ability to make judgment about and attach
meaning to incoming stimuli
Ability to ascribe meaning to sensory information
of all kinds(auditory, visual, gustatory, olfactory,
tactile, and kinesthetic stimuli)

Perception in Special Education

History
Samuel Orton (1930s): failure to achieve cerebral
hemispheric dominance
Werner & Strauss (1930s & 40s): Srauss syndrome;
visual-perceptual and perceptual-motor problems as
well as distractibility and hyperactivity
Cruickshanks (1950s): supported Strausss work with
subjects without MR
Newall Kephart (1960s): perceptual motor development
theory

Perceptual Assessments
Kirk (1960s): Illinois Test of Psycholinguistic
Abilities (ITPA)focusing on perceptual
component of cognition
Marianne Frostig (1964): Developmental Test of
Visual Perception to assess visual perceptual
skills in reading performance

Assessment of Perceptual
Functioning
Visual and auditory channels are often treated as
separate entities (eg.,visual and motor development
interact to aid each other and auditory perception and
visual perception often support one another).
Behavioral observations

Following directions
Copying letters, including both far-and near-point copying
Writing; drawing; and manipulating various tools and devices
Listening
Identifying letters and letter sounds

Visual Perception
Visual discrimination: identify dominant features in different
objects and to discriminate among a variety of objects
Visual figure-ground discrimination: distinguish an object from its
background
Object recognition: recognize essential nature of an object
Spacial relations: determine the position of physical objects in
space
Visual memory: recall the dominant features of a stimulus that is
no longer present
Visual closure: identify figures that are presented in incomplete
form

Auditory Perception
Auditory discrimination: recognize differences between sounds
Auditory blending: ability to make a complete word by blending
the individual phonological elements
Auditory figure-ground discrimination: distinguish a sound from its
background
Auditory memory: recognize and recall previously presented
auditory stimuli (rote memory)
Auditory closure:identify words and sounds that have been
presented in incomplete form
Auditory association: ability to relate ideas, find relationships,
make associations, and categorize information