Perception

Moafia Malik
 What is Perception?

 Perception is the process of receiving information about and making

sense of the world around us.

 It involves deciding which information to notice, how to categorize

this information and how to interpret it within the framework of
existing knowledge.

 A process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory

impressions in order to give meaning to their environment.
 What is Perception?
Sensation

An individual's ability to detect stimuli in the immediate environment

Organization

The process of placing selected perceptual stimuli into a framework for "storage.

Selection

The process a person uses to eliminate some of the stimuli that have been sensed and to
retain others for further processing.

Translation

The stage of the perceptual process at which stimuli are interpreted and given meaning.
 Factors influencing perception

 A number of factors operate to shape and sometimes distort

perception.

 These factors can reside in the perceiver, in the object or target

being perceived or in the context of the situation in which the
perception is made.
 Factors influencing perception
Factors in the perceiver
Attitudes
Motives
Interests
Experience Expectations

Factors in the situation

• Time-
Perception
• Work Setting
• Social Setting
Factors in the Target
Novelty
Motion
Sounds
Size
Background
Proximity
Similarity
 Perceptual Organization

 It is the process by which we group outside stimuli into recognizable and

identifiable patterns and whole objects.

 Certain factors are considered to be important contributors on

assembling, organizing and categorizing information in the human brain.

 These are

 Figure ground

 Perceptual grouping
 Figure Ground Illustration
 Field-ground differentiation
 The tendency to distinguish and
focus on a stimulus that is classified
as figure as opposed to background.
Look at the chart below and say the COLOR not the word

YELLOW ORANGE BLUE

BLACK GREEN RED

YELLOW PURPLE RED

ORANGE GREEN
YELLOW

Left-Right Conflict Your Right Brain Tries To Say The Color But Your Left Brain Insists
On Reading The Word
 Perceptual Grouping

 Our tendency to group several individual stimuli into meaningful and

recognizable pattern.

 It is very basic in nature and largely it seems to be inborn.

 Some factors underlying grouping are

 continuity

 closure

 proximity

 similarity
 Common Perceptual Errors
 Perceptual defense: the tendency for people to protect themselves against ideas, objects, or
situations that are threatening

 Stereotyping: the tendency to assign attributes to someone solely on the basis of the category of
people, of which that person is a member

 Halo effect: the process by which the perceiver evaluates another person solely on the basis of one
attribute, either favorable or unfavorable

 Projection: the tendency for people to see their own traits in others

 Expectancy effects: extent to which expectations bias how events, objects, and people are actually
perceived

 Self-fulfilling prophecy: expecting certain things to happen will shape the behavior of the perceiver
in such a way that the expected is more likely to happen
 Social identity theory
 This theory introduced the concept of social identity as a way to explain the
inter-group behavior.

 People maintain a social identity by defining themselves in terms of the groups

to which they belong and have an emotional attachment.

 This theory is all about becoming part of different groups, and how membership
to these groups helps construct our identities.

 They suggested that people have an inbuilt tendency to categories themselves

into one or more in-groups, building a part of their identity on the basis of
membership of that group enforcing boundaries with other
 The Three Elements

 Categorization

 Identification

 Comparison
 Categorization
 This looks at the way in which people put others (and themselves)
into categories. We label one another based on interest, ethnicity,
gender, occupation and other factors.

 Calling someone a singer, footballer, student, ladies, for example,

are ways in which we do this.
 Identification
 Once a social identity has been identified, people will choose to associate
with certain groups.

 Your collective identity becomes your in-group. This could be you

family, a friendship group-even your class. This closeness functions to
boost our self esteem and to create a sense of belonging.

 A group or individual that poses as a threat to your in- group is called the
out-group. Examples of this would be an outside family member, a new
member to class, someone from a different ethnic background, or more
close to home, somebody from the other side of the social area!
 Comparison
 People compare themselves and their groups with other groups, seeing
a favorable bias towards the group in which they belong.

 Nowadays we see younger people dividing themselves into social

groups or subcultures based on clothing, the music they listen to or
other interests..
 Attribution Theory
 It is concerned with how and why people explain events as they do.

 Tries to explain the causes of the others‘ behavior.

 Cause could be
 Internal

 External