AP Sensation and Perception Quiz

While attending a concert, Anthony finds that he can clearly recognize the melody coming from the lead violin above all the other instruments playing in the orchestra, even though the other instruments may be louder. Gestalt psychologists would explain Anthony’s ability using the principle of

• figure-ground
• closure
• simplicity
• constancy
• proximity

Eleanor Gibson and her colleagues have used the visual cliff to measure an infant's ability to perceive

• patterns
• depth
• size constancy
• shape constancy
• different hues

The tendency of most people to identify a three-sided figure as a triangle, even when one of its sides is incomplete, is the result of a perceptual process known as

• closure
• proximity
• similarity
• feature analysis
• shape constancy

A person is asked to listen to a series of tones presented in pairs, and asked to say whether the tones in each pair are the same or different in pitch. In this situation the experimenter is most likely measuring the individual's

• sound localization ability
• dichotic listening ability
• difference threshold
• echoic memory
• attention span

People listening to rock music played backward often perceive an evil message if specifically told what to listen for. That phenomenon best illustrates

• parapsychology
• complementary afterimages
• perceptual constancy
• perceptual adaptation
• top-down processing

A person with sight in only one eye lacks which of the following visual cues for seeing in depth?

• Retinal disparity
• Linear perspective
• Motion parallax
• Relative size
• Texture gradient

The intensity at which a sound becomes audible for a given individual is known as the individual's

• contrast sensitivity
• absolute threshold
• response threshold
• critical frequency
• just noticeable difference (difference threshold)

Which of the following is the best example of the opponent process theory?

• Fred stares at a green book for a minute, and then when he looks at a white page, he sees the color red.
• The more time Stanley spends in the dark, the better he can see in the dark.
• Esther can see all the colors of the leaves during the autumn
• When it gets brighter outside, Tyronne's pupils dilate
• Frances’s irises are a different color than Wendy’s irises.

The place in the retina where the optic nerve exits to the brain is called the

• lens
• sclera
• fovea
• blind spot
• aqueous humor

Which of the following explains transduction?

• The process by which sensory stimuli are converted into neural signals
• The degree of stimulation needed for a signal to be detected 50 percent of the time
• The difference in signal strength needed for that difference to be detected
• The process by which a person's eyes adapt to the dark
• The process by which a false negative is identified