Meet the Profs event

Thursday Sept. 23 at 4:30 in AH117

You’re invited to participate in a study:

• Psychology study on sexual orientation

• Recruiting homosexual females and heterosexual and homosexual males

• Involves a voice sample and hand scan, and completing a survey

• Anonymous

• Contact sos@uleth.ca

Light is focused on the Retina

• photoreceptors transduce incoming light

• ganglion cells send signals along to the brain

The Retina has photoreceptors

• each ganglion cell integrates information from a particular spot on the retina called its receptive field

Neurons “collect” information

Receptive Fields

Stimulus is in receptive

fieldStimulus is

near receptive

fieldStimulus is outside

receptive field

• Ganglion cells project to the brain via the optic nerve

• information is projected to contralateral cortex!

Visual Pathways

• the retina is mapped onto primary visual cortex

• called a retinotopic or spatiotopic map

Visual Pathways

Stimulus Cortical Activity

• signals are separated according to the type of information

Visual Pathways

Dorsal Dorsal “Where” “Where” Pathway: Pathway:

Motion and Motion and LocationLocation

Ventral “What” Pathway: Color and FormVentral “What” Pathway: Color and Form

Primary Primary Visual Cortex Visual Cortex

(V1)(V1)

Sensory Systems:

• Auditory (hearing)Visual (sight)Gustatory (taste)Olfactory (smell)Somatosensory (touch/temperature/pain)Vestibular (balance)

• Sensory systems extract information about the environment by transducing energy

• Perceptual mechanisms interpret that information and fill in the missing parts

Some Themes

• Sensory systems in the brain are organized in a way that reflects the nature of the sensory surface– somatotopy, retinotopy = spatiotopy– cochleotopy = tonotopy

• Sensory information is often handled by contralateral hemisphere

Some Themes

Are you getting it?

• We’ve gone through a lot of material

• REMEMBER: The goal wasn’t to memorize a bunch of facts

• I want you to think critically about how these systems work and what that means for perception

Are you getting it?

• Here’s an example of the kind of question I might ask you:

• Notice it requires both fact regurgitation and some reasoning.

When a sound source is moving toward When a sound source is moving toward you, the spacing between the regions of you, the spacing between the regions of compression and rarefaction is smaller compression and rarefaction is smaller than when it is moving away from you, than when it is moving away from you,

what effect does this have on the percept what effect does this have on the percept of the sound ?of the sound ?

How to practice getting it:

• Make up your own questions!

• tell your friends, get them to ask you questions

• Notice and think about the world around you

• Revisit the lecture slides online

• Use Sensation and Perception text as a resource!

• Office Hours: Monday 3 - 4 room D856 or by appointment

What if you’re not getting it? Try these (in this order):

Next Time:

• We begin studying perception…

HearingHearing