How perception works
A man reads a book, looks at a bird, touches a hot kettle - although these
Perception often happens instantly and withoutparticipation of consciousness: light hits the retina, impulses go along the optic nerves to the right parts of the cerebral cortex, one after another, and are converted into a visual image. This happens automatically.
Perception - for example, visual - consists ofseveral stages: interaction with a stimulus, reflection of light on the retina, transduction of light into an electrical signal, “travel” of the signal along the optic nerves to the visual cortex, formation of an image of an object. At the very end, a person realizes that he sees something. Most often, an action occurs next: sometimes just blinking, paying closer attention to an object, or moving towards it.
The more complex the object we are looking at, themore factors influence its perception. Even looking at a lamp, we take into account previous experience and may incorrectly assess its color: doubt between green and light green if there was always a green lamp in our room. When a person forms a visual impression of another person, even more factors come into play: we are influenced by expectations from this person, the position he occupies. Stereotypes also come into play: on a bus, a person would rather sit next to a petite elderly woman than a large, shaggy man in a dirty jacket. Although it is the “grandmother” who may turn out to be a pickpocket or simply drag you into an unpleasant conversation.
At the same time, although a person may be mistaken inpredictions for the perception of faces, he perceives and remembers them effectively. At least more effective than text. According to research, people are able to remember more than 2 thousand images and reproduce them with an accuracy of 90%, but from a text they remember only 30%, from an oral story only 10%.
How children perceive information
Unlike adults, children are able to separateinformation from their senses and therefore perceive the visual world differently, according to new research. Scientists from University College London have found that children under 12 do not integrate different sensory information to make sense of the world in the same way adults do. This refers not only to the combination of different senses such as sight and sound, but also to different aspects of visual perception.
The study looked at how children andadults combine perspective and binocular depth information. The scientists asked children and adults wearing 3D glasses to compare two inclined surfaces and determine which was the “flattest,” considering perspective and binocular information separately or both together. It was not until age 12 that children integrated perspective and binocular information to improve the accuracy of their judgments, just as adults do.
This is both good and bad.On the one hand, children construct visual images worse and may make mistakes in measuring distances. On the other hand, they are better at separating one information from another, which means they are less susceptible to visual illusions and distortion of information.
But, of course, children still combine informationfrom different sources. Otherwise, they could not learn in principle. Research shows that one-year-olds remember the names of objects better if the word is spoken to them, they are holding the object themselves, their heads are steady and the object is close. That is, the visual image of the object and the name pronounced by the parent are combined, and the child learns the word.
How to structure learning with perceptions in mind
- Trust more in visual perception.More than 50% of the information about the world a person receives fromusing vision. And although he can be deceived by relying on sight, it is better to use visual information for learning. Drawings, cards, diagrams help to better assimilate and remember information. Humans perceive animated images even better: this is why we often learn using YouTube videos.
- Take it a little at a time.If you “add” too much to the brain at onceinformation, a collapse of perception may occur. The fact is that the brain correlates each new image with existing information: if it has to do this work with a thousand images, it will get tired faster and the information will quickly disappear from the head. Even if you want to study more and more, it is necessary and important to take breaks.
- Exercise with interest.Attention greatly influences perception:We remember information especially well with involuntary attention. We are simply attracted to the subject of study, and do not need to expend willpower to focus on it. On the other hand, a person has post-voluntary attention. A person takes on a complex task, studies the conditions, uses voluntary conscious attention, learning is difficult. But now he solves the first problem, receives a “reward” from the brain, and then things go easier: attention becomes involuntary, because the activity becomes interesting and enjoyable.
- Alternate types of perception.Firstly, the senses become physically tired: you need very good lighting and posture to read for hours without the effect of tired eyes. Secondly, when changing the type of perception, information is perceived better.
- Use synesthesia or associations.Synesthesia is a perceptual effect in whicha person mixes sensations of different types. For example, hears colors or feels the color of sound. Synesthesia is considered an innate property, but a similar state can be developed using the association method. If you listen to instrumental music and read a book at the same time, you can ensure that pieces of text will be associated with parts of the melody: sometimes this helps to remember information better.
- Use stereotypes.Although stereotypes interfere with the perception of objects,You can use these mistakes to better assimilate information. For example, if you need to remember the characters of a book, you can attribute to the negative those traits that you consider unpleasant, and do the opposite with the positive ones.
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