This book combines approaches from philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience in the study of perception. In addition to appealing to readers from all three of these disciplines, Perception: The Basics is a perfect introduction for students and general readers. Its interdisciplinary coverage of all aspects of perception does not require familiarity with either abstract philosophical concepts or neuroscientific knowledge.
Besides addressing the classic questions of how perception works, the book highlights the intricate connections between perception and action as well as perception that is not triggered by sensory input, like mental imagery, dreaming, and hallucination. Further, the book balances out an overemphasis on vision in the literature by giving almost equal coverage to all the sense modalities (although some examples are easier to present in visual form).
Questions that are discussed in detail include:
What is the function of perception?
Is perception an unbiased way of learning about the world?
What is the difference between the different sense modalities, like seeing, hearing, smelling, etc.?
What is the connection between perception and action?
What is the relation between perception, mental imagery, dreaming, and hallucination?
With helpful chapter summaries and a comprehensive final bibliography, Perception: The Basics is sure to be the first-stop for anyone trying to better understand this important area of interdisciplinary research.
Table of Contents
What is Perception?
Window to the world
The processing of sensory input
Perceptual representation
Perceptual attention
The function of perception
The Variety of Senses
Vision
Audition
Touch
The chemical senses
Multimodal perception
Perception and Cognition
The perception/cognition divide
Top-down influences on perception
Perceptual expectations
Cross-cultural differences
Perceptual justification
Perception and Action
How perception leads to action
2 Action-guiding perception