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Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Sensation

Video Exercises

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Scared Slow

After a car accident or other scary experience many people report feeling like the event happened in slow motion. One neuroscientist set out to test whether our brains really see things slowed down in response to fear. This ScienCentral News story shows why he had to scare people in order to do the experiment.

See this video here.

Interviewee: David Eagleman, Baylor College of Medicine
1.
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The researchers could have approached this problem by simply asking people if, in their own experience, time seems to slow down. What might be some of the limitations of the “asking” approach?
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One problem that can reduce the validity of a study is if the researcher really isn’t studying the experience he or she wants to study. Here, the study would be invalidated if people really weren’t afraid. Based on what you see in the video, do you think that—at least insofar as the task is concerned—this study has the potential to produce valid data? Explain your response.
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The researchers used a “response performance measure.” There are three types of response performance measure described there. Which of those three types was used in this experiment?
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All research in universities must be approved by an IRB. Are there any ethical issues that the IRB should have discussed when considering whether or not to approve this study? How would you rate the study’s risk/benefit ratio?
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Hearing Motion

Imagine if words created a taste in your mouth, or music generated bursts of color. Some people have a rare condition called synesthesia, where their senses are somewhat crossed. Now scientists have found a new type of that condition: people who “hear” motion.

Interviewee: Melissa Saenz, Caltech; Johannes Pulst-Korenberg

Copyright © ScienCentral, Inc.

Each of our senses is a special system for detecting and representing information in the world. But this video shows that the neat division of experience by particular senses is not as simple as it seems.

5.
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The section of the chapter called “How Do We Sense Our Worlds?” describes the basic sensory process called Transduction. For Johannes Pulst-Korenberg, the young man who is the topic of this video, where did transduction take place when he had his experience of sound and motion. Identify a single sensory system.
6.
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The distinction is made between sensation and perception. Thinking of Johannes Pulst-Korenberg’s experience, what was his sensory experience (sensation) and what was his perceptual experience (perception)?
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The video talks about “cross wiring” of the brain, but it doesn’t say where this cross wiring might take place. In fact, researchers are still studying this question. There are at least two different brain areas where this cross wiring might occur. Find one subcortical region that handles both visual and auditory information, where “cross wiring” might be possible. Then find one of the lobes of the cerebral cortex that handles both visual and auditory information and also might be the location of “cross wiring.”

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