(2) PERCEPTION IS SELECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE

Attention is the process of preferentially responding or perceiving one’s world. It is affected by some
external and internal factors which are as follows:
External Factors:
a) Repetition - a series of repitition enhance situations or be better remembered.
TV commercials shown several times a day are better remembered than commercials
presented once a month over a one-year period.
(NESFRUTA AND ARIEL COMMERCIAL)
b) Intensity and size - stimulus that is most intense either bigger, brighter or louder is noticed
first.
(The Generics Pharmacy - Kuya Kim at City Gate)
c) Movement - catchy signs of movement draw our attention involuntarily.
(Manna Mall electronic ads)
d) Contrast - the onset of a loud sound and soft ending of sound catches more attention.
(Radios / Speakers)
Internal Factors:
a) Perception is Constant - despite changes in the stimulations of the sense organs, constancy in
shape, location, color, object, and size remain.
(AIRPLANE - the image received by your eyes is a small figure of an airplane. But you still
perceive the airplane original actual size. THE SIZE OF OBJECT REMAIN CONSTANT.
LEAVES - the color is seen as dark or black at nighttime yet we still perceive the leaves as
having the same color.)
b) Set or Expectancy - with so many stimuli around, you tend to select what to pay attention to.
You focus on what is important and exclude the rest from your perception.

c) Motives - the need or interest will influence your response to the different stimuli.
(A hungry individual give more attention to some nearby eatery than showing interest in
shapely girls passing by.)

(3) PERCEPTION HAS ORGANIZING TENDENCIES

Under this attributes, there are several forms like:
 a) Apparent Movement - it refers to our tendency to see patterns and therefore perceive
things as belonging together if they form some type of continuous pattern.
We tend to see lights moving when actually these are lights turning on and off.

b) Closure - this is the tendency to fill in the gap or completing what is incomplete.
Even at first glance we perceive a circle and a square.

c) Similarity - it refers to our tendency to group things together based upon how similar they
are to each other.
We tend to see two rows of shaded circles and two rows of unshaded circles.

d) Proximity - elements near one another is perceived as belonging together ot stimuli close to
each other are perceived as a group.
We tend to perceive 3 columns of 2 lines each rather than 6 different lines. The lines are
grouped together because of how they are close to each other or the proximity to one another.
e) Figure and Ground - there is a tendency to see things as figures against ground.
If you perceive two faces, the black is your figure and the white is becomes the ground.
Whereas if you perceive it is a wine glass, the white is the figure and the black is the background.

 Errors in Perception
the following errors of perception may be experienced by some individuals:
HALLUCINATIONS. These may draw false notions or impressions of sensory vividness arising from
inner mental factors. Mentally ill individuals may make a world of fantasy to suit his or her own emotional
conflict with reality. It may affect the five senses like:
a) Auditory Hallucinations - sound (a person with an psychological disorder may hear a sound from
a heating vent although he is the only one in the room)
b) Olfactory Hallucinations - smell (a paranoid may smell deadly gas flowing into her room)
c) Visual Hallucinations - sight (a deeply depressed woman may see vision of her dead child)
d) Gustatory Hallucinations - taste (a person may believe that there is a poison in his food or drink)
 e) Tactual Hallucinations - touch (a person may perceive of being touched by a dead person in a dark
road while walking alone)

ILLUSIONS. A false perception of some object or something that deceives by producing a distorted
impression or belief. This takes place when you misinterpret the relationship among presented stimuli; so that
what is perceived does not correspond to physical reality.

 Hallucination is a false perception while Illusion is a distorted perception.