We explain what perception is and the components that psychology analyzes. Also, what are the stages of perception.
What is perception?
Perception is the individual mechanism carried out by human beings that consists of receive, interpret and understand signals that come from outside codifying them from sensory activity. It is a series of data that is captured by the body as raw information, which will acquire meaning after a cognitive process that is also part of perception itself.
Precisely there lies the difference between perception and sensation, with which the term is often confused: while perception includes the interpretation and analysis of the stimuli sensation is the immediate experience that points to an involuntary and systematic response.
Briefly, perception refers to a mental image formed from human experience which includes its form of organization, its culture and its needs. There are the two components of perception that psychology analyzes:
- The external medium, which is precisely the sensation that will be captured (in the form of sound, image), and…
- The internal environment, which is the way in which that stimulus will be interpreted (totally variable depending on the individual).
This is why it is said that the perception It is subjective in nature is selective, because people decide (sometimes unconsciously) to perceive some things and not others, and it is temporary because it will not occur forever but for a short term.
Reviewing the history of the study of perception, we can mention physiology, which in the 19th century was concerned with delimiting the functioning of the human psyche in the reception of stimuli, but that was precisely what gave rise to psychophysics, a branch of psychology that is precisely responsible for that.
Nowadays, most studies on perception are oriented towards advertising which is desperate to try to understand how individuals perceive external agents, seeking to find the best way to penetrate their needs and priorities.
See also: Intuition
Stages of perception
Among all of them, it has been determined that perception works with a three-stage process:
- Detection/Exposure. As stated, individuals only perceive a small portion of the stimuli that are within their reach. However, this selection that is made is not done consciously, nor is it done randomly. On the contrary, there are certain criteria that make a stimulus perceived more easily.
Regarding the stimulus, the larger the size, the more varied the color, the greater the movement, intensity, contrast and shock with what the individual expects to find, the greater the ability to be perceived. Regarding the individual himself, individual needs and values, personal and collective tastes, interests and what is not harmful to his body or his spirit will be what is most easily attended to. - Attention / Organization. Assigning meaning to what you are perceiving has also been a matter of analysis. Probably the greatest contribution has been that of the Gestalt Psychological School, which delimited the laws in which people group their perceptions (on the basis that the content of the perception is not equal to the sum of the characteristics of the stimulus). . The most important are the following:
- Individuals organize stimuli by specifically differentiating figure and background.
- They group stimuli according to their proximity, linking things that are in continuity.
- In cases of incomplete sequences, we seek to complete and close them, to contribute to the proportionality and balance in which we operate.
- Similar stimuli tend to cluster together.
- Interpretation The final part of the process will be the one that gives content to the stimuli that were previously selected and organized. Here the individuality of each person comes into play much more, with their previous experience and personal values. However, common behaviors have been established during this process, such as the creation of stereotypes, the projection of one's own characteristics on others, or the few dispositions to which one does not know much.
