Seeing brain, vision, face recognition, prosopoagnosia, sensation, perception, cortical blindness, blindsight, visual cortex, visual impairments, illusions, imagination, Gestalt school, agnosia,

1. Cognitive Psychology
Lesson 3 - Spring 2019
The seeing brain
Professor Valentina Bazzarin
USAC Reggio Emilia

2. From eye to brain
The eyes play a crucial role in
vision but the brain is involved
in actively constructing a visual
representation of the world that
is not literal reproduction of
light falling on the eyes.
Sensation Vs Perception
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_cont
ours

3. Sketch a caricature of one of your classmates
Source: https://www.groundai.com/project/alive-caricature-from-2d-to-3d2778/

4. 10 year challenge: a clean database about ageing
Source: https://www.wired.com/story/facebook-10-year-meme-challenge/

5. Recognizing faces
https://youtu.be/qxCC74jCfXc https://youtu.be/7s6kQdyyxOEhttps://youtu.be/7s6kQdyyxOE

6. Sensation and perception
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unWnZvXJH2ohttps://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/
08/30/face-blind

7. Cortical blindness and blindsight
Myth 1 The retina of the of the left eye
represents the left side of space. The left side of
the left eye and the left side of the right eye both
contain an image of the object in the right space
Myth 2 Some visual neuron respond when the
light is taken away. The analogy with the TV’s
pixels is not correct. The neurons in the
extrastriate areas respond only to certain
colors or movements.
Myth 3 The image in the retina and the
representation of it are upside down with
respect of the outside world. All orientation is
relative and the brain does not need to turn
things around to perceive them appropriately. It
extracts relevant information.

8. Functional specialization of the visual cortex
The visual cortex of the brain is a part of the cerebral cortex that processes visual information. It is
located in the occipital lobe in the back of the head.
Visual information coming from the eye goes through the lateral geniculate nucleus in the thalamus
and then reaches the visual cortex. The part of the visual cortex that receives the sensory inputs
from the thalamus is the primary visual cortex, also known as visual area 1 (V1), and the striate
cortex. The extrastriate areas consist of visual areas 2 (V2), 3 (V3), 4 (V4), and 5 (V5).[1]
Both hemispheres of the brain contain a visual cortex; the visual cortex in the left hemisphere
receives signals from the right visual field, and the visual cortex in the right hemisphere receives
signals from the left visual field.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_cortex#/media/File:Brodmann_areas_17_18_19.png

9. CogPsych Quiz! SHOWTIME
We start with the challenge
now and we close the
challenge once one of the
team reaches 1000 points
or the course finishes

10. First question for team A
What sends signals to other
cells and what receives the
signals?

11. a) Axons;
Dendrites
b) Dendrites;
Axons
c) Ventricles;
Nucleus
d) Soma;
Myelin

12. First question for team B
The study of the ‘time-course’
of information processing in
the human nervous system is
called...

13. a) preferential
looking
b) Mental
chronometry
c) Sympathetic
system
d) Electromyo
graphy

14. Second question for team A
Which is the tissue of the
nervous system consisting
primarily of axons and
support cells?

15. a) Grey matter b) Anti-matter
c) White matter d) Corpus
Callosum

16. Second question for team B
A common way of measuring the
sympathetic nervous system that
monitors small changes in
conductivity as a result of mild
sweating is called...

17. a) Electroence
phalogy
b) Galvanic Skin
Response
c) Temporal
Skin
Response
d) Habituation

18. Third question for team A
How many are Brodmann’s
areas?

19. a) 48 b) 42
c) 63 d) 52

20. Third question for team B
Regions in the brain are
divided by...

21. a)Function,
sagittal section,
action potential
b) Function, gray
matter, white
matter
c) Patterns of gyri
and sulci,
cytoarchitecture,
function
d)Cytoarchitecture
limbic system,
corpus callosum

22. Fourth question for team A
Which part of the hindbrain
is a key link between the
cerebellum and the
cerebrum?

23. a) Pons b) Thalamus
c) Medulla
Oblongata
d) Inferior
Colliculi

24. Fourth question for team B
The fatty substance that is deposited
around the axon of some neurons
that increases the speed at which
impulses are conducted is named...

25. a) Dendrite b) Basal Ganglia
c) Axon terminal d) Myelin

26. Fifth question for team A
Where is the
Hypothalamus located?

27. a) above the
thalamus
b) under the
thalamus
c) it is a part of
the thalamus
d) it is no where
near the
thalamus

28. Fifth question for team B
The hippocampus is
important for...

29. a) Learning and
memory
b) Detection of
threatening stimuli
c) Processing
information between
sensory information
and the subcortex
d) The information
about emotional
and cognitive
conflicts

30. Visual impairments
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cG5ZuK0_qtc

31. Visual (optical) illusions

32. Gregory’s categorization of visual illusions
List
https://en.wikipedia.org/wik
i/List_of_optical_illusions

33. Using Gestalt principles for storytelling
https://www.fusioncharts.com/blog/how-to-use-the-gestalt-principles-f
or-visual-storytelling-podv/

34. Best illusions of the year
http://illusionoftheyear.com/Gianni A. Sarcone, Courtney Smith, Marie-Jo
Waeber
Archimedes Laboratory™ Project, Italy

35. Recognizing objects - Agnosias
Apperceptive agnosia is a failure in recognition that
is due to a failure of perception. In contrast, associative
agnosia is a type of agnosia where perception occurs
but recognition still does not occur.[1]
When referring to
apperceptive agnosia, visual and object agnosia are
most commonly discussed; This occurs because
apperceptive agnosia is most likely to present visual
impairments[2]
. However, in addition to visual
apperceptive agnosia there are also cases of
apperceptive agnosia in other sensory areas.
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apperceptive_agnosia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ze8VVtBgK7A

36. Imagery and perception
Imagery involves some of the same structures of
perception, but activated in the reverse from semantic
knowledge to early visual processing.