3.1.2.3.1 Direct perception without inference and the influence of nature Quiz: AQA Psychology, Unit 2

The 20 questions

1. What does Gibson's direct theory of perception say about the information from the environment?

   • The environment provides only sensory fragments, which the brain must build into whole scenes
   • The real world provides enough information for direct perception, without the need for inference
   • The environment provides information only in the form of stored memories held in the brain
   • The environment provides too little information, so the brain must infer the rest from memory

2. What does 'direct perception without inference' mean?

   • Seeing the environment only when prior knowledge has been used to test a hypothesis about it
   • Seeing the environment as it is, with no need for the brain to build a model from memory
   • Seeing the environment in fragments, which the brain must join together to build a full scene
   • Seeing the environment only after the brain has built a model from memory and past experience

3. Gibson's theory is described as the influence of nature. What does this mean?

   • Perceptual abilities are the same for every species, because they are all shaped by culture
   • Perceptual abilities depend on the natural light outdoors, with no role for the brain at all
   • Perceptual abilities are largely learnt from experience, rather than being shaped by evolution
   • Perceptual abilities are largely innate, shaped by evolution, rather than learnt from experience

4. Which contrast best describes Gibson's view compared with Gregory's?

   • Gibson says perception is an inference built from experience, while Gregory says it is direct and innate
   • Gibson says perception depends on the sensory store, while Gregory says it depends on the short-term store
   • Gibson says perception is direct and innate, while Gregory says it is an inference built from experience
   • Gibson says perception depends on serial position, while Gregory says it depends on interference

5. Why does Gibson argue that perception needs no inference?

   • Because the light reaching the eyes carries enough structured information about the world to act on
   • Because the brain stores all objects in memory, so no new information is needed from the eyes
   • Because perception only happens after rehearsal, so inference is never needed for objects
   • Because the eyes receive so little information that the brain must guess what the object is

6. Which example best supports Gibson's idea of direct perception?

   • A student works out the distance of a tree using a guess built from remembered sizes of trees
   • A child decides an object is a cup after testing a hypothesis against several stored memories
   • A viewer sees a shape as a face only after building it up from separate lines in the brain
   • A driver judges the speed of an approaching car using the information in the moving scene around them

7. What role does nature play in Gibson's theory?

   • Learnt abilities allow people to store the information in the environment so that it can be used
   • Motivation decides which information in the environment can be picked up by people at each time
   • Culture decides which information in the environment can be picked up by people as they grow
   • Innate, evolved abilities allow people to pick up the information that is already present in the environment

8. Which feature of Gibson's theory would a critic most likely question?

   • Whether the eyes can detect light, since the receptors are well understood to work correctly
   • Whether sensory memory can hold an exact copy of input for under one second in the store
   • Whether the short-term store can hold about seven items, as the multi-store model proposes
   • Whether the environment really contains enough information for perception to need no inference at all

9. A researcher argues that people see the world directly. Which evidence would support Gibson's view?

   • Perception of depth improving when people move, because the information in the moving scene is picked up
   • Perception of depth being worse for objects that are rehearsed in the short-term memory store
   • Perception of depth being the same whether the person moves or stays still in the room
   • Perception of depth depending on the number of objects that the person has learnt in the past

10. Which statement best sums up Gibson's direct theory?

    • Perception is inferred because the environment provides little information, so people build models from memory
    • Perception is direct because the environment provides the information, which people pick up through innate abilities
    • Perception is stored because the environment provides information, which people keep in memory for later use
    • Perception is serial because the environment provides information, which people recall in order later on

11. In Gibson's view, why is perception not a process of building a model?

    • Because models are only built for objects that have been rehearsed in short-term memory first
    • Because the information is already present in the environment and can be picked up directly
    • Because building a model is faster than picking up information, so it is always used instead
    • Because the model has to be stored first in the sensory store before it is used to perceive

12. Which feature of the environment would Gibson most likely use as evidence for direct perception?

    • Patterns of light that are only ever shown in fixed pictures on a screen in front of the viewer
    • Patterns of light that stay exactly the same no matter how the observer moves in the scene
    • Patterns of light that change in a systematic way as an observer moves through the environment
    • Patterns of light that are remembered from the past and must be built into a model by the brain

13. Which idea would be least consistent with Gibson's direct theory?

    • A person can see an object's layout from the information in the light reaching their eyes
    • A person can judge the layout of a room using the patterns of light across the environment
    • A person can perceive a scene directly, with the information picked up through innate abilities
    • A person must build a model of the object from stored memories before they can see it

14. What does the phrase 'the real world presents sufficient information' mean in Gibson's theory?

    • The environment contains information that is always too large for the short-term store to hold
    • The environment contains enough structured information for perception to be direct
    • The environment contains information only about colour and light, not about depth or movement
    • The environment contains only partial information, so the brain must fill the gaps with memory

15. Gibson's theory is used to explain why perception is accurate in everyday life. Which reason fits?

    • Because people rehearse what they see so that it is moved into long-term memory for later use
    • Because the brain corrects each sensory error by building a new model of the scene in view
    • Because people always check their perception against stored memories before they act at all
    • Because the information in the environment is rich, so people can pick it up directly and act on it

16. Gibson's theory is a direct theory. What is the best contrast term for 'direct' in this sense?

    • Indirect, meaning perception needs inference or processing beyond the information in the stimulus itself
    • Serial, meaning perception processes each item in a fixed order one after the other in turn
    • Stored, meaning perception relies on a copy of the input kept in the sensory store for a while
    • Gradual, meaning perception improves slowly over time through rehearsal of what is seen

17. A climber judges whether a ledge can be reached by seeing how the rock surface is laid out. Which Gibson idea fits?

    • The climber builds a model of the ledge from memory before deciding whether to reach for it
    • The climber uses the serial order of the rock features to recall which part of the ledge is reachable
    • The surface layout provides information that can be picked up directly to judge whether the ledge is reachable
    • The climber rehearses the ledge's shape so that it can be moved into long-term memory store

18. A pilot uses the flow of runway lights as the aircraft moves to judge the landing. Which Gibson idea fits best?

    • The pilot rehearses the lights so that they pass into the short-term store for the landing
    • Information in the moving light pattern is picked up directly to guide the landing
    • The pilot compares the lights with a stored model of runways before deciding how to land
    • The pilot uses the serial order of the lights to recall where the runway is positioned

19. Which result would challenge Gibson's claim that perception needs no inference?

    • Perception of an object being distorted by a misleading context, which suggests the brain makes an inference
    • Perception of a moving object being equally accurate for near and far distances from the viewer
    • Perception of an object being accurate in full daylight with a clear view of its surface
    • Perception of a sound being identical whether the person is still or moving about in the room

20. Which everyday observation fits Gibson's claim that the environment is rich in information?

    • A person can judge the slope of a hill only after recalling its height from a previous day
    • A person can judge the slope of a hill only if they rehearse the hill's name aloud in their mind
    • A person can judge the slope of a hill only by using the serial position of the hill in a list
    • A person can judge the slope of a hill from the way the ground texture changes across the view

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