Perception Laboratory
Spring 2015
Warning: This is a dynamic syllabus. It gets updated as we go. Consult it several times a week on line.
Last Updated April 21, 2015
Instructor:
William M. Mace
Office: Life Sciences 212A
Office Hours: Monday 4:00 pm – 5:15 pm
Thursday 3 pm – 4 pm — and by appointment
Phone: X2343
E-Mail: william.mace@trincoll.edu
What time is it? (BROKEN LINK)
Trinity College Intellectual Honesty Policy
Moodle
The syllabus will be linked to Moodle. We may use Moodle more during the term, but most things will be linked to this webpage.
Required Reading
Grading:
In order to pass the course, you must complete all assignments —collecting data formal write-ups of assigned lab experiments.
| Schedule of Labs | ||
| Date | Reading for lab | Topic description |
| Lab 1 January 20 | Introduction — including computer portions on Excel and the World Wide Web. Visual Angle. Calculating the visual angle of your thumbnail at arm’s length and then using it.Visual Angle PowerpointVisual Angle Excel Constant Angle to manipulate (BROKEN LINK) in Geometer’s Sketchpad program (GSP) | Visual Angle.Assignment: Calculate the visual angle of your thumb at arm’s length, the moon, the sun, and your computer screen at a comfortable viewing distance. Review visual angle data; What does it mean? What does the comparison between the sun and moon imply? Look at visual angle of objects in hallway at different distances |
| Lab 2 January 27 | Excel sheet with Daycare door details about angles for all distancesSee article by Baird et al (1990) on the Moon Illusion. Author Fuld son Journal of Vision Assignment for FridayMoon illusion assignment due before class next week. | Class today: [1] Review visual angle with Geometer’s Sketchpad program. [2] Calculate distance to Daycare Center door. [3] Finding visual angles in the Journal of Vision.[4] Learn PowerPoint animation. [5] Review Moon illusion for PowerPoint homework. |
| Lab 3 February 3 | Review of Moon Illusion | Learning to program with Matlab and Psychtoolbox. Beginning with exploring the coordinate grid and then drawing shapes |
| Lab 4 February 10 | More visual angle applications: Focal length of cameras Matlab lab Scripts with m files: Script named “MouseCoordsWmm.m” (FILE INCOMPATIBLE) | Learning to program with Matlab and Psychtoolbox. Beginning with exploring the coordinate grid and then drawing shapes |
| Lab 5 February 17 | Scripts for a full experiment are in MoodleBegin full experiment in lab | Finally — we begin an experiment on the sensitivity to squares — of all things. Method of Constant Stimuli “Square” experiment |
| Lab 6 February 24 | Review of results of Square experiment; discussion of writing lab report. | |
| Lab 7 March 3 | ||
| Lab 8 March 10 | Simple apparent motion (File not compatible) Ramachandran and Anstis Simple (File not compatible) Ramachandran and Anstis Variant (File not compatible) Schiller extensions of Ram and Anstis (File not compatible) | Apparent motion lab |
| Lab 9 March 24 | Archetype of categorical perception research | Collect data |
| Lab 10 March 31 | Discussion of data from bistable experiment Discussion of data from speech experiment | Write up speech data as lab report due April 14 |
| Lab 11 April 7 | Binocular vision Stereopticon (Includes anaglyphs) Same tutorial in pdf. Easy to look at, but not manipulable. | |
| Lab 12 April 14 | Try stereo with inexpensive stereoscopes and displays for them. Begin event perception and biological motion. | Speech Lab Report Due by 10 pm |
| Lab 13 April 21 | Gunnar Johansson and biological motion. BBC video on movement Beginning of this video is Sverker Runeson research to follow up the Johansson videos. The film, made for TV, was made by Martin Freeth, who is shown on camera as the participant in the experiment. | |