Introduction Of Perception

It is very strange that in this dynamic world, every day we are bombarded with the countless objects,
events or persons. But, we retain few stimuli and reject others. In addition to that, the way we
understand and interpret the stimuli received differs from person to person. What is the reason of
this phenomenon? The answer is perception. Perception is a psychological factor affecting human
behaviour because perception determines the way the individual experiences the situation.

3. Meaning and Definition of Perception

Perception can be understood as the process through which information or stimulus is received from
the environment, then selected, organised and interpreted in order to assign some meaning to it.
The meaning is derived out of the information received from the environment so that the
information can be used for taking important decisions and actions. The process of perception can be
better explained through the definitions given below:
According to Joseph Reitz, “Perception includes all those processes by which an individual receives
information about his environment- seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting and smelling. The study of these
perceptual processes shows that their functioning is affected by three classes of variables-the objects
or events being perceived, the environment in which perception occurs and the individual doing the
perceiving.”
“Perception can be defined as a process by which individuals organise and interpret their sensory
impressions in order to give meaning to their environment.”

Therefore, in simple words, perception can be described as the process of seeing what is available to
be seen. But, this process is influenced by perceiver, the object being perceived and the situation in
which perception is being formed.

4. Nature and Importance of Perception

Perception is basically interpretation of the sensory data which involves understanding the stimulus
received from the environment. It is determined by physiological as well as psychological
characteristics of an individual because perception not just involves receiving the stimulus from the
sensory organs-eyes, ears, skin, nose, tongue but, it is much more than that. Perception is formed
when the stimulus received is organised in a particular fashion and then interpreted to have an idea
about what is happening in the environment. In addition to that, perception is a subjective process
because different individuals may perceive the same environment differently on the basis of what
stimulus they select from the environment, the manner they organise and interpret the
information in order to understand the situation. Importance of perception can be understood from
the following points:

a) Perception is important in understanding variations in individual behaviour. As discussed above,

every individual perceives the surroundings differently and therefore, understanding the perception
help us find out why every individual behaves in a particular manner. This is one of the major reasons
why one individual finds one job interesting and satisfying while another finds the same job boring
and dissatisfying.

b) As perception strongly influences behaviour of an individual, we can very easily predict the
behaviour of an individual in the changed circumstances by understanding his perception about the
present environment.
c) Perception can also help in assessing various needs of the people, because their perception is
largely influenced by their needs.

5. Perceptual Process

From the definitions of perception discussed above it is very clear that perception is composed of
various sub-processes: receiving, selecting, organising, interpreting, checking and reacting to stimuli.
The process is influenced by perceiver, object and situation. The process of perception is explained in
the following figure:

5.1 Receiving

Human body is comprised of five sensory organs viz. eyes, ears, nose, tongue and skin. These sensory
organs help in sensing the environment in the form of vision, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The
sensory organs receive the stimuli form the outer environment. Anything which we notice in the
environment is stimulus e.g. noise of vehicles, smell of food, sound of rain, sense of heat or cold etc.
The stimuli which we receive serve as inputs for the process of perception.

5.2 Selecting

Many things happen in the environment simultaneously but, human mind cannot pay equal
attention to all events or things equally. Therefore, individuals filter or screen out the irrelevant
things and select the things which are relevant with their existing beliefs, values and needs. This
process of selecting relevant things from the environment for paying the attention is called
perceptual selectivity. The following factors influence the process of selecting stimuli from the
environment:

5.2.1 External Factors: External factors influencing selection are following:

a) Size: Size always catches the attention of an individual. Generally bigger objects are more likely to
catch attention than the smaller objects. For example: A very big animal in a zoo will always catch
more attention of the visitors than the smaller one. In addition to this, a full page advertisement in a
newspaper always stands out than a small column advertisement.

b) Intensity: The stimuli with high intensity are more likely to be perceived than the stimuli with low
intensity. Very bright colours, very bright lights, loud noise, strong odour are noticed faster than light
colours, dim lights, soft sound, weak odour etc.

c) Repetition: Repeated stimuli draw more attention than those which are not repeated. Instructions
which are repeated by a plant supervisor are retained in the memory of employees for a longer
period of time than those instructions which are conveyed only once. An advertisement which is
repeated more on a T.V channel or radio station catches attention and is remembered by the viewers
than the advertisement which shown just once a day.

d) Contrast: Principle of contrast states that stimuli which stand out against the background or
objects which contrast with their surroundings will receive more attention. An exit signboard in a
movie hall, a danger signboard on a road under construction are made with a colour scheme which
contrasts with each other like red and black, yellow and black or white and black.
e) Movement: The principle of motion states that a moving object or thing draws more attention
than a still one. A moving vehicle among the parked vehicles will catch the attention immediately.

f) Novelty and Familiarity: Novel objects or familiar objects always gain more attention of perceiver.
In a crowded trade fair, a friend or a familiar face and a new face in a family get together will be
immediately noticed.

g) Nature: It refers to whether the object is visual in nature or auditory. It is a common fact that
pictures receives better attention than words, videos attracts more attention than still pictures and a
rhyming phrase attracts more attention than a phrase which is presented as a narration. Animated
cartoons catch more attention of children than comic books.

5.2.2 Internal Factors: Internal factors influencing the process of perception are:

a) Learning: Learning is a cognitive factor which strongly influences the process of perception.
Learning creates expectancy in the individuals and then they tend to perceive what they want to
perceive. Take the following example:

Read the text given in the above figure, the individual will most likely read the last word as ‘Mac-
Hinery’ instead of ‘machinery’. This is because individual tends to be caught in verbal response set.
Now take another example:

In the above figure, because of the prior learning, one will read the sentence as “bird in the hand”.
But, it will take few seconds to realise that there is an extra ‘the’ in the sentence.

b) Needs: Needs also play a significant role in the process of perceptual selectivity. A thirsty person
will always be sensitive towards the sources of water and a hungry person will always tend to see
eating points everywhere. A person who has high need for affiliation will always join the group of his
friends in the leisure time and the person with high need for achievement will tend to work hard
even in the leisure time to accomplish his goals.

c) Age: The people of different age group always hold different perceptions about the
environment. For example: older senior executives always feel that young executives are not
competitive enough to take important decisions of the organisations and on the other hand young
staff always complaint that older staff members are resistant to change and tend to follow
conventional methods of working in the organisation. These differences in the perceptions of old and
young employees are due to difference in their age.

d) Interest: Perception is also influenced by the interest of the person though unconsciously. A
fashion designer will notice so many details in an outfit which is hanged on a statue of a shop in just
a casual look, but a routine visitor will not be able to observe the same details in the same outfit
even if he looks at it ten times more.

5.3 Organising

After receiving and selecting the stimuli from the environment, the data received must be organised
in a particular fashion so that we can extract some meaning out of it. This aspect of organising the
information into a meaningful whole is called perceptual organisation. Perceptual organisation is
completely a cognitive process and is based on the following principles:
a) Figure and Ground: This principle is considered as the basic form of organising the perceptual set.
This principle simply states that the object or event or person which is being perceived stands out
from its background. See the figure given below:
In the first sight, it looks like a white vase but, if you take white as a background then you will see
two faces which are in black colour.
b) Perceptual grouping: Grouping is defined as the tendency to group the stimuli into some
meaningful patterns. Grouping includes similarity, proximity, closure and continuity.
Similarity: The principle of similarity states that objects of similar shape or colour or size tend to be
grouped together. In an organisation all white collared employees are seen as one group. See the
following figure, the signs are perceived as four rows rather than eight columns.
Proximity: The principle of proximity states that individuals tend to perceive the objects placed
together as one group. The employees who are working in the same department are perceived as
one group because of geographical proximity. See the following figure, eight circles are perceived as
two groups of four in first row and four groups of two in the second row because of nearness of
circles to each other.
Closure: The principle of closure states the tendency to perceive the object as a whole even when
some parts of it are missing. Individual’s perceptual process will fill the gaps that are unfilled from
the sensory input. The following figure demonstrates the principle of closure. The object given below
will be perceived as a circle even if some parts are missing. In an organisation also a sincere, hard
working and honest worker will be perceived as a good performer by the managers even if he behave
in a contradictory manner sometimes.
Continuity: Principle of continuity assumes that an individual tend to perceive continuous lines or
pattern. People tend to perceive the obvious ways of performing the tasks and fail to think creatively.
Continuity leads to inflexibility and non creative thinking on the part of employees.
c) Perceptual Constancy: The principle of constancy states the tendency to perceive certain
characteristics of an object as remaining constant, despite of the variations in the stimuli. This
principle provides a sense of stability in this dynamic world. There are several aspects of constancy:
Shape Constancy: When an object appears to maintain it shape despite of marked changes.
Size Constancy: When we tend to see the object unchanged in the size even if it moves farther away
from us. A player who is standing on the other side of the football ground will not perceive football
smaller as compared to when he looks at the same football from a closer location.
Colour constancy: familiar objects tend to be perceived of the same colour even if they are exposed
to some changed conditions. The owner of a red car will see his car as red in the bright sunlight as
well as in the dim twilight.

d) Perceptual defence: This principle states that individuals tend to build a defence against the
stimuli which are conflicting, threatening or unacceptable. Defence may assume the four possible
forms: (a) outright denial, (b) modification of data received, (c) change in the perception but refusal
to change and (d) change in the perception itself.

5.4 Interpreting

Perceptual interpretation is the essential part of the perceptual process. After the selection and
organisation of the information, perceiver interprets the information in order to assign meaning to it.
Actually perception is said to be formed only when the information is interpreted. Several factors
contribute in the interpretation of the information. Most common of them are discussed as follows:
a) Perceptual set: Previously held beliefs or experiences about an object influence the individual’s
perception about similar objects. This phenomenon is called perceptual set. For example, an old
manager may have developed a general belief that young executives tend to be frequently absent
from the job and they are not committed to the organisations. This previously held belief will always
influence his perception whenever he will meet a new young worker.
 b) Stereotyping: Stereotyping is the tendency of judging someone on the basis of the group to
which he belongs. An individual’s perception about one person will always be influenced by his
experiences with the other members of the group to which that person belongs. Some common
examples of stereotyping are: Americans are materialistic, Japanese are nationalistic, workers are
anti-management etc.
c) Halo Effect: It is the tendency of perceiving others on the basis of a single trait which may be good
or bad, favourable or unfavourable. Sometimes, we judge the person on the basis of one first
impression. For example, a person who is just kind may also be perceived as good, able, helpful etc.
and the person who is rude may also be perceived as awful, aggressive, unkind, harmful etc. Halo
effect is a common error committed by the managers while evaluating their subordinates.
d) Projection: Projection is the tendency of assigning own attributes to the others. It is easy to judge
others if we assume that they are like us. It refers to projecting own feelings, abilities, motives and
tendencies into judgement of others. A manager who himself is punctual assumes that all staff
members of his office are punctual.
e) Implicit personality theory: When we make judgement about others, our perception is influenced
by the belief that certain human traits are associated with others. For example, honesty is associated
with hard working.
f) Selective perception: As discussed in the starting of the process that, individuals have the
tendency to select certain objects from the environment which they find relevant to their existing
beliefs and values. This is because, human mind cannot assimilate everything which it observes and
hence, we select certain stimuli and screen out the other. But we don’t choose the stimuli randomly;
we choose them according to our interests and experiences. Therefore, selective perception offers
the risk of drawing inaccurate picture of the ambiguous situation.
g) Attribution: Attribution refers to the process of assigning causes to the behaviour. People are
interested not only in observing the behaviour but also in determining its causes. Their evaluations of
and reactions to other’s behaviour may be heavily influenced by their perception that the others are
responsible for their behaviour. When we observe an individual’s behaviour, we attempt to
determine whether it is internally caused or externally caused. Internally caused behaviours are
those which we believe that they are under the control of the individual and externally caused
behaviours are those which are believed to be beyond the control of the individual. The
determination that whether the behaviour is internally caused or externally caused depends upon
three factors viz. distinctiveness, consensus and consistency.
Distinctiveness refers to whether the individual displays different behaviour in different situations. If
the individual usually behave differently in different situations, his behaviour is externally caused. But
if he behaves in the similar manner in the different situations his behaviour is internally caused.
Consensus is when everyone behaves in a same way whenever they face the similar situation. If
there is a consensus in everyone’s behaviour, it means the behaviour is externally caused otherwise
it is internally caused.
Consistency in a person’s action refers to when an individual behaves in a same way over a period of
time. If the behaviour of a person is consistent, it is internally caused otherwise it is externally
caused. The following figure explains the process of attributing one’s behaviour to external factors or
internal factors