| Chapter 5: Sensation and Perception The brain actively builds representations of the environment from the basic information it receives. What you perceive is often a good-enough guess of what the environment is like, but may not be "real." The brain relies on information it has in store to do this. We refer to this as top-down processing. As we all have different information stored in our brain it shouldn't be surprising that we may perceive certain situations differently. Several things can influence our perceptions: mood, attention, expectations... Our mind can strongly influence our perception of reality, and may even lead us to behave in pre-determined fashion (self-fulfilling prophecy). The effects of subliminal messages on tapes has proven to be bogus. Yet, under very strict laboratory conditions it is possible for information presented unconsciously to influence our behaviors. |
 |