A sensation is a process by which sensory receptors receive stimulation and produce nerve impulses that are sent to the brain. They, in turn, interpret the impulse into a real image, sound, pain, or taste. These physical stimulants are the one that emits energy that is absorbed by a sensory organ such as the hand, tongue, or nose and causes a sensation. Perception, on the other hand, is the action that occurs after the brain has received a message from the neural impulses; the process involves the interpretation as well as translation of the information received. It is an important process that helps us in rationalizing the information that is related to the physical stimulus. Hence perception is when the brain processes the data it has received as well as giving it meaning.
The human being has different sensory organs that have different stimulation which is around through smelling, hearing, tasting, and finally being felt physically in the skin. These sensory organs receive a signal from the surrounding and the process is the one that is called sensation. In simple terms, perception can as well be stated as another sensory organ, to sum up the human sensory organs to six. It is when anything and everything around us happens, and an opinion is formed. It is a personal experience as well as what is in the mind or what they think r view the world around them. People are different. The sensation is an important element in creating a perception. It is very simple that creators of awareness of qualities such as taste and color, among others, are a result of the excitement of the sensory organs. Perception is a complex process that is psychological, while sensation is just a simple process that is more physical.
It is clear that perception and sensation are the elements that complement as well as balance each the. The stimuli-related information could not have a meaning. Without the presence of sensation then perception will not happen as well. The case is an exception to an individual who believes in extra perception. It is also clear that without perception our sensation would have remained unknown since the mental processing is not there.
However, these processes are very different things. They differ in a number of things despite the fact that they relate to and support each other. The difference between perception and sensation is that sensation is just a passive activity that brings information from the outside environment into the body as well as the brain. On the other hand, perception is the active process that organizes, selects as well as interprets the data that is sent by the sensory organs such as the ear, hand, or any other human sensory organ. A sensation is a passive process since we do not engage in the sensing process in our consent. Every individual can be in a position to sense a variety of information or different situations at the same time. For instance, a person can be able to feel the temperature of that given room, the sound of a hooting train, smell of perfume. We can say that due to too much information from the sensation of our brain, everytimes do not interpret everything. Perception interprets psychologically what we have seen or any physical activity that has sent some signal to the brain so that the brain may interpret.
For instance, in a case where you’re talking to an individual in the process, you might not realize that there is a person who has just got in. Despite the fact that the footsteps were heard as well as the door creek, the brain did not just interpret the information, and therefore perceiving the coming in of that person was not possible. Most of the activities we do in this world may go unperceived. There are a number of important things in the world that go unnoticed.
More so we can say that perception is shaped by expectation, memory as well as learning. An example of it will bring about more distinctive things about perception as well as sensation. For instance, when we are far building or structure that we are seeing may appear smaller, but as we walk closer, the building tends to increase in size. It is, therefore, what an eye can see, hence we do not be surprised and start shouting about how the building is increasing as we move closer since, in our mind, we know the building has always been the same, and it is just the distance that makes the building appears so. Another instance is when something has been removed in a room, and we walk in; we can just tell there is a difference in the room compared to how it was previously.
According to most psychologists, they believe that sensation is an up-to-down process that involves the movement of information from the body to the brain, while perception is the opposite; perception is the up to down process. Hence this means that after a psychological process, perception occurs when the information is sent back to the sensory organs so that they can correspond to the physical stimuli. For instance, in a case where the hand has touched a hot object, the impulse will be sent to the brain, and after a psychological interpretation, the information will be sent to the sensory organ, and the individual will withdraw the hand from the hot object. The most important aspect is how we interpret the kind of data that affects our interaction with the world.
Therefore we can say that the way perceptions well as sensations process information are two completely different ways. In sensation, the sensory organ acts as a register of the physical property as well as the physical stimulus. It is the organ that decodes this data and changes the information into the neural impulse. The neural impulse is transmitted to the human brain. Hence we can say that there is no clear line of differentiating perception and sensation; in our real-life situation, we understand that perception follows sensation. Out of sensation and the information in the brain being processed psychologically, one can be able to make sense of a certain issue.
We can be able to compare sensation and perception since they consist of different processes. Perception is an internal activity that is psychological and can only be involved in the brain, while sensation is a physical activity that involves sensory organs. There is a different threshold that is associated with perception and sensation. These thresholds include absolute threshold as well as difference threshold. An absolute threshold is the one that works as a detector, and it refers to the weakest stimulus that an individual may still be able to perceive. At this level, perception is around 50%, and it is therefore known as the lowest intensity. Therefore comparing sensation and perception gives us a deeper understanding of how both relate and what it takes for the two processes to happen successfully.
