Psychology: Attention, Sensation, and Perception

These three concepts (attention, sensation, and perception) are distinct but related cognitive processes, most often discussed within the field of cognitive psychology. Sensation refers to the experience of the physical world through the use of your senses (sight, smell, taste, etc.). Perception is the interpretation of these experiences, organizing and analyzing the sensations so that you can understand and react to them more meaningfully. Attention (for which there is a limited capacity), refers to your focus on certain sensations, stimuli, etc. in your environment over others. (Definitions adapted from the APA Dictionary of Psychology).

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