PERCEPTION, ATTENTION AND WORDS: AN INTERVEHAVIORAL ACCOUNT

Abstract

Perception is still a controversial topic in psychology and in the history of science. Historically, it has been studied using non-existent entities that are responsible for the way organisms interact with the world perceived. A naturalistic approach developed by Kantor (1924, 1926, 1977; Kantor & Smith, 1975) is presented as to alternative of traditional explanations. The concepts of sensation, attention and perception are explained as fundamental parts of the total response system. Perceptual functions are described as historical and context dependent; they define how the organism will respond to a stimulus object. As any other function, perceptual functions can also be substitutable; this possibility is developed further while considering non-linguistic perceptual functions of words. It is concluded that perceptual reactions are fundamental for any further interaction of the organism with its environment; therefore it should not be left outside of the study of scientific psychology.