please see the attached file.

This is quite straightforward. The process is explained for each experiment and all you really need to do is follow the directions in each scenario, and record the results. You are expected to conduct the experiments (you acting as both researcher and the participant), and report the results in terms of adaptation. This is important for you to learn about the adaptation process. Your tentative outline might look something to the effect...

I. Introduction (about ¼ - ½ page, explain adaptation as discussed in the text, not as a general dictionary definition, introducing topic and purpose statement; see suggested definition below the outline)

E.g. provide a definition of adaptation, which generally means that your brain adapts to a stimuli over repeated exposure, which changes the sensation perception of the stimuli. (Check the definition in your text or class material and use that definition is possible).

II. Three experiments (using illustrative examples below).

· Experiment 1 (e.g. about ½ page: explain the experiment, the results, explain how adaptation is evident in each of your experimental results, provide a comprehensively describe the sensory systems (e.g., touch perception, taste perception, and so on) involved in these experiments, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain)).
· Experiment 2 (e.g. about ½ page; repeat the same process as for Experiment 1, as described below)
· Experiment 4 (e.g. about ½ page; repeat the same process as for Experiment 1, as described below)

III. Discussion and Conclusion (tie up main points e.g., brief explanation about adaptation and its impact on sensory perception (touch, etc.).

DEFINITION OF ADAPTATION:

The following definition is perhaps close to your text definition, but please use your text definition as suggested in the requirements for this assignment.

Neural adaptation or sensory adaptation...

It is a change over time in the responsiveness of the sensory system to a constant stimulus. It is usually experienced as a change in the stimulus. For example, if one rests one's hand on a table, one immediately feels the table's surface on one's skin. Within a few seconds, however, one ceases to feel the table's surface. The sensory neurons stimulated by the table's surface respond immediately, but then respond less and less until they may not respond at all; this is neural adaptation.
More generally, neural adaptation refers to a temporary change of the neural response to a stimulus as the result of preceding stimulation. It is usually distinguished from memory, which is thought to involve a more permanent change in neural responsiveness. Some people use adaptation as an umbrella term that encompasses the neural correlates of priming and habituation. In most cases, adaptation results in a response decrease, but response facilitation does also occur. Some adaptation may result from simple fatigue, but some may result from an active recalibration of the responses of neurons to ensure optimal sensitivity. Adaptation is considered to be the cause of perceptual phenomena like afterimages and the motion aftereffect. In the absence of fixational eye movements, visual perception may fade out or disappear due to neural adaptation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensory_adaptation).

Now let's look closer at the following experiments to help you fill in the above outline:

EXPERIMENT 1:

1. Rub your index fingers gently over a piece of very coarse sandpaper a few times and rate its coarseness on a scale from 1 (very soft) to 7 (very coarse). After a minute or two, rub the same finger over the paper and again rate its coarseness. Did your perception of the coarseness change? How?

You will randomly select one piece of course sandpaper and measure it on 7 levels (dependent variable). Your dependent variable will be the measure of your perception of the degree of coarseness of the sandpaper (e.g., on a scale from 1 (very soft) to 7 (very course)). You might hypothesize that the second exposure to the 'coarseness' will change your sensory perception of the coarseness. In other words, you are predicting that over repeated exposure to the sensory perception of coarseness, adaptation will occur.

It might be written up something to the effect...

Purpose: The purpose of your study is to determine if one's sensory perception (touch) will change after repeated exposure to a course object (sandpaper). In other words, will you adapt to the coarseness over time, as measured by the dependent variable (e.g., rate it as less course over repeated exposures).

Method and Procedures: The researcher randomly selected a piece of course sandpaper from 20 other sheets of course sandpaper. The researcher acted as the participants for the experiment. Specifically, the researcher rubbed his/her index fingers gently over a piece of very coarse sandpaper a few times and rated its coarseness on a scale from 1 (very soft) to 7 (very coarse). After a minute or two, s/he rubbed the same finger over the paper and again rated its coarseness on a scale from 1 (very soft) to 7 (very coarse). After a minute or two, rub the same finger over the paper and again rate its coarseness.

To help you in your rating, you might ask yourself:

a. Did your perception of the coarseness change?

On a scale from 1 (very soft) to 7 (very course), how did you rate the coarseness of the sandpaper the first time? _____
The second time? ______

Let's say for illustrative purposes that your perceptions of the coarseness did change.

b. How? (E.g., Results)

Let's assume that you rated the coarseness a 7 for the first exposure, and then, on the second exposure to the sandpaper, you rated the coarseness a 4. Thus, the your experiences adoption, meaning that with repeated exposure to the 'coarseness,' your touch perception adapted to sensation of coarseness by perceiving the sandpaper to be less course over repeated exposure to the coarseness.

It might be written up something to the effect...

Results: The researcher's perception of the coarseness changed from Exposure 1 to Exposure 2. After the first exposure, the researcher reported... Then, after the second exposure, she or he reported... This can be explained in terms of adaptation, as defined above. For example, adaptation was evident when the researcher rated the sandpaper as not as course (4) after the second exposure as compared to the first exposure (7) to the course sandpaper (use your own results here).

Conclusion: The researcher concluded that the results could be explained in terms of adaptation i.e. touch adaptation. (Now, use your text definition of adaptation, and describe in detail the sensory systems (touch) involved in this experiment, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain, using the definitions in your test as suggested by your instructor. This is important).

Let's look at the second experiment. Please do this experiment as well, to experience the adaptation process.

EXPERIMENT 2:

2. Distribute one cup with sugar water and one with fresh water. Take a sip of the sugar water and swish it around in your mouth (e.g., taste perception) or several seconds without swallowing it; gradually, it should taste less sweet. After swallowing it (or spitting it back into the cup), taste from the cup containing fresh water. Did the taste of the fresh water surprise you? How?

The purpose of this experiment is to determine the effect of repeated exposure of sugar water on taste perception. Specifically, ...

Procedures and method: The researcher distributed one cup of sugar water and one cup of fresh water. Then, the researcher took a sip of the sugar water and swished it around in her or his mouth for several seconds without swallowing it. After swallowing it (or spitting it back into the cup), the researcher/participant tasted water from the cup containing fresh water.

Results: After repeated exposure to the sweet water, the researcher reported that the sugar water tasted less sweet. When the researcher tasted the fresh water, the fresh water also tasted sweet. (use your own results here).

The results can be explained in terms of adaptation, as defined above. In other words, adaptation was evidence when the fresh water also tasted sweet after repeated exposure to sweet water. In other, the person's sensory perception has adapted to the sweet water and expected the next exposure to also be sweet. The sensory system involved in this experiment is the taste sensory system. The adaptation process involves both the taste sensory system, and perception controlled through the adaptation occurring in the brain.... During this process, the brain...

Conclusion: The researcher concluded that the results could be explained in terms of adaptation. (Now, describe in detail the sensory systems (taste, etc.) involved in this experiment, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain, using the definitions in your test as suggested by your instructor. This is important.).

Again, please do this final experiment to experience the adaptation process first hand, which greatly aids the understanding of the perception process, which is interpretative (and changes over repeated exposure). It differs from the sensory system, which is guided by the input of the external object and the brain signals, which remains constant. However, perception changes with repeated exposure, because it is interpretative and subjective.

EXPERIMENT 4

4. Fill 3 medium-sized bowls with (a) very hot (but not painfully so) tap water, (b) very cold tap water, and (c) a mixture of the very hot and very cold water. Arrange them, so your right hand is in front of the cold water, your left hand is in front of the hot water, and the lukewarm water is in the middle. Submerse your hands into the water (right into cold, left into hot) for about 3 minutes. After 3 minutes, quickly transfer both hands to the lukewarm (middle) bowl. (Touch perception) What did you sense?

For this fourth experiment (a) might be written up something to the effect of...

The purpose of this experiment was to determine the effect of adaptation on touch perception. Specifically, ....

Procedures and method: The researcher filled 3 medium-sized bowls with (a) very hot (but not painfully so) tap water, (b) very cold tap water, and (c) a mixture of the very hot and very cold water. He then arranged them, so his right hand is in front of the cold water, his left hand is in front of the hot water, and the lukewarm water is in the middle. The researcher then submersed his hands into the water (right into cold, left into hot) for about 3 minutes. After 3 minutes, he quickly transferred both hands to the lukewarm (middle) bowl.

Results: After quickly transferring both hands to the lukewarm (middle) bowl, the researcher sensed that the water was also cold. (Use your own results here).

The results can be explained in terms of adaptation, as defined above (assuming to define adaptation in the Introduction) sensory system involved in this experiment is the touch sensory system and touch perception (Now give details of the sensory system and the brain as suggested in the assignment). During this process, the brain... (You need to explains the brain process that occurs during this adaptation process in detail)

Conclusion: The researcher concluded that adaptation could explain in terms of adaptation. For example, ....
(Now, describe in detail the sensory systems (touch, etc.) involved in this experiment, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain).

c. In all three experiments, you will experience adaptation.

· Fully describe the process and results of each experiment. (E.g., as described above)
· What is adaptation? Explain adaptation as discussed in the text, not as a general dictionary definition. (E.g., look up adaptation in your text and use the definition and explanation that the author(s) use, as it is imperative that you follow the direction of the assignment. Explain this in some detail as this is the main process that each experiment deals with. However, you will only need to explain it in full once, and then refer back to the definition when explaining these four steps for the second, third and fourth experiment below).
· Explain how adaptation is evident in each of your experimental results. (E.g., in the first experiment above, the adaptation was evident when your touch perception rating of coarseness (e.g., sandpaper) changed over repeated exposure (exposure 1 = 7 and exposure 2 = 4).

· Comprehensively describe the sensory systems involved in these experiments, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain (As described in your text???) (E.g., this will involve the sensory systems of touch and the related brain responses. Look up touch perception and the related brain responses in your text (e.g., look in the back index for perception and then go down to touch perception).

2. Summarize your responses to the experiments. Write some paragraphs of reports addressing the items above.

Again, your tentative outline might look something to the effect...

I. Introduction (about ¼ - ½ page, explain adaptation as discussed in the text, not as a general dictionary definition, introducing topic and purpose statement)

E.g. provide a definition of adaptation, which generally means that your brain adapts to a stimuli over repeated exposure, which changes the sensation perception of the stimuli. (Check the definition in your text or class material and use that definition is possible).

In your report for each experiment in the next section, you can then refer back to this definition instead of writing it up for each experiment.

II. Three experiments (using illustrative examples above).
· Experiment 1 (e.g. about ½ page: explain the experiment, the results, explain how adaptation is evident in each of your experimental results, provide a comprehensively describe the sensory systems (e.g., touch perception, taste perception, and so on) involved in these experiments, from the receptors all the way into and including the brain)).
· Experiment 2 (e.g. about ½ page; repeat the same process as for Experiment 1, as described above)
· Experiment 4 (e.g. about ½ page; repeat the same process as for Experiment 1, as described above)

III. Discussion and Conclusion (tie up main points e.g., brief explanation about adaptation and its impact on sensory perception (touch, etc.).