How Does Perception Affect Learning?

Researching this question was definitely a challenge for me. I don't think I even fully understood the definition of the word 'perception', let alone that in relation to learning. Looking at the theorists and theories involved, such as Gibson, Gestalt and Gregory, seemed to confuse me more as I couldn't really gather their main points. After some more perseverance with the ideas I have used this blog post to summarise and give myself a clearer understanding on what is involved in the concept.

Hulse, Deese and Egeth (1975) define perception as a general term that refers to awareness of objects, qualities or events that stimulate organs, and can also refer to a person's experience of the world. Therefore, when someone perceives something through their environment, they learn it and then try to put it into practice. 

Learning is often viewed as gaining knowledge or skills through experience, practice or study. Therefore, the two concepts together seem to form ideas of our responses to the world around us, through this gaining knowledge and understanding.

There are lots of different types of perceptions that are argued to affect learning, such as kinaesthetic, visual and auditory. Kinaesthetic perception is important in many areas of early childhood learning, but as children grow older, most of their learning will take place through visual and auditory perception (Illumine, no date). Moreover, another way these perceptions can affect learners is through the visual aspects and the related skills. Gibson (1966) saw an importance in visual perceptions in his study of optics, textured gradients and affordance. However, he only went as far as to explain 'seeing' but little into assigning meaning and did not look in depth at learning or memory.

Gregory also studied perception. He argues that the topic involves making inferences about what we see and trying to make a best guess. His ideas relate to learning in the classroom as he also found that prior knowledge and past experience are crucial. Therefore, when we visually look at something we are developing a perceptual hypothesis that is not just based on what is in front of us, but relies upon prior knowledge as well.

Apologies for any confusing points I may have made in this...

...but we do have seminar time to go through everyone's blogs tomorrow (on perceptual theories in learning) so hopefully I will gain a further understanding there in the discussions, and possibly be able to add more clarity to my writing here!

@HannahSheltonTT