Write a short note on what are cognitive maps ? State the stages in Environmental Perception.

Cognitive Maps:

Cognitive maps refer to mental representations or internal models of spatial environments that individuals create to navigate and understand the world around them. These mental maps include information about the layout, landmarks, spatial relationships, and routes within a given environment. Cognitive maps are based on individuals' perceptions, experiences, and spatial abilities, and they play a crucial role in spatial orientation, navigation, and wayfinding.

Cognitive maps are dynamic and flexible, continuously updated based on new sensory information and experiences. They are essential for everyday activities such as driving, walking, and navigating unfamiliar environments. Cognitive maps also play a role in memory, problem-solving, and decision-making, as individuals use spatial knowledge to plan routes, solve spatial tasks, and make spatial judgments.

Stages in Environmental Perception:

Environmental perception involves the process by which individuals acquire, interpret, and make sense of information about their physical surroundings. It consists of several stages:

1. Sensation: Sensation is the initial stage of environmental perception, where individuals receive sensory input from the environment through sensory organs such as eyes, ears, nose, skin, and mouth. Sensory information includes visual stimuli (e.g., light, colors, shapes), auditory stimuli (e.g., sounds, noises), olfactory stimuli (e.g., odors, scents), tactile stimuli (e.g., textures, temperatures), and gustatory stimuli (e.g., tastes, flavors).

2. Perception: Perception is the process of organizing, interpreting, and making sense of sensory information to create a meaningful representation of the environment. Perception involves cognitive processes such as attention, pattern recognition, depth perception, and interpretation of sensory cues. It allows individuals to recognize objects, identify spatial relationships, and extract relevant information from the environment.

3. Attention: Attention is the selective focus of cognitive resources on specific stimuli or aspects of the environment while filtering out irrelevant or distracting information. Attentional processes determine which sensory inputs are attended to, processed, and encoded into memory. Attention plays a crucial role in environmental perception by directing individuals' awareness to relevant environmental cues and facilitating information processing and decision-making.

4. Interpretation: Interpretation involves assigning meaning to sensory information based on past experiences, knowledge, beliefs, and expectations. It involves cognitive processes such as categorization, schema activation, mental imagery, and inference-making. Interpretation influences how individuals perceive and understand their surroundings, shaping their attitudes, emotions, and behaviors towards the environment.

5. Memory: Memory is the retention and retrieval of information about the environment over time. Memory processes include encoding, storage, and retrieval of environmental information from long-term memory. Environmental perception relies on memory to recognize familiar places, recall spatial layouts, and navigate to desired locations. Memory also plays a role in updating cognitive maps and adapting to changes in the environment over time.