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Understanding the value of knowledge and the context in which it is used is an important step in learning about human cognition. Nowhere are the roles of knowledge and context clearer than in human perception.
The process by which meaning is assigned to stimuli is referred to as perception. Perception is critical to all aspects of cognition and is itself directly influenced by the person’s knowledge and the context of events created by his or her knowledge. Closely related to perception is attention, the allocation of a person's cognitive abilities. As your read this page, you also may be listening to the radio. What you perceive at any given moment depends on how your attention is divided among various tasks. If most of it is devoted to a weather forecast on the radio, you may not correctly perceive the meaning of some of what you are reading. On the other hand, if you are immersed in this subject, you may not hear your name when the radio announcer calls it and says that you have five minutes to phone to collect a $1,000 prize.