Sensing, Processing, and Responding!.
Ever wonder why you jump when someone sneaks up behind you and says boo; or how about why you automatically blink when something gets close to your eyes. Actions such as blinking and jumping are known as responses. What you are responding to is known as a stimulus. The reason you know to respond is because your brain processes the information and the sends a message to your muscles saying respond in a certain way. These three steps are known as Sensing, Processing and Responding. They are the steps that take the body from just feeling cold to actually putting on a jacket. .
The actions of sensing, processing, and responding all take place in the nervous system. Each action is one in a chain of events that begins with a stimulus activating a receptor. A stimulus is virtually anything in the environment that provokes a response, anything you can feel, see, hear or smell. Our body uses specialized receptors to sense each stimuli. Eyes are receptors to visual information, ears to audible stimuli; the nose is a receptor for odors, and skin for things that are felt. When a receptor is triggered by a stimulus the first stage is in action, Sensing. As soon as the information is collected by the receptors it is transported to the brain for the next stage, Processing. We are not sure what we see or hear until the brain has made a relationship between the sound and something we know is responsible for that noise. Once the sense is interpreted the body reacts accordingly, responding. The response may vary in gravity depending on the stimulus. It is in the response mode that it may happen quickly or in time. Though you may know what will happen you may choose to respond in a timely fashion.
For example, I was laying out the other day with my roommate. As I was outside for almost 2 hours I could feel the heat from the sun getting very hot. I was sensing the heat.