Editing Logarithm (section)

===Psychology===
Logarithms occur in several laws describing [[human perception]]:<ref>{{Citation | last1=Goldstein | first1=E. Bruce | title=Encyclopedia of Perception | url={{google books |plainurl=y |id=Y4TOEN4f5ZMC}} | publisher=Sage | location=Thousand Oaks, CA | isbn=978-1-4129-4081-8 | year=2009}}, pp.&nbsp;355–56</ref><ref>{{Citation | last1=Matthews | first1=Gerald | title=Human Performance: Cognition, Stress, and Individual Differences | url={{google books |plainurl=y |id=0XrpulSM1HUC}} | publisher=Psychology Press | location=Hove | isbn=978-0-415-04406-6 | year=2000}}, p.&nbsp;48</ref> [[Hick's law]] proposes a logarithmic relation between the time individuals take to choose an alternative and the number of choices they have.<ref>{{Citation|last1=Welford|first1=A.T.|title=Fundamentals of skill|publisher=Methuen|location=London|isbn=978-0-416-03000-6 |oclc=219156|year=1968}}, p.&nbsp;61</ref> [[Fitts's law]] predicts that the time required to rapidly move to a target area is a logarithmic function of the ratio between the distance to a target and the size of the target.<ref>{{Citation|author=Paul M. Fitts|date=June 1954|title=The information capacity of the human motor system in controlling the amplitude of movement|journal=Journal of Experimental Psychology|volume=47|issue=6|pages=381–91 | pmid=13174710 | doi =10.1037/h0055392 |s2cid=501599}}, reprinted in {{Citation|journal=Journal of Experimental Psychology: General|volume=121|issue=3|pages=262–69|year=1992 | pmid=1402698 | url=http://sing.stanford.edu/cs303-sp10/papers/1954-Fitts.pdf | access-date=30 March 2011 |title=The information capacity of the human motor system in controlling the amplitude of movement|author=Paul M. Fitts|doi=10.1037/0096-3445.121.3.262}}</ref> In [[psychophysics]], the [[Weber–Fechner law]] proposes a logarithmic relationship between [[stimulus (psychology)|stimulus]] and [[sensation (psychology)|sensation]] such as the actual vs. the perceived weight of an item a person is carrying.<ref>{{Citation | last1=Banerjee | first1=J.C. | title=Encyclopaedic dictionary of psychological terms | publisher=M.D. Publications | location=New Delhi | isbn=978-81-85880-28-0  | oclc=33860167 | year=1994|url={{google books |plainurl=y |id=Pwl5U2q5hfcC|page=306}} |page=304}}</ref> (This "law", however, is less realistic than more recent models, such as [[Stevens's power law]].<ref>{{Citation|last1=Nadel|first1=Lynn|author1-link=Lynn Nadel|title=Encyclopedia of cognitive science|publisher=[[John Wiley & Sons]]|location=New York|isbn=978-0-470-01619-0|year=2005}}, lemmas ''Psychophysics'' and ''Perception: Overview''</ref>)

Psychological studies found that individuals with little mathematics education tend to estimate quantities logarithmically, that is, they position a number on an unmarked line according to its logarithm, so that 10 is positioned as close to 100 as 100 is to 1000. Increasing education shifts this to a linear estimate (positioning 1000 10 times as far away) in some circumstances, while logarithms are used when the numbers to be plotted are difficult to plot linearly.<ref>
{{Citation|doi=10.1111/1467-9280.02438|last1=Siegler|first1=Robert S.|last2=Opfer|first2=John E.|title=The Development of Numerical Estimation. Evidence for Multiple Representations of Numerical Quantity|volume=14|issue=3|pages=237–43|year=2003|journal=Psychological Science|url=http://www.psy.cmu.edu/~siegler/sieglerbooth-cd04.pdf|pmid=12741747|citeseerx=10.1.1.727.3696|s2cid=9583202|access-date=7 January 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110517002232/http://www.psy.cmu.edu/~siegler/sieglerbooth-cd04.pdf|archive-date=17 May 2011|url-status=dead}}
</ref><ref>{{Citation|last1=Dehaene| first1=Stanislas|last2=Izard|first2=Véronique |last3=Spelke| first3=Elizabeth|last4=Pica| first4=Pierre| title=Log or Linear? Distinct Intuitions of the Number Scale in Western and Amazonian Indigene Cultures|volume=320|issue=5880|pages=1217–20|doi=10.1126/science.1156540|pmc=2610411|pmid=18511690| year=2008|journal=Science|bibcode=2008Sci...320.1217D| citeseerx=10.1.1.362.2390}}</ref>