Neuroscience
From sworn witness accounts of alien visitations, to deep-rooted trust in quack medical treatments, the human trait that psychologists call "naive realism" has a lot to answer for. This is people's instinctive feeling that they perceive the world how it is, encapsulated by the saying "seeing is believing." The truth, of course, is that our every perception is our brain's best guess, built not merely with the raw material of what's out in the world, but just as much with the bricks of expectation, hope and imagination.
William Hart and his colleagues at the University of Alabama propose that naive realism not only inspires false confidence in what we see, but also more generally in our beliefs and assumptions. Based on this logic, the researchers tested whether explaining to people about naive realism, and showing them the unconscious, fallible mental work that leads to their unstable perceptions, might have knock-on effects, making them more open-minded and more doubtful of their assumptions about a person's character.
Nearly 200 students took part and were split into four groups. One group read about naive realism (e.g. "visual illusions provide a glimpse of how our brain twists reality without our intent or awareness") and then they experienced several well-known, powerful visual illusions (e.g. the Spinning Wheels, shown above, the Checker Shadow, and the Spinning Dancer), with the effects explained to them. The other groups either: just had the explanation but no experience of the illusions; or completed a difficult verbal intelligence test; or read about chimpanzees.
Afterwards, whatever their group, all the participants read four vignettes about four different people. These were written to be deliberately ambiguous about the protagonist's personality, which could be interpreted, depending on the vignette, as either assertive or hostile; risky or adventurous; agreeable or a push over; introverted or snobbish. There was also a quiz on the concept of naive realism.
The key finding is that after reading about naive realism and experiencing visual illusions, the participants were less certain of their personality judgments and more open to the alternative interpretation, as compared with the participants in the other groups. The participants who only read about naive realism, but didn't experience the illusions, showed just as much knowledge about naive realism, but their certainty in their understanding of the vignettes wasn't dented, and they remained as closed to alternative interpretations as the participants in the other comparison conditions.
"In sum," the researchers said, "exposing naive realism in an experiential way seems necessary to fuel greater doubt and openness."
At the time of writing, the internet is abuzz with talk of a dress that looks different colours to different people, with numerous scientific explanations on offer. It's a bit like the main intervention condition in this study writ large – experience of an illusion, combined with explanation that shows the hidden work of unconscious processing. Might this internet meme foster greater openness in society?
Before we get carried away, more is research is needed to test the longevity of these effects, and how far they generalise. It's possible, for example, that people's core beliefs would not be affected in the same way. Nonetheless, the researchers are hopeful: "... the present effects may have implications for fostering a more tolerant, open-minded society," they concluded.
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Hart, W., Tullett, A., Shreves, W., & Fetterman, Z. (2015). Fueling doubt and openness: Experiencing the unconscious, constructed nature of perception induces uncertainty and openness to change Cognition, 137, 1-8 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2014.12.003
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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Neuroscience
Visual illusions foster open-mindedness
William Hart and his colleagues at the University of Alabama propose that naive realism not only inspires false confidence in what we see, but also more generally in our beliefs and assumptions. Based on this logic, the researchers tested whether explaining to people about naive realism, and showing them the unconscious, fallible mental work that leads to their unstable perceptions, might have knock-on effects, making them more open-minded and more doubtful of their assumptions about a person's character.
Nearly 200 students took part and were split into four groups. One group read about naive realism (e.g. "visual illusions provide a glimpse of how our brain twists reality without our intent or awareness") and then they experienced several well-known, powerful visual illusions (e.g. the Spinning Wheels, shown above, the Checker Shadow, and the Spinning Dancer), with the effects explained to them. The other groups either: just had the explanation but no experience of the illusions; or completed a difficult verbal intelligence test; or read about chimpanzees.
Afterwards, whatever their group, all the participants read four vignettes about four different people. These were written to be deliberately ambiguous about the protagonist's personality, which could be interpreted, depending on the vignette, as either assertive or hostile; risky or adventurous; agreeable or a push over; introverted or snobbish. There was also a quiz on the concept of naive realism.
The key finding is that after reading about naive realism and experiencing visual illusions, the participants were less certain of their personality judgments and more open to the alternative interpretation, as compared with the participants in the other groups. The participants who only read about naive realism, but didn't experience the illusions, showed just as much knowledge about naive realism, but their certainty in their understanding of the vignettes wasn't dented, and they remained as closed to alternative interpretations as the participants in the other comparison conditions.
"In sum," the researchers said, "exposing naive realism in an experiential way seems necessary to fuel greater doubt and openness."
At the time of writing, the internet is abuzz with talk of a dress that looks different colours to different people, with numerous scientific explanations on offer. It's a bit like the main intervention condition in this study writ large – experience of an illusion, combined with explanation that shows the hidden work of unconscious processing. Might this internet meme foster greater openness in society?
Before we get carried away, more is research is needed to test the longevity of these effects, and how far they generalise. It's possible, for example, that people's core beliefs would not be affected in the same way. Nonetheless, the researchers are hopeful: "... the present effects may have implications for fostering a more tolerant, open-minded society," they concluded.
_________________________________
Hart, W., Tullett, A., Shreves, W., & Fetterman, Z. (2015). Fueling doubt and openness: Experiencing the unconscious, constructed nature of perception induces uncertainty and openness to change Cognition, 137, 1-8 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2014.12.003
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- First Brain Scan Study To Feature That Dress
Figure and caption from Schlaffke et al., 2015.Earlier this year a dress nearly broke the internet. A photo of the striped frock (which is actually blue and black) was posted on Tumblr and it quickly became apparent that it looked very different...
- Children's Understanding Of The Internet
How much do young children understand about the internet? Zheng Yan at the University of Albany recruited 83 children, aged from 5 to 12 years, to find out how much they used and understood the internet. Children aged from five to eight years tended to...
- What On Earth...?
Children's drawings of the Earth as flat, or hollow with people inside, have led some psychologists to believe children develop naive, but coherent, mental models of what the planet is like based on their own observations. Such accounts predict that...
- Call For Submissions: Best Visual Illusion Of The Year Contest!
Filling in the Afterimage after the Image 1st prize, 2008 Rob van Lier and Mark Vergeer (Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands) Do you have an entry for this year's contest? Are you mesmerized by visual illusions? Then read on! Submission...
- Neuropsychology Abstract Of The Day: Art And Neuroscience
Returning to a fav topic of mine, here is a new research study: The right hemisphere in esthetic perception Front Hum Neurosci. 2011;5:109 Bromberger B, Sternschein R, Widick P, Smith W, Chatterjee A Abstract Little about the neuropsychology of art perception...