Invisible Gorilla: A Classic Experiment With Perceptual Abilities
The Invisible Gorilla Experiment has become a psychology classic. It was first made in 1999 and is still considered a typical example of the limitations of observation. It also describes how people don’t want to accept the fact that they are often blinded by the world around them.
Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons, creators of the Invisible Gorilla Experiment, never imagined this experiment would arouse so much curiosity and become popular. It has been repeated several times in different countries and among people of different ages and levels of education with very similar results.
If you want to try it for yourself, just watch the following video and follow its instructions before continuing. The rest of the article will become clearer if you do it yourself first!
- Just count the number of passes the white shirt team makes to each other.
- You need to be attentive and consider both the feeds thrown and the feeds popping through the ground.
- Take the test and then continue reading.
An invisible gorilla experiment
We gave you the same instructions above as Chabris and Simon gave to the group of volunteer students before taking the exam.
When participants stopped watching the video, they were asked the following questions (also answer them if you watched the video):
- Did you notice anything unusual when you counted your entries?
- Did you notice anything other than the players?
- Or did you notice anyone other than the players?
- Did you notice the gorilla?
The last question surprised the participants of the invisible gorilla experiment the most. Or at least 58% of them. When the experiment was repeated, the percentage of surprise was roughly the same. Yes, the video had a gorilla, but more than half of the people didn’t notice it. Did you notice?
Reactions to what happened
The first time an invisible gorilla experiment was done, and in all subsequent experiments, most participants who did not notice the gorilla were amazed at how obvious it was! It seemed quite impossible to them that they had not seen something so clear.
When asked to watch the video again, they all saw the gorilla without any problems. Some thought they had been shown two different videos, but this was obviously not the case. The experiment won the Ig Nobel Prize. It is a prize given to scientific activities that “make a person laugh first and then think”.
Why are so many people blind to such a clear video image? That is the big question posed by the experiment. It is also amazing that so many people refuse to accept that they were betrayed by their eyes and perceptions. They think they see everything right, but they still didn’t see something so clear.
Traps of perception
Researchers Steve Most and Robert Astur conducted a similar experiment years later. In this case, a driving simulator was used. Volunteers were told they would join where they would have to stop if they saw a blue arrow. If they saw the yellow area again, they wouldn’t have to stop.
When the volunteers completed this activity, two motorcyclists went in front of them in the simulator. When the motorcycle was blue, the virtual drivers noticed it and braked. When it was yellow, almost 60% of the participants hit a motorcyclist. The results of the invisible gorilla experiment were thus repeated in a certain way.
In such cases, it happens that people focus only on things that interest them. In the first experiment, the white-shirt team feeds, and in the second experiment, the blue arrow. They focused all their thoughts and attention on color. Because the gorilla was black and some motorcyclists were yellow, the volunteers did not notice this element.
This is because some people can focus on only one variable at a time, while others have a broader and more flexible focus model. For this reason, for example, you should never talk on the phone while driving.
