Category: Research
Joe and Michelle are having dinner at a romantic restaurant. It's their first anniversary, and everything is perfect -- until an attractive woman walks past the table. Michelle notices that Joe casts a quick glance at the woman. Michelle flashes...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 2:20 PM • 35 Comments •
Category: Research
Last year's movie Changeling tells the story, from the late 1920s, of a mother whose son is kidnapped. Then, six months later, the police say they've found the boy and return him to his mother, who immediately claims that the...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 2:46 PM • 8 Comments •
Category: Research
New research identifies individuals with an exceptional ability to identify faces.
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Posted by Dave Munger at 3:21 PM • 67 Comments •
Category: Research
The notion that "smiling will make you feel better" has actually been confirmed by research. There are several studies demonstrating that people are happier when they smile, at least in certain circumstances.
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Posted by Dave Munger at 11:15 AM • 15 Comments •
Category: Research
Take a look at these two pictures of the Mona Lisa: They're derived from a series of images of the famous painting that had been obscured by random noise filters (like when your old analog TV wasn't getting a signal),...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 1:31 PM • 9 Comments •
Category: Research
Attentional blink is a fascinating phenomenon that occurs when we see images, words, or numbers presented in a rapid sequence. As images flash by at about one every tenth of a second, you're asked to look for two in particular....
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Posted by Dave Munger at 4:41 PM • 8 Comments •
Category: Research
What's your first reaction on seeing this picture of Nora? Are you excited because she appears to be excited? Or do you react to her intent? Perhaps you think she's cute, or maybe even sarcastic. Ultimately you might have...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 2:30 PM • 0 Comments •
Category: Research
Last week, we presented research by Miranda Scolari's team about visual expertise and visual short-term memory. Their conclusion: "experts" don't have a larger visual memory capacity than non-experts, they just have the ability to process more details. Scolari's team was...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 3:38 PM • 0 Comments •
Category: Research
Take a look at this quick video. You'll see a set of six small images, arranged in a circle, for 1 second. Then the screen will go blank for 1 second. Finally, one image will reappear in the place of...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 5:54 PM • 16 Comments •
Category: Research
What are we looking at when we recognize faces? The shapes of of the individual components of the face -- eyes, nose, mouth? Or are we recognizing the larger patterns of how those parts relate to one another -- the...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 4:47 PM • 2 Comments •