About Face
I was doing a bit of reading about recognition and faces, one thing led to another in the way that internet research does, so here are a few morsels from research (scholarly and otherwise) on human perception of faces. Er, Four Links On Faces?
1. The Thatcher Effect
This image looks pretty normal when viewed upside down, even though the mouth and eyes are inverted in both versions of the image. Really. Turn your laptop upside down, right now. Behold, the Thatcher Effect.
Researchers from Emory University attribute the phenomenon to our sensitivity to the relationship between facial features in upright faces, a sensitivity that also allows us to differentiate between faces and recognize familiar faces. Read more.
| Tagged with: | Faces, Illusions, Perception, Psychology, Research |