I just read a fascinating article on visual cognition.
In one experiment, people who were walking across a college campus were asked by a stranger for directions. During the resulting chat, two men carrying a wooden door passed between the stranger and the subjects. After the door went by, the subjects were asked if they had noticed anything change.Half of those tested failed to notice that, as the door passed by, the stranger had been substituted with a man who was of different height, of different build and who sounded different. He was also wearing different clothes.
These two videos (QuickTime required) show the switch from a different angle, so the swap is obvious to us. But it's mind-boggling to me that the person giving directions failed to notice the change about half of the time.
Posted by rv at May 16, 2004 09:21 AM to science!