Blind Spots

Take a good look at this image. How many black dots are there?

There are twelve. You probably saw that as you scanned over the image. But what you didn't see is all twelve dots at the same time. Look again. When you focus your field of vision on one specific area, dots from other areas simply disappear.

This happens because our vision, contrary to our beliefs, is not as detailed as we think. When you focus your vision on a spot, the spot image hits your retina and is in focus. Like these words here. But if you look at this word and try to NOTICE (without changing your focus), can you read the words in the previous paragraph? Most people cannot... because our peripheral vision is not as detailed.

But this illusion isn't just about the failures of our peripheral vision... If so, we would still se some faint outline of a blurry black dot. This illusion plays on our brain's ability to recreate expected patterns. You see, you've lived your entire life with blurry peripheral vision, and so your brain has learned to reconstruct a world just outside of your area of focus, for your comfort. So the brain sees the pattern of gray lines and understand how it should continue, and it perceives it coninuting. Since the black dots are not a regular part of the pattern, when your brain reconstructs the pattern... the dots are not there.

Perception > Reality

To learn more about perception and the power it can have in interpersonal relationships and communication, please feel free to reach out to us.