In 1999, Daniel Simons and Chris Chabris published a book titled the Invisible Gorilla after years of research in their field of psychology. The book focused on an unfamiliar concept; the illusions of our everyday lives. Simons and Chablis discussed several illusions, including the illusion of memory (Simons & Chabris, 2011). Throughout the book, the two emphasize the concerns that falling prey to these illusions can create. The illusion of memory encompasses the disconnect between how we think memory works, and how it actually works (Simons & Chabris, 2011).
Humans naturally believe in the accuracy of memories, with 95% of students tested reporting that if a person with a huge door walked between them and another person they just met and …show more content…
Researchers believed there was an effect, and that change blindness had a strong influence on the accuracy and confidence of eyewitness identification. In the study, participants were told to pay close attention to the details of the event because they will take on the role as an eyewitness viewed a video that started as an innocent person walking through a building, and then another person who was stealing (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, 2016). The subjects were then asked to identify the thief from a line-up containing either that culprit, or the innocent man (two different groups). In this situation, approximately 64% of participants did not notice a change between the innocent man, and the thief. The study concluded that change blindness increases misidentifications. Although the chances are increased, innocents are not necessarily at significant risk for misidentification (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, …show more content…
Knowledge of change blindness and other illusions has been around for decades, with a lot of experiments done to further our understanding of the principle. Change blindness occurs in everyday situations that people are completely unaware of. In the Invisible Gorilla, there was a study done showing film to a group of undergraduate students. They were told that there were continuity errors, things that do not necessarily belong or match the scene, overlooked by script supervisors. Then they were asked if they believed if they were not told about the continuity errors that they would have noticed them. About 70% of students said they would have spotted the change. When a group of students was shown the film without knowledge of the continuity errors, no one noticed. Most people firmly believe that they will notice unexpected changes, when in fact almost nobody does (Simons & Chabris, 2011). This carries over to the ideas presented by Fitzgerald, Oreit and Price and their insight into change blindness and eye witness identification.
There is a great deal of emphasis on how these visual changes go “undetected” (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, 2016). In an eyewitness event, accuracy of memory is extremely crucial. We can see a criminal in action, and just moments later misidentify them due to change
Humans naturally believe in the accuracy of memories, with 95% of students tested reporting that if a person with a huge door walked between them and another person they just met and …show more content…
Researchers believed there was an effect, and that change blindness had a strong influence on the accuracy and confidence of eyewitness identification. In the study, participants were told to pay close attention to the details of the event because they will take on the role as an eyewitness viewed a video that started as an innocent person walking through a building, and then another person who was stealing (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, 2016). The subjects were then asked to identify the thief from a line-up containing either that culprit, or the innocent man (two different groups). In this situation, approximately 64% of participants did not notice a change between the innocent man, and the thief. The study concluded that change blindness increases misidentifications. Although the chances are increased, innocents are not necessarily at significant risk for misidentification (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, …show more content…
Knowledge of change blindness and other illusions has been around for decades, with a lot of experiments done to further our understanding of the principle. Change blindness occurs in everyday situations that people are completely unaware of. In the Invisible Gorilla, there was a study done showing film to a group of undergraduate students. They were told that there were continuity errors, things that do not necessarily belong or match the scene, overlooked by script supervisors. Then they were asked if they believed if they were not told about the continuity errors that they would have noticed them. About 70% of students said they would have spotted the change. When a group of students was shown the film without knowledge of the continuity errors, no one noticed. Most people firmly believe that they will notice unexpected changes, when in fact almost nobody does (Simons & Chabris, 2011). This carries over to the ideas presented by Fitzgerald, Oreit and Price and their insight into change blindness and eye witness identification.
There is a great deal of emphasis on how these visual changes go “undetected” (Fitzgerald, Oriet, & Price, 2016). In an eyewitness event, accuracy of memory is extremely crucial. We can see a criminal in action, and just moments later misidentify them due to change