If you have dared to try looking in the mirror in the candle light, you might have noticed a face staring back at you. You might even have thought it was Bloody Mary herself. Well, calm your fears, because new research from University of Urbino researcher Giovanni B Caputo finds that you have nothing to worry about (maybe)!
Caputo had 50 participants look in the mirror for 10 minutes in a dimly lit room and describe what they saw (none of them knew what they were supposed to see).
Surprisingly (or perhaps not), two-thirds of participant said they saw huge deformations of their own face. Nearly half of the participants even reported seeing “fantastical” or “monstrous” beings! A few participants also reported seeing faces of parents, ancestors, and strangers, including women and children. ALL the participants saw someone or something in the mirror other than themselves! Many participants also reported feeling that the other someone was watching them. Some even got scared if the face in the mirror looked angry.
The fact that EVERYONE saw something in the mirror indicates that the cause of this phenomenon is in our perception, not somebody in the mirror – although you never know….
Caputo speculates it might have something to do with the Troxler effect. Stare at the + in the below demonstration for 20-30 seconds.
Did you see the purple dots disappear? If not, try it again
Caputo believes the appearance of a new face in the mirror might be due to an incomplete Troxeler effect. Since there is no fixation point (like the + ) in the mirror, it might be that only some parts of our face disappear (like the nose or eyes, for example), but not all of them.
It might also be that when our face disappears, our brain imagines another face there since we’re expecting to see a face there. Or it might be some other fun mind trick our brain likes to play on us.
Have you ever tried conjuring the Bloody Mary? Did it work?
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