Chapter 6 Entry

     Since I was younger, I have been fascinated with illusions and how they play tricks on the mind. I remember when I was younger, illusions used to come on the back of the cereal box.  I would be able to look at them and figure out the trick within a few minutes. But I remember an illusion that truly stumped me.  This one illusion in particular, was of an old lady and a younger woman. At the time, I could only see the old lady.  I thought that she looked quite comical and that is what stuck out to me at first.  I went to show my older sister what I thought was just a funny picture, but she could not see it. Instead, she said that she saw a younger woman looking away and a feather on her head.  We both became confused because we didn’t see the difference in the picture.  So to finally solve the issue, we outlined what we saw with a pencil.  After much staring, I was finally able to see the mysterious younger woman that sister saw!  I wondered why was it so hard for me to see the past the older lady.

     In Chapter 6, they discussed sensation and perception.  The chapter went into detail on how our sensory and perceptual processes work together to help us sort out complex images, much like the mysterious picture of the two ladies. In the book, there was a similar image that contained hidden faces, but you were only able to see them depending on the way you perceived the image.  For me, I first saw the older lady because I thought that it was funny.  After seeing that image first, it was harder to see anything past it.  Therefore, I constructed my perception based on my senses of the comical image.