Do you know what will happen if you look in the mirror for 10 minutes without a break

Have you ever heard of Christmas divination in front of a mirror for a betrothed? Variants of the ritual are different, but in general they look like this: at night we light a candle in front of a mirror and look into it until we see the physiognomy of the future groom.

Well, or the charming face of some representative of evil spirits - how lucky. They say that such fortune-telling is an extremely frightening activity, not for the faint of heart.

You may ask: why are we talking about all sorts of mystical practices? XXI century in the yard. Oddly enough, such obscurantism as Christmas divination in front of a mirror has an exciting effect on people for a reason. And science has explained why.

Psychologists from the University of Urbino conducted experimentIllusory Scenes Fade into and out of View / Scientific American. They forced the subjects to sit in an empty semi-dark room and stare at their own face in a mirror for 10 minutes.

The effect exceeded all expectations.

Participants vying with each other reported that after a while their faces in the mirrors became completely alien, and even bizarrely distorted. Yes, test subjects seenThe strange‑face‑in‑the‑mirror illusion / Mind Hacks in the reflections of the living or already dead parents, some old women, children or portraits of distant ancestors. And also the muzzles of animals, such as a cat, a pig or a lion, and absolutely fantastic monsters, which are difficult to describe.

Even those members who continued to recognize themselves toldG. b. caputo. Visual Perception during Mirror‑Gazing at One’s Own Face in Patients with Depression / The Scientific World Journalthat individual features were distorted, as if they did not belong to them. As a result, scientists gave this phenomenonIllusory Scenes Fade into and out of View / Scientific American the name "Illusion of someone else's face."

Here people who believe in any mysticism can say: “That's right! After all, mirrors are portals to other dimensions, from where various otherworldly entities can look at the curious... "

However, the “illusion of an alien face” does not only work with mirrors. Scientists from the same Urbino University decided checkG. b. caputo. Strange‑face illusions during inter‑subjective gazing / Consciousness and Cognition patterns of its manifestation.

To do this, they sat the subjects in pairs with the condition to look at each other without looking up. And test subjects reportedG. b. caputo. Strange‑face illusions during inter‑subjective gazing / Consciousness and Cognitionthat the faces of their comrades were changing. Some saw the muzzles of monsters, others noticed distorted features, and still others generally stated that the partners in the experiment began to look like their friends or relatives. Sometimes the illusions were funny, and sometimes they were disturbing and frightening.

Scientists believeIllusory Scenes Fade into and out of View / Scientific Americanthat there are two reasons for the "illusion of an alien face" - these are the so-called Troxler phenomenon and neural, or sensory, adaptation.

1. The Troxler Phenomenon can be described as follows: when we look at something for a long time, it takes and disappears from our field of vision. It's just that the brain reasons: the object is motionless, and therefore unimportant. And therefore simply cuts outS. Martinez‑Conde. The role of fixational eye movements in visual perception / Nature Reviews Neuroscience his. In general, this is a useful effect: it allows us not to focus on the tip of the nose and scratches on the cornea - the so-called flies in the eyes. Numerous optical illusionswhen you look at the picture for a long time - and it disappears.

2. Neural adaptation it works like this: when you get the same information for too long, your brain stops it perceiveD. Gilden. Neural Adaptation of Imaginary Visual Motion / Cognitive Psychologyso as not to be overwhelmed. Let's say if you sprayed perfume, then after a while stopG. DePalo. Common dynamical features of sensory adaptation in photoreceptors and olfactory sensory neurons / Scientific Reports smell them. It's just that the brain is a lazy organ and tries not to overload itself with unnecessary sensations if they seem unimportant to it.

These two effects cause our mind to deceive itself.

At first, you stare at a face for too long, whether it's your own in the mirror or someone else's belonging to your friend. The brain gets used to it, begins to consider it unimportant and cuts it out of your consciousness, which can make your eyes look slightly defocused.

When you move your eyes slightly, the neural responses in your brain will “refresh” and the brain will again will tryIllusory Scenes Fade into and out of View / Scientific American focus on the face in front of you. If it is not clearly visible - for example, due to semi-darkness - the brain "finishes" its shape and features, based on its own imagination. Yes, just like neural networks in smartphones, which, when the camera does not have enough data, finalize the picture according to their own understanding.

The result of such drawing May beIllusory Scenes Fade into and out of View / Scientific American both funny and scary. And it was the “illusion of a strange face” that gave rise to Christmas divination for the betrothed, rituals to call Bloody Mary and other ways to scare yourself with the help of a mirror.