Looking Isn’t Seeing

• Chabris and Simons cite a number of situations where people were looking in the direction of something without seeing it. Vehicular accidents are common. Motorcycle accidents are often the result of the motorist not seeing the motorcycle. The reason is that they don’t expect to see one. Walking and biking are the safest where they are done the most. We have limited attention resources. Any distraction means we have less attention for our primary task. Our vision does not record an entire scene like a video recorder. It isn’t unusual for two people looking at the same scene to see different things. Eyewitnesses are overrated.

Share this: