Have you ever noticed that you can see shapes in clouds or tree branches? Wondering if other people see the same thing as you? Honestly, what do you think when you look at this photo? Can you see it?
If your baby is in this photo, you may need to see a therapist.
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Is it just a random blot on the page, or can you see something more substantial like a building, an animal, or a child? Now, look at this photo. When you look at a photo with a blemish next to a photo of a baby, do you start to see the baby in the photo with the blemish?
If there is a baby in the photo, it may mean that you are prone to hallucinations or psychosis.
But before you start questioning your own mental health, seeing a baby in a blotchy photo isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Researchers believe this ability may help explain why some people are more prone to hallucinations, which are often associated with psychotic disorders and are a natural process in the brain for making sense of the world. I think there is.
Visions and sounds that don’t exist can be created by the brain’s habit of anticipating what it expects to experience and filling in the missing gaps in reality. Most of us have experienced mild hallucinations at least once, when we hear or see things that aren’t there.
In a 2015 study by the University of Cambridge published in the journal PNAS, researchers found that “perceiving things that don’t exist or having strange, unsubstantiated beliefs (hallucinations and delusions, respectively) psychotic symptoms that occur in certain syndromes including We studied the emergence of this loss of contact with reality based on current models of normal brain function. ”
The study used 18 volunteers referred to mental health services and a separate group of 16 healthy volunteers. All participants were asked to look at vague, incomplete black and white images (similar to images of babies) and say whether there was a person in the image.
At first, all study participants found the task difficult, but then they were shown a series of undistorted color images from which a black and white image was produced. People with early signs of psychosis performed better than people in a healthy control group.
We use accurate information about the world around us (such as where we are) to understand our surroundings, but when this is not possible, we decipher somewhat vague and incomplete information from our senses. Must be.
“Vision is a constructive process. In other words, our brains create the world we see,” one of the study’s researchers, Dr. Christoph Teufel from Cardiff University’s School of Psychology, said in an interview. The brain fills in the blanks.” , presenting us with an image of the world edited and crafted to fit what we expect, ignoring anything that doesn’t quite fit. ”
Professor Paul Fletcher, from the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge, said: “Having a predictive brain would be extremely useful. It would make us efficient and adept at creating a coherent picture of a vague and complex world. But that also means we’re not.” It is a far cry from perceiving something that is not there, and that is the definition of hallucination.
In fact, in recent years we have come to realize that such changes in perceptual experience are by no means limited to people with mental illness. They are milder forms and relatively common throughout the population. Many of us have heard or seen something that wasn’t there. ”
A 2014 study states that hallucinations are relatively normal and even common. Once again, the study generated more questions than answers. Seeing a child in a blotchy photo could mean you have a serious mental health problem…or your normal brain is It might just mean you’re filling in the blanks.
If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, there are ways to get help. Call SAMHSA’s National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357) or text “HELLO” to 741741 to connect to the Crisis Text Line.
Christine Schoenwald is a writer, performer, and frequent contributor to YourTango. She has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, Salon, Bustle, Medium, Huffington Post, Business Insider, Woman’s Day, and more.