Hartmann, Matthias; Müller, Petra (2023). Illusory perception of visual patterns in pure noise is associated with COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs. i-Perception, 14(1), p. 20416695221144732. Sage Publishing 10.1177/20416695221144732
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Just as perceptual heuristics can lead to visual illusions, cognitive heuristics can lead to biased judgements, such as "illusory pattern perception" (i.e., seeing patterns in unrelated events). Here we further investigated the common underlying mechanism behind irrational beliefs and illusory pattern perception in visual images. For trials in which no object was present in the noise, we found that the tendency to report seeing an object was positively correlated with the endorsement of both COVID-19 specific conspiracy theories and paranormal beliefs. The present results suggest that the cognitive bias to see meaningful connections in noise can have an impact on socio-political cognition as well as on perceptual decision making.
Item Type: |
Journal Article (Original Article) |
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Division/Institute: |
07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Psychology 07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Psychology > Cognitive Psychology, Perception and Methodology |
UniBE Contributor: |
Maalouli-Hartmann, Matthias, Müller, Petra |
Subjects: |
100 Philosophy > 150 Psychology |
ISSN: |
2041-6695 |
Publisher: |
Sage Publishing |
Language: |
English |
Submitter: |
Pubmed Import |
Date Deposited: |
07 Feb 2023 11:20 |
Last Modified: |
12 Feb 2023 02:26 |
Publisher DOI: |
10.1177/20416695221144732 |
PubMed ID: |
36741291 |
Uncontrolled Keywords: |
COVID-19 cognitive biases conspiracy beliefs illusory pattern perception paranormal beliefs |
BORIS DOI: |
10.48350/178440 |
URI: |
https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/178440 |
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