Margaret Thatcher Face Illusion
But instead of changing everything in the picture.
Margaret thatcher face illusion. The margaret thatcher illusion which also gets called the thatcher effect along with other names occurs when a picture is turned upside down. It is named after the late british prime minister margaret thatcher on whose photograph the effect was first demonstrated. Access to society journal content varies across our titles.
The interesting part is that the brain thinks it can so you get a confident feeling that everything is alright until you turn it over. The thatcher illusion reveals orientation dependence in brain regions involved in processing facial expressions. This phenomenon is referred to as the thatcher illusion as its discoverer peter thompson used a photo of margaret thatcher shown below in his original experiment.
The effect was originally created in 1980 by peter thompson professor of psychology at the university of york. If you have access to a journal via a society or association membership please browse to your society journal select an article to view and follow the instructions in this box. Case in point the thatcher effect sometimes known as the thatcher illusion.
By psalta l young a. According to clinical psychologist dr. Why does the effect occur.
Browse and enjoy our huge collection of optical illusions and mind bending images and videos. Three decades ago thompson 1980 discovered what is now a classic visual demonstration in psychology. Take a look at this amazing margaret thatcher illusion illusion.
Julie smith whose video showcasing the oddity has earned over 33 million views the thatcher effect is a phenomenon in which changes in facial features that are very obvious in an upright face are much more difficult to identify when the face is upside down. W thompson p and andrews t. That inverting the eyes and mouth of margaret thatchers face passes largely unnoticed when the face is presented upside down even though the face appears grotesque in the upright.
The thatcher illusion was first reported by the university of yorks professor peter thompson in 1980 and laid the groundwork for a new way of thinking about how we process faces. Biggest optical illusions blog. A psychologist is going viral on tiktok after explaining an illusion that has users seriously creeped out.
Julie smith is a clinical psychologist based in hampshire england. In addition to her day to day work she also has a popular tiktok page where she shares little known facts about her field. In a recent clip smith explained the thatcher effect a phenomenon that explains some pretty crazy details about how our brains work.
Dedicated to visual phenomena and real life illusions. The thatcher effect or thatcher illusion or eyesmouth wrongway is a phenomenon where it becomes more difficult to detect local feature changes in an upside down face despite identical changes being obvious in an upright face.