By: Lisle O.

The Purpose of this experiment was to determine if painting a mental picture of a certain experience alters the way someone perceives an optical illusion. A random sample of fifty, seventh-grade students were chosen. A survey was given to each student. They were shown a series of optical illusions, and asked for their perceptions. The first two questions were typical optical illusions. The first one was the difference between a circle and an oval, and the second one was lines misperceived as unequal. On the third question, a mental picture was placed in their mind by having them a paragraph that would alter their perceptions about a picture that would be shown. The data recorded showed that they misperceived reality, and instead were fooled by the optical illusion. This was true for the first two questions.
The hypothesis of this experiment was that placing the mental picture of an event would change a person's perception of an optical illusion. The hypothesis was accepted. This conclusion shows that different people can perceive reality in different ways. In other words, the exact, same object is interpreted differently.