What you see first depends on your age in this optical illusion – Evening Edition Ouest-France

A young girl or an old woman? This image is one of the oldest optical illusions in the world. But a study shows that what you see in this picture may depend on your age…

It’s simple: either you see a young woman looking off into the distance, her head turned three-quarters, or you see the angled profile of an older woman looking to the left of the picture… This image is the oldest. Known optical illusions. A 2018 study, conducted by two Australian psychologists, was published in the journal Scientific reports

declared that young men look first at a young woman and that old men usually look at an old woman first.

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The study included 393 participants (242 men and 141 women) aged 18 to 68 years in the United States, with a mean age of 32 years. Each participant was shown the image for half a second, then asked to determine the gender and age of the character they saw in the picture.

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Most of the young participants actually saw the girl first. The researchers refined the results by separating the respondents, with the oldest 10% on one side and the youngest 10% on the other. They found that the older set saw the older woman first, and the younger set saw the younger woman.

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Purpose of study? Decide if “Age bias affects early interpretation of imagery at the subconscious level.” In their conclusion, the study’s authors explain: “Although face perception is based on neural processes, it is also conditioned by social processes. »

and emphasizing those sociocultural practices “The elderly are less inclusive”.