Abstract. Visual illusions highlight how easily our conscious experience can be altered with respect to perceptual reality. Despite sharing in-principle mechanisms with phenomenological control, i.e., the ability to alter our perceptual experience to match task demands or expectations, research tying the two remains scarce. This study aimed to replicate and extend Lush et al., (2022) by testing for a relationship between phenomenological control and illusion sensitivity across multiple illusion types, assessing the role of higher-level (top-down) processes. It also examines associations between visual illusion sensitivity and psychoticism to assess the potential contribution of lower-level effects (e.g., weak priors). Five hundred participants were recruited in an online study using an illusion-based perceptual decision paradigm (Illusion Game; Makowski et al., 2023) measuring sensitivity to three visual illusions (Ebbinghaus, Müller-Lyer, Vertical-Horizontal), alongside the Phenomenological Control Scale and personality measures. Bayesian correlation analyses provided evidence supporting the absence of a relationship between phenomenological control and illusion sensitivity, replicating prior findings. No evidence was also found for an association between illusion sensitivity and psychoticism. These findings support the hypothesis that visual illusions are to some degree cognitively impenetrable, and suggest that illusion susceptibility operates independently of higher-level control over subjective experience. However, low consistency across illusion measures highlights important methodological limitations in capturing individual differences related to illusion sensitivity.
RealityBending/IllusionGamePhenomenologicalControl
Folders and files
| Name | Name | Last commit date | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|