OBEs and imagery experiment

[Dr B]

Dear all

Have you ever had an out-of-body experience - where you experience the world from a vantage point outside of your physical body?

If so, and you would like to take part in an experiment - please PM me and let me know. It would require you to come to my lab (more details on request).

The experiment is about 45mins long and involves a short computer-based task and then filling in some questionnaires.


{apologies for the shamless self publicity}

[vbloke]

only when drunk

[Dr B]

my hunch is those factors may well be correlated with each other...

[bobdezon]

ill get some of my ex lady friends to give you a call Dr B

[Dr B]

[SKIRRID5]

I don't fancy being a guinea-pig, but there is one thing I'd like to ask about OBEs. We don't "see" the world directly; our brain constructs a model from the visual input, and tests it against stored examples. When the process gets somehow snarled up, we "see" something that's not actually there. Is that more or less right? What puzzles me are the instances where people claim they seemed to be floating up above, looking down on themselves. Unless one commonly looked up at a mirrored ceiling (maybe some of you rascals do!) one's brain would not have a stored image of oneself seen from above, would it?

[chillzero]

Maybe not from above, but if you look in a full length mirror, you'll have an idea what you look like lying down, no?

[Dr B]

We don't "see" the world directly; our brain constructs a model from the visual input, and tests it against stored examples. When the process gets somehow snarled up, we "see" something that's not actually there.

Indeed, but this can also happen when things do not get 'snarled up' as well. Perception itself is something of a fiction - it's not a complete fiction but it does go way beyond the sensation that gives rise to it. Check out the Emmerts law effect with after-images - its quite striking.

What puzzles me are the instances where people claim they seemed to be floating up above, looking down on themselves. Unless one commonly looked up at a mirrored ceiling (maybe some of you rascals do!) one's brain would not have a stored image of oneself seen from above, would it?

Good question! Actually the OBE imagery is entirely consistent with a model-building approach. We build models for flexibility in representation and one aspect of that is the manipulation and transformation of stored information. We use unreal perspectives all the time. We use them in navigation, memory, spatial reasoning, communication, imagery, perspective taking and so on.

Let me give a common example from research on autobiographical memory. Can you remember an instance (a specific instance that happened to you) when you participated in a primary school play / production? If you can, hold that image in your mind. Try to paint the picture on what is going on and what you 'see'.

Now, do you see yourself in your own memory? Quite often people see themselves in their own memory from 'outside' of themselves. In order to see ones self - the 'perspective' has shifted. This is perfectly normal and part of the memory process. Many people see themselves in their own memories (not always and not for all memories - but commonly for old memories and traumatic ones). Oddly, people are often not aware of the fact that their memory has done this until it is pointed out to them This is because we are the experiencer's of the experiences (placing the 'self' at the centre of it) - but the trace can decay and then require top-up information from generic knowledge and abstraction processes (which can be false). From here, spontaneous transformations can occur - like seeing yourself in your memory.

This is an example (just one) of how internal abstraction processes can alter perspectives and place a representation of the 'self' into the model in a novel way. Seeing yourself in your own memory is, in essence, a form of out-of-body experience (see Nigro & Neisser, 1983, Points of view in Personal memory, Cognitive Psychology; for a empirical investigation) in the sense that you are looking at yourself from an external point of view (though you never think it's real perception).

Now here is a twist - I have been doing research on this over the last few years and the mechanisms involved in this memory distortion do not appear to relate - in any meanigful way - to the OBE. Therefore, perspective changes can occur for different reasons and can be served by different mechanisms - but i dont want to say too much yet as this has yet to be submitted and published 8)

Does this make sense?

[Dr B]

There are also loads of studies on scene perception showing that abstraction processes may actually be relatively fast acting and possibly instantaneous.

Some experiments have shown that Participants are faster at recognising scenes from elevated and abstracted perspectives (ones they never saw during the test phase) relative to those presented with the exact same scene (from the same angle)! In other words they recognised the pictures more quickly from a novel (though similar) perspective than the very same one they saw moments ago!

This has been taken to mean that information is very quickly integrated into a 3-dimensional model of the world.

Although this does not speak to the notion of seeing oneself - it does speak to the notion of a view-independent abstraction process which is inherent to the brains model building mechanisms

[Dr B]

In addition there is a model / account termed 'strategic regulation' (Korriat & Goldsmith - I think)......which claims that the same information can be recalled and represented quite differently depending on the task at hand / context / intention / social meaning / and so on.

For example, what is the memory / information, what are you recalling it for (to communicate to others?), what is the aim, and so on.

Imagine describing the route home. Now imagine giving directions to somoeone to find their way to your home - these circumstances are different and sometimes will cause you to represent the same recalled information in quite different ways depending on many other factors.

....i love my job........