Perception and Illusions: Apply It

  • Describe examples of Gestalt principles
  • Understand multimodal perception
  • Give examples of multimodal and crossmodal behavioral effects
  • Explain how and why psychologists use illusions
  • Discuss real-life examples of the Ebbinghaus illusion

Revisiting the McGurk Effect: Variations and Differences

Earlier in this module, you learned about the McGurk effect, whereby the auditory features of a stimulus seem to change to match its visual features.

Watch this video to experience how strong this effect can be even if we are not watching anyone speak. In this case, we are simply given contextual information about what we might be hearing.
You can view the transcript for “Brain Games – Multimodal Perception and Superior Temporal Sulcus” here (opens in new window).

What was your experience like? Did you experience the McGurk effect any differently with this video versus the one you watched a few pages back?

While the McGurk effect is a pretty robust psychological phenomenon, some evidence suggests that not everyone experiences the McGurk effect to the same extent.

Can you think of a situation when the McGurk effect might not work or people who might be immune to it?

  1. Proverbio, A., Massetti, G., Rizzi, E. et al. (2016) Skilled musicians are not subject to the McGurk effect. Scientific Reports, 6. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep30423 ↵
  2. Brown V. A, Hedayati M., Zanger A., Mayn S., Ray L. Dillman-Hasso, N., Strand, J. F., (2018) What accounts for individual differences in susceptibility to the McGurk effect?. PLOS ONE 13(11): e0207160. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0207160 ↵