What do you call it when you can read something that isn't there?
By ladyljs
@ladyljs (1303)
United States
October 6, 2008 8:50am CST
I have seen these emails in the past, but haven't gotten one lately. My kids are thinking about doing a project on the phenomenon of the brain finishing words in a sentence, but I can't find out what it is called.
I.E.
Tday is the bst day! It is gong to be snny and wrm.
Our brain automatically does a spell check, and we are able to read the sentence.
Any comments on this would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
1 person likes this
1 response
@danishcanadian (28953)
• Canada
7 Oct 08
I think it's a form of classical conditioning. We are so used to seeing osmething a certain way, that we don't register it as being wrong. It's the same with typos that we might miss.
"I am going to talk you to the store today."
Probably by the word "to" you realized that I meant "take" not "talk" but our fingers often hit keys spelling real words that our brains did not mean to type. That is also classical conditioning of sorts.
