This is due to the expectations we have, which can also explain misunderstandings about other people’s intentions.
When we interact with other people, we have a reasonable expectation of what might happen. For example, if someone greets you, they are more likely to extend a hand to you than suddenly turn around. If someone suddenly starts a pirouette as a greeting, it may take a while for our brain to register and process this. This is because we often do not actually see what others are doing, but are mainly concerned with thinking about what the other person will do. Researchers discovered this Netherlands Brain Institute.
That’s because our brains react strongly to the actions of others and make a plan around them. When we see someone perform an action, for example picking up a knife, the same parts of our brain become active as if we were to perform that action ourselves. For a long time, researchers thought that it would work as follows: first we see what is happening with our eyes, and then we send that information to the parts of our brain that help us to act ourselves. This way we can better understand and empathize with what the other person is doing.
Plan
But according to the Dutch researchers, this may not be entirely true. After all, we never carry out an activity without context, but always have something of a plan in mind. For example, the activity ‘making a sandwich’ is part of the larger context ‘making breakfast’. When we see someone making breakfast, our brains suddenly listen little to the fact that we see someone making a sandwich, and more to our own plans around it. “What we would do ourselves becomes what we see,” says research leader Christian Keysers.
Two in one
The researchers saw this after they were allowed to take a unique look into the brains of people who suffer from epilepsy. These patients already had small wires in their heads to measure where their epilepsy came from. When they were not having a seizure, the researchers were allowed to use those wires to see how their brains worked. This way they could measure very precisely what happens unconsciously in the brain.
Sequences
The people who participated in the study were shown various videos in which someone did different things, such as making a sandwich or folding a shirt. They always showed two versions. In one version, everything went as you would expect: you see someone grab a sandwich, then a knife, then cut open the sandwich, and so on. In the other version everything was mixed up: you see someone take a knife, then a sandwich, then a plate, and so on. In the meantime, the researchers used the wires to monitor which parts of the brain were active when they watched the videos.
Observe
This showed that the brain responded very differently to the two versions. In the version where everything happened at the same time, the brain did what we thought: first it saw what was happening with the eyes, and then it sent that information to the parts that help us to act ourselves. But in the version where everything went as expected, something changed. Now the brain sent the information in the other direction: from the hands to the eyes. It seemed as if they were ignoring the information from their eyes, and relying more on their own plan.
To predict
This means that our brains not only respond to what we see, but also predict what we will see. We see the world from within ourselves, instead of from the outside world. Only when what we see does not match what we expect, then this prediction no longer works, and we see what really happens instead of what we thought would happen. After all, the participants saw exactly the same things in the two versions of the video, but only in the normal version could their brains use their own plan to figure out what would happen next.
This automatic interpretation of other people’s behavior can be useful when it is predictable. This way we can anticipate what the other person is doing faster and better. But if the other person shows unexpected behavior, it can cause problems, explains Valeria Gazzola, one of the leaders of the study. “Because we see not only what others are doing, but also what we think they are going to do, we sometimes make mistakes in understanding the intentions or feelings of others. Especially if they are different from ours.”
2023-11-19 07:40:31
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