Cambridge scientists discover why children think they are invisible when they hide their eyes

Daily Mail
Sun, 28 Oct 2012 08:16 UTC

Researchers are looking for a scientific answer to explain why children think they actually disappear when they cover their eyes while playing peekaboo.

Researchers led by James Russell at the University of Cambridge have carried out the first study into this bizarre trait with groups of three and four-year-old children.

The children's eyes were covered with masks and they were then asked whether they could be seen by the researchers - with most saying no.

Many also believed that the researchers could not see adults who were wearing eye masks - leading to the conclusion most young children believe that anyone who covers their eyes is obscured from other people's view.

The researchers then attempted to distinguish what exactly creates the feeling of invisibility - whether it was not being able to see at all or just because the other person couldn't see their eyes.

The children were given a pair of mirrored goggles so that while they could see through the glasses, no one could see their eyes.

Unfortunately, only 7 of the 37 participating children were able to get to grips with the idea that while they could still see, no one could see their eyes.

But of those who did understand the concept, six believed they were invisible if the researchers couldn't see their eyes, even if they could still see them.

Although when the children were asked to explain how they were made invisible by simply hiding their eyes, many knew that their bodies remained visible, suggesting a childhood distinction between their physical bodies and the 'self' they connect to their eyes.

To test this theory that children believe they can be seen only through their eyes, the researchers looked directly at each of the children while asking them to avert their gaze.

They then did the same process in reverse, with the children looking at the researchers while they diverted their eyes.

In each instance, the majority of children felt they were not being seen so long as their eyes didn't meet the other person's, giving some support to the ideology of eyes being the the window to the soul.

Reader Comments

gdpetti · 2012-10-28T13:11:19Z

Hmmm

Afterlife or hyperdimensional bleedthrough? A matter of choice in whether to be seen or not? To see or not? Seems it takes them a while to learn our ways or 'seeing'. Is it all children or those of a certain type that share this propensity?/

Topaz11 · 2012-10-29T00:06:49Z

strikes at the core of things... something the author of the article and the harvard researchers don't have much stomach for... too 'personal'...
well put, senor, and apt questions for anyone willing to cut through the headwork and take stock of what we have the capacity to 'see' as all kids do; those who've yet to learn of clever adult distinctions

Divide By Zero · 2012-10-28T19:29:16Z

Even easier

A child lacks the awareness of the laws of reality, that things he/she doesn't see still can see him. I don't know why the media tries to make pseudo spirituality of these studies.

Perhaps the researchers do this... like the higgs-boson particle being called "the god particle"... bleh

Jean Michel · 2012-10-28T22:13:29Z

Perhaps the children see their corporeal bodies as mere vessels of their personalities, with the eyes being the only outward physical expression of who they really are. They have not yet learned the vanity of the flesh that convinces us that we are our bodies.

One cannot deny that we exist in a Universe based in duality. I think that is a point that has been well established.

Everything has its antithesis, even science. In a reality that is, at least seemingly, based on the positive/negative balance, to discount one half of the equation is to negate the other.

I think that the Heisenberg Principle is an attempt to explain certain metaphysical aspects of the human psyche.

l_e_cox · 2012-10-30T20:57:24Z

How children see things.

This is a very interesting study. One hopes it was reported accurately.

The notion that a child tends to retain an awareness of its spiritual identity for a few years after birth seems ridiculous, yet it is plausible to me. It aligns with Ian Stevenson's work, for example. It also explains the behavior of "Boriska" who as a boy spoke from the identity he held previously until it became too socially embarrassing for him, at which point he stopped.

Though it may not be real to many readers, if you can imagine being a bodiless being, a simple cause point, and not emitting anything, then no one would be able to see you. The only way a being can "look" is by sending out a beam. But by so doing, that being also becomes visible. It is a very basic spiritual action.

To block one's eyes is to symbolically stop looking. The child, more or less totally into creating its own reality, would be quite satisfied that, as a game, ceasing to look would render one invisible. After all, it's just a game, isn't it?

Topaz11 · 2012-10-29T00:08:17Z

simple

before the headwork which spurned on the article above, or the theories laid atop it, the childlike wonder which is before distinctions, theories, explanations...
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🪓🪛 will work, besides pulling out the wires.

Science of the Spirit

Cambridge scientists discover why children think they are invisible when they hide their eyes

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