Lesson 3: Treatment

Perception

As stated at the beginning of the course, perception affects behaviour. If we perceive mentally ill people as “bad” or “at fault”, then our opinion of them and our corresponding behaviour toward them reflects this perception. Individuals suffering from mental illnesses are often treated with less dignity than individuals suffering from physical illnesses. The problem is not the mental illness itself, but rather the interpretation we put on it!

People tend to focus their attention on things or events they find interesting or important. It is easy, too, to focus too narrowly or only on the negative aspect of events. When our focus is skewed in this way, we do not get the entire “picture” and our complete understanding of events and situations is compromised. For an example of perceptual blindness, please review the experiment on the next page (summarized from Scientific American, March 2004) that highlights how important our focus is regarding perception and understanding.

Experiment Summary: Perceptual-Blindness

Scenario
Participants were asked to view a one-minute video showing one three-player team wearing white shirts and one three-player team wearing black shirts. The players on both teams weaved among each other while tossing two basketballs (one per team). The viewers of the video were asked to count the number of passes made between players of the white team. About halfway through this short video a man in a gorilla costume walked through the room, stopped in the centre, thumped his chest, and then exited the room. The gorilla was present in the video for about nine seconds. The purpose of the experiment was to find out how many people would notice the gorilla in the video.

Results
Only 50% of the participants viewing the video noticed the gorilla. The other 50% of the participants did not notice anything unusual ~an effect called inattentional blindness. Inattentional blindness occurs when an individual is focussing on one task (such as having a phone conversation while driving) and then becomes oblivious to key events (such as a kangaroo crossing the street in the crosswalk). Many of the participants who did not notice the gorilla did not believe there really was a gorilla. The scientists had to rewind the video and show it to them again.

Discussion
Our perceptual system (the senses and central nervous system) receives and analyses data, but our focus determines which data we consider important. When we focus on one event or set of data, we often miss important information. Also, we cannot assume that important events will draw our attention away from less important events. Statistics show that when people drive their vehicles, for instance, they will watch for other cars sharing the road, but they will “forget” about bicyclists – a potentially dangerous action.