#113 The PAREIDOLIA EFFECT: What is it and are you going crazy?

Have you ever seen a strange face in a photo and wondered who or what it was and whether your eyes were playing tricks on you? In this episode, you join me as we explore Amy’s question: 'What is pareidolia and am I going crazy?'  We look at what pareidolia is, how and why we see faces and whether people’s fear of ghosts or darkness triggers them to see images of faces in objects or photos, Is my mind playing tricks on me?

RESEARCH SOURCES:
https://hub.jhu.edu/magazine/2024/winter/pareidolia-faces-in-nature/
https://thedebrief.org/auditory-pareidolia-the-voices-in-your-head-may-have-a-rational-explanation/
https://www.artsandmindlab.org/pareidolia-research
https://www.education.com/science-fair/article/hear-what-they-want-to-hear/
https://phmuseum.com/projects/pareidolia-primeval-awareness-or-generative-biological-intelligence

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Transcript

Speaker 1: Anna Schmidt (Host)  

Hello and here we are at Perfectly Paranormal episode 113

My name is Anna Schmidt, and I'm here every week to share with you true paranormal encounters and information about devils, demons and dark energy beings that no one else talks about. Today, today, you join me as we explore Amy’s question about pareidolia – what it is, how we see it and does people’s fear of ghosts or darkness triggers them to see images of faces in objects or photos and is that voice real. Is my mind playing tricks on me? 

 I’d never heard of pareidolia until I started work as a paranormal tour guide and was accessing photos of the previous tours in the haunted location where we worked and saw shapes, and silhouettes of faces in some of the photos. I questioned this with some of the other people in the groups and heard “Oh, that is just pareidolia, your mind wanting to see faces where there are none.” Or I would be listening back to a spirit box recording or EVP and clearly hear a word, name or an answer to a question and it would be fobbed off as random noise that I wanted to be a specific answer.

WHAT IS PAREIDOLIA?

THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF PAREIDOLIA: The more common is the sensory illusion of visual pareidolia and then there is also auditory pareidolia.

Wordhippo.com definition of visual pareidolia:

The tendency to interpret a vague stimulus as something known to the observer, such as interpreting marks on Mars as canals, or seeing shapes in clouds, .

Iivescience.com defines auditory pareidolia as:

The phenomenon of hearing intelligible voices or noises in meaningless background noise.

Pareidolia used to be thought of in medical circles as connected to hallucinations, psychosis and mental health disorders such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorders. One resource I linked in the notes suggests that people with creative brains are more likely to experience pareidolia as their brains are wired with creativity and creative potential to look at problem-solving, with flexible and original thinking, not closed and limited thinking like a lot of people possess. I like to think of it as being open to new perspectives and possibilities... observing the environment around us. And I am going to share one way I did this as a kid and still do sometimes as an adult.

Visual pareidolia falls into two categories as I see it:

1.     The faces people see in clouds, rock formations, on the moon and even in everyday objects – the well know face of Jesus in  a piece of toast, random facial expressions seen in cut vegetables, and in usable objects with handles and holes such as household items. This doesn’t require zooming in on photos like the second type of visual pareidolia, these faces are part of the structure of items and objects. With clouds, clouds are forever changing in shape due to environmental shifts in wind and weather and our brains look for familiar objects. Rock faces and shapes are created by erosion, the natural layout of the land and the angles you perceive them. Tree trunk structure and shapes are created by natural formations and environmental factors. EXAMPLE: I have never been much of a cloud gazer but I used to have fun looking at the faces on the front and rear of cars. The faces were created with the locations and shapes of the lights, grill, locations of the indicator lights, bumper bars and the overall shape of the car. This gave me never-ending giggles and once you see the car faces, you can’t unsee them.
 
 

2.     Then on the other hand, we have the spirit and dark being faces that can sometimes be seen in photos when you zoom in. I have noticed these when looking at photos and once your eyes attuned to seeing them, you can’t unsee them either. 
 EXAMPLE: I was looking at a picture of a woman and her daughter on FB one day, not specifically looking for pareidolia images but admiring the building behind her and as my focus suddenly shifted left. What I saw was rather interesting, I saw a white wispy shape near the child’s head. Zooming in on the shape, as it was in the dark shadow area, I easily saw a pale white head with an open mouth and arms peeking out behind the child. This was distinctly different to the shapes in the brickwork behind them that had random faces created by the holes in the bricks and mortar and shadows etc that your brain may force you to see faces in. This was something else. I showed the semi zoomed in photo to people without telling them what I saw and they all saw it too.

AUDITORY PAREIDOLIA

I have five examples for you of what might be auditory pareidolia or not… you make up your mind. No.4 is my favourite.

1.     I am in bed some nights and hear someone say Mum or Anna… Am I dreaming, am I awake?… I feel awake, roll over and listen again... nothing. We have noisy neighbours so the ‘mum’ might be someone outside my house or in a neighbouring yard or house or is it a spirit presence in my home wanting help?

2.     Sometimes I go to bed asking a question and wake up hearing the answer outside my head above my left ear (this happens a lot) and I don’t share a bed with anyone, so it isn’t a human voice. Is it my spiritual helpers sharing the answer I need or my brain finding the answer and somehow projecting the answer??? 

3.     I have been at spiritual markets behind my stall busy writing something and hearing my name as clear as a bell like someone is standing very close to me, when I look up…there is no one there and no one near my table and other stall holders are busy doing their thing. Is this spirits in the environment wanting my attention … very possibly because I don’t go looking for pareidolia of any kind but spirits and other entities come looking for me or are in the room I am present in.

4.     On the other hand, I do enjoy using sound recording devices and spirit boxes to communicate with spirits in our earth's environment. I have ringing in my ears, so clear hearing isn’t one of my best attributes. I often share recordings or do spirit box sessions with others and we can have 2,3,4 other people all hearing the same word or words coming through the spirit box. You can’t tell me that is pareidolia. It isn’t the power of suggestion either, we clearly hear spirit’s names, ages, a message or answers to questions, it is a really fun activity.

5.     Lastly, have you ever been thinking about a personal struggle or had a problem that you need help or much needed inspiration?... Well, our spiritual support team use our environment to communicate with us such as sharing messages in songs on the radio or you have been thinking about your dad who passed away and you have the radio on and his favourite song plays. I like to think of this as divine intervention.
 
 So, what do you think?... have you heard a random voice with no rational explanation or seen a vivid face or full body image of someone looming in the background of a photo… are you a believer, a sceptic or sit on the fence?

There will always be rational minded sceptics when it comes to all non-scientific attributes in our environment and that is great… Sceptics challenge us to delve deeper and actually unpack in a multitude of ways the unseen paranormal world around us.

So, in episode 114, have you ever wondered what the signs of paranormal presence are in places? Well, you will hear a comprehensive guide to the human and environmental causes attracting paranormal presence and all the common and not so common possible signs of energetic disturbances, annoying and possibly frightening issues with paranormal intruders in buildings. So, join me next week as we unpack the causes and reasons why energetic intruders and their trickster behaviours are present in homes.

Thank you for joining me today and don’t forget if you want to share your paranormal 
 experiences or have a question, email me at spiritualbeing44@gmail.com 

For information on paranormal house clearing visit my website:  

https://www.spiritualbe-ing.com.au/  

I look forward to sharing this spooky space with you again next week and remember life is perfectly paranormal.

RESEARCH SOURCES:

https://hub.jhu.edu/magazine/2024/winter/pareidolia-faces-in-nature/

https://thedebrief.org/auditory-pareidolia-the-voices-in-your-head-may-have-a-rational-explanation/

https://www.sciencefocus.com/the-human-body/pareidolia

https://www.artsandmindlab.org/pareidolia-research

https://www.education.com/science-fair/article/hear-what-they-want-to-hear/

https://phmuseum.com/projects/pareidolia-primeval-awareness-or-generative-biological-intelligence