Contents
What to Do
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Press the "Experiment 1" button to start. You will see a rectangle with a line going through it at some orientation. You can control the shape of the rectangle (making it square) or the orientation of the line (keeping it perpendicular to the sides of the rectangle) by moving the mouse appropriately. You might start by controlling the orientation of the line. When the line is perpendicular to the sides of the rectangle press the mouse button to see a new rectangle. Move the mouse again (if necessary) to make the line perpendicular to the sides of the new rectangle. Press the mouse to see a new rectangle. Continue in this manner until a graph of the data appears (this happens after eight orientation control trials).
In the typical psychology experiment a variable (the independent variable or IV) is manipulated and its effect on another variable (the dependent variable or DV) is measured. The observed relationship between IV and DV is supposed to reveal something about the nature of the organism under study. But this is only true if the organism under study is not a perceptual control system. A perceptual control system acts to protect controlled perceptions from the effects of disturbance. An observer who cannot see or is unaware of the perception under control will see the disturbance as an IV and the actions that protect the perception from disturbance as a DV. The observed relationship between IV and DV appears to characterize the organism's responsiveness to external events, but this is an illusion: a behavioral illusion. The relationship between IV and DV actually characterizes the responsiveness of the (unobserved) controlled perception to the effects of the organism and the disturbance.
The present study illustrates the behavioral illusion in a simple psychological experiment. The IV in this experiment is the height of the rectangle; the DV is the width of the rectangle, which depends on movement of the mouse. The graph of the results shows the relationship between IV and DV when you are controlling either the shape of the rectangle or the orientation of the line going through it. If you controlled the orientation of the line in Experiment 1, the graph shows a linear relationship between IV and DV with a slope that inclines at a 45 degree angle relative to the IV axis. If you controlled the shape of the rectangle in Experiment 1, the graph still shows a linear relationship between IV and DV but the slope of the line inclines at only a 23 degree angle relative to the IV axis
Now do Experiment 2 (press the "Experiment 2" button) and control the same perception that you controlled in Experiment 1. When you have completed the experiment you will see that the graph of the results differs from what was seen in Experiment 1. If you were controlling the orientation of the line you will see that the slope of the linear relationship between IV and DV now inclines at about a 23 rather than a 45 degree angle relative to the IV axis; if you were controlling the shape of the rectangle you will see that the slope of the linear relationship between IV and DV inclines at a 45 rather than a 23 degree angle relative to the IV axis.
A psychologist looking at these results would conclude that something about you had changed between Experiment 1 and Experiment 2. If you controlled the orientation of the line in both experiments, the psychologist would conclude that you became less responsive to changes in the IV in the second experiment compared to the first; if you controlled the shape of the rectangle in both experiments, the psychologist would conclude that you became more responsive to changes in the IV in the second experiment compared to the first.
In fact, you were the same in both experiments. What changed between Experiments 1 and 2 was not you but your environment. The environmental connection between you and the perception you were controlling was different in Experiments 1 and 2. It looks like your responsiveness to stimulation (the IV) changes between Experiment 1 and 2; in fact, it is the environment's responsiveness to you that changes. This is the behavioral illusion.
This experiment also shows that it is not possible, in principle, to determine what perception a person is controlling by observing only the relationship between disturbances to that perception (the IV in these experiments) and the actions the person takes to protect the perception from disturbance (the DV in these experiments). For example, repeat Experiment 1, first controlling the orientation of the line and then controlling the shape of the rectangle. You will see that the IV-DV relationship differs in the two cases; the slope of the relationship between IV and DV is steep (45 degree angle) when you control the orientation of the line and shallow (23 degree angle) when you control the shape of the rectangle.
You might conclude, then, that it is possible to determine what a person is controlling by observing IV-DV relationships; when the relationship between IV and DV is steep the person is controlling line orientation; when the relationship is shallow the person is controlling shape. But if you now repeat Experiment 2, first controlling the orientation of the line and then controlling the shape of the rectangle, you will find the exact opposite relationship between the slope of the IV-DV relationship and the perception that is controlled.
The only way to determine what perceptions a person is controlling is monitoring measures of those hypothetical perceptions and see if those perceptions are protected from disturbance. This the what was done to determine the controlled variable in the Test for the Controlled Variable Demo.
In the present experiment, the degree to which two possible controlled perceptions (orientation and shape) are protected from disturbance (the IV) is measured in terms of RMS (root mean squared) deviation from a constant value (horizontal orientation and square shape, respectively). The RMS measure will be small, indicating little effect of the disturbance, when the perception is under control; it will be large when the perception is not under control. You will see that, in both Experiment 1 and Experiment 2, the RMS measures (as opposed to the observed IV-DV relationships) will correctly indicate which of the two perceptions (orientation or shape) is under control.
The is a very simple experiment to do. There is no time requirement; you can take as long as you like to bring the controlled perception (shape or orientation) to it's intended state (square or horizontal). Be sure to click the mouse when you are ready to proceed to the next trial.