Publication details
Sensing spirits and other dangerous beings : how uncertainty makes us feel the unseen presence
| Authors | |
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| Year of publication | 2022 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | The human propensity to detect agents, not really present around is one of the oldest problems in CESR. But is there any causal connection with uncertainty? In the study, I was inducing via sensory deprivation a specific kind of such experience, i.e., the “Unpleasant Feeling of Sensed Presence” (UFoP), using the predictive processing theory. UFoP was induced by 0.5h sensory (visual, auditory) deprivation trial, manipulating expectations about the being that could come during the process (using semantic priming), measuring biological data (PPG, EDA), capturing experience via post-deprivation surveys and interviews, and controlling for two psychological dispositions: imaginative suggestibility and fantasy proneness. The main predictor of UFoP experience was felt uncertainty, moderated by suggestibility (but not by fantasy proneness), while semantic priming had no effect. In my paper, I will further discuss if – under the condition of greater uncertainty – a) humans generally tend to detect agents due to evolved hyperpriors for the agent-related fear, b) we tend to (falsely) predict the presence of other agents because agents are the main source of uncertainty in our environments. |
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