After learning a brand new word, noticing a brand new variety of drink, or discovering a brand new disease, it’s possible you’ll feel such as you're encountering these items more often than before. This is known as the frequency illusion. Frequency illusion is expounded to memory. Now that something, it appears to be popping up more often.
In reality, your latest favorite song can have at all times been there. But since it's floating around in your head, you would possibly notice it all over the place and, in turn, think that it has someway turn out to be more popular.
Experts also call this idea the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon or Blue Car Syndrome. The name “Baader-Meinhof” comes from a militant group in West Germany. After reading about them within the newspaper, one person began seeing the terrorist organization many times, years after it had been a preferred news topic.
Likewise, blue automobile syndrome is called after a typical situation: If you see a certain automobile once, you usually tend to notice the identical automobile again.
This phenomenon may be very common. It probably affects everyone in some unspecified time in the future of their life. Simply put, a frequency illusion occurs since you pay more attention to the things which have recently turn out to be essential to you.
The frequency illusion consists of two parts. First, you’ll consider that something is more common. Then you’ll persuade yourself that the word, concept, or other thing hasn't come up as often because it does now, which is known as confirmation bias. The frequency didn't actually go up, but your brain convinced you it did.
Although there aren’t many studies on frequency illusion, the concept may be very just like what is known as “working memory-guided attention capture.” This explains how your attention is directed. When you may have a certain idea in mind, your attention naturally shifts to that thing – without you even realizing it.
Frequency illusion works along with your voluntary and involuntary attention. Voluntary attention helps you choose and concentrate on information that is vital to your current task. Involuntary attention occurs when something else distracts your attention from the duty at hand.
This has to do with how we now have developed. Our minds must reply to the things around us to remain protected. But we also should ignore certain things if we wish to finish a task effectively. Attention is vital for learning and memory. If you don't listen to something, you won't remember it. So in case you've just learned something latest for the primary time, there's probability you'll see it easier because it now.
For most individuals, the frequency illusion won’t have any major impact. It's just an interesting phenomenon. But for others, the frequency illusion can result in serious consequences.
For example, in case you work in the sphere of criminology, your attention could also be drawn to a specific suspect. Your mind will then be more inclined to listen to that person when latest information involves light. This could help the case and lead a detective to the best suspect. But it might probably even be harmful. When a detective focuses on one person, they might miss other essential evidence.
If you’re employed within the medical field, you could have recently learned of a brand new medical condition. By specializing in this disease, it’s possible you’ll be more more likely to diagnose more people based on their symptoms. In this case, a frequency illusion might be helpful since you can be more aware of this latest condition. But it could also cause you to skip other similar conditions and misdiagnose someone.
In other cases, in case you suffer from certain mental disorders, the frequency illusion can worsen your condition. If you may have schizophrenia, confirmation bias brought on by the frequency illusion may cause you to substantiate your individual suspicions. If you concentrate on a particular delusion that you may have resulting from schizophrenia, the frequency illusion can persuade you that something is real although it shouldn’t be.
Overall, this phenomenon shows you ways much information your brain is definitely taking in at any given time. Most of the time you aren’t even aware of it. This concept explains why when our attention is fixed on something, we notice certain things greater than others.