Fighting Triangles: Social Perception AKA The Heider-Simmel Illusion

“In 1944, psychologists Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel made a very short, animated film of moving shapes. This is purist cinema. Shapes are just moving around, but it is virtually impossible not to project judgements, desires and a storyline onto them. With such raw materials, the perceived narrative is not about the shapes, but a reflection of the viewer’s own psychology and memories. Scientists found that viewers construct their own individual interpretations of events; there is not one common narrative, but innumerable permutations—sometimes with imagined voices or sound effects.” - Brittany Gravely / Harvard Film Archive “In 1944, psychologists Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel made a very short, animated film of moving shapes. This is purist cinema. Shapes are just moving around, but it is virtually impossible not to project judgements, desires and a storyline onto them. With such raw materials, the perceived narrative is not about the shapes, but a reflection of the viewer’s own psychology and memories. Scientists found that viewers construct their own individual interpretations of events; there is not one common narrative, but innumerable permutations—sometimes with imagined voices or sound effects.” - Brittany Gravely / Harvard Film Archive “In 1944, psychologists Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel made a very short, animated film of moving shapes. This is purist cinema. Shapes are just moving around, but it is virtually impossible not to project judgements, desires and a storyline onto them. With such raw materials, the perceived narrative is not about the shapes, but a reflection of the viewer’s own psychology and memories. Scientists found that viewers construct their own individual interpretations of events; there is not one common narrative, but innumerable permutations—sometimes with imagined voices or sound effects.” - Brittany Gravely / Harvard Film Archive “In 1944, psychologists Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel made a very short, animated film of moving shapes. This is purist cinema. Shapes are just moving around, but it is virtually impossible not to project judgements, desires and a storyline onto them. With such raw materials, the perceived narrative is not about the shapes, but a reflection of the viewer’s own psychology and memories. Scientists found that viewers construct their own individual interpretations of events; there is not one common narrative, but innumerable permutations—sometimes with imagined voices or sound effects.” - Brittany Gravely / Harvard Film Archive