Bruner and Minturn’s perceptual set study

Bruner and Minturn: AIM

To investigate whether an ambiguous figure was seen differently if the context of the figure was changed

(Aka. To investigate the influence of expectation on perception)

Bruner and Minturn: METHOD

• An independent groups design

• Participants either saw a sequence of letters or a sequence of numbers with the same ambiguous figure in the middle

This figure could either be seen as a 13 (12,13,14) or a B (A,B,C)

Bruner and Minturn: RESULTS

• Those who saw a sequence of letters were more likely to see the figure as being the letter B

• Those who saw numbers were more likely to say it was the number 13

Bruner and Minturn: CONCLUSION

This shows the expectation of what the figure represented was affected by the context the figure was presented in, making their hypothesis correct

Bruner and Minturn: WEAKNESS

Artificial task

An ambitious figure is designed to trick perception, making the results lack validity.

Bruner and Minturn: STRENGTH

Real world application

It can explain errors such as misidentifying an aircraft as an enemy plane because of expectations or other examples of serious mistakes caused by faulty perception.