Gifs
are short, silent animations. Unlike videos, they carry no sound files within
them. Which is why it's extremely odd that a lot of people online claim to
be able to hear one.
Does anyone in visual perception know why you can hear this gif? pic.twitter.com/mcT22Lzfkp— Lisa DeBruine 🏳️🌈 (@LisaDeBruine) December 2, 2017
It's
a gif you've probably seen before as it resurfaces every few months, always
with a similar caption: Someone asking "why can I hear this", usually
accompanied by a few crying faces to show how distressing they find the
experience.
—
Best Tweet (@BestTwlt) April
17, 2017
The
gif, created by Twitter user Happy
Toast, has resurfaced again after a scientist put out an appeal for help
understanding why people hear a noise.
Can
you hear it? You're not alone.
Dr
Lisa Debruine, a researcher at the University of Glasgow, also included a poll
to see how many people could hear the gif. So far, 75 percent have said that
they could hear a thudding noise.
We
also know that our perception of sound can be influenced by visual information
in other ways, it's not limited to soundless gifs. The McGurk effect, shown in
this video from the BBC's Horizon program, shows how your brain can be tricked
into hearing different things based on the visual information you are
perceiving at the time.
In
this case, you won't be able to tell whether you're hearing "baa" or
"faa" because of the way the man's mouth is moving. What you see can
override what you hear.
Learn
more here.