Can Psychology Explain Opposing Views of the Minnesota Tragedy?

"The precise circumstances surrounding the death in Minneapolisof Renee Nicole Good continue to be passionately debated across the world, with wildly different interpretations of the shocking images. Millions of people are examining the exact same video feed, and yet many insist on opposite conclusions. How is this possible? Is it just politics? Do we merely see what we want to? Or could there be some deeper psychological issue manifesting?"

"Psychologists' experiments surprise and challenge us, revealing dangerous overconfidence in what we believe we saw. In one famous early study, subjects viewed films of car accidents, and were then asked about what they witnessed, just as people are questioning now, what they saw in Minnesota. But if the inquiry was posed as "About how fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?" this elicited a significantly higher perception of speed in the answers"

"On a retest one week later, those subjects who were asked aboutsmashed cars were more likely to respond "yes" to the question "Did you see any broken glass?" even though broken glass did not exist in the accident. Changing just one word in an apparently innocent question significantly alters what witnesses think they see. We are very suggestible and can be manipulated into believing we saw something that never existed, surprisingly easily."

The death of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis has produced sharply divergent interpretations of the same video footage, with millions reaching opposing conclusions. Experiments in psychology demonstrate that perception and memory are fallible and prone to overconfidence. Studies using filmed car accidents show that subtle differences in question wording (for example, 'smashed' versus 'hit') change estimated speeds and can produce false memories, such as seeing broken glass that never existed. Single-word changes and emotive framing can manipulate eyewitness reports. Selective attention further limits what observers notice, increasing disagreement even when viewing identical material.

Read at Psychology Today