Carpenter effect

The Carpenter effect (or ideomotor effect ) describes the phenomenon that seeing a certain movement and - to a lesser extent - thinking about a certain movement triggers the tendency to execute this movement. The English natural scientist William Benjamin Carpenter (1813–1885) described this ideomotor effect for the first time in 1852. Recent studies using electrophysiological methods have confirmed the psycho-motor law ( ideomotor law ).

background

The Carpenter effect is part of the so-called ideomotor principle, which also includes the Ideo-Real Law . It is possible to "... using the derivative of the muscle action potentials not conscious and not prove to visible embodiment reaching weak muscle activations correspond structurally pulse pattern perceived, presented or intended motion."

The carpenter effect offers an explanation for many occult practices such as pendulum , backing glasses or ouija , the behavior of planchettes , dowsing rods and assisted communication .

See also

• Mirror neuron
• Kohnstamm effect

literature

• Winfried Hacker: General work and engineering psychology. Psychological structure and regulation of work activities. Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, Berlin (East) 1973.

Web links

• The work of Carpenter from 1852 in the original text (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hacker, 1973
2. ↑ harvard.edu (PDF; 135 kB) ( Memento of the original from April 11, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.