science

The Invisible Gorilla

The Invisible Gorilla is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The Invisible Gorilla rather than just read about it. In short: The Invisible Gorilla is a non-fiction book published in 2010, co-authored by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons. The title of this book refers to an earlier research project by Chabris and Simons revealing that people who are focused on something can easily overlook something else.

Key takeaways

The Invisible Gorilla belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The Invisible Gorilla to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The Invisible Gorilla from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Invisible Gorilla is a non-fiction book published in 2010, co-authored by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons. The title of this book refers to an earlier research project by Chabris and Simons revealing that people who are focused on something can easily overlook something else. To demonstrate this effect, they created a video of students passing a basketball between themselves. Viewers asked to count the number of times the players with the white shirts pass the ball often fail to notice a person in a gorilla suit who appears in the center of the image (see Invisible Gorilla Test), an experiment described as "one of the most famous psychological demos ever". Simons and Chabris were awarded an Ig Nobel Prize for the Invisible Gorilla experiment.

See also Attention Attentional control Change blindness Inattentional blindness Invisible ships

References

External links The video on Daniel Simons' YouTube channel on YouTube

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The Invisible Gorilla

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The Invisible Gorilla claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The Invisible Gorilla before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The Invisible Gorilla ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The Invisible Gorilla

In research: The Invisible Gorilla appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The Invisible Gorilla in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The Invisible Gorilla is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2010 non-fiction books, Attention, Collaborative non-fiction books, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The Invisible Gorilla outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The Invisible Gorilla in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The Invisible Gorilla means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The Invisible Gorilla out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The Invisible Gorilla in simple terms?

Why does The Invisible Gorilla matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The Invisible Gorilla?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The Invisible Gorilla.