As wonderful a thing as the human mind is, it is however is not error free. But that is not unexpected, consider the fact that the human brain is always getting so many signals and stimuli responses at a time and some how a human being is responding to all of them, which is an astoundingly amazing concept on it own. At this point I would like to take my words back and re-state that, since the mind is a beautiful and complex organ, there are some concepts of the brain that one cannot explain. They cannot however be referred to as faults. The following documents enlists such complexities of the brain that one cannot comprehend!

10. GAMBLER’S FALLACY

The Gambler’s fallacy is the phenomenon where the mind thinks that a probability of the future is altered by some of the past events. This may be true in some cases but most of the times, the probabilities remain the same no matter what the result of the previous events have been. For example, when you flip a coin and it turns up heads more than ten times, you automatically start thinking that since it was heads so many times, then the probability of a tail is more now. This is however, is not true because no matter how many times you flip the coin and no matter what the result is, the probability of a head and a tail remain the same! This is the confusion due to which a lot of gamblers lose a fortune! You can easily guess how I am sure!

9. REACTIVITY

Reactivity is known as the tendency of a person or a group of people to react differently when they know that they are being watched. For example, an experiment was conducted in the 1920′s by Hawthorne Works where they observed a few people under various strengths of light and it appeared that their behavior changed. Also, they studied that their behavior changed mostly because they knew that they were being observed, not because there were various levels of lighting!

8. PAREIDOLIA

I am sure that most of you have had the opportunity to observe that there are some pictures that appear to be something else. This phenomenon is known as Pareidolia and it makes random images and sounds appear to be what they actually are not. Some people perceive clouds to be in the shape of dinosaurs, and some people hear messages in the already recorded tracks. This phenomenon has been used to test various patients, where the patients are shown images and then their mental state is judged by how they perceive the images. It is known as the Rorschach Inkblot test, which was developed only to tap into the mental states of people. They show the inner thoughts of people!

7. SELF FULFILLING PROPHECY

The prophecy that comes true because one indulges in behavior that complements it. In simple words, you engage in behavior that help towards obtaining results that will confirm the existing set of attitudes. The biggest example of this particular psychological behaviour is seen in relationships. Sometimes people reach a low point in their relationships and then think that perhaps this relationship is not going to work. Based on this, they stop paying attention to their relationship and this eventually the relationship does end up failing, which in turn fulfills the prophecy that the relationship might not work! This is known as the phenomenon of self-fulfilling prophecy! This is also known as one of the common reasons of a chain recession reaction. Technically speaking you cannot find out about a recession until you are six months into it already. But media starts making reports of a recession and thus eventually people panic and start a chain reaction that causes an actual recession phase! Interesting to know, is it not!

6. HALO EFFECT

The Halo effect is the phenomenon where a few certain good or bad aspects of a person’s personality determine their over all personality. Take as an example, the fact that an employee is late for work for three consecutive days and the manager thinks that he is a lousy worker and does not give any importance to his job. On the other hand, he might have been late due to a few reasons like his car breaking down perhaps, and it might not be a regular part of his work ethics. It is interesting to note that some people assume that good-looking people are given a higher importance. Well keeping this in mind they change their over all attitude towards them and when they eventually get better job opportunities, this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy!

5. HERD MENTALITY

Herd mentality is one of the most commonly observed phenomenons in the world. It refers to the fact that people start following something that seems to be in trend. Suppose someone finds out that these days people are washing there cows with shampoo, you will find that after a few months, everyone who has the resources and the means have started washing their cows with shampoos. It is also known as mob mentality and can also explain why somethings catch so much popularity all of a sudden! Some say that it also happens because of peer pressure and some do not agree and say that it is just something psychological. Things that are actually weird and uncool have gained so much popularity due to this particular trend!

4. REACTANCE

Reactance is basically the strong urge to do the opposite of what someones wants you to do. It is mostly observed in children, if you really force them to do something, they will have the strong tendency to do the opposite. It is also one of the techniques used by psychologists around the world when dealing with very tough patients, and also by parents. What they do is that they enforce the kind of behavior that they do no want the subject to exhibit which obviously makes the subject do the exact opposite and thus mission accomplished.

3. HYPERBOLIC DISCOUNTING

Have you ever accepted a small but immediate payment rather than waiting for a bigger payment after a long time. The tendency to accept 20 dollars right now rather than a hundred dollars a year later is known as hyperbolic discounting. People prefer smaller immediate pay offs rather than one big pay off later!

2. ESCALATION OF COMMITMENT

A lot of people invest in various ventures and a lot of them actually end up as failures. The ventures I mean. So when that happens people tend to move in towards different ventures. In some cases however, people feel the need to keep investing into the failed venture just because of a vast amount of initial investment makes them feel that they should invest more and that would probably aid it to improve and they will get their initial capital back. This is known as an escalation of Commitment which is also a very commonly observed phenomena!

1. PLACEBO EFFECT

There are some people in the world who believe that there is something or the other wrong with them medically and until and unless they are given a medicine for it, they will continue to believe that they are indeed sick. For such people, a placebo pill was invented (which is called so because this psychological effect is known as the placebo effect), which is basically composed of nothing but is shaped to look like a medicine pill. It is given to such people to cure them of their non-existent disease or illness! This brain of ours has some really weird happenings going on doesn’t it!