Change Blindness

Change blindness is the failure to notice a change in a visual scene, especially when our attention is distracted or there is a brief interruption.

In simple words:

Change blindness = A change happens, but we don’t notice it.

Famous experiment

Daniel Simons and Daniel Levin studied change blindness using a famous “door study.” A person was asked for directions. During a brief interruption, the person was secretly replaced by someone else, and many participants did not notice.

Why does it happen?

Our brain does not create a complete, detailed record of everything we see. We mainly notice things that receive our attention.