Reality Bending Lab

Exploring the neuropsychology of reality and its distortions.

_{We’re a team led by Dominique Makowski at the University of Sussex in Brighton, UK. We research reality perception, fake news, illusions, fiction, deception, self-control, and more, using EEG and physiological signals. We also develop open-source tools and software.}

"Do not try to bend the spoon; that's impossible.

Instead, only try to realize the truth...

There is no spoon.

Then you'll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself."

Research Themes

Reality bending

What are the mechanisms by which our belief and feeling of reality can be altered?

Core Self

How cognitive abilities unfold into personality traits and metastable neuropsychological profiles?

Metascience

What is the history of psychology and neuropsychiatry? What are the methods and tools of tomorrow?

News

How do we know what is real? The 'Affective Reality Theory'

The Affective Reality Theory posits that affective reactions are key to the formation of reality beliefs.

Dominique Makowski

Apr 11, 2023 6 min read Reality

How do we know what is real? The 'Affective Reality Theory'

I got ChatGPT to do a personality test. You won't believe what happened next!

Following my previous blog post about including AIs in psychological experiments, I proceeded to do a small experiment to see whether we could administer a personality scale to ChatGPT.

Dominique Makowski

Apr 6, 2023 2 min read Personality, Reality, AI

I got ChatGPT to do a personality test. You won't believe what happened next!

We should treat AIs like Human participants in psychological experiments

A lot of diverse and interesting perspectives have been recently discussed is regards to chatGPT and AGI, but there is one opinion that I found particularly relevant that I wanted to expand on.

Dominique Makowski

Apr 5, 2023 4 min read Fiction, Reality, AI

We should treat AIs like Human participants in psychological experiments

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The University of Sussex, besides being located in Brighton, the most vibrant and sunniest city in the UK, is also home to one of the strongest and largest psychology department in the country. It is famous for its research on consciousness, with scientists like Anil Seth, Andy Clark, Zoltan Dienes and Hugo Critchley, its teaching of cutting-edge psychological methods (with stats rockstar Andy Field), its history of multidisciplinary research (arts and science), and its radical engagement in open and disruptive science. Join this amazing community now!