Category: Articles
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Mandai Bird Paradise: Asia’s Biggest Aviary Sanctuary
The Mandai Bird Paradise is the biggest bird conservatory in Asia, inaugurated back in May 2023. As one of the six pillars of the Mandai Wildlife Reserve, the incredible sanctuary covers over 42 acres of land on Mandai Island in Singapore. The reserve houses around 3,500 birds encompassing over 400 different species. Mandai Nature is the conservation arm of the Mandai Wildlife Group, which is dedicated to providing a haven for all these species through the Mandai Bird Paradise and to preserving Southeast Asia’s incredible biodiversity through conservation efforts, with a focus on averting species extinction (Temasek Trust, 2024).
Such a variety poses a rather obvious question: How? In order to answer this question, we must chart our way through the science behind conservation, biodiversity and rehabilitation!
Conservation
Conservation, as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is to carefully preserve and protect something. In a wildlife context, it is orchestrated management of natural resources to prevent exploitation, destruction, or neglect. Conservation efforts to preserve biodiversity are not just about protecting animals in isolation, but in our context, it is about the creation of an entire ecosystem where species can thrive naturally.
At Mandai Bird Paradise, conservation takes an approach similar to this article on biodiversity conservation by diversity (Ramón et al., 2020). In-situ conservation focuses on protecting species in their natural habitats, whereas, ex-situ conservation, which is practiced at Mandai, provides controlled environments where vulnerable or endangered species can be bred, monitored, and protected from immediate threats such as habitat loss or poaching.
The sanctuary also participates in international breeding programs and collaborates with global conservation organizations to ensure genetic diversity is maintained among species. This is critical because reduced genetic diversity due to issues such as environmental changes from global warming can make populations more susceptible to disease. Through these coordinated efforts, Mandai Bird Paradise becomes more than just a sanctuary, but a cornerstone in the Mandai Wildlife Group’s stand as an active contributor to global conservation science.
Biodiversity
Biodiversity refers to the variety of life in a particular habitat or ecosystem, encompassing differences in species, genetics, and ecological roles. The presence of over 400 bird species at Mandai Bird Paradise highlights not only the richness of different avian life present but also the complexity of maintaining such diversity within a single environment. This maintenance is done by separating the 42-acre land into around 10 unique habitats that each suit a certain group.
Each species then gets to play its unique role in its ecosystem, from seed dispersal to pollination and pest control. By housing a wide array of species, the sanctuary effectively simulates interconnected ecological networks, allowing researchers and conservationists to better understand how these systems function.
Maintaining biodiversity in a controlled setting requires careful planning. Factors such as diet, climate conditions, nesting environments, and social groupings must all be tailored to meet the needs of different species. For instance, tropical birds such as the Andean cock-of-the-rock (yes, you read that right) require high humidity and dense vegetation, while others may need open spaces or specific nesting structures. This level of detail ensures that the birds are not only surviving but thriving in conditions that closely resemble their natural habitats.
Andean cock-of-the-rock
Rehabilitation
Rehabilitation is another crucial component that involves the care and recovery of injured, displaced, or trafficked birds with the goal of reintroducing them into the wild whenever possible.
Birds that arrive at rehabilitation centers often suffer from injuries caused by habitat destruction, illegal wildlife trade, or human interference. At Mandai, veterinary teams and specialists provide medical treatment, nutritional support, and behavioral conditioning to help these birds regain their strength and natural instincts.
One of the key challenges in rehabilitation is ensuring that birds do not become overly dependent on human care. To address this, caretakers minimize human interaction and design enclosures that encourage natural behaviors such as foraging and flight. Only when a bird demonstrates sufficient recovery and independence is it considered for release. Even when release is not possible, rehabilitation still plays an important role. These birds may become part of educational programs, helping to raise awareness about conservation issues and inspiring visitors to take action in protecting wildlife.
Mandai Bird Paradise – Sanctuary & Conservation Magic
Mandai Bird Paradise is more than the visually stunning attraction you see through my lens, it is a living example of how science, conservation, and education can come together to protect our planet’s biodiversity. By integrating conservation strategies, maintaining diverse ecosystems, and supporting rehabilitation efforts, this sanctuary embodies what modern wildlife preservation should look like. In doing so, Mandai Bird Paradise not only safeguards thousands of birds but also inspires future generations like yours and mine to value and preserve the delicate balance of life on Earth.
Blue-crowned Parakeet
Bits of My Time
This reserve is one of the most beautiful places on Earth! Walking out into the Crimson Wetlands zone of the park felt like a scene straight out of a movie. There were colorful macaws soaring overhead, bright American flamingos dancing by the pond, Scarlet ibis carefully balancing on the hand rails and so much more. My exploration of the Mandai Reserve taught me so many fun facts about birds and this experience rekindled my love for all things nature. It truly gave me a fond memory to recall for the rest of my lifetime.
References
All Photography/Illustrations by Kristina Sarah Siju
Mestanza-Ramón, C., Henkanaththegedara, S. M., Vásconez Duchicela, P., Vargas Tierras, Y., Sánchez Capa, M., Constante Mejía, D., Jimenez Gutierrez, M., Charco Guamán, M., & Mestanza Ramón, P. (2020). In-Situ and Ex-Situ Biodiversity Conservation in Ecuador: A Review of Policies, Actions and Challenges. Diversity, 12(8), 315. https://doi.org/10.3390/d12080315
Protecting Wildlife, Preserving The Future. (2023). Temasek Trust Revamp. https://www.temasektrust.org.sg/what-we-do/impact-hub/article-details/mandai-nature-impact-report-2023-2024
Speiran S. I. M. (2025). The ‘Sanctuary Gap’: Reviewing the Research on Captive Wildlife Sanctuary Tourism. Animals : an open access journal from MDPI, 15(4), 496. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani15040496
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Bouba? Kiki? Baby Chicks Associate Sounds With Shapes
One of the chicks above is named “Bouba.” The other is named “Kiki.” Going just off of your gut intuition, which one is which?
If you answered that the left chick is “Bouba” and the right chick is “Kiki”, many people agree with you, including speakers of over 25 languages, belonging to 9 language families and 11 writings systems—a surprisingly high number, given that these are purely nonsense words (Ćwiek et al., 2021). For some reason, “bouba” is obviously round, while “kiki” is obviously spiky.
Perhaps even more astonishing is that, as discovered in a recent study by Maria Loconsole and colleagues at the University of Padova, baby chickens are among the population that agrees with you.
What is the bouba-kiki effect?
Most words have an arbitrary relationship to their meaning. Nothing about “cat” inherently refers to the feline domestic animal, and neither does 猫 (māo), बिल्ली (billi), gato, or قطة (qiṭṭa). But certain sounds seem to inherently have meaning.
First described in 1947 by Wolfgang Kölher through the nonsense words “Maluma” and “Takete”, the “bouba-kiki” phenomenon in linguistics refers to this effect (Loconsole et al., 2026). “Maluma” and “bouba” feel inherently round, while “takete” and “kiki” feel inherently sharp and spiky. This effect is common across cultures, languages, and age: even infants as young as 4 months possess this sound mapping, where certain sounds seem to inherently correspond to certain shapes (Ozturk et al., 2013). This effect is even found (to a lesser extent) in blind individuals, though a period of sight seems necessary for the effect to occur (Piller et al., 2023).
The most common explanation for the bouba-kiki effect is the way we say those syllables. When we say “bouba” and similar words, our mouths make a round shape; when we say “kiki” and similar words, our mouths make an angular shape. Our brains thus associate words that are “round” to pronounce with round shapes, and “angular” with angular shapes. Alternatively, the shape of the letters “b” and “o” are round, while the shape of the letters “k” and “i” are angular (Lockwood & Dingemanse, 2015).
However, this hypothesis is challenged by the generic shape hypothesis, which states that humans form generic associations between certain sounds and meanings. This hypothesis was proposed in a study conducted by Ananya Passi and S. P. Arun in 2019, where the bouba-kiki effect was found with unpronounceable words, and an association was even found between clear tones and shape, where higher tones were associated with angular shapes. This indicates that humans potentially form general associations between sounds and shapes, regardless of the way those sounds can be pronounced. However, the reason why those associations might be formed remains unanswered, and these studies have been restricted to humans.
Other animals have been shown to also experience some form of association between sound and another sense: for example, chimpanzees, tortoises, and dogs associate lower pitches with larger objects and higher pitches with smaller objects (Kalan et al., 2014; Korzeniowska et al., 2022; Loconsole et al., 2023). However, the bouba-kiki effect specifically has not been found to exist in other animals, even great apes, such as chimpanzees and a bonobo (Margiotoudi et al., 2019; Margiotoudi et al., 2022).
Baby chicks?
If the effect isn’t even found in our closest animal relatives, then where else can researchers look? In 2026, Loconsole and her colleagues decided to change tracks and look elsewhere. As surprising as their choice may seem, their pick of animals wasn’t arbitrary: chickens are precocial creatures, which means that they can be tested shortly after hatching, and chicks also share many cognitive mechanisms with human infants (Wood & Wood, 2021).
In the first part of the study conducted by Loconsole and her colleagues, 3-day-old chicks were trained to go around a panel depicting a shape with both spiky and round edges, with food behind the panel acting as an incentive. During the experiment, the chicks were placed in front of two panels. One of the panels displayed a round shape, and the other one displayed a spiky shape, and neither of the panels concealed food. The researchers played a recording of a human voice saying either “bouba” or “kiki” to the enclosure, and they watched to see which panel the chicks would choose.
In the second part of the experiment, 1-day-old chicks were introduced to an enclosure with a screen that once again showed a shape with both spiky and round edges, though there was no incentive. After the chicks grew accustomed to the screen, the researchers changed it up: like the first part of the experiment, the screen now showed two shapes side by side, with one jagged shape and one blobby shape. The researchers once again played either “bouba” or “kiki”, and they recorded which shape the chicks approached first, as well as which shape they spent more time exploring.
The researchers found that the 3-day-old chicks significantly preferred the panel with the round shape when hearing “bouba”, and the panel with the angular shape when hearing “kiki”. They also found the same results with the 1-day-old chicks: when “bouba” was played, the chicks first approached the round shape significantly more and spent more time exploring the round shape. The reverse was true when “kiki” was played.
What does this mean?
The study shows that this bouba-kiki effect is not learned, but rather something inherent that’s present even in the earliest stages of life. One implication of this study is that this crossmodal association, or association between different senses, plays a role in how communication develops between animals. Animals such as chickens do not have language, but they still communicate through various calls and vocalizations. Although these vocalizations aren’t necessarily directly symbolic, having these innate associations may help with future development of more complex communication.
Additionally, the findings of the study indicate that the bouba-kiki effect isn’t specific to humans or even mammals, but rather throughout all vertebrates. But how does this reconcile with past findings wherein the effect was not found in other great apes? After all, it’s rather unlikely that this association evolved separately in birds and in humans, but skipped our closest great ape relatives.
According to Loconsole and colleagues, this difference may be explained by the difference in methodology between experiments, as well as the past experience and training of the research subjects. Kanzi, the bonobo who was tested for the bouba-kiki effect, was already trained in associating sounds and shapes and was capable of correctly matching English words to pictures, which may have played a role in his choices (Loconsole et al., 2026; Margiotoudi et al., 2022).
So what do the findings of the study mean for the bouba-kiki effect and the development of human language? Does this mean that chickens are also capable of speech?
No, not really. The bouba-kiki effect is only one example of the human ability of iconicity, or the capacity to form associations between form and meaning, argue Marcus Perlman and Bodo Winter in their commentary article in response to the 2026 study. In other words, the study reveals that the effect originates further back in the tree of life, but the origins of language lie elsewhere, in a broader framework. The bouba-kiki effect may reflect one way in which human language developed through associations between senses, but humans are able to form much more complex associations in language through a combination of speech, gestures, and visual signs. As such, researchers must look at other, broader areas for more clues in their hunt for the origins of language (Perlman & Winter, 2026).
So overall, the chicks might agree with your naming of their illustrated compatriots, but unfortunately, they won’t be able to say as much in words.
Want to learn more about the bouba-kiki effect? Check out our past article on the phenomenon!
Writing and illustration by Joyce Ma
References
Ćwiek, A., Fuchs, S., Draxler, C., Asu, E. L., Dediu, D., Hiovain, K., Kawahara, S., Koutalidis, S., Krifka, M., Lippus, P., Lupyan, G., Oh, G. E., Paul, J., Petrone, C., Ridouane, R., Reiter, S., Schümchen, N., Szalontai, Á., Ünal-Logacev, Ö., Zeller, J., Perlman, M., Winter, B. (2021). The bouba/kiki effect is robust across cultures and writing systems. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, 377(1841), 20200390. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2020.0390
Kalan, A. K., Mundry, R., & Boesch, C. (2015). Wild chimpanzees modify food call structure with respect to tree size for a particular fruit species. Animal Behaviour, 101, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2014.12.011
Korzeniowska, A. T., Simner, J., Root-Gutteridge, H., & Reby, D. (2022). High-pitch sounds small for domestic dogs: Abstract crossmodal correspondences between auditory pitch and visual size. Royal Society Open Science, 9(2), 211647. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.211647
Lockwood, G., & Dingemanse, M. (2015). Iconicity in the lab: A review of behavioral, developmental, and neuroimaging research into sound-symbolism. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 1246. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01246
Loconsole, M., Benavides-Varela, S., & Regolin, L. (2026). Matching sounds to shapes: Evidence of the bouba-kiki effect in naïve baby chicks. Science, 391(6787), 836–839. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adq7188
Loconsole, M., Stancher, G., & Versace, E. (2023). Crossmodal association between visual and acoustic cues in a tortoise (Testudo hermanni). Biology Letters, 19(7), 20230265. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2023.0265
Margiotoudi, K., Allritz, M., Bohn, M., & Pulvermüller, F. (2019). Sound symbolic congruency detection in humans but not in great apes. Scientific Reports, 9(1), 12705. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-49101-4
Margiotoudi, K., Bohn, M., Schwob, N., Taglialatela, J., Pulvermüller, F., Epping, A., Schweller, K., & Allritz, M. (2022). Bo-NO-bouba-kiki: Picture-word mapping but no spontaneous sound symbolic speech-shape mapping in a language trained bonobo. Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, 289(1968), 20211717. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1717
Ozturk, O., Krehm, M., & Vouloumanos, A. (2012). Sound symbolism in infancy: Evidence for sound–shape cross-modal correspondences in 4-month-olds. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 114(2), 173–186. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2012.05.004
Passi, A., & Arun, S. P. (2022). The Bouba–Kiki effect is predicted by sound properties but not speech properties. Attention Perception & Psychophysics, 86(3), 976–990. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-022-02619-8
Perlman, M., & Winter, B. (2026). In search of meaning. Science, 391(6787), 762–763. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aee8641
Piller, S., Senna, I., & Ernst, M. O. (2023). Visual experience shapes the Bouba-Kiki effect and the size-weight illusion upon sight restoration from congenital blindness. Scientific Reports, 13(1), 11435. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-38486-y
Wood, S. M. W., & Wood, J. N. (2021). One-shot object parsing in newborn chicks. Journal of Experimental Psychology General, 150(11), 2408–2420. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0001043
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Why Is Math So Hated?
“What’s your favorite subject?”
“I’m not sure… just definitely not math. What’s yours?”
“Oh, funny story…”
Ah yes, math, the subject notorious for being one of the hardest subjects in school, with “math anxiety” being the term coined for the fear of math. If you’re reading this, you’ve most likely been through the agony of a difficult math class or teacher that just didn’t understand you. As a math major and someone who loved math as a child (but also had their share of math difficulties), I sought out to understand why math is so hated, and if there is anything we can do to change that. After all, I was able to see firsthand how cool math is and my hope is that more and more people will be able to as well.
How Math is Taught in School
Many students point to the difficulty of math when asked why they dislike it, as shown from this table, where math being hard was listed as a reason almost twice as much as it being boring (Stodolsky et al., 1991). Therefore, we should look to how math is taught in school to see why students are struggling so much. In general, many math educators teach in a more computationally-focused way, prioritizing students’ abilities to memorize concepts and algorithms to be able to complete a problem set, rather than letting them discover the math on their own or letting the students know the “why” behind what they are doing (Stodolsky et al., 1991). This was certainly my experience in some of my classes, where when asked why something works the teacher would just say “don’t worry about it.” This can cause students to be confused on how to follow the steps given to them to solve a problem or give them difficulty when trying to memorize them for a test. If students knew all of the derivations to the formulas they were using, I think they would be more likely to remember it and boost their problem-solving skills than if they regurgitate a step-by-step process given to them.
Gender Stereotypes Regarding Math Ability
If you’re a girl, you may have heard it at least once in your life: “You’re a girl? You can’t possibly be good at math or science, you belong in humanities (or the kitchen).” Or perhaps, you’ll be the only girl, or one of a few, in some advanced STEM class. One study was held testing children in a few different categories: math performance, math anxiety, and test anxiety, collecting data over different grades for boys versus girls. The study found that higher math anxiety had more of a negative effect on girls than for boys (Erturan & Jansen, 2015). This is likely due to the aforementioned stereotypes that boys are better than girls at STEM related subjects such as math, putting more pressure on girls when testing. Even if they might know the content, these stereotypes can put doubt into girls’ minds about whether or not they are capable of doing well in math.
Intergenerational Effects on Math Anxiety
Math anxiety has existed for a long time, not just in this generation, but in those of our parents and grandparents as well. As a result, it makes sense to consider the possibility that it gets passed down from generation to generation, not necessarily through genetics, but through parents’ attitudes towards math rubbing off on their children. Another study on math anxiety investigated the role that parents played pertaining to their children’s levels of math anxiety, by testing students’ reading and math performance and giving parents questionnaires to determine their levels of math anxiety. The study revealed that there was a negative correlation between a parent’s math anxiety and their child’s performance, but only when the parent was significantly involved with helping the child with their homework (Maloney et al., 2015). It is speculated that the cause of this is the parents letting out their own negativity towards the subject to the child, expressing their frustration which caused their children to also have higher levels of math anxiety and do poorer on their tests.
What To Do?
It is clear there are many outside factors that can cause a child to dislike math, so how do we combat this? Even if we don’t like math that much ourselves, we can try our best not to project that mindset onto young minds and instead, encourage students to develop a growth mindset (Mendoza, 2025). With some work, it would also be beneficial to make a few changes to the way math is taught in school by making learning more interactive and prioritizing understanding over memorization. And hopefully, maybe one day, math will not be considered the “hated” subject but simply just a subject that more people enjoy.
References
Erturan, S., & Jansen, B. (2015). An investigation of boys’ and girls’ emotional experience of math, their math performance, and the relation between these variables. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 30(4), 421–435. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24763249
Maloney, E. A., Ramirez, G., Gunderson, E. A., Levine, S. C., & Beilock, S. L. (2015). Intergenerational Effects of Parents’ Math Anxiety on Children’s Math Achievement and Anxiety. Psychological Science, 26(9), 1480–1488. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24544088
Mendoza, K. (2025, February 28). 9 Strategies to Help Students Love Math – Oxford Learning. Oxford Learning. https://oxfordlearning.com/9-strategies-to-help-students-love-math/
Stodolsky, S. S., Salk, S., & Glaessner, B. (1991). Student Views about Learning Math and Social Studies. American Educational Research Journal, 28(1), 89. https://doi.org/10.2307/1162880
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The Hidden World of the Piano Action
The cover image was taken by the author.
In my humble opinion, the best way to unwind after a long, arduous day is to pour out all your stresses onto the beautiful white and black keys of a grand piano.
(Of course, that’s a little hard to do if you’ve never learned to play… I digress, though.)
During my time at Georgia Tech, I’d find myself sitting at the piano located in the West Village Dining Hall almost every night – and while I wouldn’t say the piano there is especially well maintained, it still produces a sound that’s pleasant to my ears. In the end, isn’t that all that matters?
“Enough with the preamble! What’s the point of all these ramblings?” You might be asking. Well, to answer that hypothetical question – I often think about the acoustics of a piano. That, of course, naturally leads to how it works… and believe it or not, there happens to be a surprising amount of physics under the (metaphorical and literal) hood of the instrument!
The story of the piano begins with the clavichord, developed in the 14th century. The clavichord action was as simple as could be – a key lever with a hammer on one end. After the key is depressed, the hammer is immediately lifted until it hits the string, remaining in contact until the key is released (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020).
Figure 2 Source: (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020)
While this action enables volume dynamics, vibrato, and control over the attack and duration of one’s sounds, there remained one large problem: the string would be damped for as long as the key was held down.
The harpsichord attempted to address this issue, while sacrificing some of the finer benefits of the clavichord.
For its action, when a key is pressed, the jack is lifted along with the plectrum and damper, the latter immediately releasing the string. Right after, the plectrum hits the string, generating sound. At some point, the jack meets a rail up above that stops its motion, allowing the string to resonate for as long as the key is held down. When the key is finally let go, the jack falls such that its plectrum does not hit the string a second time (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020).
Figure 3 Source: (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020)
Even though this solves the major issue with the clavichord, the harpsichord, in turn, has almost no volume dynamics, nor can vibrato be performed with it!
That takes us to the mid-17th century, where Bartolomeo Cristofori would invent what was known as the fortepiano – named because of its ability to play forte (loud) and piano (soft).
The action of the fortepiano is far more complex than both the clavichord and the harpsichord. When the key is first pressed, it lifts an intermediate lever; a damper connected to that lever releases the string. After a small period of time, the jack on the intermediate lever pushes the hammer up. The hammer lifts off the jack halfway to the string and uses its existing momentum to hit the string.
If the key was immediately released, the string is immediately damped, making a staccato (short) sound, as the mechanism returns to its resting position. If the key is held down, the string is undamped and free to resonate; the hammer falls back down onto the jack. After the key is released, the hammer returns to its resting position and the string is damped, muting the sound (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020).
Figure 4 Source: (Russo & Robles-Linares, 2020)
In essence, the fortepiano was the combination of the good of both the clavichord and harpsichord – dynamics and vibrato, along with volume and an ability to sustain sound. In many ways, the fortepiano is similar to the grand pianos of today, but with a few key differences…
Figure 5 Source: (Brent et al., 2011)
…Quite a lot of differences, in fact. From a first glance, this diagram seems far removed from the likes of the fortepiano, but most of the underlying theory remains the same.
To put it simply, the goal of the grand piano action is to let the hammer hit the string to create vibration – but, most importantly, it should be fast enough that it doesn’t damp the string. Efforts to reduce that time have resulted in the complex system seen in Figure 5… each part of that mechanism plays its own role in giving as much control to the pianist as possible (Brent et al., 2011).
Control is an important part of playing the piano, in my own experience. The difference between a grand piano and an electronic MIDI keyboard is like night and day. Even the smallest, involuntary actions when playing a grand result in minor yet noticeable changes – and the best of the best (which, unfortunately, doesn’t include me) are able to manipulate each and every facet of control given to them.
As we close the hood on the fascinating world of the piano action, I hope you’ve gained a proper appreciation for the instrument! The fact that we’ve been able to manufacture such a sleek design, fitting in all the complex mechanisms into such a small area, all while ensuring it works to perfection… it’s an engineering miracle, to be honest.
When I inevitably return to that piano in West Village, I’ll surely be thinking about the action that I’m invoking with every press.
Reference List
Brent, G. R., Yu, B., Grijalva, R., & Awtar, S. (2011). Characterizing the Feel of the Piano Action. Computer Music Journal, 35(1), 43–57. JSTOR. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41241706
Russo, M., & Robles-Linares, J. A. (2020). A Brief History of Piano Action Mechanisms. Advances in Historical Studies, 09(05), 312–329. https://doi.org/10.4236/ahs.2020.95024
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Filling in the Gaps: Biases and Pareidolia
Our brains are amazing, allowing us to do so much. Even so, they aren’t perfect. Do you remember during COVID, you would meet people for the first time wearing masks? Then, when you finally saw their whole face, you were surprised. And it’s not like you had purposefully thought about what the bottom half of their face looked like, but it was still somehow different than expected.
Facial Recognition & Pareidolia
This may be due in part to the fact that humans are wired to recognize faces. This is such a strong skill that we even recognize “faces” in inanimate objects: the front of cars, electrical outlets, even clouds or rocks. This phenomenon is called pareidolia, a human tendency to recognize meaningful patterns, especially faces. This is thought to evolve from the need to quickly recognize facial expressions for threats or social cues. We even have an entire region of the brain responsible: the face fusiform area (FFA) (Zhou & Meng, 2020). Studies have shown that even infants can recognize face-like patterns as faces (Kato & Megitani, 2015). Infants as young as seven months were able to recognize faces in Arcimboldo’s paintings (Kobayashi et al., 2012). These paintings were of inanimate objects, such as vegetables, arranged to resemble a portrait of a human. They are honestly a bit creepy, but feel free to give it a google!
Obviously we can all recognize a face, even under a mask, but a study using an artificial face recognition system gave us some evidence for why. A system called deep convolutional neural networks, or DCNN, determined the most important facial feature for facial recognition to be the eyebrows. This was followed by the eyes, mouth, then nose (Zhang et al., 2024). This makes sense with facial recognition under a mask, as the two most important features are still visible. Why the eyebrows are the most important isn’t clear. It could be that eyebrows are important for facial expressions, or that they are important for individual recognition due to their large diversity in color, shape, and placement.
Cognitive Dissonance & Bias
I found the science behind facial recognition fascinating, but it still doesn’t quite explain why we subconsciously fill in the bottom half of someone’s face. As it turns out, recognizing parts of a meaningful pattern, such as the face, but missing key parts of it, creates cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is when there is discrepancy between what your brain expects or believes and the information it is gathering. In the case of a mask, your brain is expecting to see all the important components of a face, so when the mouth and nose are missing, it creates a sort of tension. To relieve this tension, your brain uses what it knows about the face to fill in the gaps. This way, the pattern fits in with the categories we already have.
Significance
Pattern recognition, especially facial recognition, is super important, allowing us to recognize slight changes in facial expression or obstructed faces, like under a mask. But this can also lead to something not so great. Amy E. Herman said in her book “Visual Intelligence” that humans see through the brain, not the eyes. All your sensory organs collect signals and send them to the brain for processing. The signals don’t mean anything on their own, whether that is light through the eyes or smell through the nose. It is the processing that allows us to process these signals into something meaningful. This information is then tried to fit in with our prior knowledge, reducing cognitive dissonance. But in the process of fitting in new information, it can get twisted. Filling in what a face looks like under a mask, for example, is the brain twisting information to fit it in with what it already knows. This phenomenon happens all the time and is the science behind confirmation bias.
Human brains are extremely susceptible to confirmation bias, even going so far as to discard or ignore information that contradicts our beliefs (The science of stereotyping, 2022). The Smithsonian has a super cool interactive article about the science of bias if you are interested in learning more!
All of this to be said, our brains are amazing things, but they are not perfect. It is important to know that sometimes they take the easy path, twisting information to fit what we already know, from what someone looks like under a mask, to knowing a face-shaped rock is not a person.
References
Zhou, L.-F., & Meng, M. (2020). Do you see the “face”? Individual differences in face pareidolia. Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology, 14, e2. https://doi.org/10.1017/prp.2019.27
Kato, M., & Mugitani, R. (2015). Pareidolia in infants. PLOS ONE, 10(2), e0118539. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118539
Kobayashi, M. et al. (2012). Do infants recognize the Arcimboldo images as faces? Behavioral and near-infrared spectroscopic study. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 111(1), 22-36. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2011.07.008.
Zhang, Q. et al. (2024). Understanding of facial features in face perception: insights from deep convolutional neural networks. Frontiers in Computational Neuroscienc, 18 https://doi.org/10.3389/fncom.2024.1209082
University of Wisconsin–Madison Department of Psychology. (2022). The science of stereotyping. https://psych.wisc.edu/news/the-science-of-stereotyping/
Smithsonian Institution. (2021). The science of bias. https://biasinsideus.si.edu/online-exhibition/the-science-of-bias
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Why You Shouldn’t Go To Bed at 4 AM
Imagine the following scenario – it’s 2:15 am and you’re furiously typing away a final paper that is due before your 8 AM class tomorrow. With dark circles under your eyes, you take another sip of your iced Americano and promise yourself that you will go to bed soon. You don’t and end up staying up til 4 AM. The next day, you walk around campus with just three hours of sleep – you have bloodshot eyes, are unable to think properly, and just feel like passing out.
Under the pressure of school, work, or whatever it may be, we all have been tempted to compromise our sleep. In the face of such situations, sleep seems like something that can wait, or worse, be ignored completely. However, that is a large and even dangerous misconception because sleep is incredibly important for the functioning of our bodies. One of its crucial goals is to be restorative for many physiological, cognitive, and psychological processes. Without the restorative effects of sleep, the body can begin to experience issues in various areas of health. In extreme cases with chronic sleep deprivation, there can be serious consequences, which can include even a shortened lifespan.
What is sleep?
Sleep is described as a state that is easily reversible and also characterized by changes in consciousness and decreased responses to sensory stimuli. In other words, you are able to relatively easily enter a state of sleep and vice versa, come out of that sleep, which is known as wakefulness. In addition, you are not actively tuned into your environment during sleep, which explains why you do not use much of your senses (e.g., vision, hearing, touch, etc.) while you sleep.
In addition, sleep is regulated and controlled by our bodies, specifically the brain, by “biological clocks” called circadian rhythms. The specific part of the brain that is responsible is called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) and helps control sleep as a 24 hour cycle, which includes wakefulness. Moreover, sleep is divided into four primary stages: N1, N2, N3, and REM sleep (Baranwal et al., 2023). Specifically, the N1 stage is responsible for light sleep while the N2 stage is when our heart rate and body temperature decrease (Baranwal et al., 2023). The N3 stage, also known as slow wave sleep, is characterized as deep sleep and is believed to be when body repair/restoration occurs (Baranwal et al., 2023). Lastly, REM sleep or the N4 stage is when dreaming occurs (Baranwal et al., 2023).
Impact of Sleep on the Body
As it was previously emphasized, sleep is restorative in many ways – for instance, physiological processes, such as regulation of homeostasis and secretion of growth hormone, work more efficiently during sleep (Irwin, 2015). Specifically, homeostasis can be described as how the body maintains a balanced internal environment. Disruptions in homeostasis due to sleep deprivation can negatively impact the body, such as causing a weakened immune system (Baranwal et al., 2023). In addition, research has shown secretion of growth hormone increases during slow-wave sleep, or the N3 stage of sleep (Baranwal et al., 2023). As a result, not sleeping well, especially for children and teenagers, can have negative effects on growth.
Its importance is not limited to just physiological processes, but also cognitive processes such as learning, memory, executive functioning, and regulation of emotions (Hyndych et al., 2025). It is already well known in the scientific field that sleep is crucial for learning and memory in which sleep deprivation can cause serious disruptions. Hence, it seems ironic – especially from a student’s perspective – because the purpose of pulling all nighters is to cram information and speed up the learning process – however, its effects are actually the very opposite.
Research continues to be ongoing and has linked sleep deprivation to many health issues in many areas such as metabolic, cardiovascular, etc. For example, it is associated with impairment in muscle repair (metabolic), hypertension (cardiac), increased stress levels, and reduced production levels of antibodies (immune), etc (Baranwal et al., 2023). As you can see, sleep is vital to our daily functioning and health overall!
So what?
So, the next time you feel tempted to stay up to finish work or pull an all-nighter – just don’t. Sleep is not something we “just do” but plays a crucial role in that it restores your body and mind, helping to reset you for the next day. Missing out on hours of sleep can cause dysfunction and leave you feeling worse than better. In the long run, sleep deprivation can cause serious health issues and a few all-nighters are simply not worth that.
References
Baranwal, N., Yu, P. K., & Siegel, N. S. (2023). Sleep physiology, pathophysiology, and sleep hygiene. Progress in Cardiovascular Diseases, 77(1), 59–69. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pcad.2023.02.005
Dang-Vu, T. T., Schabus, M., Desseilles, M., Sterpenich, V., Bonjean, M., & Maquet, P. (2010). Functional Neuroimaging Insights into the Physiology of Human Sleep. Sleep, 33(12), 1589–1603. https://doi.org/10.1093/sleep/33.12.1589
Harvard Medical School. (2021, October 1). Science of Sleep: What is Sleep? Harvard.edu. https://sleep.hms.harvard.edu/education-training/public-education/sleep-and-health-education-program/sleep-health-education-47
Hyndych, A., El-Abassi, R., & Mader, E. C. (2025). The Role of Sleep and the Effects of Sleep Loss on Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Processes. Cureus, 17(5). https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.84232
Irwin, M. R. (2015). Why Sleep Is Important for Health: A Psychoneuroimmunology Perspective. Annual Review of Psychology, 66(1), 143–172. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115205
