The Science of Camouflage
Human Perception in the Military
Despite being out of the Air
Force for nearly two years now, I still often find myself viewing routine daily
events through a military lens. For example, when presented with the word “Resilience” in the Cognitive Map Lab, my
thoughts went immediately to POWs. Naturally then, when considering the
nature of human perception, I thought of how the camouflage patterns of
military uniforms take advantage of the limitations of human perception.
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Can you spot the snipers in these photographs? |
In nature, animals use varying camouflaging methods for protection from predators. Typical methods target the specific ways the predators perceive their surroundings. Many predators scan surroundings for movement. This explains why many animals (e.g., deer) freeze when they sense danger. However, other animals camouflage themselves with colors, patterns, or textures to defend themselves against predators that are object-based perceivers, like humans.
We identify latent characteristics of a given object, and then utilize residual knowledge from past experiences to draw conclusions about what we see. Our minds then fill in missing information to make sense of inconsistencies so that what we see fits our mental model of how the object should appear.
The human brain
prioritizes speed over accuracy. A person looking at an entire landscape takes
in as much information as quickly as possible. For example, looking at a
forest, you see spotted greens, vertical browns, and probably dark spots
interspersed. You have seen so many forests in your life that your brain
immediately generates a mental image even if you only looked for a split
section. It fills in the blanks that you didn’t have a chance to analyze with
what it knows should be there: leaves, trees, maybe some animals. So, if there
are actually a pair of eyes, some hands, maybe even a foreign, non-natural object
(e.g., a firearm), or a slightly different color scheme in a small portion of
what you observed than the rest of the forest, your brain does not take the
time to notice such anomalies. Even if
you do notice, your brain will most likely disregard the irregularity and
justify the inconsistency.
In the past, military
uniform (and equipment) patterns were designed with a “one size fits all”
mentality, regardless of military branch or deployment location. Now, based
upon immense bodies of research data, military uniforms are constantly being
updated to best protect soldiers under specific conditions. In the past, prominent artists who explored
human perception in their works, such as even Pablo Picasso in WWII, have been
tasked with developing camouflage patterns. Fast forwarding to today, computer program algorithms produce patterns with specific shapes and angles that take the most advantage of the
limitations of human perception. Still, even with
the use of such technology, outside factors can sometimes thwart the objective of camouflaged uniforms. In the last five years, US Army uniforms
for troops in Afghanistan were changed in response to complaints that the uniforms’
design only addressed the region’s desert character, failing to consider the
forested areas or alpine environments. Some
studies even suggested certain patterns actually made troops more observable and
more likely targets than if they weren’t wearing any camouflage at all. However,
as we continue to explore the science of human mind and its methods of
processing information, military camouflage will inevitably continue to evolve
and improve in its objective.
So, if you missed the
snipers hiding in these photographs, don’t feel bad, you are not alone! You
have just fallen victim to the complexities of human
perception!
Very eye-opening application! It is interesting to think about how camouflage takes advantage of the limits of human perception and the favoring of speed over accuracy. I wonder if there are individuals who, through repeated exposure, are better able at picking out people hiding in plain sight than others? And are people in the military who are familiar with certain types of camouflage better able to quickly recognize their colleagues in a "noisy" environment?
ReplyDeleteThere are some things from repeated exposure that one can start to pick out. There are small salient features that someone can start to recognize after seeing camouflaged individuals repeatedly. While camouflage is designed to take advantage of human perception limits, there still are limits to what we can effectively camouflage.
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