Cody Honours Study

The size-weight illusion (SWI) pertains to the
experience of perceiving the smaller of two equally weighted objects as
heavier. Competing theories to explain the illusion can be generally grouped
into cognitive and sensory theories,
which place more importance on top-down processing of cognitive expectations and
bottom-up processing of sensory information about the size and weight of
objects, respectively. The current study examined the relative contribution of
these two general explanations. This was done by varying the amounts of
cognitive load in a dual-task and the quality of somatosensory feedback by wearing
or not wearing gloves.