Visual Intelligence

To get the most accurate picture of anything, we need to see others’ perceptions and recognize others’ points of view.

and a habit is established.”

Noting the facts of your location—what’s around you or the subject of any scene you are studying—can be critical or even life-saving if something unexpected happens.

“Powers of observation can be developed by cultivating the habit of watching things with an active, enquiring mind. Training in observation follows the same principles as training in any activity. At first one must do things consciously and laboriously, but with practice the activities gradually become automatic and unconscious

The final entry in our triad of prevailing perceptual filters is change blindness, the failure to notice fluctuations in our visual field.

COBRA—which stands for Camouflaged, One, Break, Realign, Ask—will help us uncover hidden details by reminding us to concentrate on the camouflaged, work on one thing at a time, take a break, realign our expectations, and ask someone else to look with us.

It puts us at risk of gathering information selectively, subconsciously seeking data that support our expectations and ignoring those that don’t.

“Any time you do a task—whether it’s visual, auditory or otherwise—it draws on a specific set of cognitive operations. The more tasks you perform, the more you draw from that limited pool of resources.”

a look, or what we might have experienced in the past.