# The Room Experiment on directional bias



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

The experiment goes like this: imagine four identical cube-like rooms that are lit and have no windows. The first room has the exit door on the north wall, the second on the south wall, the third on the east wall, and the fourth on the west wall. The rooms would be at an unknown location.

Which of those rooms would you choose if you would have to spend 24 hours locked in one of them?

The point of this experiment is directional bias. Do you have a compass inside yourself that tells you all the time where north is (even falsely)? The rooms should have completely different moods in them if you are experiencing this phenomenon.

I would choose the north one, though I'm fairly certain that most people would say it's irrelevent.

Discuss. And state your type if you have comments. Also if you know what this phenomeon is called, please comment.


----------



## Jagbas (Jul 8, 2015)

I'm sorry but i don't understand how the side of the door is relevant. If I perceive where the north is, I don't care where the door points. And if I don't and I'm in an unknown location without a clue about where the cardinal points are, what's the difference? I wouldn't even know that my door is on the n/s/w/e wall.
Unless you have a pesonal preference for a cardinal point but that's a different perception. 

Why did you choose the north one? I chose that is irrelevant but if I had to be locked in this room for 24h I think I'd sit in a corner with the door on the left. So maybe it's the room with the door on the south wall and I'd be sitting in the north/east corner facing west. But again the side of the door is not important.


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

Jagbas said:


> I'm sorry but i don't understand how the side of the door is relevant. If I perceive where the north is, I don't care where the door points. And if I don't and I'm in an unknown location without a clue about where the cardinal points are, what's the difference? I wouldn't even know that my door is on the n/s/w/e wall.
> Unless you have a pesonal preference for a cardinal point but that's a different perception.
> 
> Why did you choose the north one? I chose that is irrelevant but if I had to be locked in this room for 24h I think I'd sit in a corner with the door on the left. So maybe it's the room with the door on the south wall and I'd be sitting in the north/east corner facing west. But again the side of the door is not important.


Technically, your own position relative to the room could be changed, so that is not what I mean. The point here is that the direction of the door would affect the mood in the room significantly if you are experiencing this phenomenon. But only if you actually are told in which direction the door is before you go into the room. Otherwise my mind would make a conclusion (most likely false) even if has no proof or any clues.

I chose the north one because the room with the door to north would be least unpleasant, no matter what is my own position relating to it. 

The rooms would seem significantly different inside though there would be no clues what's outside. It's possible though that this is a rare phenomenon. I just want to know if any other people are experiencing this. It's interesting.


----------



## Sporadic Aura (Sep 13, 2009)

I'd choose any of them except the north so I wouldn't have to spend 24 hours with you! just kidding man


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

Sporadic Aura said:


> I'd choose any of them except the north so I wouldn't have to spend 24 hours with you! just kidding man


Yeah, it could get a bit awkward being in a small room with someone for 24 hours without access to a bathroom... :laughing: lol


----------



## SiFan (Mar 10, 2015)

Jagbas said:


> ....
> 
> if I had to be locked in this room for 24h I think I'd sit in a corner with the door on the left.
> 
> ....


I had the same idea. For instance, I'd want to be in the southeast corner facing north. The opposite corner, northwest, is where the door is located. The door would be placed on my left in the west wall of the northwest corner.


----------



## WorldzMine (Sep 9, 2014)

NTlazerman said:


> Which of those rooms would you choose if you would have to spend 24 hours locked in one of them?


What is the context were a person would be _forced_ to make such a pointless choice? And moreover choices made under coercion (since the coercion is implied in this experiment) negates the whole concept of "choice".

"Force and mind are opposites; morality ends where a gun begins."

Your "experiment" would have to be a version of the following regardless of it's purpose or circumstances and as a result it's "results" would be of no consequence.



> Do not open your mouth to tell me that your mind has convinced you of your right to force my mind. Force and mind are opposites; morality ends where a gun begins. When you declare that men are irrational animals and propose to treat them as such, you define thereby your own character and can no longer claim the sanction of reason—as no advocate of contradictions can claim it. There can be no “right” to destroy the source of rights, the only means of judging right and wrong: the mind.
> 
> To force a man to drop his own mind and to accept your will as a substitute, with a gun in place of a syllogism, with terror in place of proof, and death as the final argument—is to attempt to exist in defiance of reality. Reality demands of man that he act for his own rational interest; your gun demands of him that he act against it. Reality threatens man with death if he does not act on his rational judgment; you threaten him with death if he does. You place him in a world where the price of his life is the surrender of all the virtues required by life—and death by a process of gradual destruction is all that you and your system will achieve, when death is made to be the ruling power, the winning argument in a society of men.
> 
> ...


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

WorldzMine said:


> What is the context were a person would be _forced_ to make such a pointless choice? And moreover choices made under coercion (since the coercion is implied in this experiment) negates the whole concept of "choice".
> .


The point of the experiment is not to force someone to make irrelevent choices. The point of this experiment has only to do with the perception of direction. The experiment would exactly work the same way if you were paid to be in that room for 24 hours.

Or did I miss the point?


----------



## ViceCityGentleman (Aug 8, 2015)

I do not know because I have a habit of following the Earth's rotation for everything. I guess because I always do what seems to be the correct one, follow the "order".


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

ricardo1222 said:


> I do not know because I have a habit of following the Earth's rotation for everything. I guess because I always do what seems to be the correct one, follow the "order".


Well, it's a result. And an interesting one as well! I suspected that someone did that. Do you also sync it by the seasons (Earth's orbit)?


----------



## ViceCityGentleman (Aug 8, 2015)

Yes


----------



## Jagbas (Jul 8, 2015)

NTlazerman said:


> The point here is that the direction of the door would affect the mood in the room significantly if you are experiencing this phenomenon.


Ok so to me all the rooms would be the same, but for you every cardinal point gives you a different "sensation"?
Someone told me once that it's better to sleep with the bed on the north wall, I don't remember for which reasons. Is something like that? That the position of an object relative to one of the cardinal points changes the perception of the room? 

Anyway, what you experience is interesting, can you make some other examples?


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

Jagbas said:


> Ok so to me all the rooms would be the same, but for you every cardinal point gives you a different "sensation"?
> Someone told me once that it's better to sleep with the bed on the north wall, I don't remember for which reasons. Is something like that? That the position of an object relative to one of the cardinal points changes the perception of the room?
> 
> Anyway, what you experience is interesting, can you make some other examples?


Yes, the relative direction of the room (or any space) in respect to the cardinal points changes the perception of the room completely. The same room (or place) could be a lot more depressing if it is pointing to one direction opposed to another.

One very good example is this: I'm walking on a street, and then I turn the street (and the surrounding world) 180 degrees in my head. Suddenly the street has a totally different vibe to it. 

So basically, I can have 4 or more different versions of the same city and switch between them if I want to (though that is very difficult at times). I hope this does not sound too weird.

I often find myself torn because I don't know which one is the right one (because everyone could have a different perception of the cardinal points in their heads). It does not really matter since it's irrelevant practically, but still, I made this test to understand if my "north" is someone's "west", or if anyone even is experiencing this phenomenon.


----------



## Jagbas (Jul 8, 2015)

Really interesting! Hope there's someone else :wink:


----------



## stiletto (Oct 26, 2013)

Directionally, I like south for no reason. (Not door specific).

When it comes to room, I don't actually care if I have to spend 24 hours in any of them. So it's irrelevant.


----------



## RoseateThorns (May 4, 2015)

I chose south.


----------



## Jagbas (Jul 8, 2015)

RoseateMist said:


> I chose south.


Why? Can you elaborate?


----------



## muslamicinfidel (Aug 2, 2015)

NTlazerman said:


> The experiment goes like this: imagine four identical cube-like rooms that are lit and have no windows. The first room has the exit door on the north wall, the second on the south wall, the third on the east wall, and the fourth on the west wall. The rooms would be at an unknown location.
> 
> Which of those rooms would you choose if you would have to spend 24 hours locked in one of them?
> 
> ...


This sounds a lot like embodied cogniton, and more specifically, conceptual metaphor theory (CMT). According to CMT people understanding and use of language is mediated through unconscious metaphoric associations that structure human thought. CMT argues that metaphor is a fundamental part of ordinary thought, particularly in regards to abstract concepts and that these metaphors structures much of cognition thought to be separate from language, and also, that many central cognitive processes, such as those related to time and space are expressed and influenced by metaphor. At the heart of the theory is the idea that understanding one thing in terms of a dissimilar other thing activates a series of entailments, defined as correspondences between selected elements of the two domains in a metaphoric relation. These correspondences can be elements or attributions common to the structure of both concepts. Whilst these entailments are expressed in common language, it is believed, and there is evidence to show, that they actually operate at the conceptual level suggesting that people use metaphor even when not using language, (If you wish to understand how the metaphoric associations are created and stregthened you may wish to read up a little about neural bindings).

Our use of conceptual metaphor arises through our bodily experience with the world. The central principle of embodied cognition is that thought processes and functions are grounded in bodily states. Spatial concepts such as “up”, “down”, “right”, “left”, “front” and “back” provide prime examples of how metaphor is related to experience. In one’s bodily experience things that are up in the world tend to be more (MORE IS UP) and things that are down in the world tend to be less (LESS IS DOWN), which is why when talking of prices they can be either “high” or “low”. This observation allows metaphor to be seen as something that is involved in thought, and more importantly, that it is a part of thought that fundamentally arises in many cases from recurring bodily experiences. We can relate the same ideas with related conceptual metaphor with your room dilemma. According to CMT spatial metaphors such as UP (concrete) become associated with the concept of GOOD (abstract), similarly DOWN IS BAD. <---These arise from religious ideas that are embedded into us such as heaven being UP and hell being DOWN; it's good to be on top (UP) of the world but bad to be DOWN in the dumps; one can feel UPlifted, but can also feel DOWN etc etc.

Ok, now to address the small issue of bias. I think it's due to a natural inclination to favour good over bad hence up/north over other spatial dimensions (such as down/south, east/right, and west/left) as a result of unconscious association between north and good.

I hope that sheds some light on it.


----------



## Mirkwood (Jul 16, 2014)

Lol, I halt already at the


> "imagine four identical cube-like rooms that are lit and have no windows. The first room has the exit door on the north wall, the second on the south wall, the third on the east wall, and the fourth on the west wall. The rooms would be at an unknown location."


I mean.. how would such a building look like.. are they just buildings by themselves?.









Silly, maybe.. but yeah .. i wanted some symmetry.. doors in the middle of square.. but then the rooms would be triangular, if there are to be 4 rooms in one square, each door point each its direction.. uhm..

Anyway, ive not heard about this befor, never come across it.

I cant really choose.


----------



## muslamicinfidel (Aug 2, 2015)

Mirkwood said:


> Lol, I halt already at the
> 
> I mean.. how would such a building look like.. are they just buildings by themselves?.
> 
> ...



Strangely, I imagined them lined up like prison cells. The third and fourth shared the same door, or at least were able to access each other's cells. With the option of having two cells I would have picked either room 3 or 4.


----------



## NTlazerman (Nov 28, 2014)

muslamicinfidel said:


> Ok, now to address the small issue of bias. I think it's due to a natural inclination to favour good over bad hence up/north over other spatial dimensions (such as down/south, east/right, and west/left) as a result of unconscious association between north and good.
> 
> I hope that sheds some light on it.


This is actually not what I meant. North is not "better" than any of the directions. This is not the phenomenon I'm talking about, but I understand what you're saying. 

This has only to do with perception, and is not linked to metaphors. This phenomenon here is more like having a compass in your head which tells you always where each cardinal point is, and it changes how I view things without relating it to any concept. It's more like an instinct. Also, since a few years ago I would have chosen the south door, It has nothing to do with that. At some point I then rotated my perception 180 degrees, that's why I answered north.


----------



## muslamicinfidel (Aug 2, 2015)

NTlazerman said:


> This is actually not what I meant. North is not "better" than any of the directions. This is not the phenomenon I'm talking about, but I understand what you're saying.
> 
> This has only to do with perception, and is not linked to metaphors. This phenomenon here is more like having a compass in your head which tells you always where each cardinal point is, and it changes how I view things without relating it to any concept. It's more like an instinct. Also, since a few years ago I would have chosen the south door, It has nothing to do with that. At some point I then rotated my perception 180 degrees, that's why I answered north.


Many thought processes are subconscious and we never become aware of them. They structure our thoughts and influence decisions in ways we aren't even aware of so i wouldn't rule out CMT completely. It's a powerful theory and new evidence is being found in support of it everyday.

I get what you mean though, it may be a phenomenon that could be understood from a different perspective. I'll have a read and get back to you with any ideas i come up with.


----------



## RoseateThorns (May 4, 2015)

Jagbas said:


> Why? Can you elaborate?


I don't know. I imagine I'm facing north, to me it would feel most natural walking into the room from the south. When actually sitting in the room I'd prefer to have the door on what I perceived to be the north (So I'm opposite the door), but when actually in the room, If I turned around I probably wouldn't be able to tell that the door wasn't north. So I decided to go with the direction I felt most comfortable walking in from.


----------

