Misinformation as Material: Towards the use of cognitive psychology as a research tool for artists

“There is an elementary school in Japan with a course in cognitive psychology. In this country you can find art school heads of department who don’t even know that such a subject exists.” Artist and writer Simon Bill. Facebook post made on 7th July 2022

This written contribution towards a PhD by Publication outlines research projects that draw on a personal fascination in the effects of the fictive - both its cathartic potential and its tendency to slip into darker territories that can cause harm to others. By exploring what happens when a fiction is believed and how it impacts on the individuals and communities who harbour those beliefs, it considers how the ‘false’ can shift our behaviours.

This research is explored in relation to three major public projects with a focus on work undertaken in the last ten years (2012-22). They include WITH (withyou.co.uk), that forms the background to this research; False Memory Archive that extends key research areas and Smoke and Mirrors: The Psychology of Magic, a major exhibition that I initiated and co-curated at Wellcome Collection, London.

Aspects of human cognition contribute to the creation of our subjective experiences, whether that be our imaginations, our memories, our beliefs, or our sense of ‘self’. Working closely with world-renowned Cognitive Psychologists1 on residencies and projects since 2012, I have developed an understanding of an area of research that I refer to as the Science of Subjectivity. This term could also be described as the science (or psychology) of perception or of conscious experience, and I’m situating my understanding of this territory as an artist who explores affinities between art and science. This thesis draws on research from cognitive psychology that identifies how certain fictions are believed and why our perceptual systems have evolved to tell stories that help us make sense of our experiences. These tendencies can be exploited and weaponised through suggestion and misinformation, particularly by those in positions of authority.

This commentary will explore how certain themes have become embedded within contemporary art practice and its institutions over the last twenty years. It proposes that the Science of Subjectivity is a useful contribution to furthering an understanding of art that is concerned with politics and activism, tactical media and the parafictional, the nature of identity, memory and autobiography and the psychic, mystical and spiritual. The transference of knowledge from cognitive psychology to these key issues in contemporary art, presented through research and artistic practices that move beyond current archetypes, combined with evidence from key public projects, constitutes a unique contribution to knowledge in this interdisciplinary field of art and science.