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Fortean Experiments / Claims Involving Mirrors

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i'm sure i read this somewhere but can't remember exactly... it seems an experiment was done where people were sat in a room illuminated so that all was in darkness except a small mirror in font of them. it was flexible and moved by small motors or something at the corners and centre. at the start the mirror was all deformed so that nothing was recognisable, and the subjects were asked to manipulate it until it was flat - presumably they weren't allowed to actually touch it and had to go by the way their faces looked. apparently many found it entirely impossible to know when or if they'd done it or to remember what they actually looked like, and were quite upset by the experience... does this ring any bells, did i dream it or am i confusing it with the good old sensory deprivation, stare at a mirror in a darkened room until you see monsters thing?
 
I have read about a fat mirror , where women were asked to adjust it to what they believed was their actual reflection , they nearly always made themselves fatter than they really were ! It was to do with a study on self image .
Marion
 
I'd probably make myself skinnier - I've gained weight over the past few years, and my body image hasn't kept up. I sometimes fail to recognize my own reflection when I come upon it suddenly.

Nonny
 
I think they made themselves fatter when asked to show what they thought they really looked like and thinner when asked to show what they would like to look like ! I love the crazy mirrors at the fair - the skinny - ising one makes me look normal :D

Marion
 
Wow, that's a really creepy experiment! I mean, in a dark room -- it evokes images (the childhood fear) of a bloody mary game except you find out that the face covered up with blood is your own when you finally put it together -- I mean, a dark room and everything -- I think the bloody mary legend (that everyone hears when they're a kid) associations with the generic mirror with a dark room and, on top of that, a distorted mirror -- maybe that's what upset subjects -- the unknown of what they *might* see if they managed to undistort the mirror?

NOTE: For more discussion of the Bloody Mary game / folklore see:

Midnight / Candle / Mirror Myth & Bloody Mary Game
https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/midnight-candle-mirror-myth-bloody-mary-game.18432/
 
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I heard they also did an experiment where they showed some guys and gals silhouettes. The women then should choose the ones they expected the guys would find the most attractive. And the guys then had to choose the ones they found most attractive. It seems the women always picked the ones that were skinnier than the guys liked them.
 
Raymond Moody Jnr, the doctor who wrote the massively popular book (Life after Life) about NDEs, penned a later one (I have it on the bookshelf somewhere) about mirror techniques for seeing dead relatives in mirrors. The technigue is similar to described - a darkened room, a low-key light source. The viewer looks obliquely into the mirror - and soon enough sees images in stunning detail. Moody even draws on ancient references to the Muses and other characters and locales in history where similar polished-surface prognostication and spirit contact was conducted - which is basically the same as gazing into a crystal ball (or, in Nostradamus' case, a bowl of water lit by a candle).
I've not had the inclination to experiment, but I'm sure it has more to do with unlocking the imaginary abilities of the unconscious than spirit-viewing (and therefore has potential for fantasy and wish fulfillment that might be more cheerfully used for entertainment or therapy (although Moody has used it as a therapeutic tool - providing comfort to bereaved relatives)).
I explored this area a little in some 'ghost' research a few years back, with respect to ghosts seen often in mirrors. Whatever the source and validity of the image (in some instances, a 'haunted room' produced repeated images to different witnesses who were ignorant of the room/building's reputation), I feel that the same mechanism is involved, and I speculated that a 'reflected' image might pose less of a strain on the computational processes of the brain (or sense-related belief system) than a fully formed, figure (with full parallax) projected into three-dimensional space?
 
Mirrors-

There used to be a shop near my house with a curved mirror which made even the most hugely pregnant woman look svelte! I loved that shop, being in that condition through most of my 20s!

My friend bought a very unusual mirror with no frame for 50p from a boot sale and hund it on her market stall. A woman approached her and said, 'That's my mother's mirror! She left it to me when she died in 1946! On the back you'll find...' and went on to describe some repair attempts exactly. The mirror had disappeared when her husband tampered with it. (As had her Ma's cuckoo clock, which the poor lady later found in an antique shop!)
This happened in her home town, a long way from the boot sale venue. So where had the mirror been in the meantime, I wonder?

I love mirrors and have them all over the house. Some spirits can be seen in mirrors, and also in TV screens, according to many reports!

I have a tall mirror hanging over my bed facing the door. Nobody's sneaking up on me!
 
I suspect escargot, that the aforementioned hubby had flogged the mirror & clock to some antique dealer "on the knock" in the locality.
 
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