Right Brain Left Brain Spinning Girl

Spinning Girl Someone sent me a link to this spinning girl and I found it interesting.

Which way is she spinning for you? For me, she is spinning to the right (clockwise) 100% of the time. For Sylvia, she is spinning to the left (counter-clockwise) 100% of the time. For our kids, she randomly switches back and forth for no apparent reason. The way my brain processes the image (seeing clockwise rotation) is suppose to mean I’m a “Right Brain” person. Counter-clockwise indicates Sylvia is a “Left Brain” person (which is why we make a great team even though we often disagree about things), though the description given of the Left Brain person more closely match who I am. Weird.

The main point this puzzle brings up for me though is to remind me that, as humans, we interpret and view things in life differently. What I see may not be true for you, and vice versa. This is why eye witnesses often tell completely different stories about the same event.

Being in an occupation where subjective opinion and interpretation plays large in how decisions are made, I have to remember that people don’t always see things as I do. I’ve often scratched my head when a Buyer passes up on a home that I view as being exactly what they say they want, but they simply don’t see it as their perfect home. Or when a buyer falls in love with a home that isn’t at all what they said they wanted, but for them, they see the perfect home.

If you see the woman spinning left and I see her spinning right, is one of us wrong? No. Can you convince me she is spinning left? Well, I might believe you if you say that’s what you see, but I still don’t see it. I’m trying though. Comments on the site where I found this indicate that if I try long enough, I should eventually be able to see it go both ways.

9 thoughts on “Right Brain Left Brain Spinning Girl”

  1. If I look away and then look back I can get her to spin the other way, generally she spins clock-wise but I can get her to shift pretty easily. I am also ambidextrous!

    I have seen this on many website, I’m still not 100% convinced it isn’t a hoax of some sort since she switches so much for me, interestingly when I look at her after reading the descriptions of left and right brain I can get her switch more easily.

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  2. I’m with your girls. I can easily see her switching from one way to the other for no reason but I found that I was watching her hips and which leg/foot she was landing on. Maybe it’s where you are looking!

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  3. hold your hand and block most of her body and focus on the foot. try to imagine / or think the foot to spin the other way as you were thinking. Once you get the thing spinning on the direction you want, move your hand up slowly, don’t blink or close your eyes. Gradually, the spinning pattern is established.

    I don’t believe this is really a left brain right brain test. It probably has no scientific significants whatsoever. It’s just how our brain process images and image imprints can trick up into illusionary conclusions. In other words, one thing you can learn from this experiment is to not trust your personal instinct no matter how obvious it may seem. The truth never changes, it’s our perception of the truth that got changed.

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  4. I think “naked” part probably got more people’s attention then their actual brain size. So what part of the brain that dictate sex?

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  5. I found her to be spinning counter clockwise. Had a hard time getting her to spin the other direction but found that if I focus on the shadow and foot only, that I could make her spin either way.
    Here is the weird part. I can make her oscillate!
    I did this by scrolling the page down so all I can see is her foot and her shadow. Imagined her going left, right, left, right.
    Once it started working, I scrolled the rest of the image into the picture and viola! Just stay focused on her big toe. 🙂 Try it!

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  6. I was convinced this was some kind of trick (eg the image changed directions randomly) hence I found this website! Sometimes when I looked she’d be spinning clockwise and other times anti-clockwise. After studying the image for a while I’ve been able to get the silhouette to change direction at will, so I’m happy it’s not a hoax. However, I don’t know how valid a test it is for right/left brain preference. The way to get her to change direction is to focus on her feet and before the foot crosses the other leg follow it up to the main body. To change the direction simply focus on the foot again and follow it up to the main body on the other side of the stationary leg…….if that makes sense! You’ll see if you remain focused on the feet you can get her to oscillate as Mike says but if you move up to the body you can’t (well, I couldn’t :O))

    This leads me to believe it’s luck as to which direction you see her spinning, when you first look at the image you’ll probably focus on the moving foot as it’s the most active part of the image, you’re eye will then naturally be drawn up to the main body where, depending on at which point your focus moved up to the body – moving foot to the left or right of the stationary leg – you’ll see the figure spinning anti-clockwise or clockwise respectively.

    Of course this is all highly unscientific of me and slightly obsessive but hey, I’m at home sick with a cold…….

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  7. I did it! I finally made her spin counter-clockwise! For years I’ve been trying to do it, but to no avail. It happened when I was reading your article. All of a sudden she started going counter-clockwise. So I stopped reading and just stared at it for a while. Then I started thinking about artsy things, and just like that, she started turning clockwise!

    I think the key to solving this puzzle for right brainers is to place the image near a serious article, and just keep reading, while still being able to see the image out of the corner of your eye. As you begin to focus in on the article or text, you brain will begin to process the words into sentences, which is analytical. Analytic thinking is typically what left siders do, so once your brain starts analyzing, you switch to the left side. Now stop reading and just think the thoughts you would usually think, all while keeping your eyes on the image. In a flash you will see her moving clockwise. Crazy stuff.

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