Michotte’s research on perceptual impressions of causality: a registered replication study

Michotte (Michotte A, 1946 La perception de la causalité. Louvain: Études de Psychologie. Michotte A, 1954 La perception de la causalité, 2nd éd. Louvain: Études de Psychologie. Michotte A, 1963 The perception of causality. (Transl. by TR Miles, E Miles). London: Methuen: English translation of Michotte) showed that visual impressions of causality can occur in perception of simple animations of moving geometrical objects. In the launching effect, one object is perceived as making another object move by bumping into it. In the entraining effect, the two objects move together after contact and the first moving object is perceived as pushing or carrying the other one. There has been much further research on the launching effect in particular, and citations of Michotte's pioneering work have increased rapidly in recent decades, underlining its importance in contemporary psychology and neuroscience. However, many of the experiments reported in Michotte's book, exploring conditions under which launching and entraining do and do not occur, have never been replicated. The methodology, involving mostly a few knowledgeable observers and no statistical analysis, indicates that replication and extension would be desirable, to assess the reliability of the results reported by Michotte and to inspire further research on aspects of these perceptual impressions that have been neglected in more recent research. In this pre-registered replication study, 14 experiments are reported that replicate and, in some cases, extend experiments reported by Michotte (Michotte A, 1946 La perception de la causalité. Louvain: Études de Psychologie. Michotte A, 1954 La perception de la causalité, 2nd éd. Louvain: Études de Psychologie. Michotte A, 1963 The perception of causality. (Transl. by TR Miles, E Miles). London: Methuen: English translation of Michotte). Some findings reported by Michotte were replicated, others only partly so, and in other cases results were different from what Michotte reported. In particular, results on the delay manipulation differed from those reported by Michotte. Results show the great importance of the entraining and pulling impressions, which have hitherto received much less attention than the launching impression. Extensions to Michotte's experiments revealed numerous new findings and open up prospects for much more innovative research. The results also have significant implications for possible explanations for perceptual impressions of causality.