Liminal spaces like the "Backrooms" exploit our brain's sensitivity to uncertainty during transitions.

Our brains are sensitive to liminal space because memory is structured around change.

Physical boundaries, such as liminal spaces, help organize life experiences.

Context cues can reduce uncertainty, and opportunities for reflective pause can help process transitions.

With growing anticipation for the A24 film debut of Backrooms, liminal spaces have become a viral symbol of psychological horror. These spaces unsettle us because they highlight our brain's sensitivity to processing ambiguity and transition. Images of the film’s main characters, the backrooms themselves, evoke similarly disconcerting places we’ve all experienced: a narrow, dim hotel hallway, a long underground hospital corridor, or an empty airport terminal. By examining the neuroscience behind these spaces, we can better understand their impact and what they reveal about navigating transitions.

Trapped in Liminality

Recently, it has become more cost-effective to abandon malls, big-box buildings, and entire neighborhoods and construct new ones, rather than reuse or repurpose existing structures. This practice has resulted in a new typology of liminal spaces. These are liminal in time: spaces sitting empty, awaiting reuse or demolition, much like ghosts lingering before crossing over. These are not merely liminal spaces, but rather spaces trapped in liminality. This architecture of ambiguity, across both space and time, may resonate with many youth experiences about our world, as youth transition to adulthood.

Neuroscience shows that the systems we use to navigate physical space also organize our memories. Our brain is highly sensitive to liminal spaces because memory is organized around change – in space, time, and events. By exploring what the brain is doing while in liminal spaces, we can better move through change and avoid getting stuck in uncertainty.

Boundaries Structure Our Experiences

Spatially, liminal spaces physically demarcate change........

© Psychology Today