Unlike many other optical illusions, what was special about the dress was that at the time, no one could explain exactly why different people perceived the color of the garment so differently. Researchers have now revealed the secret - and explain the differences with the lighting conditions in the image.
As part of a study, they examined the subjects' brains using functional magnetic resonance tomography. They found out that people who see the dress in gold and white have more active frontal and parietal brain regions than those who see blue and black.
These areas are necessary for attention and decision-making or the processing of visual information. Incidentally, the activity of the brain says nothing about intelligence. If you succumb to the illusion that the dress is gold and white, your brain simply has to work harder.