Negative priming with numbers: No evidence for a semantic locus

Selective attention has been studied extensively using the negative priming (NP) paradigm. An important issue regards the representational level at which NP occurs. We investigated this issue by using numbers as stimuli. Because numbers have a well-defined semantic organization, which can be clearly measured by means of the distance effect, they are very suitable for testing the assumption that NP is situated at a central semantic level. Four experiments are presented in which the numerical distance between prime distractor and probe target was manipulated. The task was magnitude comparison. Target and distractor were defined on the basis of colour. In Experiment 1, all numbers were presented in Arabic format; NP was observed only with identical prime distractor and probe target, and no distance-related NP was observed. This could not be explained by a decay of inhibition since in Experiment 2 similar results were obtained with a shortened response-to-stimulus interval. Experiment 3 showed that these observations also hold for numbers presented verbally. Nevertheless, a cross-notational experiment with Arabic prime and verbal probe (Experiment 4) revealed no NP whatsoever and excluded the possibility that the absence of distance-related negative priming was the result of a fine-tuned inhibitory mechanism operating at the semantic level. The results are considered in the light of current theories of negative priming.     

Negative priming insame-different matching: Further evidence for a central locus of inhibition

Responses to recently ignored information may be slower or less accurate than responses to information not recently encountered. Such negative priming effects imply that the mechanism of selective attention operates on unattended, as well as attended, information. In the present experiment, subjects judged the second and fourth letters of five-letter strings (e.g., BABAB) as “same” or “different.” Responses were slower when a target letter was identical to the distractors presented in the immediately preceding trial. This effect did not depend on which response was required on the current or preceding trial. The results suggest that ignored information is functionally disconnected from the response system as a whole, rather than from a specific response.     

Negative priming in same-different matching: further evidence for a central locus of inhibition

Responses to recently ignored information may be slower or less accurate than responses to information not recently encountered. Such negative priming effects imply that the mechanism of selective attention operates on unattended, as well as attended, information. In the present experiment, subjects judged the second and fourth letters of five-letter strings (e.g., BABAB) as "same" or "different." Responses were slower when a target letter was identical to the distractors presented in the immediately preceding trial. This effect did not depend on which response was required on the current or preceding trial. The results suggest that ignored information is functionally disconnected from the response system as a whole, rather than from a specific response.     

The locus and modulation of the location negative priming effect

Responding to the location of a target is slower when it appears at a recent distractor location [ignored-repetition (IR) trial] than when it arises at a new position [control (CO) trial], defining the location negative priming (NP) effect. On IR trials, both the distractor location and response are from the prior trial, and the locus question asks whether the delayed responding that arises is caused by the reused distractor position (i.e., a location locus) or the need to execute a distractor output (i.e., a response locus). A location NP procedure was used, incorporating a many:1 location-to-response mapping design, along with a response cue on some trials. A response locus for the location NP effect was indicated. Distractor-turned-target responses took longer to initiate than new outputs (many:1 paradigm), and valid response cues reduced distractor response interference and the location NP effect. Importantly, a possible S-R compatibility problem within the many:1 S-R paradigm was not supported.     

Stimulus and response priming in rapid serial visual presentation: evidence for a dissociation

Two experiments investigated the capacity demands of stimulus and response priming in a rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) task. Three targets were presented in a stream of visual symbols: The first two (T1 and T2) required an unspeeded manual response at the end of the trial, but the third (T3) called for an immediate,speeded manual response. T2 and T3 either were identical (fully compatible), required the same response (response compatible), or required different responses (incompatible). Priming in the fully compatible condition depended strongly on successful identification of the priming stimulus, whereas response-based priming was observed regardless of whether the prime could be reported or not. These findings suggest that stimulus coding and response coding are automatic processes, unaffected by attentional capacity constraints, followed by capacity-limited stimulus consolidation and response selection. Moreover, even though response codes are activated automatically upon stimulus processing, both types of codes act, and affect behavior, independently.     

句法加工中的预测现象及实验证据

句法加工是读者通过整合输入的言语信息来理解句子的过程。句法加工的存在,使得读者能够提前预测文本的信息,提高阅读效率。由于阅读离不开信息整合,研究者提出两类不同的句法理论:句法预测的模块局域性理论和句法预测的互动分析性观点。这两类理论的争论点在于句法加工是单独模块化的自上而下加工,还是自下而上-自上而下的互动分析加工过程。其区别表现为句法预测的作用——前者认为句法预测对句子加工有抑制作用,后者认为句法预测对句子加工起促进作用。来自眼动、ERP等研究的数据佐证了句法预测的存在。未来研究应围绕其差异进行深入探讨,以揭示句法加工的实质。     

中心词和非中心词在句法启动的词汇增强效应中存在不同的机制

句法启动中, 非中心词和中心词重复是否诱发出相似强度的词汇增强效应, 目前存在着较大的理论争议。本研究在汉语双宾结构和介宾结构上分别操纵中心词和非中心词重复, 并在确保具有合适统计检验力基础上, 完成了3个句法启动实验。实验结果清楚地显示中心词重复诱发了稳定的词汇增强效应, 非中心词中的直接宾语重复也诱发了稳定但相对较弱的词汇增强效应。在此基础上, 我们尝试提出一个解释框架以调和现有的理论争议。     

The impact of locus of control and priming on the endowment effect

This paper demonstrates the effects of different priming conditions on the endowment effect with respect to seller and buyer roles for individuals with different loci of control. Individuals with an external locus of control process information less rationally, and they are more susceptible to external influences. In addition, the literature reports that when individuals are making a purchasing decision, they tend to perceive the value of the product as being higher because of its utility aspect because decision makers search for reasons and arguments to justify their choices (Shafir 1993; Tversky & Griffin, 1991). Therefore, this study investigates the effects of different priming conditions (utilitarian priming vs. hedonic priming) on the endowment effect according to each type of locus of control (internal vs. external). The results showed that the endowment effect was larger when externals were exposed to utilitarian priming as opposed to hedonic priming. Finally, the implications of these findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

The bivalency effect: adjustment of cognitive control without response set priming

The occasional occurrence of bivalent stimuli, that is, stimuli with features relevant to two tasks, slows performance on subsequent tasks with univalent stimuli, including those which have no common features with bivalent stimuli (i.e., the “bivalency effect”). We have suggested that the bivalency effect might stem from an episodic context binding arising from the occasional occurrence of bivalent stimuli. However, as the same response set is used usually for univalent and bivalent stimuli, bivalent stimulus features may be negatively primed via response features. We investigated this possibility in two experiments, in which one group of participants used the same response keys for all tasks and another group used separate response keys. The results showed a comparable bivalency effect in both groups. Thus, it rather results from episodic context binding than from response set priming.     

Give and take: syntactic priming during spoken language comprehension

Syntactic priming during language production is pervasive and well-studied. Hearing, reading, speaking or writing a sentence with a given structure increases the probability of subsequently producing the same structure, regardless of whether the prime and target share lexical content. In contrast, syntactic priming during comprehension has proven more elusive, fueling claims that comprehension is less dependent on general syntactic representations and more dependent on lexical knowledge. In three experiments we explored syntactic priming during spoken language comprehension. Participants acted out double-object (DO) or prepositional-object (PO) dative sentences while their eye movements were recorded. Prime sentences used different verbs and nouns than the target sentences. In target sentences, the onset of the direct-object noun was consistent with both an animate recipient and an inanimate theme, creating a temporary ambiguity in the argument structure of the verb (DO e.g., Show the horse the book; PO e.g., Show the horn to the dog). We measured the difference in looks to the potential recipient and the potential theme during the ambiguous interval. In all experiments, participants who heard DO primes showed a greater preference for the recipient over the theme than those who heard PO primes, demonstrating across-verb priming during online language comprehension. These results accord with priming found in production studies, indicating a role for abstract structural information during comprehension as well as production.     

Binocular vision enhances a rapidly evolving affordance priming effect: Behavioural and TMS evidence

Extensive research has suggested that simply viewing an object can automatically prime compatible actions for object manipulation, known as affordances. Here we explored the generation of covert motor plans afforded by real objects with precision (‘pinchable’) or whole-hand/power (‘graspable’) grip significance under different types of vision. In Experiment 1, participants viewed real object primes either monocularly or binocularly and responded to orthogonal auditory stimuli by making precision or power grips. Pinchable primes facilitated congruent precision grip responses relative to incongruent power grips, and vice versa for graspable primes, but only in the binocular vision condition. To examine the temporal evolution of the binocular affordance effect, participants in Experiment 2 always viewed the objects binocularly but made no responses, instead receiving a transcranial magnetic stimulation pulse over their primary motor cortex at three different times (150, 300, 450 ms) after prime onset. Motor evoked potentials (MEPs) recorded from a pinching muscle were selectively increased when subjects were primed with a pinchable object, whereas MEPs from a muscle associated with power grips were increased when viewing graspable stimuli. This interaction was obtained both 300 and 450 ms (but not 150 ms) after the visual onset of the prime, characterising for the first time the rapid development of binocular grip-specific affordances predicted by functional accounts of the affordance effect.     

Masked priming of words and nonwords in a naming task: Further evidence for a nonlexical basis for priming

Masked priming effects in word identification tasks such as lexical decision and word naming have been attributed to a lexical mechanism whereby the masked prime opens a lexical entry corresponding to the target word. Two experiments are reported in which masked repetition priming effects of similar magnitude were obtained with word and nonword targets in a naming task. Masked orthographic priming was more stable for word than for nonword targets, although morphological primes produced no advantage beyond that achieved by matched orthographic primes. These results, taken together with the recent finding that repetition priming of nonwords can be obtained in the lexical decision task, support the view that masked priming of words and nonwords has a nonlexical component. We suggest that masked primes can enhance target identification by contributing to the construction of an orthographic or a phonological representation of the target, regardless of the target's lexical status.     

The distractor frequency effect in a delayed picture-word interference task: further evidence for a late locus of distractor exclusion

A picture-word interference experiment examined the origin of the distractor frequency effect, the effect that pictures are named slower in the context of low-frequency than high-frequency words (Miozzo &; Caramazza, Journal of Experimental Psychology, 132, 228–252, 2003). We compared two accounts of the effect: an early, input-related account and a late, response-related account. Participants named high and low-frequency pictures with low and high-frequency distractors in two conditions. In the immediate naming condition, picture and distractor were presented simultaneously. In the delayed naming condition, the distractor was presented 1,000 ms after the picture; pictures had to be named upon distractor presentation. There was a distractor frequency effect in both conditions, but an effect of picture frequency only in the immediate naming condition (showing that in the delayed naming condition, lexical selection had been completed). These results support a late origin of the distractor frequency effect.     

Binocular vision enhances a rapidly evolving affordance priming effect: Behavioural and TMS evidence

Extensive research has suggested that simply viewing an object can automatically prime compatible actions for object manipulation, known as affordances. Here we explored the generation of covert motor plans afforded by real objects with precision (‘pinchable’) or whole-hand/power (‘graspable’) grip significance under different types of vision. In Experiment 1, participants viewed real object primes either monocularly or binocularly and responded to orthogonal auditory stimuli by making precision or power grips. Pinchable primes facilitated congruent precision grip responses relative to incongruent power grips, and vice versa for graspable primes, but only in the binocular vision condition. To examine the temporal evolution of the binocular affordance effect, participants in Experiment 2 always viewed the objects binocularly but made no responses, instead receiving a transcranial magnetic stimulation pulse over their primary motor cortex at three different times (150, 300, 450 ms) after prime onset. Motor evoked potentials (MEPs) recorded from a pinching muscle were selectively increased when subjects were primed with a pinchable object, whereas MEPs from a muscle associated with power grips were increased when viewing graspable stimuli. This interaction was obtained both 300 and 450 ms (but not 150 ms) after the visual onset of the prime, characterising for the first time the rapid development of binocular grip-specific affordances predicted by functional accounts of the affordance effect.     

The negative priming effect: Inhibitory priming by ignored objects

A priming paradigm was employed to investigate the processing of an ignored object during selection of an attended object. Two issues were investigated: the level of internal representation achieved for the ignored object, and the subsequent fate of this representation. In Experiment 1 a prime display containing two superimposed objects was briefly presented. One second later a probe display was presented containing an object to be named. If the ignored object in the prime display was the same as the subsequent probe, naming latencies were impaired. This effect is termed negative priming. It suggests that internal representations of the ignored object may become associated with inhibition during selection. Thus, selection of a subsequent probe object requiring these inhibited representations is delayed. Experiment 2 replicated the negative priming effect with a shorter inter-stimulus interval. Experiment 3 examined the priming effects of both the ignored and the selected objects. The effect of both identity repetition and a categorical relationship between prime and probe stimuli were investigated. The data showed that for a stimulus selected from the prime display, naming of the same object in the probe display was facilitated. When the same stimulus was ignored in the prime display, however, naming of it in the probe display was again impaired (negative priming). That negative priming was also demonstrated with categorically related objects suggests that ignored objects achieve categorical levels of representation, and that the inhibition may be at this level.     

Links between conscious awareness and response inhibition: evidence from masked priming

Recent results from “subliminal priming” experiments have shown that masked prime stimuli which can not be consciously perceived can trigger response activation processes, but that these response activations can later be subject to inhibition. Links between conscious awareness and response inhibition were investigated by manipulating the visibility of masked prime stimuli, from clearly visible primes to prime stimuli that were inaccessible to conscious perception. Response inhibition was observed with unperceived prime stimuli, but not for suprathreshold primes. Correlations between individual prime identification thresholds and the onset of response inhibition indicate that the absence or presence of conscious awareness can predict whether or not response inhibition is elicited. These results demonstrate qualitative differences in the effects of conscious and unconscious information. It is argued that response facilitation produced by consciously available perceptual information can counteract automatic effects of self-inhibitory motor control circuits.     

Word recognition and syntactic attachment in reading: evidence for a staged architecture

In 3 experiments, the author examined how readers' eye movements are influenced by joint manipulations of a word's frequency and the syntactic fit of the word in its context. In the critical conditions of the first 2 experiments, a high- or low-frequency verb was used to disambiguate a garden-path sentence, while in the last experiment, a high- or low-frequency verb constituted a phrase structure violation. The frequency manipulation always influenced the early eye movement measures of first-fixation duration and gaze duration. The context manipulation had a delayed effect in Experiment 1, influencing only the probability of a regressive eye movement from later in the sentence. However, the context manipulation influenced the same early eye movement measures as the frequency effect in Experiments 2 and 3, though there was no statistical interaction between the effects of these variables. The context manipulation also influenced the probability of a regressive eye movement from the verb, though the frequency manipulation did not. These results are shown to confirm predictions emerging from the serial, staged architecture for lexical and integrative processing of the E-Z Reader 10 model of eye movement control in reading (Reichle, Warren, & McConnell, 2009). It is argued, more generally, that the results provide an important constraint on how the relationship between visual word recognition and syntactic attachment is treated in processing models.     

A responding hand effect in a simple-RT precueing experiment: evidence for a late locus of facilitation

Reaction time (RT) to a peripheral flash target is often shortened by a shortly leading (about 100 msec) non-informative cue presented at the same location; later on (500 msec), to the contrary, RT is lengthened. In this paper, an interaction between target position and responding hand is reported. Subjects made speeded key-press responses to targets presented either 7 degrees to the left or 7 degrees to the right of fixation. A valid (same location) or invalid (mirror-symmetric location) cue preceded the target by either 80 or 500 msec. Depending on the trial, subjects used either the left or the right hand. The crossover in RT, from facilitation to inhibition, is observed only when the target is on the same side as the responding hand. An analysis of the RT distributions suggests that (a) facilitation is due to decision rather than perceptual processes, (b) inhibition is due to motoric processes.